Flutter App Development

Create apps for iOS and Android phones and tablets using Flutter, a Google framework that produces two outputs for a single app. Let’s face it, creating iOS apps using Apple tools such as Swift and Xcode is extremely complicated. Creating Android apps with Kotlin and Android Studio is just as difficult. This book breaks down complex concepts and tasks into easily digestible segments with examples, full-color pictures, and hands-on labs with starters and solutions.

As you work through the accompanying lab exercises, you’ll learn the Dart programming language; the entire Flutter development toolchain; the differences between stateful and stateless widgets; and a working knowledge of the architecture of apps. You’ll work with themes and styles, develop custom widgets, and even teach your app to respond to gestures like taps, swipes, and pinches. You’ll also design, create, and control the layout of your app. Create tools to handle form data entry from users. And ultimately create killer multiscreen apps with navigation, menus, and tabs.

You’ll see that with Flutter, you can write an app one time that produces two outputs: one that can be submitted to the Apple App Store and another that can be uploaded to the Google Play Store. In short, one code creates the same app that runs on iPhones, iPads, Android phones and tablets, virtually all devices. And if you like, it can also create a version that runs on Macs, Windows, Linux, and in browsers!

Flutter App Development explains difficult topics in plain, everyday terms that simplify the process of writing mobile apps.

What You’ll Learn

• Get the most out of great Flutter widgets
• Create custom widgets, both stateless and stateful
• Exercise expert control over your Flutter layouts
• Manage data in stateful widgets and with libraries like Riverpod
• Exchange data actively with RESTful API servers

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: Hello Flutter

Chapter 2: Developing in Flutter

Chapter 3: Everything Is Widgets

Chapter 4: Value Widgets

Chapter 5: Responding to Gestures

Chapter 6: Navigation and Routing

Chapter 7: Managing State

Chapter 8: State Management Libraries

Chapter 9: Making RESTful API Calls with HTTP

Chapter 10: Styling with Themes

Chapter 11: Laying Out Your Widgets

Chapter 12: Layout – Positioning Widgets

Chapter 13: Layout – Fixing Overflows

Chapter 14: Layout – Filling Extra Space

Chapter 15: Layout – Fine-Tuning Positioning

Chapter 16: Layout – Special Presentation Widgets

Appendix A: Dart Language Overview

Appendix B: Futures, Async, and Await

Appendix C: Including Packages in Your Flutter App

Appendix D: How to Work with Files

Appendix E: How to Debug Your Layout

Who This Book Is For

Developers who have coded in JavaScript, Python, Java, C#, C++, or any similar language. Managers, product owners, and business analysts who need to understand Flutter’s capabilities.