The Brad Martin Perspective
April 10, 2018
The Brad Martin Perspective
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User
Overall Satisfaction with NativeScript
At nStudio, LLC. we use it as our suggested application framework to clients for developing iOS and Android applications that integrate with a web app so we can utilize the code-sharing strategy of a web framework like Angular or VueJS and significantly reduce the amount of code to write for a web app and mobile app.
- The CLI for development workflow is very great. The livesync option for fast dev iteration works really well.
- Styling native apps is not easy but NativeScript provides an abstraction of CSS to easily style native apps similar to how web apps are styled.
- The one area we are wanting to see is Hot Module Reloading, this is supposedly in the works but we anxiously awaiting it to be implemented. While the livesync is great it sometimes can be a hinderance to the work flow when the app has to restart for code changes, where HMR would allow instant code changes without an app restart.
- The layouts could use some better "guessing" on what the developers are trying to do if they are not sure of how to do things, the learning curve for layouts can be rough for new devs.
- While NativeScript allows you to develop for both Android and iOS this is a huge time saver. Which has given us a great increase in time to production for clients.
- Being a framework written by people, there will be bugs and unforeseen issues that come up, and with the framework not being well known by the developers using it. It can be a challenge to find and help fix the bugs in a framework as large as NS. This is not just an issue with NS, it's an issue with any open source framework/library. The internals are massive on most frameworks and to truly understand it, you'd need weeks of time to dedicate to it.
The direct native API access without having to write any Java or ObjC was the ultimate decision for us. We can drop in a native Android/Ios library and instantly code against that SDK without any special work. Whereas with Ionic or RN, you have to write some Java/ObjC (or Swift) and "bridge" your way to those native APIs. There are advantages in doing this but the time factor in not having to know Java or write any was a win for us and our clients.