I'm really new with this thing of "Android development" and I was really excited when I found Appcelerator Titanium, but now I got the big surprise, it doesn't work on my computer. What other alternatives are there for Android development specially if they include HTML, JavaScript and CSS for creating such applications?
Everything you need to know is on the official site http://developer.android.com/
There is a very popular alternative for making Android and iOS apps with only HTML and JavaScript. It is called PhoneGap:
http://www.phonegap.com/
I think it is exactly what your looking for.
I hope this helps.
My first port of call would be to try and get on the trial of Google App Inventor. It's a really neat way of making Android apps. You can find out more here: http://appinventor.googlelabs.com/about/
A list of various alternative web-tech-based development frameworks is here
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multiple_phone_web_based_application_framework
having said that, I have succeeded in running Titanium on Vista and Ubuntu, so if you post the error you are getting someone might be able to help.
App Inventor is fun, although it isn't Javascript based.
You may want to try out Unify, a framework for developing web apps for major platforms (in the moment iOS, Android, webOS - more coming in the future). It is open source and has been released a few days ago. :-)
http://www.unify-project.org/
http://www.unify-training.com/
Get the SL4A app for android. It lets you run python scripts on your android.
Also, look into webview. It let's you load html.
Related
I read a lot of answers but i dont know wich is correct. Almost mobile browsers doesn support WEBGL, only newest. Almost script, libraries or plugins works with FLASH or WEBGL. I see and read a lot of your documentations and i dont know what to do. I need compatibility with almost smartphones in android and ios. I wanna use PHONEGAP platform to buil the app.
Can you guide me? Thanks a lot
Use CocoonJS instead of Cordova.
Check the Answer of this Question
I am looking into building my first Android application and was wondering what is the best approach to take for an experienced GWT developer.
During my research I found phone gap which helps you develop for multiple platforms using Html CSS and javascript, when I kept searching I found mgwt and gwt-phonegap which I guess will be great for a GWT developer. Before I start really looking into it I wanted to ask the experienced phone developers around here if I am in the right direction. Maybe using the plain SDK will be easier for me, after all I only want it to run on Android based phones. Maybe someone can offer other alternatives ? My application is pretty simple but demands using some of the phone's APIs like location and notifications.
Thanks!
You might be interested in this video which explains the basic concepts around mgwt and phonegap: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0V0CdhMFiao&feature=plcp
Of course there are many different ways that you can go with developing a mobile app and GWT and Phonegap is one of them.
I hope this question is specific enough. I have a client for whom I made an iOS native app and an Android native app (same app, different platform). It's a fixed pixel design (I made this work for Android somehow:) and it works on iPad, iPhone and most Android devices (with some letterboxing). Now I am asked to write the same app for the Windows store and they want me to use HTML and JavaScript. My question is, when I use HTML and JavaScript, would it be "easy" for me to use this code into some sort of hybrid solution (PhoneGap, etc)? The app doesn't need much complicated functionality but does need to support push notifications on iOS and it needs to be able to play videos, preferably HLS. Any advice on what the best hybrid solution and do hybrid solutions allow you to build for Windows 8?
I'm a cross-platform developer working on PhoneGap and Titanium Appcelerator. The correct answer is "It depends". Currently the state of cross-platform development is not very recommendable. Yes, you can write plugins for PhoneGap and it does support windows phone but you will have a ridiculously hard time getting them to communicate with each other properly. I learnt this from experience.
If it was a hacking/hobby project to further the cause then I would say go for it but for a time-bound client project like yours, I would recommend against cross-platform solutions and go native instead. Plus native always gives considerably better control, speed and ease of development. You will probably develop it faster in native than cross platform anyway. I've played around with windows SDK and it seems easy to use and well-built with good documentation and you can use C# which is similar to Java since you have already used it on android.
You can also build windows 8 desktop apps using html and javascript natively but this isn't present in windows phone 8 yet.
As I mentioned, If you don't need too many native controls, then you can go cross-platform. For your requirements, it can be done. If you have already developed android and ios apps and only need windows app now, then going native would be easier. But if you have to make all 3 then you can go cross platform if your requirements are restricted to what you mention. Here's a good quora thread that discusses the pro's and cons:
http://www.quora.com/Is-Titanium-good-for-developing-iPhone-apps
Take a look on Xamarin
Main idea - they brings real native code for all platforms.
They have instruments to compile C# code that it can be used at all platforms
For example you should create UI in XCode (for iPhone) and use ModoDevelop to create DAL/BLL, then you can re-use C# code base over all other platforms
They have cross-platform iPhone/Android/WP7/W8 samples on GitHub
Also see Q&A on Stackoverflow tagged Xamaring
We are starting to build multiple apps for multiple clients both in IOS and Android native platforms. The problem is we are going completely native which is taking too much time.
I would like to look at the linked in method (http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2012/10/a-behind-the-scenes-look-at-linkedins-mobile-engineering/) which is a more hybrid approach using HTML and native code.
The problem is I don't think Phonegap is that good - good for prototyping but maybe not for full versions of apps as it can be a bit slow and a bit buggy.
I would like to look into doing a model where we create like 65% HTML and 35% native to that device (like linked in)
Would anyone have any suggestions for this? Would people say we need a massive development team to pull such an approach off?
I welcome thought:)
Thanks
I'm a web developer in ASP.NET, C# and looking to start some mobile development. I'm aware Apple uses Objective C and Android uses Java, is there a way to create an app for both platforms or do I need to buy a Mac and some books on objective c and Java?
Thanks
You can use http://phonegap.com/ or http://www.appcelerator.com/platform to write cross-platform apps.
Rumour has it that Delphi XE3 (Due to come out soon) can be compiled onto Apple, Android, Windows 8 etc.etc. so if you can hold out a little longer that should be good!
For now, you are better using a mac (with XCode) to program for IOS or OSX as Apple is very particular and you need certificates for devices, projects, development and distribution etc.etc.etc.
Android i believe you have a bit more play with, but at the moment it is 2 seperate languages. Check out the DEV centres:
https://developer.apple.com
developer.android.com/
There are ways to create apps for both platforms, especially if you know web technologies : PhoneGap and others.
But like specified in the doc, you will most probably need an actual mac if you want to build to iOS
Although there are workarounds
You could use PhoneGap or Appcelerator. Haven't tried them myself, though. But with those tools you could build for both Android and iOS.
Since you are a .Net, C# developer, i recommend you to use Mono for Android, it comes with cost but will save you time and easy to deploy
http://xamarin.com/monoforandroid
The best way to be truly cross-platform is to develop for the web. I would include this in your consideration of development strategies, in addition to PhoneGap and Titanium, as Peter mentioned. You do not have as much access to core OS features, but that is improving all the time (see http://mobilehtml5.org/). Whether or not this is feasible depends on what you are trying to accomplish.
I want to develop a HTML5 Web App.
I read that in HTML5, you can use the new feature "Offline Web Applications"
With the *.manifest file
I read an article from november 2010, that this feature only works on the iOS platform.
Does it work on Android now?
Yes. It works on Android as well as iOS and most desktop browsers. You don't need PhoneGap unless you want to access native features or deploy to the App store.
UPDATE:
Check out this chapter from Jonathan Stark's book: Building Android Apps with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
In general, http://mobilehtml5.org/ provides nice mobile compatibility tables to answer this and other similar questions.
Yes it can. Here's an example for an offline game:
http://www.davidgranado.com/2010/11/make-a-set-mobile/
The one thing that sucks is that iOS generates a nice icon automatically. However, android doesn't. Also, I noticed that on random versions of android, it will display an error popup about the fact that it can't connect to the internet, but still runs fine after that.