Techletter #39 | July 19, 2023
I have built and published a mobile app from scratch. It’s being used across organizations for internal purposes. I do work on app updates like bug fixes & new feature development. It’s definitely not an easy thing when you are accountable for it and there is no one who could help you with it except Google and AI chatbots. The complexity of developing a mobile app is simply higher than a web application.
In this techletter, I describe my experience with Mobile Application development using React Native.
Why mobile application development is complex than a web app? It is simply because there is a lot of configuration that you need to care about, there are nearly thousands of devices & is impossible to test your app on all devices manually. You need to understand Android & IOS environments. Debugging the app without any help like crashlytics or mix panel makes it nearly impossible.
The best thing about mobile applications is that they are handy and can add a lot of value to the users or organization if the product is built efficiently.
How to build a mobile app?
Being a full-stack engineer I prefer JavaScript. Even though you can build a mobile app using Java, Kotlin, or Flutter, if you already know JavaScript and React then React Native makes much more sense. As you can focus on building more than the syntax or approach.
The mobile app that is built using react native can be slower compared to native languages. But, react native has a very large and growing community and people are finding solutions for better performance.
The mobile application development process can be shown as below
The above diagram shows the simple process of app development. It looks very simple but the process is not as it looks like. You need to deal with a lot of problems that you come across.
Once you release the updates, the application is gone forever, you cannot make any major changes to the same app version. So, there is no chance of making a mistake, else will cost you either a lot of money or time.
Releasing updates can be done once you fix the bugs or add new features. Remember, it’s not as easy as pushing the updates on the web. It takes a lot of time for app updates. You need to change the version number and code before publishing. you cannot publish the same version again. And each time you need to update, you must send it for verification. And make sure you continue the same package name, or else your app must be released as a new app.
If you want quicker updates and if your app is organisation only, you can publish the app privately.
When you release an application within the organization only, it won’t be publicly available. It will be visible to people within your organization only. Releases and updates are very quick compared to public apps. But, the process will be the same.