NativeScript is an open source framework that allows
you to create native iOS and Android apps, with one codebase, using the web
skills you already have (JavaScript and CSS) and the libraries you already
love.
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GraalVM
Score 9.1 out of 10
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GraalVM is a universal virtual machine for running applications written in JavaScript, Python, Ruby, R, JVM-based languages like Java, Scala, Groovy, Kotlin, Clojure, and LLVM-based languages such as C and C++.
GraalVM removes the isolation between programming languages and enables interoperability in a shared runtime. It can run either standalone or in the context of OpenJDK, Node.js or Oracle Database.
Oracle's GraalVM Enterprise is a multilingual virtual machine, which Oracle states…
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Pricing
NativeScript
GraalVM
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
NativeScript
GraalVM
Free Trial
Yes
Yes
Free/Freemium Version
Yes
Yes
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
No
No
Entry-level Setup Fee
No setup fee
Optional
Additional Details
The NativeScript framework and CLI are completely free and open source. NativeScript Sidekick is a free download to improve developer productivity with optional paid tiers for power users.
GraalVM Enterprise is an entitlement with Java SE Subscription at no additional cost.
NativeScript allows to easily integrate with native APIs by threading models. Moreover, the framework itself can be integrated with Angular, VueJS and JavaScript due to the fact that it was built on based on these frameworks. It allows you to easily maintain if you projects are based on these frameworks. Therefore, for the development of cross-platform applications it can be very handy!
If you want to have a cool VM, don't spend too much memory and mainly being multilanguage go ahead. Be aware there are some points that can be improved like a couple of languages are not accepted so far. Like used to, it's easy to use and you can find a lot of information regarding the tool so if you need to do something fast, it's a good choice.
True native app. The app uses native components and that is quite noticeable in the overall performance of the app. NativeScript is also awesome in the way we can access the native APIs, so we are never really constrained by the framework. If we need, we can just dive into the native APIs without leaving our environment and language (JS).
Cross-platform. Builds for Android and iOS. It deals with the platforms differences very well.
Support for Vue.js. Even though it is just a community effort, the NativeScript-Vue plugin is the best alternative to build native Apps with Vue.js. That was a major factor to go with NativeScript.
Nativescript runs everything on a single thread. i.e., the UI thread. If you want to offload some processing, you have to use web workers. This experience can be improved in the future releases.
Currently NativeScript only have hot reload when you change the UI file or Css file. There is no hot reload when you change Js/Ts file, unlike Google's Flutter. This is also something which NativeScript will get in the future releases.
In current version of NativeScript, there is no livesync when building with webpack. This feature will be added with NativeScript 4.x. (an RC version for 4.x is already available)
The hybrid is ok but native is better for performance and the right use case I want to go for is the performance without dealing with too many development tools.
My focus has been, and must remain, with obtaining support from web resources over that of paid support programs. Many companies, including those of government agencies, do not have a budget sufficient for paying large sums of money to other organizations to answer questions. Even in cases where an organization did purchase support programs, developers often found that the delays in obtaining responses to development issues was excessive. I give NativeScript the lowest possible rating, due to the fact that their website content is severely outdated and of little use to a developer in a crunch. The NativeScript environment may be far better than I have been able to report, but held back from excelling due to poor support content. Being that I am often asked to push the boundaries in various areas, improper documentation is highly detrimental to a development team, and thuss a review. I would be more than happy to improve this review as the content of the support documentation provided by the NativeScript team makes its way to their website in the form of real-world examples which are applicable to all versions, or at least the most recent versions, of their product.
The support we received when porting legacy applications from the GraalVM team and community was commendable. We were able to get assistance in introducing alternatives for the libraries we were using where appropriate. GraalVM support was also able to help us with some configuration options we were stuck with for configuring deployment environments on AWS compute.
NativeScript was indeed a better experience at first than Ionic. But the real game-changer in 2022 for cross-platform applications is Flutter now. We changed to it shorty after NativeScript, as it is much more stable, more widely supported, has a ton of extra features, and does not rely on JavaScript and Android knowledge as much as NativeScript.
The reason why we had to select GraalVM one is [a] cutting-edge compiling technique, GraalVM is well operated in the Environment of Open JDK, which speeds up the execution of Java programs. GraalVM makes creating packages and native apps simpler, and this improves distribution. It also brings native image support [that] makes compilation and distribution easy and effective.
We had built this particular app once already, during a 6 month time frame, using Ionic. When we hit the wall, we chose NativeScript, and built the whole app from scratch. We estimated another 6 months, but completed the work in 4 months due to the ease of use.
We have found collaboration with our client much easier because of the simplicity of releases and speed of development.
Having a tool like NativeScript has allowed us to make competitive quotes for mobile app development contracts, where previously that would have been closed to us due to our lack of native development experience. Being able to build iOS apps without a Swift-code expert has opened those doors for us.
Financial: Increased Java container count on the same hardware.
Performance: Decreased cold start time for container startup.
Training: Adopting GraalVM has a learning curve. This requires investment in time and resources. The benefits come through re-evaluating our current deployments for optimization.
