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There are numerous development methodologies to create a mobile app. Every method is unique in its own way depending upon how the goal should be achieved with less effort and cost. Here we talk about Facebook’s React Native to develop undistinguishable native apps for mobile.
React Native is a project based on ReactJS, which adopts a new approach to mobile development.
It is a framework for the development of applications on native platforms that allows unifying the development experience on different operating systems.
React Native App Development is available for iOS, Android and Windows 10, WIndows 10 Mobile and Xbox One applications.
The Components
ReactJS is based on the concept of a component. The Component is something that has a state, which can accept properties and has its own life cycle.
This “atomic” development approach is perfect for performing unit tests or for creating more complex components, including simpler ones.
Functional approach and Virtual-DOM of React
The React Components can be seen as well as functions and idempotent, in fact, a component of the interface is expressed by calling its method render () that can access the current status and to the properties.
The updated flow of each component is made in this way:
1.It executes the render () method that receives input data and returns a content tree to display (Virtual-DOM).
2.The render () method is executed every time the data is modified and generates a new Virtual-DOM.
3.React calculates the differences between the current Virtual-DOM and the one relative to the previous state of the component and applies the minimum operations necessary to have the updated real DOM. This approach has the characteristics of functional programming, in fact it can be seen as a function that takes in input 2 DOM and returns a list of operations to be performed on the Real DOM in order to correctly apply the necessary changes.
No WebView
The WebView is a tool based on the Webkit engine that allows you to correctly render web pages formed by Javascript, Html, and Css. Many frameworks use it because it allows unifying the development of an app that can then be published both on the Apple Store and on the Play Store, without major changes.
The negative aspect of this tool is that it needs a lot of resources, so the applications are less performing than those developed with a native UI.
Unlike the classic WebApp, React Native maps each of its components through the native user interface of the iOS or Android platform.
The Initial Approach
For a first approach to React Native it may be helpful to use a well-designed project with a modular and Test Friendly development approach.
An interesting project is Pepperoni, an open source model that includes a fingerprint series already ready for use. It provides an up-to-date React Native scaffolding, a modular structure and is designed to perform Unit Testing with Mocha and Enzyme.
Mocha is a tool for unit testing of Javascript usually associated with a powerful library Chai.js, Enzyme instead is a tool that simplifies the testing of ReactJS components.
Pepperoni also integrates libraries like Redux and ImmutableJS for managing the application status. It also supports application state caching that allows offline operation and faster application opening. In addition to an authentication system (OAuth), it has many other tools that greatly simplify the initial configuration of the project.
Pros
- Easy to use
- Once you understand the React Native approach it becomes very easy to develop new components.
- More efficient, thanks to the native interface.
- React Native gains a lot in terms of performance compared to the common WebApp, because it makes use of a native interface and does not delegate the rendering of the UI to the WebView.
- A very rapid react native development cycle.
- React Native is in effect a native application that interprets the business logic written in Javascript, this allows to speed up the development cycle considerably: every time the code is changed, it is not necessary to recompile the entire application.
- Virtual Dom: This approach allows you to calculate the least number of operations to perform to make changes to the DOM gaining speed in rendering the UI.
- Simplify the development of unit tests.
- Thanks to its atomic component structure, the development of unit tests is simpler and faster.
- tests is simpler and faster.
Cons
- Despite the UI is native, the business logic is still interpreted, so it is less efficient than native applications.
- It allows less control over native applications
- In native applications, there is greater control, especially on performance management.
Conclusion
React Native is certainly an excellent framework that allows you to develop applications with good performance and an interface comparable to that of native apps.
This tool, however, undoubtedly has some disadvantages that are reflected both in the performance (although better than other JS framework) and in the ability to control all the features that a native application can offer.
We, at Bacancy Technology, believe that it can be an ideal solution for a more development-oriented team in Javascript. This is because it offers tools that facilitate and, in some way, unify business logic and deployment on various mobile platforms.
To develop an MVP in a short time and with good performance remains an excellent solution, especially if you hire dedicated react native developers from us.
