Google Launches Flutter Platform For Android And iOS Developers

By Nathaniel Artosilla, Christian Post Contributor Thursday, March 01, 2018

Google has launched Flutter, an open source toolkit for helping developers build iOS and Android apps. The toolkit was announced at the Mobile World Congress and is now available in beta.

While still not a household name, a number of developers have already used it to build and publish apps that became top sellers on both Google Play and the App Store. Google themselves have used the toolkit in a number of major projects most notably, their new Fuchsia OS.

One of the biggest problems currently facing Google's Android mobile operating system is fragmentation. This resulted in many developers opting to make apps for the iOS first which, thanks to Apple's control over all iPhones and iPads, allows for an easier development process.

Google is currently trying to tackle this issue from the manufacturer's end by launching its Android One initiative. With the release of Flutt, r however, the tech giant will make it easier to make apps not just for Android but also the iOS.

In an interview with Tech Crunch, product manager Seth Ladd said it's not surprising that Google decided to make the announcement at this year's MWC. According to Ladd, Google wants to take this opportunity to engage with mobile developers as well as showcase the advancements they have made over the course of last year.

Most of these advancements mean better tooling, like support for Android Studio and Visual Studio Code for writing Flutter apps. Another interesting feature for developers is the support for stateful hot reloads where developers can change the code and see it reflected in the app a second later.

As Ladd notes, this makes the development process faster. It also reduces the need for developers to utilize a large number of prototyping tools to see how their app works.

Google hopes to release updates for Flutter every four weeks although a 1.0 version release date is yet to be announced. Interested developers can check out the toolkit can visit the Getting Started guide on its official website.