I am starting a new series called React Native 101. This series will be all about React Native. I'll be blogging regularly for this series, whenever I discover something interesting and helpful. I'll be blogging about it in my style. I am hoping to do some collaborations too for this series.
First of all welcome to this series about React Native. Let's start with a little intro about React Native.
Why do we need React Native?
The world is going mobile now. Apps are what everyone uses. Whether it be just to access the internet or buy something online, people are using apps for this. For developers app development became came overwhelmingly. The main dilemma is Android or iOS. There are cross-platforms like Flutter, but not many people get inclined towards that way. They quickly start learning web development and jump on to React, since that is something very trending. They build a lot of projects using them maybe even startups. Many need apps for their websites in the freelancing business too. Can there be a solution where React.js can be used to build apps? ENTER REACT NATIVE .
What is React Native?
React Native is a software framework that allows you to build cross-platform(Android, AndroidTV, iOS, macOS, tvOS, Web, and Windows.) using React.js. It is one of the most popular app development frameworks. React Native is completely open-source. That's great, isn't it? Knowing React is a prerequisite for developing in React Native. You can also learn React on the go if your goal is to build an app. There is a friend of mine who started React Native, moved to React, and now develops great web apps as well as mobile apps. You can use React concepts like useState, useRef, useEffect, etc. React Native is easy to set up and you can set up a basic project using: Expo and React Native CLI(Command Line Interface). We will talk more about it in the next blog on how to set it up.
History of React Native
React was created by Facebook. So React Native will of course be developed by them.
React Native was released in 2015 and the development process started all the way back in 2013. The developers over at Facebook realized the above problem and decided to find a solution for it. Facebook had developed React as a JS Web Framework before, therefore they decided to develop a React-based App Development Framework. An engineer at Facebook, Jordan Walke found a way to generate UI elements for iOS from JS code. This lead to the idea of the development of React Native. Facebook organized an internal hackathon to perfect this prototype. They also made the project open-source. After months of planning, coding, and open-sourcing, a final version was built. A simple website was spun up which contained the docs, set up process, and what it exactly is.
What's Next?
We will talk about the setup process in the next blog. We'll be explaining Expo and React Native CLI both, also a bit more on what Expo is. The next few blogs will be basics, concepts, and tips related to React Native.