Comment by quadcore | Hacker News Reader

Comment by quadcore | Hacker News Reader

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Congrats on the launch. Ive switched from webflow to flutter for the website Im building (for my startup project). Flutter is awesome (though I still "wonder what the result is gonna be" but way less than with css) and I believe youre betting on a great horse. I dont know if youve noticed but when you browse a flutter website with chrome on a desktop computer, it offers you to install the app natively! Like you said: super cross-platform. Initially I was using webflow because I dont understand a thing to css and I find the paradigm sux overall. But then as a consequence webflow isnt my taste as well. I was building my android app with flutter and I thought I should just do the website with it as well. Best of luck, I think youre a hot startup. Ps: maybe you should consider to market it for website as well, not only apps (sry if you do already). Im no expert to say it will be convincing for this end but Im never going back to html5 and its derivative frameworks lemme tell you that :)

I've taken a look at the generated code very quickly. You're using a lot of paddings in columns for example where I would use a SizedBox with no child in between the elements. Or even better, expandables. It makes for less nested elements, plus padding used like that feels like a translation of css to flutter. I rarely need padding but maybe its just me. Also you may have a good reason for doing so.

Also I think the standard is to prefix class members with a _ - although I dont like that since it hinders readability (maybe you dont like it either and want to instore your own standard)

I would definitely work at having the fewest levels of nested elements as possible as its a main thing that average prog dont like in flutter. Also eliminate the need to hardcode sizes whenever possible (expandables, percentages - using layoutbuilder is the example of top of my head, etc)

Thanks for the suggestions! Yes, there's definitely room for improvement with the generated code ... I think the padding -> SizedBox conversion at least in some cases (only when main-axis padding is added) can be automated. We can experiment with code improvement features such as that and see how it works.

Expanded + Percentages for widths are possible already

At the risk of seeming a little bit nitpicky here, thing is: the end user shouldnt even use padding in this case. What Im saying is that when I look at a tool like that, what I will look for is how well you embrace the paradigm of the framework. Cause its greater than html5 imo - for the use cases were talking about. It should lead to fewer editor UI, fewer buttons, fewer basic options. Padding in this case should probably be only cross axial (or whatever) and then it becomes rarely used and then leads to better editor UI. Fewer hardcoded values as well - remember its "super cross platform". Should be hard to enter values.

Im only saying this to inspire you - not sure what the solution should ultimately be.

:D

Agreed, making it more natural to create apps in a way that follows Flutter best practices is a desirable end goal. There's so much to improve, it's exciting :-)

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