Mobile development framework
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A multiple phone web based application framework is a software framework that is designed to support the development of phone applications that are written as embedded dynamic websites and may leverage native phone capabilities, like geo data or contact lists. For more general frameworks see List of rich internet application frameworks.
Current frameworks
Warning: this is not a full list of the best available frameworks. See Mobile_application_development#Platform_development_environment instead.
| Feature | PhoneGap | iUI | WorkLight | QuickConnectFamily | Big5Apps (discontinued) | Rhodes | Appcelerator Titanium | MobileReflex | iPFaces | MoSync | Canappi | Jmango | Eclipse Pulsar | mobl | Sencha Touch[1] | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Website | http://phonegap.com | http://www.iui-js.org | http://www.worklight.com | http://quickconnectfamily.org | http://big5apps.com | http://rhomobile.com | http://appcelerator.com | http://mobilereflex.com | http://www.ipfaces.org | http://www.mosync.com | http://www.canappi.com | http://www.j-mango.com/web/ | http://www.eclipse.org/pulsar/ | http://www.mobl-lang.org/ | http://www.sencha.com/products/touch/ | |||||
| Open Source License | MIT | New BSD | No | MIT | GPL v2 | MIT | Apache Public License v2, Proprietary | No | closed source freeware | GPL v2 (+ commercial edition) | No | MIT | GPL v3 (+commercial edition) | |||||||
| Free? | Yes | Yes | No | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes[2] | No | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | Yes | ||||||
| Framework target | Embedded applications | Web Applications | Embedded and Enterprise Applications | Embedded and Enterprise Applications | Web applications | Embedded applications | Embedded applications | Enterprise Applications | Enterprise Applications | Embedded and Enterprise Applications | Enterprise Applications | Web applications | ||||||||
| Development languages | HTML, Javascript | JavaScript, HTML and CSS | JavaScript, HTML and CSS, Native code or a combination of both | JavaScript, HTML, CSS for mobile and desktop apps. Objective-C, C++, PHP, Java, Erlang for Desktop and Server apps | HTML, Javascript | HTML, Javascript, Ruby | HTML, Javascript, [PHP, Ruby & Python for Desktop apps] | Java ME, C Sharp, Objective-C, JavaScript, Java, CSS for mobile and desktop apps. | PHP, ASP.NET, Java | C/C++ | Objective-C, PHP, SQL ,JavaScript, HTML, CSS, Java, Silverlight | mobl | HTML5, CSS3 , Javascript | |||||||
| Platforms |
| |||||||||||||||||||
| iOS support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | |||||||
| Android support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | On Roadmap | On Roadmap | Yes | On Roadmap | Yes | Yes | |||||||
| Blackberry support | Yes | Limited models | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Beta version | Yes | Beta version | No | No | Yes | ||||||||
| Palm WebOS support | Yes | Yes | For web apps | Yes | ? | No | ? | On roadmap | ? | ? | No | Yes | No | |||||||
| Symbian support | Yes | ? | For web apps | ? | ? | Yes | ? | On roadmap | ? | Yes | Yes | No | ||||||||
| Windows Mobile support | Yes[3] | Yes | Yes | On roadmap | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | On roadmap | Yes | On roadmap | No | ||||||||
| Other Device support | Tablet, Desktop and Web environments | Tablet, Desktop and Web environments | Linux & Mac | Tablets and Windows (Win32) | Windows, Linux & Mac | Linux, Windows | Java ME beta version, general web browser through XSLT | Java ME, Moblin | Tablet and Web environments | Webkit/Firefox desktop browsers | Webkit desktop browsers (chrome,safari) | |||||||||
| General |
| |||||||||||||||||||
| Enterprise data synchronization | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes, via RhoSync | No | No | On roadmap | On roadmap | Yes | |||||||||
| Multi-Threaded Applications | No | No | ? | Yes | ? | Yes, via Ruby | ? | ? | ? | ? | No | |||||||||
| File uploading | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | No | |||||||||
| Image Library Browsing | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | ? | On roadmap | Yes | |||||||||
| In Application Email | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | |||||||||
| Application distribution support | No | No | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes, via RhoGallery | Yes, via cloud services | AppStore, Cloud Services | AppStore, Cloud Services | On roadmap | No | |||||||||
| Distribution analytics | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | No | Yes, via cloud services | AppStore, Cloud Services | AppStore, Cloud Services | On roadmap | No | |||||||||
| Self contained, no web required | Yes | No | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes, Offline Support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes, Offline Support | |||||||
| Web Services | ? | ? | Yes | Yes (XML/JSON AJAX) | ? | Yes (REST or SOAP with JSON or XML) | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes (PHP/MySQL - XML/JSON - HTTP/SOAP) | Yes(JSON) | Yes(JSONP, JSON) | |||||||
| 'Mobile APIs support | ? | ? | Yes | Yes (SenchaTouch, JQTouch, etc.) | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes (Simple Connector Architecture, Facebook, Twitter, RSS, Twilio, AT&T -SMS, Location, IPTV) | |||||||||
| Able to access the web for data | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | |||||||
| Geolocation support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Cell-ID, GPS, DRM | Yes | Yes | ||||||||
| Vibration support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | On roadmap | |||||||||
| Accelerometer support | Yes, Blackberry requires OS 4.7 | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | On roadmap | On roadmap | Yes | ||||||||
| Sound (play) support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | |||||||||
| Sound (record) support | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | On roadmap | |||||||||
| Camera support | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | In beta | Yes | Using PhoneGap | ||||||||
| Zeroconf (Bonjour) support | ? | ? | ? | Yes | ? | ? | Partial[4] | No | No | No | No | |||||||||
| XMPP support | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Via JS | No | ? | ? | No | |||||||||
| File system IO support | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | |||||||||
| Gesture / Multitouch support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | |||||||
| Device Motion Event (accelerometer) support | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes (iOS) | ||||||||
| Device Orientation Event (accelerometer) support | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | ? | Yes | Yes (iOS) | ||||||||
| Native date/time picker support | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | ? | Yes | No | ||||||||
| SMS support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | Sending | Yes | No | ||||||||
| Telephone support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | No | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | |||||||
| Maps support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Via JS | Yes | ? | Beta | Yes | |||||||||
| Orientation change support | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | ||||||||
| Contact support | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | Yes | ? | ? | No | Through Phonegap | ||||||||
| SQLite support | Yes, not possible on Blackberry | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes | Yes | Yes | No | On roadmap | No Uses onboard storage and back-end databases via service layer | Yes | ||||||||
| Native Language Application Development support | No | No | Yes | Yes | No | Yes via Rhodes extensions | Yes | No | No | No | Yes | |||||||||
| Graph Library Support | ? | ? | Yes | Yes | ? | Yes via HTML5 SVG or Canvas | ? | ? | ? | ? | Yes | |||||||||
| Other notes | XML driven UI. | transparent caching of resources & data | ||||||||||||||||||
History
With mobile device manufactures each having its own preferred development environment, a growth mobile phone application developments that are World Wide Web capable and a large population of HTML savvy developers, there has arisen web based application frameworks to help developers write applications that can be deployed on multiple devices.
March 6, 2008 - the first iPhone SDK beta is released to a limited number of developers (4,000).
March 12, 2008 - the first versions of the QuickConnectJavaScript, QuickConnectPHP, and QuickConnectErlang frameworks made available to the public. These were focused on easing browser - server communication. QuickConnectJavaScript was the basis from which the first versions of QuickConnect for the iPhone were developed.
April 8, 2008 - iPhone OS 2.0b3 Beta 3 is released to the same set of developers. Lee Barney begins development of QuickConnect for the iPhone as a hybrid application framework. This is the first iPhone SKD release that included the UIWebView component. This component allows applications to display HTML and CSS pages and run JavaScript. No database support was included at this time. QuickConnect for the iPhone development began. It was a port and partial re-write of the earlier QuickConnectJavaScript 1.0 framework that had been made available in March of the same year.
May 23, 2008 - Lee Barney publishes a seminal posting 'UIWebView Example Code' on the tetontech blog describing and providing source code on how to call from JavaScript to Objective-C and from Objective-C back up to JavaScript. This posting has had over 60,000 hits.
May 29, 2008 - iPhone OS 2.0b6 Beta 6 is released. This is the first version of the UIWebView that included SQLite database support.
July 11, 2008 - iPhone OS 2.0 and the first release version of the iPhone SDK released. All developers could now download the SDK if they registered.
August 2008 iPhoneDevCamp in San Francisco - Nitobi begins development of PhoneGap.
November 11, 2008 - A port of QuickConnect made available for Mac desktop and laptop systems.
December 16, 2008 - version 1.0 of QuickConnect for the iPhone released. This included support for embedded Google maps, Geo location, SQLite support both in the browser and with installed databases, an AJAX wrapper, drag-and-drop, phone, email, audio file recording and playing, as well as other features.
January 16, 2009 - version 1.0 beta 1 of QuickConnect for Android released. This release was an eclipse project that could be imported by the user into their workspace.
August 29, 2009 - version 1.5 of QuickConnect for the iPhone released.
November 11, 2009 - version 1.6 beta 6 of the QuickConnect family made available. This included the first support for Palm WebOS. This support was provided by an Xcode template that would build, install, and run the application into the PalmWebOS emulator. An Xcode template for Android 2.0 support was also added. This template would build for both the emulator and the Android app store as well as install and run the application on the Android emulator Templates were now available for the iPhone, Android, and PalmWebOS mobile devices.
See also
- Mobile_application_development, esp. the "Platform development environment" section
References
- ^ http://blog.nowvu.com/2010/08/30/a-lightweight-method-to-check-sencha-touch-browser-compatibility-in-php/
- ^ Access to pre-release versions, beta previews, and some plug-in modules require a purchased subscription.
- ^ http://www.phonegap.com/features
- ^ Currently only iOS is supported.