Comment by strogonoff | Hacker News Reader

Comment by strogonoff | Hacker News Reader

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I briefly investigated using React Native on a project. Obscure installation and linking process which no one seems to understand exactly, no SPM support on iOS, incomplete documentation that from the start pushes to adopt yet another layer on top (such as Expo, and I suppose Hyperview is now another option)… It felt like I am adopting some rusty legacy software, and not in a good way (more full of quirks than mature, well-documented and time-tested). Judging by discussions, most people would somehow get it working and then not touch it again until it breaks. My intuition was to stay away and to recommend, if PWA is not an option and resources are limited, to go with a native app for one platform (whichever more familiar) & later pay someone to port it for the other.

Probably has changed since then, but I remember the RN docs telling me to use Expo. I was wondering the whole time, do people actually use Expo or no. And why is it uploading my code to some website? Soon I had a clear answer; I had to "eject" from Expo to do a prod build or just add any native components. Not a good first impression.

That said, RN was a win in the long run. It was a lot less baffling than the notorious Xcode/Swift/ObjC/UIKit ecosystem I'd used for years.

That hasn’t been true for quite a while. No need to upload code to build or submit, though it certainly makes it easier.

For what it’s worth, the RN investigation I did was just last month, and impression was not good.

On the other hand, regarding iOS in particular, SwiftUI docs improved a lot recently. I remember them being baffling indeed from a few years back.

If resources are limited and you plan on charging any type of money for the app, either one time or as a subscription, it's almost always better to go iOS first and port to Android later. I obviously can't speak for the ecosystems as a whole but anecdotally of the last few companies I've worked for a strong majority of paying users came from iOS.

In my xp, React Native was far more fragile a few years ago, but it has improved immensely since then. I quite enjoy working with it these days.

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