Beginning App Development with Flutter: Create Cross-Platform Mobile Apps

Section: Introduction to Flutter

1. Hello Flutter

• Brief chapter overview and roadmap

• The Dart language itself - There's an overview and cheatsheet in the Appendix
• Deploying to a store
• Device-specific programming

• Who's a good fit and who is not
• Where to go to satisfy the prerequisites

• Problems it solves
Where it came from - Brief history and origins

• What other options are available? What might you use if not Flutter? Advantages and disadvantages of Flutter vs the other options
• React Native
• Progressive Web Apps
• WebView solutions (Ionic, etc.)
• Truly native coding (Swift, Objective-C, Java, Kotlin)

• This ain't the web!
• Imperative UI
• You're writing using Dart
• Everything is a widget (Define widgets and explain the big win of widgets)
• Widgets composition
You have to watch state

2. How do I develop in Flutter?

• Chapter synopsis: Flutter has a unique set of tools but it isn't always straightforward what each tool does and how to use it. This chapter guides the reader through the process of write-debug-test-run.
• Installing Flutter tooling - A very brief and high-level coverage of where to get the tools. It should be brief because the details are likely to change regularly.
• Overview of each tool
• The emulators
• iOS simulator through XCode
• Android emulator through Android Studio
• The IDE - Visual Studio Code
• Alternatives: Android Studio, Atom, jBoss, etc.
• The Flutter CLI
• How to check and repair your toolchain through Flutter doctor
• How to scaffold a new app
• How to run in an emulator
• When errors occur
• How to debug
• print() statement
• Flutter inspector or DartCode VS Code plugin
• Watch mode

Section: Foundational Flutter

3. Everything is widgets

• Chapter Synopsis: Widgets are super-important to Flutter since they're the building blocks of every Flutter app. We show why and provide the motivation and basic tools to create widgets.
Reminder about widgets
• Composition
• Define composition
• Provide real-world examples
• Why it is such a win
• Comparison with Web Components, React, Angular, and Vue
• The categories of Flutter UI widgets
For each category, we'll explain why we'd use them, what they have in common, and give one or two examples of the most fundamental and needed widgets in each category.
• Value Widgets
• Example: Text widget
• Style Widgets
• Example: Center widget
• Composition Widgets
• Example: Container widget
• Navigation Widgets
• Example: AppBar widget

• What is state?
• How to create a custom stateless widget (Note: creating a stateful widget is complex so we're saving it for the State chapter).

4. Value Widgets

• Chapter Synopsis: Deep
  
  Author: Rap Payne
  Publisher: Apress
  Published: 12/19/2019
  Pages: 309
  Binding Type: Paperback
  Weight: 1.04lbs
  Size: 9.21h x 6.14w x 0.70d
  ISBN13: 9781484251805
  ISBN10: 1484251806
  BISAC Categories:
  - Computers | Programming | Mobile Devices
  - Computers | Programming | Macintosh
  - Computers | Hardware | Personal Computers | PCs
  
  

  About the Author
  

  Rap Payne has focused on mobile development since he started Agile Gadgets, a mobile app development company in 2003. He is a consultant, trainer, and entrepreneur who has written apps, mentored developers, and taught software development classes for Fortune 500 companies like Boeing, Walmart, Coca-Cola, Wells Fargo, Honda, CVS, GE, Chase, HP, Lockheed, Exxon-Mobil, Lowe's, Nike, J.C. Penney, USAA, Walgreen's, and government agencies like the US Air Force, Navy, Army, NASA, Britain's GCHQ, Canada's postal service, and several provincial governments, to name a few.

  As a professional mentor and trainer, Rap has developed a talent for communicating highly complex ideas in easy-to-understand ways. And as a real-world developer, he understands the need to teach these topics using practical and realistic examples and exercises.