Mobile usage and more specifically smartphone usage, represents a
unique opportunity for application developers and brand owners alike to
generate new revenue and brand awareness.
The combination of always on 3G Internet, GPS and portability, means that consumers are increasingly turning to their smartphones for business, shopping and leisure activities. Unlike open platforms such as the Internet, smartphones are separated by a range of operating systems, handsets and carrier support.
Market share Trends
The mobile operating systems to target are Apple's iPhone OS 3.0, RIM's Blackberry 4.6+ and Google's Android. These are the largest growing mobile OS platforms; others such as Symbian and Windows Mobile are experiencing slower growth in market share and also suffer from platform "fragmentation", further lowering their effective market share. Of all the competing operating systems, only the iPhone/iPod Touch allows for near universal application development.
The Risk of Fragmentation
Software fragmentation simply put, is the incompatibility that arises from software that starts from a common codebase and over time through updates and revisions, forks into multiple sets of unique code. A non-tech example would be the English language; today there are numerous dialects of English around the world. Some are easily recognizable, while others are beyond comprehension without a translation. Fragmentation, makes it impossible to create one version of an application per platform, instead the developer needs to craft multiple versions, each one tailored to a specific device or operating system.
There is significant platform fragmentation with non Apple devices, notably the Blackberry OS, with a large roster of legacy devices such as the blackberry 8100, 8700 and 8800 families. For example the Blackberry Storm 2 runs os5.0, has a touchscreen, accelerometerc and Open GL for 3d graphics. The Blackberry Bold 9700 however, launched at the same time uses the traditional keyboard/ non touch screen layout, does not include Open GL support and uses a different screen resolution.
Things are potentially worse with Google's Android, due to its open source nature and lack of standardized models. Each manufacturer can build a totally unique Android phone running on a variety of OS versions, ranging from Android 1.5, 1.6, 2.0, 2.0.1,and 2.1.
The iPhone line can be drawn into three main groupings; the original iPhone, the iPod Touch and the iPhone 3GS. The vast majority of software written for the platform will run on the original iphone, except for applications that use the compass, MMS, or GPS. The iPod Touch does not have a camera, so any app that needs a camera will not function. The iphone 3GS is the newest model and is becoming the baseline model for app developers, especially those utilizing live video and location based services.
When developing native apps for the Blackberry, the largest pool of compatible devices are the Blackberry Curve 8300, 8900 and the 8500 series, followed by the Bold 9000, Bold 9700 and the Blackberry Tour.
Android OS has a large number of devices, but models marketed under "with Google" can be thought of as reference phones with common specifications and functionality. The T-Mobile MyTouch 3G, T-Mobile G1, Sprint Samsung Moment, all fall in this category. HTC's customized Android devices are also popular; these include the HTC Hero and the Verizon Droid Eris.
App development tools
Native iPhone apps are built with Apple's Objective C language using Xcode and then submitted to the "App Store" for distribution to the general public. There are several third party tools that allow development with other languages such as Actionscipt (Flash CS5), Lua, and Javascript.
The third party development tools take higher-level scripting languages listed above, coverts the code into Objective C and also exports the finished app as a.ipa file for submission to the App Store. Each of these third party tools supports at least several unique iPhone features such as the accelerometer, multi touch input to varying degrees. Other features such as GPS location and the camera may be limited until these tools mature.
Blackberry apps can be built with the Blackberry JDE plug-in for Eclipse using the Java language. Applications can also be built with the Javascript based Phonegap, which may lower the level of developer experience needed to begin development. Blackberry apps can be sold via the official app store known as Blackberry App World or they can be sold through 3rd party providers such as Mobihand.com. Android is also based on Java, and it too uses Eclipse IDE with the Android Development Tools plugin. There is no oversight by Google on the types of apps that can be built for Android, Google, however does reserve the right to remove malicious apps.
Types of apps to create
On the iPhone, the majority of apps currently available are games; they can range from Adobe Flash games ported with minimal functionality to full 3d games using Unity 3d. Outside of games, many iPhone apps are mobile extensions of websites utilizing open API's. Examples include Tweetie 2 using the Twitter API, and Insight, which provides two-way syncing with Basecamp.
These apps can be built by single person/small teams and don't need custom designed artwork or interfaces. Today's independent game developers are being obscured by large studios with 3D artists, modelers and programmers with access to brand name IP's.
The majority of non gaming apps are complex widgets that communicate with 3rd party API's and follow Apple interface guidelines reducing the need for graphic artists.Android roughly parallels the iphone in with games being the most popular downloads followed by general interest apps.
Blackberry apps are primarily business applications such as Poynt, with fewer games on the platform compared to Apple and Google's offerings.
Currently, technology such as augmented reality, which overlays internet data, live camera feeds and GPS into a seamless experience, will begin to mature in the next year and become mainstream. Apps that utilize the camera to read barcodes for price comparisons will also gain prominence.
This article hopefully has given you a clearer understanding of the smartphone market and their associated ecosystems. Currently, web developers have been on the sidelines waiting for tools to mature and leverage their web based skills.
The combination of always on 3G Internet, GPS and portability, means that consumers are increasingly turning to their smartphones for business, shopping and leisure activities. Unlike open platforms such as the Internet, smartphones are separated by a range of operating systems, handsets and carrier support.
Market share Trends
The mobile operating systems to target are Apple's iPhone OS 3.0, RIM's Blackberry 4.6+ and Google's Android. These are the largest growing mobile OS platforms; others such as Symbian and Windows Mobile are experiencing slower growth in market share and also suffer from platform "fragmentation", further lowering their effective market share. Of all the competing operating systems, only the iPhone/iPod Touch allows for near universal application development.
The Risk of Fragmentation
Software fragmentation simply put, is the incompatibility that arises from software that starts from a common codebase and over time through updates and revisions, forks into multiple sets of unique code. A non-tech example would be the English language; today there are numerous dialects of English around the world. Some are easily recognizable, while others are beyond comprehension without a translation. Fragmentation, makes it impossible to create one version of an application per platform, instead the developer needs to craft multiple versions, each one tailored to a specific device or operating system.
There is significant platform fragmentation with non Apple devices, notably the Blackberry OS, with a large roster of legacy devices such as the blackberry 8100, 8700 and 8800 families. For example the Blackberry Storm 2 runs os5.0, has a touchscreen, accelerometerc and Open GL for 3d graphics. The Blackberry Bold 9700 however, launched at the same time uses the traditional keyboard/ non touch screen layout, does not include Open GL support and uses a different screen resolution.
Things are potentially worse with Google's Android, due to its open source nature and lack of standardized models. Each manufacturer can build a totally unique Android phone running on a variety of OS versions, ranging from Android 1.5, 1.6, 2.0, 2.0.1,and 2.1.
The iPhone line can be drawn into three main groupings; the original iPhone, the iPod Touch and the iPhone 3GS. The vast majority of software written for the platform will run on the original iphone, except for applications that use the compass, MMS, or GPS. The iPod Touch does not have a camera, so any app that needs a camera will not function. The iphone 3GS is the newest model and is becoming the baseline model for app developers, especially those utilizing live video and location based services.
When developing native apps for the Blackberry, the largest pool of compatible devices are the Blackberry Curve 8300, 8900 and the 8500 series, followed by the Bold 9000, Bold 9700 and the Blackberry Tour.
Android OS has a large number of devices, but models marketed under "with Google" can be thought of as reference phones with common specifications and functionality. The T-Mobile MyTouch 3G, T-Mobile G1, Sprint Samsung Moment, all fall in this category. HTC's customized Android devices are also popular; these include the HTC Hero and the Verizon Droid Eris.
App development tools
Native iPhone apps are built with Apple's Objective C language using Xcode and then submitted to the "App Store" for distribution to the general public. There are several third party tools that allow development with other languages such as Actionscipt (Flash CS5), Lua, and Javascript.
The third party development tools take higher-level scripting languages listed above, coverts the code into Objective C and also exports the finished app as a.ipa file for submission to the App Store. Each of these third party tools supports at least several unique iPhone features such as the accelerometer, multi touch input to varying degrees. Other features such as GPS location and the camera may be limited until these tools mature.
Blackberry apps can be built with the Blackberry JDE plug-in for Eclipse using the Java language. Applications can also be built with the Javascript based Phonegap, which may lower the level of developer experience needed to begin development. Blackberry apps can be sold via the official app store known as Blackberry App World or they can be sold through 3rd party providers such as Mobihand.com. Android is also based on Java, and it too uses Eclipse IDE with the Android Development Tools plugin. There is no oversight by Google on the types of apps that can be built for Android, Google, however does reserve the right to remove malicious apps.
Types of apps to create
On the iPhone, the majority of apps currently available are games; they can range from Adobe Flash games ported with minimal functionality to full 3d games using Unity 3d. Outside of games, many iPhone apps are mobile extensions of websites utilizing open API's. Examples include Tweetie 2 using the Twitter API, and Insight, which provides two-way syncing with Basecamp.
These apps can be built by single person/small teams and don't need custom designed artwork or interfaces. Today's independent game developers are being obscured by large studios with 3D artists, modelers and programmers with access to brand name IP's.
The majority of non gaming apps are complex widgets that communicate with 3rd party API's and follow Apple interface guidelines reducing the need for graphic artists.Android roughly parallels the iphone in with games being the most popular downloads followed by general interest apps.
Blackberry apps are primarily business applications such as Poynt, with fewer games on the platform compared to Apple and Google's offerings.
Currently, technology such as augmented reality, which overlays internet data, live camera feeds and GPS into a seamless experience, will begin to mature in the next year and become mainstream. Apps that utilize the camera to read barcodes for price comparisons will also gain prominence.
This article hopefully has given you a clearer understanding of the smartphone market and their associated ecosystems. Currently, web developers have been on the sidelines waiting for tools to mature and leverage their web based skills.
In 2010, there should be significant traction using common languaded such as Javascript, Actionscript and XML. Off-Site Services
plans to make extensive use of these and the native developer tools to
build new experieces for its client in the advertising and creative
industries.
Brent Gairy is technical director at oss-usa.com where he oversees website development for clients in the advertising, and creative industries.
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Brent Gairy is technical director at oss-usa.com where he oversees website development for clients in the advertising, and creative industries.
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