New market Survey on multi-platform app development

An ongoing platform and device fragmentation challenges developers and increases complexity and cost of mobile application development. Fragmentation not only includes operating systems and their different releases, but devices as well. Currently there are three major approaches to simplify application development: HTML5, multi-platform development tools and industry specific white-label solutions. The report compares multi-platform and white-label solutions of 60 key players in the market.

The “Multi-Platform App Development Service Market Report” provides an actual status on the multi-platform development service market. This report concentrates on the tools that help to reduce cost, time and risk in developing mobile applications. The targeted audience for the report includes CIOs and app managers responsible for application development and strategy as well as purchasing managers of companies who are planning to publish mobile applications. Mobile network operators (MNO) and mobile handset manufacturers will benefit from key insights into the application developer tool market to improve their app store ecosystems.

Some of the questions the report answers are:

• What are the ready-to-use solutions to reduce development cost and time to market?
• How stable are HTML5 standards and how well are they deployed?
• Which white-label solutions are available for retail, news, publishers, gastronomy, travel, and many other industries?
• Which operational systems and APIs do multi-platform solutions provide access to in 2012?
• Which features (e.g. sensors, calendar, etc.) are being accessible by multi-platform tools?
• What are the costs and benefits of multi-platform solutions?
• For which app projects should I make use of multi-platform tools?”

For more information. 

List of companies mentioned in the report (obviously there’s a lot that I even don’t know!)

• Adobe
• Airport Direct Travel
• Appcelerator
• AppMobi
• Appticity
• Appworks
• Artez Interactive
• Bizzness Apps
• Blue Shoe Mobile
• Butterware
• Corona Labs
• Craig Brass Systems
• Crossmobs
• DoubleDutch
• DragonRAD
• DWC
• EDGELIB
• GENWI
• Gizmo Farm
• Gomeeki
• Grapple Mobile
• IBM
• iGenApps
• Innaworks
• KIT Digital
• LiveCode
• Local Click Media
• Marmalade
• Media Quake
• Meteogroup
• MIT
• Mobcast
• Mobile Bytes
• MoSync
• mTrip
• Multichoiceapps
• Netbiscuits
• Nokia
• Order Mapper
• Pagesuite
• Point About Inc.
• Polar Mobile
• PutITout
• Quick Connect Family
• Rhomobile
• Rightware
• Runtime Revolution
• Shopgate
• ShopSavvy
• ShoutEm
• Smarter Agent
• Software AG
• Superwaba
• The Associated Press
• Unity Mobile
• Unity Technologies
• V4x
• Vopium
• WebMobi
• Worklight

Next big event downunder: Web Directions South 2012

Web Directions South 2012 will kick off on October 18th, held in lovely Sydney.
It offers nearly 50 sessions across 4 tracks over two fully catered days, plus a lavish reception to close day 1, and a closing party on Friday night.

Make sure to check out the agenda and to attend if you’re a developer.

From a technical perspective, as usual there will be a lot of talking around CSS, Javascript, frameworks, etc … interesting to spot Kendo UI among the exhibitors, as well as Drupal and Silverstripe for the CMS side of things, obviously betting on the developers community to grow their local footprint.

I have to confess I discovered 2 new names:

• Wakanda is a new Javascript stack (derived from JQuery) for web and mobile business apps. The name hinted at a kiwi background, but no, it’s more native American Indian, and more precisely Sioux.
• Stillalive is a live web app monitoring service, allowing you to write your own unit tests to try out your entire application. Nice cloud service for medium sized businesses and independent developers.

 

 

New UX contender: Kendo UI

.NET tools provider Telerik is adding support for tablets in its release of Kendo UI Complete.

Kendo UI is an HTML5, jQuery-based framework for building HTML apps. Todd Anglin, Telerik Vice President of HTML5 Web and Mobile Tools, said in a statement that the new release moves the product beyond mobile phones to help developers create experiences with HTML5 that look native on the iPad and other tablets.

Developers are increasingly using HTML5 tools and Javascript to create products that can run on a wide variety of devices and platforms. Telerik said that Kendo UI’s unified framework utilizes adaptive rendering so that an app’s look-and-feel can automatically adapt to the display and characteristics of “any smartphone or tablet device. Which is certainly true to an extent, as only webkit based browsers are fully supported.

But that’s a nice and worthwhile initiative to bookmark. I particularly like the Kendo UI Dojo, to learn how to use the framework, a neat job. Last but not least, the price point is agressive, at $1,000 per year with unlimited support for the full suite.

 

 

Gartner MQ for WCM 2012 is out

Every year, Gartner publishes one of their Magic Quadrants about Web Content Management Software, and you can count on leaders to spread the word and give access to the full report for free:

• SDL Tridion
• Sitecore
• Ektron

Gartner defines vendors in the Leaders quadrant as companies that drive market transformation, have the highest combined scores for ability to execute and completeness of vision and are prepared for the future with a clear vision.

Furthermore, Leaders have strong channel partners, a presence in multiple regions, consistent financial performance, broad platform support and good customer support. In addition, they dominate in one or more technologies or vertical markets. Leaders are aware of the ecosystem into which their own offerings need to fit.

More on Gartner WCM MQ 2012