Fetch Charities and Categories, without showing the loading indicators on Donate Page

[yusuphjoluwasen]

Problem

The Donate page displays loading indicators while fetching charities and categories.

This results in a poor user experience, as users see spinners before they can interact with the form.

Expected Behavior

Fetch the charities and categories before rendering the Donate page, so the form is displayed only after the required data is available.

Current Behavior

• Donate page renders immediately.
• "Loading categories..." and "Loading charities..." indicators are shown.
• Once the requests complete, the dropdowns become available.

Proposed Solution

• Fetch charities and categories before navigating to or rendering the Donate page.
• Remove the loading indicators from the Donate page.

Benefits

• Cleaner UI with no unnecessary loading states.
• Faster perceived performance.
• Better user experience.

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[JaySmart001]

Hi, I'd like to pick this one up if it's still free. I work with Flutter daily and this looks like a state/prefetch change rather than anything structural. Happy to be assigned.

[yusuphjoluwasen]

Assigned to you @JaySmart001, Thanks.

[JaySmart001]

Update on this: I've got a change ready but I can't verify it locally, so I'd rather flag the blocker than push something untested.

The app cannot start on iOS as we are missing ios/Runner.xcodeproj. Documented in #459. The app doesn't start on Chrome either. Firebase.initializeApp() in main.dart is called without options and there's no firebase_options.dart or Firebase config in web/index.html, so it throws:

Assertion failed: options != null
"FirebaseOptions cannot be null when creating the default app."

Since that's before runApp(), it hangs on the splash screen.

I've created a .env with API_BASE_URL and USE_MOCK_DATA=true based on what I found in environment_config.dart and dependency.dart. Is that the right shape, and is there a .env.example or documented setup for contributors?

Also happy to run against the Firebase emulators if that's the intended local path - I noticed AppEnvironment.firebaseEmulatorConfig supports it, but I couldn't find the expected env var names.

Once I can actually run the app I'll finish verifying and open the PR.

[CherryCIC]

Thanks for flagging this, and for holding off on opening a PR until you could verify it.

You’re correct that the current web initialisation is currently broken because firebase_options.dart is missing, which causes Firebase.initializeApp() to fail before runApp(). We’ll investigate that alongside the missing ios/Runner.xcodeproj issue; which I am currently working to solve for you/ us.

Your .env shape is correct. API_BASE_URL and USE_MOCK_DATA are the expected variables, and these are documented in both .env.example and our contributor setup guide.

We’ll also clarify the expected Firebase emulator configuration, including the required environment variable names, as that documentation clearly needs improving.

Thanks again for raising this. Once we’ve resolved the local setup blockers, you should be able to verify your changes properly and get the PR opened.

Thanks again, your support is truly appreciated @JaySmart001 !

[yusuphjoluwasen]

you can now update your branch @JaySmart001, the xcodeproj has been added, I have also included a Google-Service Info.plist to fix the firebase initialization.