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Elijah L.
Elijah L.

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Handy tools for your next Flutter project

1: scrcpy: Control Android devices connected on USB

GitHub logo Genymobile / scrcpy

Display and control your Android device

I've been using this tool for demoing, side-by-side mock-ups to screen, and getting emulator-like experience on a physical device's performance, easier screenshots, etc. This has been one the most useful tools for an Android developing experience for flutter developers.

2: Mockoon: Create mock APIs in seconds

GitHub logo mockoon / mockoon

Mockoon is the easiest and quickest way to run mock APIs locally. No remote deployment, no account required, open source.

A simple, intuitive, local web service environment that will have you setting up API calls faster than the Firebase local emulator. This one is a favorite for viewing logs, creating routes on uncaught requests, and multiple environments.

3: Lefthook for linting and analysis before pushing and committing

GitHub logo evilmartians / lefthook

Fast and powerful Git hooks manager for any type of projects.

Execute custom commands triggered by git actions. In my opinion it is much simpler than using traditional local git hooks.

# On `git commit` lefthook will run `flutter format` and `flutter test`.
pre-commit:
  commands:
    flutter-format:
      glob: "*.dart"
      run: flutter format {staged_files}
    flutter-test:
      glob: "*.dart"
      run: flutter test
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4: Mason: Create and consume reusable templates

GitHub logo felangel / mason

A CLI which allows developers to create and consume reusable templates called bricks.

Mason allows developers to create and consume reusable templates called bricks.

This tooling feels similar to snippets, but allows you bulk-create your project's boiler plate code.

5: Flutter DevTools - Network & Flutter Inspector

Network & Flutter Inspector are the two most useful tools in my utility belt. The network tools is extremely helpful in determining how many calls are being made for service and ensuring the data in the channel is formatting and not being mutated unknowingly. The Flutter Inspector is handy for exploring your widget tree. Two handy uses from the inspector are the "Select widget mode" for quickly finding a UI component and the the "Debug paint" for getting layout and sizing just right with Flutter's flex-like widgets.

These may seem obvious to some but many new developers don't take advantage of these two immensely helpful utilities (and along with the rest of the DevTools Suite)!

6: Add user snippets live templates to your editor

The two primary code editors for the Flutter developer are Visual Studio Code and Android Studio/IntelliJ IDEAs. Many extension/plugins are offered on these platforms that include snippets and live templates, but sometimes these pieces of code don't fulfill your needs. You are able to create your own with each of the platforms. See the below pages to et more information for you prefer editor:

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