70: Jetpack Compose at Meta

Meta Tech Podcast

Introducing a new Android UI Framework like Jetpack Compose into an existing app is easy right? Import some AARs and code away. But what if your app has specific performance goals to meet, has existing design components, integrations with navigation and logging frameworks? That is where Summer and her team come in who handle large-scale migrations for Instagram. They aim to provide developers with the best possible experience when working on our code bases, even if that requires some temporary pain on the side of infrastructure teams that have to maintain multiple implementations at once. Why Summer thinks it is worth it, how they approach the rollout of a new framework and so much more is all discussed in episode 70.

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Links

• Jetpack Compose: https://developer.android.com/compose

• Litho: https://fblitho.com/

• Google Showcase: Meta built threads in only 5 months using Jetpack Compose: https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2023/10/meta-built-threads-in-only-5-months-using-jetpack-compose.html

• Flipper: https://fbflipper.com/

Timestamps

• Intro 0:06

• Intro Summer 1:29

• Notable differences moving from FB to IG 2:26

• The Instagram Data & UI Architecture team 2:58

• Why modernise? 3:44

• Where has the risk paid off? 6:08

• What does Compose look like? 7:49

• Compose v Litho 11:15

• Where does Litho still have the upper hand? 14:53

• Meta contributions to Compose 16:38

• Compose pitfalls 19:10

• Rolling Compose out across the company 20:13

• Design systems 22:12

• Downsides of establishing another UI framework? 24:22

• Rollout stages 28:43

• Experimentation stage 32:32

• Closed enrollment phase 38:15

• Graduation criteria 39:38

• Outro 42:20

• Bants 44:04