Cross platform application designing is the current trend in the mobile app industry as developers do not want to burn their resources by creating separate apps to run in various operating systems used within a modern enterprise. Here we list for software designers the most famous cross platform development tools to be used for compiling mobile applications that can run successfully in multiple OS platforms:
Cross platform application designing is the current trend in the mobile app industry as developers do not want to burn their resources by creating separate apps to run in various operating systems used within a modern enterprise. Here we list for software designers the most famous cross platform development tools to be used for compiling mobile applications that can run successfully in multiple OS platforms:
1. RhoMobile – This is a Ruby based open source framework which supports the creation of native mobile apps running on a wide range of operating systems and smartphones. RhoMobile staunchly stands by the mantra,
‘one codebase, every smartphone’. Apps built with this framework can run effectively on platforms like Android, iOS, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, and Symbian. The Rhodes tool of this framework allows the developer to make full use of the hardware features of a mobile device, including camera, GPS, and location data. The latest version of RhoMobile provides the RhoHub tool, which is used as a hosted development environment and RhoSync, which can be used as a standalone server to keep app data current on devices.
2. PhoneGap – This is a FOSS framework which is used for creating apps for iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Symbian, and Palm devices. Developers must be acquainted with the programming languages of HTML and JavaScript to access hardware features like camera, GPS, accelerometer, and sound of the mobile devices in which the cross compiles apps will be installed. PhoneGap offers the cross platform simulator called AIR app that helps developers access native APIs and build create well functioning mobile applications for every major platform.
3. Appcelerator Titanium – Also a FOSS framework, it allows the building of native apps for smartphones, tablets, and desktops, using the languages of HTML, JavaScript, Python, PHP, and Ruby. The Titanium framework allows developers access to over 300 social APIs and location information. The customizable metrics that come along with this framework allow storing of app data in mobile devices or on the cloud so that the developer can fully utilize the hardware features such as video camera capability of the device.
4. WidgetPad – An open source collaborative app development environment, this cross platform framework is used for building mobile applications for all contemporary smartphones using the programming languages of HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript. The tools of this framework are generally used for designing apps for the iOS and Android platforms. Developers can effectively conduct source code editing, project management, collaboration versioning, debugging, and distribution using the WidgetPad tools.
5. MoSync – This is yet another FOSS based cross platform app development framework that is based on common programming standards of SDK. The Eclipse based IDE of MoSync allows developers to create mobile apps using the C or C++ languages. Besides, support for other scripting languages like PHP, JavaScript, Ruby, and Python are also provided. The MoSync SDK integrates runtimes, device profiles, compilers, tools, libraries, and utilities. Developers can use this cross platform framework for building apps for the major OS platforms of Android, Windows Mobile, Symbian, and the mobile Linux distro Moblin. App development support on the iOS and BlackBerry platforms is expected to be introduced shortly.
Enterprises worldwide use mobile devices that run multiple OS platforms. In order to satisfy the mobile requirements of these organizations, the app developers need to show skills of application designing on each operating system. Thereby the necessity to master the use of the above listed cross platform frameworks.
