Flutter & Dart: Solid Principles And Top Design Patterns

Learn how to improve your Flutter & Dart code through mastery of S.O.L.I.D principles and the Top GoF Design Patterns.

What you'll learn

*Master* the most important and fundamental design patterns in modern Software Engineering within the *Flutter* framework using *Dart*

Learn and internalize the S.O.L.I.D principles of design like seasoned *Senior Developers* do.

Get a deep understanding of the WHAT, WHY, and HOW for those *Fundamental Design Patterns*.

Get a full Architectural exposition (with UML) of each pattern as well as *real-world* scenarios with hands-on coding examples for each pattern.

Work on and complete Dart-based assignments that will push your understanding of those patterns deeper and more fundamentally.

Learn how to *identify* the *best pattern* for the given Architectural challenge.

Requirements

It is assumed that you know your way around Flutter and Dart. Only basic experience is required.

You should be able to run the Dart code that is provided with the course. We will use Visual Studio Code as our IDE but you can use any IDE you like.

Access to a computer. A Mac, Windows, or a Linux based operating system is equally fine. All the tools are OS Independent.

You should have access to a mobile device but this is not strictly necessary as we will develop our code on an emulator/simulator first.

Description

We all want to become better software developers and be able to call ourselves "Software Engineers" or "Software Architects", but to do that you first have to master a number of design patterns.This course will put you on a track to that destination. We will teach you how to recognize when to use specific design patterns to build complex systems in a divide-and-conquer manner so that complexity is reduced and abstracted.But rather than learning all the design patterns out there, we have curated the most important, the top fundamental GoF Design Patterns for you. All of that in the context of the Flutter Framework using Dart.We start with full understanding of the S.O.L.I.D Design Principles and how they in turn relate to those design patterns. We eplain everything in the context of real-wprld problems as well as specific code examples.At the end of the course you will get to Architect a solution by coding John Conway's Game of Life simulation which will run on your mobile device.Complex software systems are plagued with three major issues:Timelines are stretched as requirements change.Multiple developers have a hard time coordinating their efforts.Code redundancy.This in turn creates issues with maintenance and overall flexibility for adding new features. In general this means poorly designed systems that are hard to maintain and are not adaptable.One answer to all the above problems is having a proper design and architecture. Think of a skyscraper being built. There is always a high-level blueprint. This blueprint is used to show everybody involved (from architects to supply chain to construction workers to machinery scheduling etc…) what is being worked on.Everybody understands and follows the same vision.A blueprint has a number of commonly understood elements which repeat themselves across many projects. For example all buildings need electrical wiring and plumbing, they might need elevators, and cooling systems, and underground parking lots, and of course stairs. They also usually are connected to the electrical grid and water supply as well as… roads.All these common elements follow certain standards that have been improved over many many years and across many many projects. They are well understood and can be used almost like recipes.In Software Engineering we also have a set of elements that repeat themselves across many projects. For example all software applications need to create objects, they need to communicate state change across those objects, they need to be able traverse over collections of those objects. In other words, if you want to be a better developer then you need to become proficient in those elements that have been time-tested. In the Software Engineering world these elements are known as “Design Patterns”This course will teach students how to recognize when to use specific design patterns to build complex systems in a divide-and-conquer manner so that complexity is reduced and abstracted.This will help you to design projects in an Architectural manner before any major development happens and can be used to shorten development time and reduce maintenance costs.Design patterns are important because they are time-tested recipes or solutions to well-known software engineering problems. When creating software applications certain problems recur in a pretty predictable fashion so rather than ‘reinvent’ the wheel we will have an assortment of, if you will, wheels to choose from.We will teach you this in a slightly different manner than you probably have been taught before. We will take a practical approach (i.e. specific examples) but the power of Design Patterns comes from their ‘concept’ and we will teach you the concept of those design patterns so that you are fully able to change them and modify them to your needs. In addition we will look at how to combine all those patterns into something greater: an architecture.A well designed Architecture is this magical thing where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.This is what we will strive to teach you.

Overview

Section 1: Introduction

Lecture 1 What are Design Patterns and why do we need them?

Lecture 2 The Design Patterns Covered in This course.

Lecture 3 The WHY Of Software Architecture.

Lecture 4 Why use UML?

Lecture 5 Organized vs. Unorganized code.

Lecture 6 Optional: UML Refresher.

Section 2: What makes a Great Architecture?

Lecture 7 Hallmarks of Good Architecture.

Lecture 8 S.O.L.I.D Design Principles.

Section 3: Singleton Design Pattern

Lecture 9 Understanding the Singleton Pattern

Lecture 10 Architectural Considerations for Singleton Pattern

Lecture 11 Coding the Singleton Pattern in Dart

Lecture 12 Singleton Pattern Coding Exercises

Section 4: Factory Method Design Pattern

Lecture 13 Understanding Factory Method Pattern

Lecture 14 Architectural Considerations for Factory Method Pattern

Lecture 15 Coding the Factory Method Pattern in Dart

Section 5: Builder Design Pattern

Lecture 16 Understanding Builder Design Pattern

Lecture 17 Architectural Considerations for Builder Design Pattern

Lecture 18 Coding the Bulider Pattern in Dart

Section 6: Adapter Design Pattern

Lecture 19 Understanding the Adapter Design Pattern

Lecture 20 Architectural Considerations for the Adapter Pattern

Lecture 21 Coding the Adapter Design Pattern

Section 7: Strategy Design Pattern

Lecture 22 Understanding the Strategy Design Pattern

Lecture 23 Architectural Consideration for the Strategy Design Pattern

Lecture 24 Coding the Strategy Design Pattern

Section 8: Observer Design Pattern

Lecture 25 Understanding the Observer Design Pattern

Lecture 26 Architectural Consideration for the Observer Design Pattern

Lecture 27 Coding the Observer Design Pattern

Section 9: State Design Pattern

Lecture 28 Understanding the State Design Pattern

Lecture 29 Architectural Consideration for the State Design Pattern

Lecture 30 Coding the State Design Pattern

Section 10: Course Assignment - The Game of Life

Lecture 31 About John Conway's Game of Life Simulation

Lecture 32 A Word about the "Game of Life" Architecture

Section 11: Final Thoughts

Lecture 33 Where do you go from here?

Lecture 34 Thank you!

*Flutter & Dart* developers who want to learn to Design, Architect, and ultimately develop *better code*.,Developers who want to get a deep understanding of what makes GREAT *Software Architecture*.