GSOC 2023 idea for mobile /flutter app

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Hey folks, I have an idea for improving mobile experience by adding flutter support in our current tech stack, So we can also add android as well as ios support for OpenMRS community

me & my friend(@shyam1ss15 ) also in openmrs, have worked on many projects in flutter and we absolutely love it,

I would suggest to develop current openmrs mobile app in flutter to take cross platform advantage, please guide us, so we can work on it. Platform: Android & IOS.

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Ya, good idea we can create one beautiful :smiley::smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

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I thought of this too, migrating OpenMRS Android Client to Flutter as GSoC Project.

I remember someone proposing this in the past, but that idea was turned down to prevent it from becoming another dead project post-GSoC.

Now that Flutter is much more famous, is this idea feasible now?

cc: @grace @jayasanka @jennifer @dkayiwa

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Hello @parthis @shyam1ss15 @prathamesh009 wouldn’t react native be a better fit seeing O3 frontend is already built around react?

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Hello @reagan thanks for sharing, I also feel react native alternative solution but I see flutter a more stable solution right now. we can choose any of them, I am good at flutter so thought of it, also I have looked at current android codebase which uses much kotlin, I feel it very similar to flutter once.

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Hi everyone, thanks for the valuable ideas.

Here are my thoughts, IMO:

Pros:

  • Flutter is now widely and easily used, so may OpenMRS’ community and contributions become more active regarding the mobile project than now.
  • Support for IOS may increase the contributions too, and of course the usage for the implementers and the providers.

Cons:

  • Building OpenMRS mobile app with Flutter from scratch again will take much time more than what GSoC project length.
  • OpenMRS products target the developing countries in which Android phones are much commonly used more than iPhones. Therefore, IMO there isn’t much need for IOS support.
  • OpenMRS Android Client project currently has a robust debug build, it just needs to be updated on Play Store after fixing release build bugs. The project’s architecture and some of the used libraries and technologies have been migrated to cleaner and modern ones recently, there is no reason to migrate from the current project, instead, it will be more valuable to improve the current project and try to attract more contributors.

Finally, building a Flutter app for OpenMRS is of course a good idea, but it needs a long-term plan with experienced mentorship, and not only during GSoC.

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