Meet the GreenFlux crowd: Alfredo Bautista Santos

Who are the people working at GreenFlux? What do they do for work and what do they like doing when they are not working?

Welcome to the Meet the GreenFlux crowd series, where we will share interviews with our employees. Starting with the first interview, our Flutter expert Alfredo Bautista Santos.

About Alfredo

Could you give a brief introduction of who you are?

‘I was born in Malaga, Spain in '97, and I've always loved computers. Since I was a child, I’ve spent a lot of time studying computer science, fixing my friends’ computers, and fixing the computer at home. So, I’ve always loved computer science and I’ve always known I wanted to be a computer scientist.'

'In 2019, I started my journey in the tech communities around Malaga and Spain, organizing events like the first Flutter and Dart conference in Europe. I became a GDE (Google Developer Expert) for Flutter & Dart, which gave me the opportunity to share my knowledge and passion around Europe since 2022.'

'Apart from that, I’ve always loved walking around Malaga, having delicious speciality coffee on sunny terraces, and enjoying walks with my dog on the beach or at the many amazing places in Malaga.’

Can you tell me what you do at GreenFlux?

‘I am a front-end software developer. We make the Charge Assist application and all the white-label apps for our customers, based on our Charge Assist app.’

What are the core technologies and platforms used in GreenFlux’s solutions?

‘The main technology we use to build the GreenFlux Charge Assist app is Flutter. Flutter is an open-source cross-platform framework made by Google, which gives us the opportunity to use the same app for Android and IOS. That way, we can provide better value with only one code base.’

‘I felt very welcomed when I joined this company. All my colleagues helped me to have a smooth onboarding.'

About the GreenFlux culture

How were your first days at GreenFlux?

‘I felt very welcomed when I joined this company. All my colleagues helped me to have a smooth onboarding, which really helped me land in this new country and new company.’

What can you say about working at GreenFlux?

‘We have a very diverse work environment with people from around the world (31 nationalities, ed.). I think this helps us to think outside the box, have better ideas, and create better products because we have very different points of view.’

And is there maybe something that should be improved?

‘I guess we are on the way to becoming more agile in product development. We are improving a lot in how we work to deliver faster, better products. But, this is very challenging to achieve, because we need to work collaboratively across teams, pay more attention to feedback and be agile in the decisions we make.’

How do you find the work-life balance at GreenFlux?

‘Very nice! I think we have a very responsible team so that we can distribute the workload very well. We can find the best time to execute our work, which gives us the opportunity to find better schedules to be with our families, practice our hobbies, or be more relaxed about the incoming work.’

Careers at GreenFlux

Interested in joining us? Check out our available vacancies or send an open application.

About the Dutch culture

What were the most surprising, or funny, cultural differences you encountered when you first arrived in the Netherlands?

‘I guess it was the different times for eating here compared to Spain. In Spain, nobody is eating around 12.00, so we had to change our routines to fit more with the country's hours. It was quite a shock for us to have lunch at 12.00 and dinner around 19.00.’

How did you adapt to the Dutch work culture and etiquette?

‘I think it was a smooth transition because although there are some cultural differences between Spain and the Netherlands like food approach or relationships. However, I think we have a lot in common between our culture and the Dutch culture. And we have a strong relationship between people from both countries.’

'It was quite a shock for us to have lunch at 12.00 and dinner around 19.00.’

About Flutter

Why does GreenFlux use Flutter? What are the key advantages of using Flutter for app development compared to other frameworks?

‘GreenFlux uses Flutter for its speed of development, its native performance, and its cross-platform capabilities. It allows us to create attractive and efficient applications for iOS and Android with a single codebase, which optimizes time and resources.’

What are some common mistakes developers make when learning Flutter?

‘I think the first one is state management, which means managing the current data displayed to the user. We need to improve performance by avoiding over-repainting the UI while ensuring it is responsive and fast. This means we have real-time data quickly displayed to the user.'

‘And, of course, this is related to the app's architecture. Some developers don't pay enough attention to it, so when the app becomes very large, it is very hard to maintain over time, making it more prone to bugs.’

What are the emerging trends and challenges in Flutter development?

‘The trendiest topic in the Flutter ecosystem was and is "ambient computing", which means that as a developer, you only have to focus on the UX and can delegate the challenge of running on every platform to Flutter. You don't have to worry about whether your end-user has an iOS, Android, or desktop device or uses your app in a browser, on Smart TVs, or in car entertainment systems.'

‘If you are a company, you probably don't need a native product. You only need to deliver a good product for your end users, and Flutter is simply the best option for that.'

‘The biggest challenge, I would say, is becoming more visible in the tech ecosystem and onboarding more companies to start using Flutter for their products. This would help the Flutter package system and the framework itself become larger and more diverse. Now, Flutter is the most-used multiplatform framework, but it is still very young. So, we need more time to achieve this kind of "seniority”.’

Is there anything else you’d like to share about Flutter?

‘If you are a company, you probably don't need a native product. You only need to deliver a good product for your end users, and Flutter is simply the best option for that. You will see an increase in productivity and happiness in your development team because you can build great products with less code. And it’s easier to share between teams.'

‘If you are a developer, I would say that the experience of developing products with Flutter is amazing. It is fantastic how you can see how you are building the app in real life, with a very nice UI, in record time. And on top of that, you will be able to deploy on almost all platforms without any changes.’

About being a thought leader

You often speak at events. How can people track where you will be speaking?

‘I usually publish every talk on Twitter or “X” because almost all tech events have a Twitter account. So, I believe that is the best place to follow my incoming talks.'

‘Apart from that, we have a GDE (Google Developer Expert) directory where you can see more info about us and some incoming events from Google, so I think that is also a nice place to track.’

Where can people follow you to learn more about Flutter?

‘I post a lot of content with some learnings about Flutter or AI on my Medium account, so I think this is a good starting point. For people who prefer (Spanish) videos, I also have a YouTube channel that you could check to learn more about Flutter.’