Flutter — Building A Dashboard With Tab Bar Navigation: Devlog #2

In this Devlog I go over some updates on the Fitness App project, code from the Flutter codelabs tutorials that will be useful for the app, and a simple dashboard that I designed with a tab bar for navigation.

If you have not read the first Devlog in this series, I set up my development environment in Android Studio, found a solution to using Virtual Devices with an AMD processor, and laid out some general features that I want for the app. Go check that out before reading this!

Project Updates

A Name For The Fitness App, And Design Mock Ups Coming Soon

So as of right now, there is no name or design for the app so until one is decided on, I’ll be referring to it as Fitness App. Very clever, yes, but I’ll get to thinking of a name a little bit down the road once I get started on prototyping the features. The name just isn’t nearly as important as getting to a working prototype. However, I’ll need to start doing some design mockups in Photoshop relatively soon so you’ll see those within the next few Devlogs. I want to have some design guidelines to go by while implementing code, that way I won’t just be putting widgets (everything in Flutter is a widget) down in random places.

Austin Howard Tech Wiki — Using Google Sites As A Project Planning Tool

I also want to mention that I’m using Google Sites as a project planning tool for my website (including this Devlog for my blog), and any other software projects that I work on, so all of the planning and resources for the Fitness App are on the Austin Howard Tech Wiki page. Soon there will be an official page for the Fitness App on this website, so stay posted for that.

Firebase Will More Than Likely Be My Backend Solution

I’ve been watching many videos about using Firebase as a backend solution for Flutter Apps and from what I can tell, Firebase is the way to go.

Firebase handles authentication, storage, database, and hosting without having to maintain a server. I’ll more than likely be using Firebase for it’s powerful asychcronous database…