This week in Flutter #19

Some weeks there is not a lot of Flutter content published by the community. Some other weeks there is a lot of content out there. This week is one of the latter. My job is to select the best content for you, so let's get started right away: there is a lot to cover today.

- Michele Volpato

Development 🧑‍💻

🔗 Using the Flutter BLoC Pattern with AWS Amplify Datastore

You might not know it, but AWS has a tool that helps mobile developers creating backends for their app: Amplify. It comes with (beta) Flutter packages. In this article, Derek Bingham shows a simple implementation of the BLoC pattern that handles the state from Amplify DataStore.

🔗 Building a Drawing App in Flutter

Learn about CustomPaint widgets and how to render and control a custom UI in Flutter with this well-written tutorial by Samarth Agarwal.

🔗 Explore Animation in Flutter - PART 1

Adam Kif started a series of articles about animations in SwiftUI and Flutter. This is the Flutter one. If you are just getting started with animation, this is a good starting point.

🔗 Flutter with the TomTom Maps APIs: Part 1

Developers at TomTom try to use Flutter with their Maps API. The result is this video and this article. It's nice to see bigger companies experimenting with Flutter.

🔗 How to create Flutter charts with charts_flutter

There is a simple package, developed by Google, to draw charts in your Flutter app: charts_flutter. Learn how to use it with this article by Samson Omojola.

One of the projects I am working on will need charts and I am looking forward to applying what I learned from this article.

🔗 How To Integrate Customized Google Map in Flutter

You can add Google Maps to your Flutter app, and it is quite easy. But what if you want to have a custom map in your app? In this detailed article, Jaimil Patel deep dives into customizing your Google Map in Flutter. There is a lot to read, so grab a snack before you start.

🔗 Flutter Navigator 2.0 with BLoC: The Ultimate Guide

I still have problems with Navigation 2.0 in Flutter. More in detail, the interaction between the state of the app and removing/adding pages to the page stack. In this article, Jalal Addin Okbi integrates Navigator 2.0 and the BLoC pattern. I have abandoned BLoC more than a year ago, but if you are into it, then enjoy it.

Tools 🛠

🔗 Flutter Version individual for every project - Flutter Version Manager

I am working on many Flutter projects. Most of them get updated to the latest stable Flutter version fairly soon after its release. One of them is still on Flutter 1, and, for many reasons, I don't see my team migrating it soon. This means I need at least two versions of Flutter on the same machine. I use aliases because I only need two versions. Aditya Agarwal explains how to use aliases or Flutter Version Manager.

🔗 Flutter Integration Test for Android and IOS on Firebase Test Lab

When you work on a mobile app, testing can become a difficult task. In the office we have half a dozen devices, Android and iOS, we use to do exploratory testing, but in the last year and a half, we have been working from home most of the time. That is where cloud-based app testing services come in handy. Get started with Firebase Test Lab with this article by Benson Thew.

🔗 Raster thread performance optimization tips

So you have a Flutter app that works. Its performance is fine, but it could be better. What do you do? You buy a faster smartphone. Or you follow this article by Filip Hracek from the Flutter team to learn how to find where the app is not performing well.

Backend 🗄

🔗 It’s Here! Announcing Appwrite 0.10 and the new Realtime API!

Appwrite, the open-source backend server that winks at Firebase, added the Realtime API: a way to subscribe to your data to get updates as they happen. The Appwrite team treats Flutter as a first-class citizen, they release the Flutter SDK and documentation as fast as any other platform. Well done!

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Read the rest on my website.

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