Learn Algolia, Nativescript and Particle

Today’s users expect great things from their search experiences — speed, relevance, and usability, to name a few. Algolia provides developers with out-of-the-box and customizable search experiences that are a joy to build.

This introductory course on the Algolia search solution focuses on the user-facing part of search. Using the Algolia InstantSearch.js front-end library, we’ll see how to build an engaging search experience in no time. (28 minutes, to be exact.) 

**Prerequisites:** 
You don’t need previous experience with search to follow this course — we’ll use an example index with an e-commerce data set preconfigured. We will work mainly in JavaScript, so basic JS knowledge is expected.

If you want to play with your own index settings and data set, you can [create a free Algolia account here](https://www.algolia.com/users/sign_up/hacker/?utm_medium=link&utm_source=egghead&utm_campaign=education), but this is not required to follow along with this first course. 

Algolia's full suite APIs enable teams to develop unique search and discovery experiences for their customers across all platforms and devices. Type a query. Click a link. Open an app. Everything your customers do sends a signal about what they want. Algolia decodes that intent to deliver the right content - instantly.

algolia

Getting Started with Algolia InstantSearch.js

NativeScript has the ability to write Objective C, Swift and Java apis directly from JavaScript and TypeScript. 

In this course, we will learn how to code directly against these native api’s with NativeScript for Angular. Many libraries are written and published in these languages. With NativeScript you are no longer limited to just JavaScript based libs, but have direct access to these api’s right from JavaScript/TypeScript. Let’s look at how to include these native libraries internally to your project as well as build public plugins to share with the community. 

We will cover some considerations with Objective C and Swift based libraries as well as Java/Android libraries. You can think of CocoaPod, Gradle, and Android Arsenal like npm for native libs. iOS libraries can be found via CocoaPods, Android libraries can be found via Gradle or Android Arsenal. 

Let’s also cover how to write custom view components based on native libs since there are considerations for both iOS and Android. Lastly we will learn how to best handle cases where a plugin/library only supports 1 platform.

Open source framework for building truly native mobile apps with Angular, TypeScript or JavaScript.

nativescript

Use Objective C, Swift and Java api’s in NativeScript for Angular iOS and Android apps 

In this course, we will learn how to use the core layouts for NativeScript apps. We will start with the basic principles of NativeScript layouts using XML. This course will use the app templates provided from the NativeScript framework and installed using [the NativeScript CLI](https://egghead.io/lessons/angular-1-x-set-up-a-native-app-project-with-the-nativescript-cli).

We will cover the following layouts: `StackLayout`, `WrapLayout`, `GridLayout`, `DockLayout`, `AbsoluteLayout` and `FlexboxLayout`. Understanding the concepts and usage of UI layouts in NativeScript is key for a great app.

Build Basic NativeScript App Templates

In this course, we will learn how to work with NativeScript for Angular. We will start with the basic fundamentals of getting setup to run our app in the iOS Simulator in addition to an Android emulator using GenyMotion (https://www.genymotion.com/). Understand how to build your native mobile views with NativeScript XML and how to style them with CSS. Using the NativeScript for Angular starter template provides a nice setup out of the box including the core theme which provides handy CSS classes to work with speeding up view building. For page navigation, we will learn how to use the Angular Router to configure a flexible routing setup for our app. The ListView component is a powerful and highly performant native control for handling your lists powered by the UITableView on iOS and native ListView widget on Android. We’ll highlight how you can use RxJS Observables with our native views. Let's also take a look at integrating npm plugins to enrich the UI component library. Lastly, a round up of styling how-to's including integrating SASS for custom app theme creation as well as creating a live app theme switcher.

This Angular course assumes a solid understanding of the fundamentals.
We have Intermediary Angular courses including topics on [Dependency Injection](https://egghead.io/courses/angular-dependency-injection-di-explained), [Components, Directives](https://egghead.io/courses/building-angular-components), [Forms](https://egghead.io/courses/intro-to-angular-forms), [Router](https://egghead.io/courses/intro-to-angular-router), and [Animating Web Apps](https://egghead.io/courses/animate-angular-web-applications)

Angular is a development platform for creating applications using modern web standards. Angular includes a wealth of essential features such as mobile gestures, animations, filtering, routing, data binding, security, internationalization, and beautiful UI components. It's extremely modular, lightweight, and easy to learn.

angular

Create Native Mobile Apps with NativeScript for Angular

The default core theme comes preinstalled and ready to go with every new project. Learn how to use some of the many helpful utility classes that are provided like common `btn` classes for Buttons, `h1`, `h2`, etc. Label classes and convenient `p-10` or `m-10` (shorthand margin/padding) classes ranging from 0 - 30. You can learn all about the rich options you get here: http://docs.nativescript.org/ui/theme

Style NativeScript views using the default core theme

We will learn how to add an Android library to our project and translate it’s Java api to NativeScript. For this lesson, we will look at [Filestack’s Android SDK](https://github.com/filestack/filepicker-android) built with Gradle. Specifically, we will cover how to immediately start working with the library even when a [NativeScript](/q/nativescript) plugin does not exist for it.

Use an Android library in NativeScript for Angular using Java apis

Java has been around a long time and when it comes to Android, you will encounter some structures that may throw you for a loop on how to code against with NativeScript. Let’s examine a few common Java/Android api constructs you may encounter and how to translate them to NativeScript. Learn how to get references to local files in your app using the ‘file-system’ module as well as how to take advantage of NativeScript’s Observable class to send notification events from one class to another. Lastly, look at considerations with Angular’s NgZone when handling your native libraries data events to update component view bindings.

Translate common Java/Android APIs into NativeScript for Angular Android apps

Objective C is a very interesting programming language which offers a lot of power as well as interesting paradigms. Let’s look at some Objective C api’s and how they translate to NativeScript. In particular, let’s learn how to wire up iOS delegates using [Filestack's FSPickerDelegate](https://github.com/filestack/FSPicker#fspickerdelegate) as an example. We will also look at handling WeakRef’s and iterating an NSArray.

Use Objective C Delegates in NativeScript for Angular iOS apps

One of the exciting benefits you have with NativeScript is the ability to write native code (Java and Objective C) directly in JavaScript/TypeScript allowing you to create a consistent high level api over top of both underlying iOS Objective C/Swift and Android Java apis. In this lesson, we will look at how to design a consistent api that taps into the appropriate native api’s on the target platforms using underlying native libraries.

Develop a consistent plugin api across your Android and iOS NativeScript app

To prepare your development environment to code against native apis such as Objective C, Swift and Java, let's learn how to [install tns-platform-declarations](https://www.npmjs.com/package/tns-platform-declarations) to provide rich intellisense support for all the native iOS and Android api’s. This lesson will cover how to modify your tsconfig.json and references.d.ts properly to ensure working with native api’s is smooth and as helpful as possible.

Prepare for native iOS and Android api intellisense with NativeScript

We will install the NativeScript CLI and use it to generate a project.


Set up a native mobile app using the NativeScript CLI

We can run our app in the iOS Simulator using the `tns` command line utilities. Also learn how to target specific simulator devices and versions. You must have a Mac to develop apps for iOS. Ensure you have XCode installed via the Mac App Store, and ensure you have opened it at least once to agree to the terms and install the additional components it may prompt about.

Preview NativeScript apps in the iOS Simulator

We will use the AbsoluteLayout component to create a layout container which uses left-top coordinates to position its child components in a NativeScript app.

Create an Absolute Positioned Layout Using AbsoluteLayout 

We can run our app in an Android emulator using GenyMotion, which provides flexible options and great performance. Let’s learn how to set one up and run our app in it. First install the Android SDK by installing Android Studio here: https://developer.android.com/studio/index.html. Then register for a GenyMotion account here: https://www.genymotion.com/account/create/. Once created and logged in, you will see a ‘Download’ button in the header where you can download the free tools.

Preview NativeScript Apps in the GenyMotion Android emulator

Let’s learn how to style those native views with CSS and understand a few things that are unique to the native platforms regarding styling. A good majority of standard web CSS properties are supported with the addition of a few like `horizontal-align` that are unique to native platforms.

Style NativeScript views using CSS

This is the fundamental building block for native views. Let’s understand the syntax and some of the options available to us to construct our views starting with Layout Containers. StackLayout and GridLayout containers are the most commonly used. Also learn about helpful snippets for a few popular IDE’s.

Create native mobile views using NativeScript XML

We will use the GridLayout component to create a layout container that can span any number of rows and columns. This allows us to create very complex UIs in a NativeScript app.

Make a Grid Layout Using GridLayouts 

We will use the WrapLayout component to create a layout that wraps UI widgets to a new row or column if no space is left in a NativeScript app.

Add Responsive Wrapping Using WrapLayout

Use the FlexboxLayout component to create a layout container that is based on the CSS flexbox-layout in modern browsers. We will examine several of the properties, behaviors, and benefits that the FlexboxLayout provides with native mobile UI layouts in a NativeScript app.

Create Flex Based Containers Using FlexboxLayout

Learn how to use the `nsRouterLinkActive` directive with options to control styling when a route is active in [NativeScript](/q/nativescript).

Add styles to active routes using nsRouterLinkActive

Learn how to use the `ActionBar` component to provide a title for your mobile view.

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