Ah, I should perhaps have clarified. I didn't mean "popular" in the sense of widespread adoption, but. More "for it's domain, is it liked/disliked".
I've used it to build complicated app that interacts with low level C++ code, and I found it exceptionally well put together. High level UI code by flutter was a pleasure to work with, with interactive development and hot reloads.
Low level performant development with all the tools and legacy of C++, and all of it put together and debugged with fairly powerful tools as well.
I cannot think of any stack that could solve the same problem. That is, without having to build separate apps for Android and iOS. And even then, I'd consider it a more productive environment to use flutter even if you target one of the platforms.
And then, the language features themselves. Dart handles null safety in a way no other language and tooling does. It goes beyond null-handling syntax, and can give runtime-guarantees (assuming you check the remote code boundaries) for null safety.
The package management is great. So, if the languages is solely a great development environment for mobile apps, with the potential for desktop/web targets... I would say great job all around.
The only negative/red-flag this has is being managed and driven by google.
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I've been a developer for the larger part of my life now, and I very much respect the dart language and project. It is well put together, does the right abstractions at the right places. The syntax is great. The standard library is satisfying. The tooling and OS abstractions are great. And I would honestly place it top 3 in terms of enjoyment and productivity. The top three being perhaps rust and kotlin.
Every language is "popular" with the niche of hardcore supporters who really really like it. Actually-popular languages are the ones who can go beyond that niche and attract large numbers of developers.
Dart is not one of those languages. Dart is just not popular.
I agree about the different ways to interpret what popular/unpopular means. But, "app development" is not really a niche. And having almost 50% market share of cross platform frameworks in that market, and growing, is also no small piece either.
> And having almost 50% market share of cross platform frameworks in that market
Is this really true? I've encountered very few Flutter apps as an iOS user — actually I can't think of any that I haven't intentionally downloaded to see what Flutter is like.
Given that the first one was limited at 2021, I would be surprised it isn't around 60%. And, having used react-native and done extensive eval on it, flutter is by far the better architectural approach, so I expect this trend to continue (unless google cans the project that is :P). IMHO, the only reason to ever pick react-native over flutter is if you already have JS developers.
I've used it to build complicated app that interacts with low level C++ code, and I found it exceptionally well put together. High level UI code by flutter was a pleasure to work with, with interactive development and hot reloads.
Low level performant development with all the tools and legacy of C++, and all of it put together and debugged with fairly powerful tools as well.
I cannot think of any stack that could solve the same problem. That is, without having to build separate apps for Android and iOS. And even then, I'd consider it a more productive environment to use flutter even if you target one of the platforms.
And then, the language features themselves. Dart handles null safety in a way no other language and tooling does. It goes beyond null-handling syntax, and can give runtime-guarantees (assuming you check the remote code boundaries) for null safety.
The package management is great. So, if the languages is solely a great development environment for mobile apps, with the potential for desktop/web targets... I would say great job all around.
The only negative/red-flag this has is being managed and driven by google.
---
I've been a developer for the larger part of my life now, and I very much respect the dart language and project. It is well put together, does the right abstractions at the right places. The syntax is great. The standard library is satisfying. The tooling and OS abstractions are great. And I would honestly place it top 3 in terms of enjoyment and productivity. The top three being perhaps rust and kotlin.