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.
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.