flutter available for rainy day

[gong tji]

Hello,

According on article : webpage

this article said : Flutter Was Not Introduced to Kill Native Android. Instead, It’s Here to Save It for a Rainy Day, due it not depend on JVM (Java Virtual Machine) compiler, but I still don't understand with term rainy day,

Could someone explain to me about the terms?

Thanks

[Campbell Ritchie]

“A rainy day” is informal and colloquial English for a time of difficulty, poverty, or misfortune.

[gong tji]

Hello

Thanks for reply

So in other word there is time of difficulty, poverty, or misfortune for JVM, so it can't be use anymore to build android app?

[Tim Moores]

I'm confused. The article doesn't talk about the "JVM compiler" that you mention at all - which is good, since no such thing exists.

IMO, the article is pretty much nonsense. It says "It uses Google’s Dart language and doesn’t offer any compatibility with Java Virtual Machines (JVM)", which is nonsense. Firstly, there is no such thing as a JVM on Android. Android uses the ART for executing (the successor to Dalvik), neither of which can run Java bytecode. It is easy to convert Java bytecode to ART bytecode, though, and the Android compiler toolchain does this for Java libraries. The toolchain can also compile Dart source code to ART bytecode, so if the article by "JVM" really means "ART", then that, too, is nonsense.

The article goes on to say "Dart is a language that’s compiled to native machine code, thereby eliminating the need to rely on Oracle’s Java Virtual Machine.", which is doubly nonsense, because Dart is NOT compiled to native machine code, but to bytecode, and Oracle's JVM was NEVER part of Android.

So, just forget you ever read that article.

[Paul Clapham]

gong tji wrote:It’s Here to Save It for a Rainy Day

And also... to "save (something) for a rainy day" means, colloquially, to put something aside for potential use in a future time of difficulty, poverty, etc. Which is not what the article meant to say.

[Norm Radder]

To me a "rainy day" is a day that the weather is raining and normal fun activities that are done outside when it is not raining can not be done.
The activity in question can be done inside when it is raining outside.  For example sorting the contents of a closet.

For me the definition of 'saving something for a rainy day" would be saving an activity for a time that you are unable to do normal things.
I don't see the relation to  difficulty or poverty.

[Campbell Ritchie]

That is the literal sense of the phrase, but in “save it for a rainy day,” it has a different meaning.

[gong tji]

Hello,

Thanks all for reply,

I thought "Rainy days" is a terms if someday android native language cannot be use to build android app anymore,
and the reason I came here, because I want to got confirmation from you're who professionals.

Currently my job ask me to use flutter, but I've plan to learn native, Could you give me advice,
which I should prefer to learn, Kotlin (Native) or still flutter?

Any advice would be appreciate

Many Thanks.

[Tim Moores]

If your job requires you to use Flutter, then there's really nothing to choose, is there? Unless you're considering changing jobs, that is. There's nothing wrong with learning something new (certainly not Flutter per se, which looks like interesting technology with potential), especially since your company pays you to do so.

[Tim Holloway]

Campbell Ritchie wrote:That is the literal sense of the phrase, but in “save it for a rainy day,” it has a different meaning.

Saving money for a rainy day does sound strange, but I think its original meaning had to do with what happens on a rainy day. The roof leaks, a flood washes beer barrels down the main street, the garden washes out, and so forth. You're not literally spending money on the rainy day, you're spending it to recover from the rainy day. It's an emergency reserve.

Which of course is a foreign concept to a generation that's expected to run at "110% efficiency", and therefore not only lacks reserve capacity for when the foreign shippers cannot deliver the raw materials, but is actually slowly deteriorating since there's no time to fix things and all the employees are burned out.

I think the Great Resignation is the reaction to that though and it's fine with me. Think of what would have been if Dr. Fleming had been told "We need positive results on Experiment X ASAP so we can make the numbers for next quarter and leverage our buyout. Throw away those mouldy failures and get to work!"

[Campbell Ritchie]

Tim Holloway wrote:. . . an emergency reserve. . . .

Yes, that is what I always thought, “Save it for a rainy day” meant: creating an emergency reserve. But I always thought “rainy” was metaphorical.

[Tim Holloway]

Metaphorical here includes but does not limit itself to meteorology or specific weather. Arwen made a pretty good "rainy day", I think, though. And even rained.

[gong tji]

Hello,

Thanks all for replies,

First, I don't know what I must say... my company change it plan, they told me to learn about defi (Decentralized finance) and NFT so they ask me to learn solidity,

I've plan to resign from my company maybe next year, I've plan to self employed,

Does building android app could support me to build my own business?(if so, once again flutter or kotlin) or do you guys have any recommendation for me what should I learn so that I can build my own business.

any advice would be appreciated

Thank you

[Tim Moores]

gong tji wrote:Does building android app could support me to build my own business?

Can it? Possibly. There are lots of people out there who make a living that way.

Will it? It's impossible for us to say whether you have the required skills to make that work.

(if so, once again flutter or kotlin) or do you guys have any recommendation for me what should I learn so that I can build my own business.

You should use whatever technology enables you to do that. Remember that we know nothing about you and your skills, so we can't possibly advise on what might be useful to learn.

But from your question "Flutter or Kotlin?" I have the strong suspicion that you may not be able to make it work for you, because you seem not to appreciate what it takes to be successful in that space. Choosing this or that framework is of importance only in so far as it may enable you to be a bit more or less productive. But customers -who you want to hand over money- couldn't care less about it, so you should focus on things that DO make a difference to them. For example, creating a great UX. But even an app with the best technical underpinnings and a great UX will fail if it isn't marketed effectively. Or if you can't provide good customer support for it. Or if you don't address bugs and technical issues in a timely manner. Or if the business model doesn't create a cash flow that works for you. Etc. etc.

[Tim Holloway]

I love mobile devices, but I really don't know how anyone can make a career in writing mobile device apps. You cannot sell most apps for more than a few dollars and many are supported by adware revenues. There was a local company posting positions, but the salaries advertised were more in line with the restaurant industry than the IT industry.

To support even a single person (let alone a corporation) you'd have to be selling many thousands of apps and not every app has that wide of an appeal. So I'd check very carefully before settling on that as a career. Even in a very low-cost country you might starve.

[Jesse Silverman]

What Tim said except...

on the corporate side, there are MANY "full-stack" positions that I probably would have been hired for, given the fact that I have decades of experience in writing/debugging/supporting "Enterprise Systems" for major companies, if I felt comfortable saying that I also was fairly comfortable doing Android apps as well (or managing the whole team including those people).

In other words, they were going for "Full-Stack" and my lack of professional Android experience put me at a competitive disadvantage given their definition of that included "comfortable developing on both the Android side and Server Side".

That is different from being able to support oneself based solely on one's Android skills plus business skills, but it is something.

So they are good skills to have, but if they are your only skills you might be finding you are competing for some of the lower-paid jobs in IT, at least in the corporate world.

[Tim Holloway]

Somebody has a problem there. To me "full stack" has always meant front-and-back-end web, microservices, and general IT. Which is bad enough. I'm a truly awful graphics designer - can make stuff that's very functional, but ugly and cast-iron backends no problem. I'm quite a loner myself and more often than not sole person responsible for major systems, but even I know when it would be better to have a team after the manner of Fred Brooks.

But throw mobile devices in on top of that and that's just really too much even for 1990+ job laundry lists. Android has a completely different design paradigm from stock IT and Apple can be even further from that. Note that I'm assuming that in their hubris, that anyone who demanded one would demand both.

[Tim Moores]

Tim Holloway wrote:Note that I'm assuming that in their hubris, that anyone who demanded one would demand both.

Indeed. It has frequently struck me when reading job ads how often in-depth knowledge of both Android and iOS was asked for. Either they have a different concept of "in-depth" than myself, or simply no idea how intricate mobile platforms have become these days.

[Tim Holloway]

Tim Moores wrote:Either they have a different concept of "in-depth" than myself, or simply no idea how intricate mobile platforms have become these days.

Well, the first rule of Users and Managers is "It's Simple! All You Have To Do Is..."