GenericJam
Interest in Elixir Mobile Framework?
Is there any interest in a mobile framework for Elixir akin to React Native or Flutter?
I am really interested but not sure about the right approach. I’ve done the steps here (this post is 5 years old so they have to be adapted a bit) to get Erlang working on an Android device although it’s currently only working through adb shell as the phone isn’t rooted which is the only way I can see I could run it with Termux. Not sure what the next step would be to get Elixir running on top of that but that’s the plan.
Maybe for graphics, etc we could look at Scenic.
I also thought about dissecting the build systems of Flutter or React Native to see if we could use a similar approach.
In the end I would like to have a component based systems similar to RN and Flutter. It makes sense to use something like Phoenix Templates for this.
I think Elixir as a language makes a lot of sense for mobile given its superior take on concurrency.
If I dare to dream I think we could think about things like code push in the future as well.
Does anyone have experience with getting beyond just building Erlang for mobile? I’d be interested to know what worked.
First Post!
amnu3387
I have no experience in this, nor any suggestions nor anything useful, but if I had a way of deploying a scenic app in mobile (both android and iOS) in a legit way as well as win/linux/macs I would have definitively gone that route for the game I’m building. I think that for a whole range of games that aren’t frame rate frenzy advanced 3d (tabletops, card games, strategy, even some rpgs and such) scenic could be a great fit. Instead I went for the final prototype as an Elixir backend, vue (static nuxt) for the frontend and pixi.js. The complexity is abysmal (but it only needs a compliant browser which is the reason why I opted for it).
Most Liked
boydm
Hey there.
It isn’t that Scenic is only aimed a fixed size devices… Is more that it doesn’t have a built-in auto layout engine.
You can query the size of the screen when your scene starts. You can also dynamically change the scale factors and other things. It’s just that there are all sorts of compromises and tuning you would want in order to get your UI to look good under a variety of aspect ratios. Any attempt to build a generic auto-layout tool is both difficult and would need to make a set of decisions that didn’t feel like they would be optimal for all cases.
Having said that, you could make an auto-layout engine, and in fact, people are working on just that.
So… If you are looking Scenic on phones where you are effectively running a single app on a variety of screen aspect ratios, you need to think through how to reposition things to keep it looking good. Or just have a lookup table that that picks on of serveral nice pre-made layouts.
Dusty
I think @boydm has commented in the past that Scenic is only aimed at devices with known/fixed screen dimensions. Given the variety of mobile devices you’d be targeting, that could be a major issue, but perhaps Boyd can clarify.
Given the amount of low-level work that goes into making these cross-platform mobile frameworks successful (and maintaining compatibility with the moving targets), I think you might be most successful if you piggyback on existing efforts. For example, writing an Elixir to Dart transpiler and supplying libraries that make the relationship to Flutter conventions transparent.
I am enthusiastic about the option to write any type of native code in Elixir, but I also see a trend in the other direction. People are weary of being chained to app stores, so there is more motivation than ever before to improve PWAs, the mobile web, etc.
eahanson
You could look at the approach that RubyMotion took. It’s a complete Ruby implementation on top of iOS and Android and compiles down to native code. You can use all the iOS or Android SDK and third-party libraries (depending on which platform your app is running on) plus all the Ruby standard library functions that were ported over, plus any cross-platform RubyMotion-specific third-party gems. I’ve written iOS apps in Objective-C, Android apps in Java, and iOS+Android apps in RubyMotion and I definitely prefer RubyMotion.
If you have a lot of time, you could try doing the same with Elixir 
Last Post!
GenericJam
Popular in Discussions
Other popular topics
Chat & Discussions>Discussions
Latest on Elixir Forum
Sponsor Spotlight
Enabling companies to succeed by building software people love.
Categories:
Sub Categories:
Forums
Popular Tags
- #ecto
- #liveview
- #troubleshooting
- #learning-elixir
- #deployment
- #library
- #erlang
- #testing
- #genserver
- #mix
- #absinthe
- #remote-other
- #otp
- #plug
- #how-to-question
- #macros
- #postgres
- #channels
- #elixirconf
- #exunit
- #discussion
- #code-sync
- #javascript
- #podcasts
- #onsite
- #dialyzer
- #docker
- #authentication
- #umbrella
- #full-time-contract
- #podcasts-by-brainlid
- #ecto-query
- #elixir-ls
- #phoenix_html
- #iex
- #blog-post
- #graphql
- #genstage
- #ai
- #websockets
- #supervisor
- #elixirconf-us
- #advent-of-code
- #distillery
- #processes
- #api
- #forms
- #metaprogramming
- #security
- #hex
Our Sponsors
Build Elixir applications with speed and confidence.
Supporting innovation across the BEAM ecosystem.
We build reliable cloud platforms for business-critical systems.
Catch errors, track performance, monitor hosts and more.
Error tracking for Elixir devs who love to ship. Start your free account.
Practical resources that improve the lives of professional developers.
Enabling companies to succeed by building software people love.
The deployment platform built for Elixir: PaaS ease, VPS control.
The team behind Membrane, Popcorn, LiveDebugger. Available for hire.
Courses that'll move you from confusion to "Aha, now I get it!"