UI Development: Stateful vs Stateless Widgets
Snowpal Podcast: A common question for a UI developer - "Do I need to implement a Stateful or Stateless Widget to solve this particular problem?"
The speaker introduces the topic of stateful versus stateless widgets in software development.
Summary
Start with Stateless Widgets
Emphasizes starting with stateless widgets when designing screens or UI pages.
States that it's the best approach until the need for statefulness arises, typically due to user interaction.
Stateful Widgets When Necessary
Advises against treating widgets as stateful unnecessarily.
Recommends converting widgets to stateful only when user interaction or API response requires it.
Frameworks and Libraries
Mentions differences in building Flutter stateful widgets versus React Native widgets.
States that while frameworks like Redux may affect the approach, the fundamental concept remains consistent.
Prevalence of Stateless Widgets
Suggests that a significant portion of widgets in any project are likely to be stateless.
Encourages developers not to start building widgets as stateful by default to avoid complexity.
Conclusion
Reiterates the importance of considering the need for statefulness based on user interactions and API responses.
Emphasizes simplicity and ease of management as reasons to prioritize stateless widgets initially.
Podcast
Transcript
0:01
Hey there, in this video, let's talk quickly about stateful versus stateless widgets.If you're building screens or UI pages, just start with a stateless widget.That's the best place to start.So a widget doesn't have to be.Excuse me, sorry, till you find the need for it to be stateful, which is essentially when there is a certain kind of interaction that happens with the user.
0:24
It shouldn't be because I've seen a lot of widgets that are treated as stateful, but they shouldn't really be.And it's it's you know you want more of them to be stateless.Even when you have a stateful widget that depends on a number of other status widgets, you can use them sort of interchangeably.
0:40
So just create these widgets as stateless widgets and when the need arises for the user to interact with them, say they're making some changes, you need those changes to be reflected.You're making API calls and based on the response from those API calls, your page, your screen changes.Whether it's a mobile app or web app doesn't matter, and which the stack doesn't matter either.
1:00
There are certain differences in how you would build a Flutter stateful widget versus a React Native widget, for instance, but fundamentally there aren't any differences, right?Because the idea is the same.Of course, when you bring others other frameworks or libraries into the mix, this changes a tiny bit.
1:20
A little bit, say if using redux for state management for instance, but outside of those, just ignoring all of that, just start with building a stateless widget and then make it stateful if you feel like you need for that to be stateful.In my mind I mean a good percentage of your widgets are going to be stateless, a good number of those.
1:40
I don't know what the math is, but I would imagine this is good for any product or any platform.Just just don't start building them as stateful because it becomes difficult to manage them and more often than not they they don't need to be stateful right?So just keep that in mind.
1:56
Thanks.
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