Cross platform mobile development unlocks code reuse

Introduction

Cross platform mobile development has become increasingly popular as businesses seek to maximize code reuse across iOS, Android, web, and other platforms. The ability to write shared application logic once and deploy it anywhere provides major time and cost savings compared to building separate native apps.

With cross platform tools like React Native, Flutter, and Xamarin, developers can now quickly build mobile and web apps from a single codebase. This reduces duplication of efforts across teams and allows faster release of features by writing once and deploying everywhere.

Platforms like DevHunt are great resources for discovering and evaluating various cross platform frameworks, SDKs, plugins, and other tools to accelerate development. As we'll explore in this post, cross platform mobile development unlocks significant capabilities that can benefit any modern application.

Core Benefits of Cross Platform Mobile Development

The strategic reuse of code across platforms is at the heart of cross platform development, which provides many advantages:

• Reduced development time and costs by reusing code across platforms
• Easier maintenance with a single shared codebase
• Consistent UX across iOS, Android, web with common UI components
• Faster feature implementation by writing once and deploying everywhere
• Expanded reach by publishing to multiple platforms simultaneously

Faster Time to Market

Cross platform development dramatically accelerates time to market by enabling code reuse across platforms. Instead of building native iOS and Android apps separately, you can focus efforts on your core app logic and business rules that work everywhere.

Tools like Flutter offer hot reload to preview changes instantly, while frameworks like React Native simplify building native-like UIs driven by JavaScript code. The result is huge time savings, allowing you to get your app into users' hands faster across platforms.

DevHunt profiles many cross platform frameworks and tools to build and iterate quickly for faster time to market. The ability to reuse code unlocks velocity traditional native development struggles to match.

Lower Development Costs

With a single shared codebase, ongoing maintenance becomes easier and more cost-effective. There is much less duplicated work across platform-specific engineering teams, allowing your development resources to be leveraged more efficiently.

The write-once, use-anywhere approach of cross platform development maximizes your existing engineering investments. Avoiding the costs of building and maintaining separate native iOS and Android codebases can provide massive savings.

DevHunt lists many cost-friendly cross platform tools to help cut development costs and time. The strategic reuse of logic, utilities, and models saves time and resources.

Key Capabilities Enabled by Cross Platform Mobile Development

Some of the major capabilities unlocked by cross platform mobile development include:

• Code sharing across iOS, Android, web apps
• Use of common programming languages like JavaScript, C#, Python
• Access to device capabilities like camera, GPS, notifications
• Option for customizable native-like UI designs
• Support for adding platform-specific features

Code Reuse

At its core, cross platform development allows extensive code reuse across target platforms. You can write your core application logic, utilities, data models, and more once then reuse everywhere.

This eliminates duplicated efforts on each native platform. You maintain a single codebase reducing bugs and fragmentation across iOS and Android.

DevHunt features many cross platform SDKs enabling code reuse across platforms. Share more code for faster, streamlined development.

Common Languages

Cross platform tools allow you to use languages like JavaScript, C#, or Python across all platforms. This allows you to leverage existing skills while maximizing code reuse.

Avoid learning platform-specific languages like Swift or Kotlin for each target. Use a single familiar language driving apps on both mobile and web for huge productivity gains.

DevHunt highlights some of the top languages powering reusable cross platform development, improving developer efficiency.

Access Native Features

While enabling code reuse, cross platform tools also expose native platform APIs for key device capabilities like GPS, camera, notifications, and more. This allows creating tailored experiences with platform-specific code even within cross platform apps.

You can build custom native UI elements matching each platform's look and feel. And enable native performance optimizations selectively when needed.

DevHunt showcases tools to access native features from cross platform code, providing the best of both worlds.

Top Cross Platform Mobile Frameworks

There are a variety of proven cross platform frameworks, each with different pros and cons:

React Native

React Native uses JavaScript and React for building mobile apps that render using real native UI components under the hood. It provides hot reloading to view changes instantly.

React Native has a vast ecosystem of third party libraries and components for building apps. Find plugins, modules, and more React Native tools on DevHunt.

Flutter

Flutter uses the Dart language and Skia graphics engine to compile cross platform apps into fast native code. Its widget-centered framework and integrated UI tools enable beautiful 60fps experiences.

Discover Flutter plugins, packages, and more on DevHunt to enhance your apps with Google's portable UI toolkit.

Xamarin

Xamarin leverages C# and the .NET framework to compile iOS, Android, and Windows apps. It enables cross platform dev in Visual Studio with the flexibility to access native SDKs using language bindings.

See Xamarin extensions, plugins, and more showcased on DevHunt to access the full native feature set using C#.

There are also HTML5 cross platform frameworks like Ionic and Cordova that leverage web technologies. And emerging options like Kotlin Multiplatform continue to push mobile dev reuse even further.

Each framework has its strengths in terms of target platforms, languages, developer experience, and more. Use DevHunt's guide to cross platform development for deeper evaluations of all options.

Choosing the Right Cross Platform Approach

Consider these criteria when selecting a cross platform framework:

Key Evaluation Criteria

• Target platforms and devices
• Performance benchmarks and hardware access needs
• Ease of use and learning curve of language/tools
• Maturity level and size of dev community
• Availability of prebuilt components and plugins
• Ability to customize UI designs
• Debugging and testing support

Native Capabilities Access

• Camera, GPS, augmented reality requirements
• Need for speed and fluid animations
• Level of native-like look and feel needed
• Ability to build custom native UI components
• Check DevHunt for native feature support details

Development Environment

• Developer experience and tooling
• Hot reload capability
• Integration with IDEs and dev workflows
• Find developer reviews on DevHunt for insights

Evaluate these factors against your project needs and team skills. Use DevHunt's guides to pick the best cross platform approach for your app.

Conclusion

Cross platform mobile development unlocks major benefits around code reuse, reduced costs, and faster development. It enables varied capabilities from a single codebase that make it a compelling choice for modern apps.

Top frameworks like React Native, Flutter, and Xamarin allow building seamless experiences across platforms using familiar languages and tools. Consider target devices, performance needs, dev environment, and ecosystem when picking the right framework.

Platforms like DevHunt provide great resources to further explore cross platform development, with guides, tool listings, and expert reviews. The strategic reuse of code enables unlocking huge gains in productivity, cost, and time to market that every development team should consider.