10 Tips Every Flutter Developer Should Know
Tags: flutter, developer, appdev
Published: 2023-04-22 06:20:16

## Tips every Flutter Developer should know:

Learning a new programming language can be challenging, requiring patience, practice, boot camps, and self-learning. However, with enough effort, anyone can learn any programming language, including Flutter, which is Google's open-source framework. 

Flutter's specialty is its ability to develop multi-platform applications using a single code-base. It was released in May 2017 and quickly gained popularity due to its versatility and open-source nature. Today, popular apps such as Google Ads, Reflectly, and PostMuse have been built using Flutter. 

As an engineering team, we have been experimenting with Flutter for some time, and we believe that every Flutter developer should know the following lessons.

**Learn Dart:** Flutter is built on the programming language Dart. Therefore, before delving into Flutter concepts, it is essential to take some time to learn Dart. Dart utilizes Object Oriented Programming (OOP). Mastering this programming language will save you a lot of time when working as a Flutter Developer.

**State Management Architecture:** As you delve into Flutter, there will come a point where you must share the application state across screens throughout your app. There are numerous approaches to consider, and many questions to ponder. You can opt for a variety of approaches, all of which provide the same functionality but with different architectures. As a Flutter developer, it is essential to explore the various state management architectures available and determine which one best suits your needs.

**IDE Shortcuts:** When working on Flutter apps, it is important to understand how your IDE functions and how you can increase your productivity. One way to enhance productivity is by using IDE shortcuts. These shortcuts allow you to perform tasks solely from your keyboard, saving you a significant amount of time while coding.

**Testing:** Testing is crucial in the development process. To ensure that your app functions seamlessly, you must possess a strong understanding of testing. Utilizing the "debugPrint" method can simplify the process as it provides more comprehensive information than a standard print statement.

**Knowledge of Widgets:** Trust me, having a good understanding of which widgets to use in specific scenarios can be a lifesaver. The Flutter SDK offers its own collection of widgets, ranging from basic containers to more complex tasks such as Async calls or accessing the Camera. Utilizing widgets can simplify your life, so it's important to explore both the built-in Flutter widgets and the various open source widgets available online.

**Code Snippet Shortcuts:** If you are using VS Code to write Dart code, utilizing code snippet shortcuts can significantly enhance your productivity. Writing boilerplate code can be time-consuming, but by learning to use code snippet shortcuts, you can avoid this issue. These shortcuts allow you to write multiple lines of code with just a few keystrokes. Additionally, you can configure your own snippets by searching for “Configure User Snippets” in VS Code.

**Using Flutter Dev Tools:** Similar to how you can inspect a webpage in Chrome, you can inspect your Flutter application through the dev tools menu in VS Code. If you are using Android Studio, it comes with an inbuilt functionality called Flutter inspector, which allows you to inspect your widgets.

**Breaking down UI into smaller widgets:** It may happen to you that while designing the UI of your application, your code appears messy with numerous nested codes. The best practice in this scenario would be to break down your code into widgets. You can easily achieve this by right-clicking on the code block and selecting “Wrap with Widgets”. This will create a new widget of the code that can be reused. You can use the same widget in different parts of your application.

**Using Dart Tips and Tricks:** We have already mentioned that to master Flutter, you need to be familiar with Dart. However, it is important to note that there are a few Dart tips and tricks that will come in handy when you start developing using Flutter.

Here are a few Dart tricks that you should be familiar with:
Dart supports string multiplication.

- You can use constructors and initializer lists for smoother APIs.
- You can use underscores for unused function arguments.
- Dart supports using of functions as arguments and anonymous functions.
- With Dart, you can implement a “call” method to your Dart Classes. This enables you to call them as a function.

**Use Packages:** To build applications quickly, Flutter is a relatively new programming language compared to Java. To assist you, you can use Dart packages. These packages are open-source libraries of code created by other developers that you can incorporate into your project. To add a Flutter package to your website, visit pub.dartlang.org and search for the package you need. If you have any questions about a specific package, you can contact the developers whose email IDs are available on the website. Alternatively, you can also write your own packages and publish them on the site, contributing to the open-source community.