Check out the Go Mobile Community
A new site catering to the mobile community has been launched. It includes a web-front to a database of over 2000 mobile devices. You can also find коли под наем information about how to Go Mobile in the Going Mobile 101 section. The site also includes an extensive list of device issues available for free. You also find industry links and news.
Visit компютриgomobile.tirawireless.com for more information and create an account for free.
One of the most crucial entry-level barriers to mobile software development is the wide variety of platforms. To date there are thousands of Java-enabled handsets. Large companies attempt to purchase as many devices as possible and thus cover their bases but what about the small and medium-size players?
Is buying every single device on the market an option? Clearly not.
One idea being tossed back and forth in the mobile industry is the concept of an universal emulator. That is, an emulator which would be able to emulate every single device out there. At present, device vendors such as Nokia, Motorola, and Sony Ericsson have been very good at providing free SDKs and emulators. The problems are still manifold. First of all, not every single device is supported, and the ones that are supported differ in the level of emulation accuracy compared to the actual device. In addition there is no real standard in terms of emulation, other than the Unified Emulator Interface (UEI) which is starting to pick up pace (using UEI emulators). Even if this does become the standard, we’d still have to support non-UEI emulators. Furthermore, managing all emulators from every single vendor would be a nightmare.
Here’s a proposed idea: test every single MIDP and CLDC api call on every single device
This is an almost impossible task of course. But if we did have this kind of data, and if it were always fresh and up-to-date, then we could more easily reproduce API bugs. We would essentially be aware of all KVM discrepancies in the market. We could even build a UI tool to emulate a real KVM which would thus reproducing every API bug on every device.
That’s as close as I can think of getting to the Universal Emulator idea.
With all the hype about mobile gaming, carriers and publishers are taking all the spotlight. Developers are left somewhere behind, armed with nothing more than their creativity and skills at hand. While bottom-up moves to empower developers are starting to increase (j2mepolish, eclipseme, etc) the real needs of developers are still not up on the priority lists of the movers and shakers in the industry.
Is that a problem? I think so.
After all, without developers, there’s no content. With the right amount of guidance, tools and incentives, I tend to believe a new breed of mobile developers would arise - hence the quality of the content would inherently increase. Branding does not mean higher quality apps. If indie developers were given an equal chance at distribution, mobile applications might become more adopted.
C’mon, give the little guy a break!
The Problem
There’s no easy way of getting a feel for a mobile game before actually buying it. Other than a crappy screenshot and a short description, it is the brand that sells a game, not the actual quality of it.
Idea: On-device mobile application bundle manager
Assuming the user would have the manager client installed on their device, then they could download sample 10-30 second game bundles which they would load into memory and use to get a feel of the actual game. Since in J2ME dynamic class loading is out of the question, one design choice would be to include a basic game skeleton in the client app which would act as a container for the game pack. The game bundle itself would of course have to be written according to some kind of custom language. In essence, the developer would write a short demo of their game in this custom language, add a few images (sprites, tiles, etc) then bundle everything up in some sort of binary, compressed format then publish it.
I don’t know about the killer app, but I’m more than certain that networked social apps are the way to go. The mobile device is by nature a tool for socializing. Time wasters (5-15 minute games) are surely in demand, as they represent the current ruling genre. But as far as mass distribution, I think it’s mobile networked social apps that will take the lead.
Are we ready for the jump yet?
Well yes and no. The biggest hurdle right now is networking: expensive data transfer rates, a wide variety of carrier-specific networking requirements and API’s and of course low latency. The next few years I expect to see more and more networked apps catering to wider audiences, aside from the regular under 25 male gamers.
How do you measure quality in the wireless software world?
While most of the traditional software measures still hold an significance importance (reliability, reusability, usability, etc). The quality of a wireless app tends to largely depend on the portability and usability aspects. A wireless app that runs on a limited amount of devices available on the market will have a much smaller chance of seeing the end of the distribution tunnel. Whereas a highly-portable application will definately gain faster acceptance on the publisher’s portfolio.
Furthermore, the limited user-input and display available on a mobile device represents a top measure for quality since the app usually has not more than a few minutes the impress the user and if he/she has a hard time figuring out what key or key sequence to press for a particular task, then all is lost.
While I haven’t even touched on performance and other crucial measures of a good app, I’m going to stick to my top 2 measures of quality:
1. Portability
2. Usability.
Here’s an idea about an app that would relate to a wider audience than the typical mobile gamers.
Idea: Personal relationships manager
The user would create a list of his/her close friends and family members and once in a while, he/she would rate a particular friend or family member based on certain criteria - friendliness, compassion, caring, etc. - on a scale of 1 to 10, based on events that happened during that particular day or say last few days. If the friend in question has the application as well, then the rating could go both ways. The user would then be presented with graphs representing “ups and downs” in his/her relationships.
Sounds simple? It is - that’s the point.
Ahead of the game now, but I expect widespread solutions to emerge within the next year or two.Why? Well for once, the mobile device is the most ubiquitous medium out there. Secondly, it lives right in the user’s pocket, next to the keys and wallet. Of course spam could be a problem but as with regular online marketing, smart solutions have emerged and have been popularly accepted and used. I expect to see the same for wireless. One solution would be to sell advertising space within an application or a game. It’s being done on the console, there’s no reason why it wouldn’t work on the mobile device.
Of course there are those who are beginning to try it out, but until widespread data connectivity hits, there’s not much future in this. But, as consumers start surfing the wireless web more often and start downloading content more and more often, these mobile marketing pioneers will be poised for action.
Big opportunities for mobile marketing up ahead…
The Problem
Mobile operators are the rulers of the wireless world. They control the last-mile, the link to the end-consumers, through their private mobile portals. Due this massive control, they have the final say as to what sells and what does not. Users have a wide variety of content available in the mobile catalogue but browsing the products is difficult, and the true value of the product is not truly visible. Especially for games, a game title, a small text description and an optional screen shot is all the user gets. It is no wonder that it is the branded content that wins the user’s attention, and thus large publishers focus on large brands, spending large amount of money for development. The small developers are left out the operator decks, since they cannot afford big brands. In many cases, the end users are disadvantaged since unbranded content does not necessarily imply lower quality.
A Potential Solution
A disruptive, end-to-end mobile distribution model, giving small developers a fair playing field, while empowering end users with more control over the process of browsing and purchasing content, such as ring-tones, wall-papers, games and applications. This model would compete directly with mobile operators.
How it would work
What happens if the Carrier blocks access to and from our servers?
Glad you asked. Let’s put it these way. They can block one, two, three, dozens of servers but not thousands. And where would we get thousands of servers? This is where P2P would come in. In a community-driven effort, P2P can always offer us a list of carrier “white-listed” addresses to and from our mobile clients.
If only the carriers would smarten up… Oh well, it’s up to the community - once again - to solve this problem.