Flutter is not just another cross-platform app development platform. It is a UI toolkit developed by Google to create natively compiled, high-end applications. Flutter app development has, therefore, gained ground among the developer’s community and the corporate world shortly after its launched in May 2017. https://www.solutionanalysts.com/blog/all-you-need-know-about-flutter-1-12

1. All You Need to Know about the Latest
Flutter 1.12 Version
Flutter is not just another cross-platform app development platform. It is a UI
toolkit developed by Google to create natively compiled, high-end
applications. Flutter app development has, therefore, gained ground among
the developer’s community and the corporate world shortly after its launched
in May 2017.
As a robust cross-platform app development tool, Flutter has become the
fastest growing open-source project by State of Octoverse report of GitHub.
Recently, Flutter developers have come up with the biggest stable release
ever- Flutter 1.12. It is claimed that this release has addressed over 1900 Pull
Requests sent by 188 contributors. Google released this version in the Flutter
Interact Event held in December 2019. Here we highlight its key features and
functionality. What’s more, we will also go through the impact of these
features on mobile application development.

2. • Flutter 1.12- New Features and Performance Enhancements
Let’s have a glimpse of new features of Flutter 1.12. We will start with the
programming language update of Dart because Flutter is built on this
language.
Advent of Dart 2.7
This version is aimed at enhancing the overall Dart experience as compared
to Dart 2.5. What’s more, it will help the Flutter app developers to prevent
errors in the instances of getting a parse integer in a string or zero variables.
This enhancement sets Flutter apart from other platforms. The mobile app
development process using Flutter largely depends on the Dart language. It
enables the app developers to reuse the code across web and mobile
domains.

3. Support for macOS
Flutter 1.12 comes with macOS desktop support. This support will facilitate
the developers to build a fully-optimized macOS app using a release mode.
Also, developers can incorporate the characteristics of material design into
Flutter-based software with ease.
Along with this support, Flutter 1.12 has many other improvements for
supporting desktop apps. Some of them are visual density assistance, menu
dropdown keyboard navigation, radio buttons, checkboxes, and the like.
Dark Mode for iOS 13
Apple’s iOS 13 has several new features and performance enhancements
to make appealing, enterprise-grade iPhone apps. One of them is the
introduction of dark mode. Now, Flutter 1.12 supports the dark mode in iOS
13, which means that the mobile app development company can build

4. awesome apps with dark mode for the iOS platform using Flutter. Other new
features for iOS 13 include shorter long press time, scrollbar fidelity, and
improved feedback.
Last year, Flutter had provided support for the dark mode of Android 10. It has
enabled Android developers to empower dark mode with the material design
widgets.
DartPad update and Android enhancements
Update in DartPad is one of the major updates of Flutter 1.12. Now, the
DartPad can edit the entire Flutter code while enabling developers to run
Flutter codes efficiently. Mobile app developers can also assess the rendered
UI with the help of an updated DartPad.
Another enhancement is designed for Android app development. Flutter has
found some issues to enhance the Android build. The Flutter 1.12 version has
made the app development process more advanced by utilizing AndroidX-
based support libraries.
The Flutter developer’s team has moved plugins to AndroidX. Gradually, all
the apps will be moved to AndroidX along with plugins. What’s more, an
alternative code path is present in the Android build that utilizes Android
archive files.
Add-to-app Upgrade
This update is also aimed at making the Android app development process
more developer-friendly. Android app developers can utilize this feature in the
‘Flutter Module’ that is present in the new Android Studio. They can
seamlessly add Flutter to their existing Android apps with the help of an
updated add-to-app feature.
This feature also assists the developers to migrate any app to the Flutter. It is
easy to add Flutter into any existing iOS or Android apps with the help of this
feature.

5. Related Reading- How to Select the Best Tech Stack for Mobile App
Development
Access to Adobe XD
Flutter has a tie-up with Adobe. It makes XD of the Adobe XD accessible to all
available Flutter plugins. The latest XD version can convert the XD designs
into codes. It is a crucial portion of Flutter app development. Adobe XD
access also supports the designers to develop and design a seamless user
experience for every available platform.
Multi-device Debugging
One of the important deciding factors for the cost of app development is
quality testing or debugging. The Flutter UI can be developed and debugged
on any one device. Therefore, developers need to spend a lot of time
debugging the apps across multiple devices especially in the Android
platform. The Flutter’s latest version assist app developers to perform multi-
session debugging across various devices at once.
Golden image feature
When it comes to the real rendering of an app, widget, and other visual
representation, the Golden image file proves very useful. The Flutter 1.12
comes with GoldenFileComparator and LocalFileComparator classes. These
classes successfully replace bits with pixels to reduce false positives
effectively.
Both these classes display visual differences to enable developers to make
distinctions between the updates in the golden image.
Layout Explorer
Layout issues are always present in manual or Hot UI-based coding.
Thankfully, the Flutter 1.12 has a Layout Explorer feature to minimize such
issues. This feature is introduced in the latest version of Dart DevTools. The
Layout Explorer can augment the inspector with the visual representation of
the layout.

6. Impact of Flutter 1.12
Flutter 1.12 has many features and functionality that can have a huge impact
on enterprises, designers, and app developers. Let’s go through a few of the
key effects of Flutter 1.12.
• Startups and SMEs
As a powerful framework for developing cross-platform apps, Flutter has
shown great potential in just a few years of launching. With this update, the
framework has made it possible for startups to test their ideas in the potential
market.
Also, as a cross-platform framework, Flutter enables the startups to address a
huge audience consists of Android and iOS users without spending a small
fortune.
Talking about established companies, they can easily deliver a seamless
experience across various platforms by using the features of the Flutter 1.12.
This latest version can help them establish a diversity of app experiences in a
natively-compiled way through a single codebase.
• App Developers
The mobile app development company can leverage many benefits of
Flutter 1.12 and serve its corporate clients with excellent cross-platform app
solutions. The latest version facilitates the app developers to use the same
language (Dart) for layout requirements and backend development. Also, it is
going to ensure that the app developers can get a higher animation speed
while developing enterprise-grade apps.
What makes these benefits special is the fact that there will be no major
impact on the cost of app development.
• UI/UX Designers
The Flutter 1.12 assist both UI and UX designers to create a visually
appealing and interactive environment. The hot reload feature assists

7. designers to make changes in the real-time while combining videos, texts, and
UI with customized animations. Many other platforms have also extended
support for the Flutter 1.12. Simply put, designers can make the most of this
latest Flutter update and come up with pleasant user experience.
• Concluding Lines
The growing community and regular updates have helped Flutter emerge as a
reliable platform for cross-platform app development. In just 3 years of
launch, it has gained a lot of popularity in the developer’s community.
Attempts are on for making this platform ready for game development and
Google’s much-awaited Fuchsia platform. The release of the Flutter 1.12 is
just a small step toward this attempt.
The release of Flutter 1.12 has brought Google’s ambient computing vision
closers than before. Over the period, we can expect that Flutter will change
the shape of mobile application development. Till then, we have a new version
of Flutter 1.12 with excellent features and performance improvements.