Discussion (with myself... cuz I'm the only developer 🥲)

[mplekunov]

So, Jetpack Compose, clearly, makes the front-end development much more consistent and faster. As a person who doesn't really like front-end dev., Jetpack Compose makes it easier for me to not overload myself with useless thinking of how XML/XAML (depending on what you are using, Kotling/JavaFX) works.

However, the main issue that I have right now is repeatability.

Since Jetpack Compose allows development of UI using purely Kotlin + Annotations, we now have a problem with code repeatability which I have to solve somehow.

The whole weatherApp is basically constructed on graphs... You have Temperature/Precipitation/Wind, UV-Index, Dew-Point, Pressure, Humidity and all other graphs which can show you the forecast (Weekly/Daily/Hourly). The problem in re-usability of those graphs. The logic for a graph that I have "can" potentially be use in other graphs... however I need to decouple it somehow first.

[mplekunov]

Note:

On the first glance, it looks like I can "Couple" graphs using Box().... Basically I can have different functions which would draw on Canvas() and then use Box() to combine those canvases into one...

Example: Let's say we have a curve on one canvas, but we also want to have a horizontal line coming from one end of canvas to the other end of the canvas. We could create two canvases with the same canvasSize. On one canvas we draw a curve, on the other line. Then we could use Box() to combine those canvases together into one.

I think that would be the play.

[mplekunov]

I think I will be able to have majority of graph logic in a week with a "more or less" workable graph Library ready to use to draw all other graphs (for other widgets). Then I could use some public weather API (MET Northway/Accu Weather) to connect it to viewmodels

[mplekunov]

Geocoder/Weather API's are added. Widgets work correctly. Need to fix Precipitation graph as it's not constrained to proper boundaries.

After that I will have to add more json fields for Weather API Service to gather information about weather statistics units.

Then I will need to create a bit more widgets (wind/pressure and stuff like that).

Finally I will need to fix Themes because right now colors are random chosen... I just threw them around just to see UI and that's it. Potentially I want to go with minimalist Black-White-DarkGray design using only those three colors (maybe add some shades of gray for "shadows")

Oh and last but not least is going to be Menu and Settings.

[mplekunov]

All in all, app is already usable. I also found out that the possible "lags" in UI that I had were related to the app being build in Debug mode. It turned out that when it's build in Debug mode, specifically when you use Compose, it will/can be laggy depending on how animation heavy it is... It took me a while to figure it out but it seems to be true as there is literally no other reason as all "heavy lifting" e.g. downloading data from REST server for Weather or Location services is done through coroutines that are not on the Mainthread.

[mplekunov]

Oh and I played around with animation, just to make something which is not too "advanced" but good enough for the eye. Well... I can definitely tell that front-end isn't really my forte... It looks semi-good though

[mplekunov]

• Need to fix Precipitation graph as it's not constrained to proper boundaries.

• After that I will have to add more json fields for Weather API Service to gather information about weather statistics units.

• Then I will need to create a bit more widgets (wind/pressure and stuff like that).

• Finally I will need to fix Themes because right now colors are random chosen... I just threw them around just to see UI and that's it. Potentially I want to go with minimalist Black-White-DarkGray design using only those three colors (maybe add some shades of gray for "shadows")

[mplekunov]

• Need to add AccuWeather API for Geocoding
• Need to add AccuWeather API for Weather Forecast