Google introduced Flutter in 2015 as a cross-platform UI that allows developers to create apps for Android, iOS, Linux, Mac, Windows, Google Fuchsia, and the web from a single codebase. Google stated in June that it is seeking cooperation from Microsoft to expand Flutter to Microsoft. Google announced the alpha release of Flutter support for Windows on September 23. Flutter developers may benefit from increased developer tooling on Windows thanks to native desktop support.
The release had been anticipated for quite some time, given that this is the world’s leading desktop operating system, with approximately 1 billion installations of Windows 10 alone.
Flutter, which uses the Dart programming language, allows developers to create apps that operate natively on each platform, sharing as much code as possible to avoid double efforts and masking differences where they occur.
Flutter wants developers to be free to focus on what they want to design rather than whatever device they want to build for. This is generally more appropriate for small businesses or freelance developers who cannot target various platforms separately.
Developers can currently use Flutter to create apps that target Windows devices such as desktop PCs. Instead of merely touch for phones, the goal has been to integrate desktop mouse and cursor interaction paradigms. According to Google, more than half of all Flutter developers currently use Windows, so providing native desktop support for Microsoft’s ubiquitous operating system makes a lot of sense.
The Flutter development team recognizes that there is much work to be done on Windows, such as adding features for “accessibility, globalization and localization, enhanced keyboard and text handling, support for command-line arguments, and more.” This initial version provides a solid basis that will be refined over the next few months. With Windows 7 and above support, Flutter support for Windows offers a starting point for ambitious developers.
