ANDROID PROGRAMMING
Digital Assignment
THARUN RAAJ – 15MIS1016
Discuss any 3 tools and libraries for cross platform mobile application development.
- Appcelerator
Cross-platform developers can use this tool to build, test, connect, and
eventually measure the functionality of the built app. It favors
JavaScript programming. The universal code concept applies here.
Developers can implement one code base across multiple platforms
from Android and iOS to Windows Phone and BlackBerry to speed up
product development and delivery.
Pros
It’s suitable for rapid application development. Developers can
build a prototype of the app in a quick and easy way to evaluate
the user interaction with the UI.
It possesses a schema-less data store called ArrowDB that lets
you deploy data models with zero setup efforts.
It facilitates seamless integration to existing continuous delivery
systems like SCM and MDM solutions.
It’s equipped with pre-built connectors available for MS Azure,
MS SQL, Salesforce, MongoDB, Box, and various others
Cons
Appcelerator is known to be a bit buggy and laggy, though the newer
version is more stable. There are also user complaints about poor
support from its developer community
- Sencha Ext JS
It houses a robust data package (to support interaction with an array
of back-end data sources) and 115+ high-performance, pre-tested,
and integrated UI components, including calendar, grids, charts, and
more. The framework unleashes the potential of HTML5 on modern
browsers.
Introducing Sencha Pivot Grid and D3 adapter, Sencha Ext JS enables
developers to build apps with great business intelligence (BI) for data
visualization and analytics. Ext JS Grid and Advanced Charting package
analyze and interpret millions of records with ease.
Pros
It features built-in native-looking themes for every major
platform.
It supports Android, iOS, BlackBerry, Windows Phone, and more.
Its backend data package works independently with different
data sources.
It supports PhoneGap/Cordova integration for native API access
and packaging.
Cons
Few choices regarding choosing the themes for the target
platforms.
Licensing complexity with the commercial version.
- MonoCross
MonoCross supports the development of cross-platform apps with C#,
Microsoft .NET and the Mono framework.
Developers can retain the coding of application, controller, and model
across different platforms while playing with the platform container
and the view, that is, user-interface, to deliver a native experience
across all key platforms. Also, it makes app porting easier than ever.
Thus, businesses can cope with the
rapid changes in platforms.
Pros
Supporting a diverse range of APIs, MonoCross makes it easier
to utilize the complete capability of the device.
Support for third-party APIs also reduces the development time
as developers don't have to struggle with the low-level
intricacies of every platform.
Using MonoCross to develop apps requires only C# and .NET
compatibility.
Cons
Cross-platform developers, particularly beginners, struggle with its
usability and features as little documentation and support resources
are available online.
