Android Development Roadmap

In this episode, let's talk about the best languages / tools and resources for Native mobile app development.

Languages / Tools

• Native Android Development in Java (or Kotlin) and XML using IDEs such as Android Studio or Eclipse.
• Flutter framework - Developing cross-platform apps for Mobile (iOS and Android) and Web.
• Kivy framework - Free and open source Python framework for developing mobile apps and other multi-touch application software with a natural user interface.
• React Native framework - Open-source mobile application framework created by Facebook, Inc. It is used to develop applications for Android, Android TV, iOS, macOS, tvOS, Web and Windows.
• Xamarin platform - Open source mobile UI framework from Microsoft for building iOS, Android, & Windows apps with .NET from a single shared codebase.

Now, let's look at the best resources to learn app development.

1. Before getting into the actual development of applications, it is really important to get the fundamentals right. That is, it is important to understand how android works and the fundamentals of applications. Read this article to know more.
2. After having understood the fundamentals of applications, it is important to understand the Activity Lifecycle. Head over to this article to know more.
3. Now that you have a clear idea about how apps actually work, it is crucial to explore and select the development tools and framework of your choice. Go through the aforementioned tools and frameworks used in the field of android development and make your choice.
4. Make your Hello World App, which is a simple app that has a single screen displaying the text "Hello, World!".
5. It is really important to try out some basic applications at first such as Calculator and To-do list app so that you make your fundamentals strong and also get familiarised with the intricacies of the development environment.
6. Slowly pick up pace and start building some medium level apps such as Weather App, Quiz app or a News app where you get to learn about how to work with APIs.
7. Start learning about databases such as Firebase, MongoDB so that you will be capable of building a full fledged, dynamic, full stack application.
8. Also, it is very important to be a good UI/UX designer apart from having a strong grip in back-end development. Start learning about Material Designs, Design patterns and fundamentals of UI/UX design using tools such as Figma or Adobe XD.
9. Apart from all the points mentioned above, it is also important to have a great understanding of the Software Development principles and Component Based Software Engineering and Software testing which will help you develop great apps!

Some helpful resources :

1. Android Development Roadmap
2. Begin with Kotlin basics
3. Android Developer Fundamentals
4. Advanced Android Development
5. Flutter Tutorial Videos?

In the next episode, let's talk about the difficulties that we face while building a cross-platform app and the process of app deployment on Google Play Store.

Best of luck on your Android Development Journey ??

See you in the next one !