This is because writing Native apps means using the Native software development kits provided by the operating system vendors, so they have access to all of the lowest level APIs that are available on a particular device.

There are certainly examples of that and in a way it makes sense. Just briefly, the motivation for React Native comes out of this fact – I suppose it’s a fact, it’s debatable – but there’s places out there where people have done research that claim, anyway, that from a user perspective, Native apps are perceived as faster and better than the alternatives of hybrid or web apps, and we’ve had high-profile cases of companies like Facebook taking their app from a hybrid version and doubling down on Native. I think we all have some idea whether or not we’ve used React Native that it has something to do with mobile applications and React – that’s kind of right there in the name – but I think it’s helpful to know a little more about how React Native apps works. Let’s dive into the first topic today, which is a brief discussion of what React Native is. I know an awful lot about that, but had the chance in the course of preparing for this webinar to branch outside of Appium a little bit because when it comes to React Native, there are several other testing tools and methods that people tend to use, so I was able to have a look at those and at the end of the webinar will talk about how they compare with Appium and when you might want to use one or the other. So, it’s been six and a half years of hacking on Appium. I started writing the code for Appium back when it was a new thing in early 2013. I’ve been working with Appium for a long time. We do mobile automation strategy for primarily enterprise clients helping them get their mobile automation off the ground and meeting whatever challenges they have. I work for a company – I shouldn’t say I work for it – I basically am the entire company, I have a consulting firm called Cloud Grey.

So if you’re just joining us, don’t worry, I’ll be doing intro stuff for the next minute or so, so you can get in and get settled and run and make that last trip for coffee if that’s what you need to do. This is Jonathan Lipps and I’m here with the HeadSpin team and we are going to have a little half hour webinar this morning talking about automated testing for React Native apps with Appium. Learn about the pros & cons of using React Native for app development, how to test React Native app Appium, and a comparison between Appium and other apps.

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