Fliplet’s prefab approach to app building makes it easy to visually create 90% of your app from standard components. But we also anticipate that for 10% of your app you may want to add custom features where you have unique requirements. Often the best apps built on Fliplet have this mix of prefab and custom features.
For this reason, we created features in Fliplet that allow you to add in custom code to get the exact features you want. Find out more about using the Developer Options here.
Do I need to be a developer to add code to an app?
The short answer is “no”. While it helps to be a software developer, most of Fliplet’s users do not come from a developer background.
Typically the amount of code required to customize an app isn’t huge. We’ve tried to make things even simpler by providing lots of examples in the Code Library that you can cut and paste into your app. If you can’t find what you’re looking for please let us know via the help options in Fliplet Studio and we’ll point you in the right direction where possible.
Can I copy someone else’s code and change the bits I need to?
Absolutely. This is the reason behind Fliplet’s Code Library. We’ve provided examples of many of the common requests along with notes to help you understand how and why they work. The other key benefit of using web languages is that they have the deepest support network on the internet. You can find lots more code examples and libraries that you can reuse on CodePen, Stack Overflow and Github for example.
What software languages does Fliplet use?
Fliplet uses the 3 same languages as most websites. These are HTML, CSS and JavaScript.
A very brief intro to HTML
Broadly speaking, HTML sets out the content structure of the app eg, a title is followed by an image is followed by some text. It’s also possible to put certain elements inside of others so that they are grouped together (much like a desktop’s file structure – there are documents and folders that contain other documents).
Some good free resources on HTML are here and here.
A very brief intro to CSS
CSS is the language you use to style the HTML elements. You can change things like border color, shadows, font styles, background colors and positioning type.
Some good free resources on CSS are here and here.
A very brief intro to JavaScript
JavaScript is where you include the maths and logic into your app. While HTML and CSS are largely static (ie, HTML defines what is included, CSS defines the styles of what’s included), JavaScript takes care of interactions. For example “if a button is clicked do a calculation”, “when a screen is scrolled add an animation”, or “after a certain time get data from a remote location”.