NativeScript 6.0 Release Enhance Android Developer’s Productivity

For so many months, the team of NativeScript has worked on a list of features that is designed to enhance developer productivity in several aspects-

• Quick delivery of patches with the help of NativeScript AppSync
• The NativeScript Core Theme now able to work creatively for all NativeScript components
• HMR is enabled by default
• Webpack now drives development experience
• A new and enhanced TabView allows common scenarios without custom development

The officials are even setting for compatibility with a few latest versions of NativeScript’s dependencies-

• AndroidX support enables extra-ordinary features for android ecosystem
• Angular 8 is now supported by NativeScript

Let’s discuss the features in detail-

NativeScript AppSync

If any software development company is able to deliver solutions fast, it has a key advantage in the market. Fixing the bug as quick as possible is a need of mobile development and achieving this can be tough due to several factors that you cannot control- such as app approval in the store and when your user will decide to update the app.

To resolve the issue, officials of NatievScript have released a new (beta) service, i.e. NatievScript AppSync that allows developer or development team to deliver latest app version instantly. The AppSync feature also pushes users to make them agree on using the latest bits.

App developers can test this service now for free. The officials have prepared detailed instructions for them that will assist them in getting started with the new service.

Important note – The service NativeScript AppSync is in BETA, so developers can use it at their own risk. It’s provided progress software and AS-IS or any other contributor assume no liabilities for harms or damages caused due to the use of AppSync.

Core Theme V2

Everyone wants to build beautiful and appealing applications without delaying. The NativeScript Core Theme allows developers to deliver eye-soothing and beautiful apps by offering them a common infrastructure for designing consistent and attractive user interface. In the announcement, officials have told that they are making many critical enhancements with the next version of the theme.

Dark Theme

The team has introduced a fully featured Dark Theme with V2 that is loaded with all the possible skins of the Light Theme. Dark themed UI is gaining more and more attention. There will be a dark mode in iOS 13 and unless the developer wants their apps to look really off- they can do it quickly by adjusting the change. It will be just a matter of a setting.

Kendo Themes Support & Code Sharing

More number of companies and their teams are selecting the option of saving development cycles and building a common codebase for their web and mobile applications. When the developers are applying the Kendo components for their web apps, they can recycle their Kendo theme in NativeScript. Other option for them is to use Kendo Theme Builder to create a new theme for their NativeScript app.

TabView

The TabView has been evolved tremendously during the last several months. The officials have introduced several changes to it; however, none of them are breaking. Developers who are using older version of Tabview 6.0, they can continue their work. The new TabView updates allow developers to leverage more customization options and flexibility when building their UI around the TabView.

Developers can style every component of the TabView. The updates also support font icons. Developers can now easily have multiple nested components of TabView- like having tabs and bottom navigation on single page.

AndroidX support

AndroidX is a critical enhancement made to the original Android Support Library. The update offers backward-compatibility with it, and moving forward. Developers will be using it as a source of future enhancements coming into the Android environment.

The AndroidX support allows NativeScript developers to avail advantages from these new developments like Material Design Components. For instance, if the apps or plugins made by Android App Developers India were using the Support Library prior to NativeScript 6.0, they should upgrade to AndroidX as soon as possible.

The list of enhancements doesn’t end here. It’s just we cannot list them here, yet we can mention some of them-

• The CalenderEvent in the Calender UI component can be extended for simpler tracking of items or products
• The TokenModel can be extended and developers can add ID to their model
• New updated V8 and WebKit are more stable
• Support for Width properties and Animating height

How to update to NativeScript 6.0?

There are three simple steps to update to NativeScript 6.0 –

• ‘npm I – g nativescript@latest’
• ‘tns migrate’
• Done!

The ‘tns migrate’ is a new command that will take care to update all the NativeScript packages.