Fixing react-native-gesture-handler Build Errors in React Native Android Projects

Learn how to resolve build errors related to react-native-gesture-handler in Android projects by using specific stable library versions.
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This video is based on the question https://stackoverflow.com/q/79382399/ asked by the user 'Lucas Acuña' ( https://stackoverflow.com/u/17171194/ ) and on the answer https://stackoverflow.com/a/79390908/ provided by the user 'Lucas Acuña' ( https://stackoverflow.com/u/17171194/ ) at 'Stack Overflow' website. Thanks to these great users and Stackexchange community for their contributions.

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Introduction

When building a React Native app for Android, you may encounter errors during the Kotlin compilation of the react-native-gesture-handler package. This often happens due to incompatible or unstable package versions.

The Problem

The build error typically looks like:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

This error indicates a compilation failure that can stem from version mismatches or instability caused by floating version specifiers like ^ in your package.json.

Why Does This Happen?

The caret (^) in package.json allows npm or yarn to install newer minor or patch versions automatically.

Sometimes the latest minor versions may introduce breaking changes or incompatibilities with your current setup.

This leads to build failures or runtime issues, such as navigation problems.

Solution: Use Fixed Stable Versions

To fix this, pin the versions of your critical dependencies like react-native-gesture-handler and react-native-webview to known stable versions without the caret (^). For example:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

Steps:

Open your package.json.

Remove the ^ from react-native-gesture-handler and other relevant libraries.

Set them to specific stable versions.

Run npm install or yarn install to update the packages.

Clean your Android build cache:

[[See Video to Reveal this Text or Code Snippet]]

Rebuild your app.

Additional Recommendations

Keep your Kotlin version updated and consistent across the project (e.g., Kotlin 1.6.21).

Monitor changelogs of critical libraries for breaking changes.

Avoid automatically updating packages without testing.

Use exact versions in production to ensure stability.

Conclusion

Build errors with react-native-gesture-handler often stem from version incompatibilities caused by auto-updated dependencies. Pinning to specific, stable versions and cleaning your build artifacts resolves these issues and ensures consistent app behavior.



Remember: Version management is key in React Native projects to avoid unexpected build and runtime issues.