Tech
Target the Web and Mobile From a Single Codebase
January 25, 2021
Imagine you could have your web app and companion Android and iOS apps developed by one developer…. all from one code base.
Well. Now you can with Flutter Web.
To put it simply, a web app is fully-featured software which runs on a web browser.
You can interact with it - it can have the same functionality as your mobile app or a desktop application - but will be accessible via a web browser from a standard link with no additional software.
A good example of a web app would be Gmail - which, of course, has advanced functionality and features.
With a web app, you have dynamic content. Your users can interact with you in a way they can’t do with a normal web page.
Web apps go one important step beyond web pages. Websites and web pages are static, you - or rather, your customers - can’t interact with them. Neither can web pages dynamically change their content.
Example static webpage - the one you’re reading now.
When we were recently approached by SeeChange, an Arm subsidiary, who asked us to produce a mobile app using Flutter, we were able to include a web app as well. In fact, the fully-functional web app we produced is now their primary platform for the product, and runs great across all major browsers.
You might recall us saying that we specialise in Google Flutter for development. Flutter is the most modern and efficient development framework for mobile apps. Not only does it allow us to produce attractive, future-proof apps at the best possible price for our customers, it now allows us to develop web apps simultaneously.
We write the code, and Flutter produces a web app, an Android compatible app, and an IOS compatible app - all from the same code base. There can be some work to change elements of the code to work in a web environment, but it’s all very minor, and certainly cheaper than developing one from first principles.
By the same token, since your web and mobile apps are using the same code, there are no compatibility or ongoing support issues.
Simply put, businesses are looking to grow their client base and retain existing customers. A companion web app allows you to have much more functionality than a traditional web page. It allows customers to “buy in” to your goods or services.
There are many business benefits are of having a web app and two mobile apps using the same code.
From your perspective as a client, it’s faster and cheaper. From our perspective of a developer, it means we don’t have future headaches supporting multiple codebases. (Which benefits you, too.)
You get a web app with much more functionality than a conventional website, which should mean better engaged and “signed up” customers and clients. And, as we’ve mentioned, there are no issues of compatibility or maintenance when both your web and mobile apps are essentially the same program code.
Sounds like win / win to us.
