Rikulo, Framework for Web & Native Mobile Applications, Makes Its Debut
Rikulo is a free and open source framework for creating incredible cross-platform web and native mobile applications in Dart & HTML5.
Rikulo was officially introduced to the Dart community around mid July and has attracted many interests and wide discussions amongst the Dart community since then. Rikulo stands for “clouded leopard” in an aborigine’s dialect and just like leopards who are fast and furious, Rikulo aims to solely provide developers with the easiest and most powerful ways to create applications by bringing structure to your user interface.
Native mobile applications can be built using Rikulo by accessing the device’s resources transparently achieving offline operation. As Rikulo leverages the technology of Cordova (PhoneGap), your application can run in cross-platform operating systems including iOS, Android, Blackberry, Windows Phone and others, avoiding the hassle of having to create different sets of code for different systems.
One of the major areas in which Rikulo and Dart shines is in the mobile arena where JavaScript is not suited to creating large applications but where HTML & CSS alone are not enough. Combining the structure, simplicity and power of Rikulo and Dart means that developers have an exciting way of creating native mobile applications. Rikulo applications can also be accessed directly through a modern web browser without any plug-in.
Google Dart has brought structured programming to the web allowing code to be run at the client and on the server. Rikulo pushes this philosophy further and place it into the user interface for both web and mobile. HTML and CSS are great for websites which contain a lot of textual content and with the advent of HTML 5 and CSS 3, even better features have been introduced. However, when creating complex applications, HTML and CSS can cause more problems than solved due to side-effects raised when creating and updating complex layouts.
Rikulo’s solution is “Structured UI Model” based on the philosophy which states “UI elements should be positioned using coordinates in relation to their parent”. This simple philosophy gives developers the power they require when laying out components while keeping the implementation simple. This simplicity is the key, shielding developers from any need to interact with the DOM. However, it is also easy for developers to take control over the layout as Rikulo’s View supports HTML markup which means that should you need HTML & CSS capabilities, it is readily available to you.
Rikulo’s rigid infrastructure not only makes it really easy to develop an application but also easy in creating a Rikulo component which gives developers more convenience, flexibility and adventure. For more information on Rikulo, remember to visit the official website.
