Posted on October 16, 2009, at 12:16 pm .
RIM is hosting another BlackBerry developer webinar and it’s your chance to get an in depth look at BlackBerry development.
Building on the momentum of their extremely successful Web Development and Toolkits webinar, RIM will be hosting a webinar with a focus on Mobile Application Design Considerations for Java Developers. Details are as follows:
Presenter: Sarim Aziz, Senior Application Development Consultant, Developer Relations
Panelists: Mike Kirkup, Director, Developer Relations
Date: Tuesday October 20, 2009.
Time: 2:00 pm – 3:00 pm EST.
To register for the free webinar, or to simply get more information, follow this link to the webinar page.
Posted on October 6, 2009, at 10:06 am .
RIM have officially announced its BlackBerry Widget Software Development Kit (SDK), allowing developers to build apps using common web technologies. Included with the SDK is access to BlackBerry Widget APIs and other tools to easily create applications that can be distributed via BlackBerry App World or a BES.
BlackBerry Widget support will be available with BlackBerry OS 5.0, but developers can get a beta release of the Widget SDK today from blackberry.com/developers/widget.
While this SDK will allow developers to easily create web applications, one has to wonder if the apps that will be created will be of the same caliber that you currently see on App World. Apple’s App Store is plagued with what are called “bulk apps,” which are basically templated web apps that congest the market and don’t provide much added value.
There will be more news about BlackBerry Widgets at the BlackBerry Developer Conference and we hope to see you there.
Posted on September 10, 2009, at 11:21 am .
RIM will be hosting its first ever developer webinar at 2 pm EST today, September 10th. The free webinar will present an overview of web development for BlackBerry smartphones and describe best practices for creating great mobile web applications.
Today’s webinar will include:
- Demonstrations of the BlackBerry Plug-in for Microsoft Visual Studio v1.2 and the BlackBerry Web Development Plug-in for Eclipse v1.0.
- A discussion on the benefits of using these development tools to preview, debug and profile your web applications for the BlackBerry Browser.
- Tips & Tricks on how web applications can be optimized for the BlackBerry Browser and an overview of techniques to increase visibility of web content to the BlackBerry community.
- A Q&A period where answers to questions raised can be provided in real time.
If you can’t make the webinar, a recording will be made available a few days after.
If you’re interested in participating in the webinar, register now!
Posted on August 28, 2009, at 1:59 pm .
The developer community around the iPhone is fairly different from that of the BlackBerry developer community in that iPhone developers have OpenGL at their disposal, allowing them to create visually rich applications, as well as as the marketplace and demographics are slightly different. While the BlackBerry Storm is capable of running OpenGL hardware-wise, we have yet to see the API’s unlocked.
Lets assume for a moment, and this might be a crazy assumption, that BlackBerry had OpenGL API’s (possibly with the Storm 2?), and that any iPhone app you see could be ported to BlackBerry. For this to be true, we would also need to see device memory increase, as well as perhaps a built-in compass.
With those assumptions, and there may be a few more, what applications have you seen for iPhone, that you would like for BlackBerry? Or rather, what are your favorite iPhone apps that aren’t available for BlackBerry?
Here are some that I would like to see, and they’re mostly for entertainment. I’m sure there are a ton of apps out there in various categories so share what you find.
Click through for a list of 10 cool iPhone apps that aren’t available for BlackBerry
Posted on August 21, 2009, at 1:38 pm .
The BlackBerry Developer Conference is trying a new strategy this year when it comes to attending sessions. There are over 40 sessions from BlackBerry development experts at RIM and this year they have been organized using tags so you can choose ones that are applicable to you.
In his BlackBerry Developer’s Blog post, Mike Kirkup describes the new tag system and breaks them down as follows:
Audience
- Sessions are broken down based on the type of developer that may be most interested in attending this session including Commercial Enterprise Developers, Consumer Developers, Corporate Developers, Business (CIOs), and Application Architects/Designers.
Technology
- Sessions are broken down based on the core technology they would discuss or leverage including Java, Web, BlackBerry Enterprise Server, BlackBerry Internet Service, and BlackBerry Developer Tools.
Specialization
- Sessions are further categorized based on a specialization of the topic including Multimedia, Location Based Services, User Interface, and Security.
Technical Level
- Sessions are rated according to the expected knowledge level of attendees – introductory, intermediate and advanced.
Session Format and Attributes
- We also give you the ability to filter sessions based on the format of the session (eg. RIM-lead Sessions vs. Community sessions) or by attributes of the session itself (eg. does the presenter provide a demo or sample code).
Hope to see you there!
Posted on August 10, 2009, at 11:29 am .
BlackBerry MDS (Mobile Data System) is a development framework for BlackBerry that allows developers to use Visual Studio as a platform and use what RIM calls a RAD (rapid application development) method. The RAD development method involves a drag and drop interface where you can then create the code behind your forms to do the work.
This news comes after RIM announced new plug-ins for Eclipse and Visual Studio. It seems that RIM is focusing on the Java and web development platforms so platforms such as MDS are all getting canceled.
As of December 31st,2009, both BlackBerry MDS Runtime and Studio will no longer be available. Runtime and Studio will lose support as of June 30th, 2010.
[Thanks for the tip J.M.]
UPDATE: Official notice from RIM.
Posted on July 16, 2009, at 10:42 am .
How to write a BlackBerry application – Lesson 3: Open a webpage, system-wide menu Item, adding an icon and yes/no dialog
This is lesson 3 in a series of BlackBerry application development lessons. These lessons are intended to bring someone with no experience in developing applications for BlackBerry, up to speed with the latest development techniques. It’s easier than you think so try it out!
Before starting, this lesson, make sure you have read Lesson 1 and Lesson 2.
1. Go into the folder where your BlackBerry Lections.jdw file is
2. Create a folder there called Lection 3
3. Open up your JDE and open the Workspace called Lections.jdw
4. Right-Click on Lections.jdw
5. Select Create new Project
6. Name the Project Lection_3 and save it to the Folder \Lection 3
7. Copy the two files HelloWorld.java and Lesson3Screen.java into the \Lection 3 folder
8. In the JDE right-click on Lection_3 and add the two files HelloWorld.java and Lesson3Screen.java into the project
Click through for Lesson 3 of Fabian’s BlackBerry development series
Posted on July 15, 2009, at 12:52 pm .
A recent article in the WSJ points to success factors for developers with software in Apple’s App Store which could serve as great tips for BlackBerry developers in App World as well.
As App World and the App Store become increasingly cluttered with applications, developers are finding new and innovative ways to gain exposure for their software and push their products to the top.
Tip # 1 – Constantly experiment with price points
PopCap Games Inc., maker of the popular Bejeweled puzzle game, experimented in June by cutting the price on its Peggle game from to 99 cents from $4.99 for four days. Peggle, which had been ranked at around 60 in top paid apps, shot up to second place within 24 hours.
There are a variety of reasons why it’s important to experiment with pricing points. While one dollar may not seem like a lot of money, it could be just the right discount that your customer base needs. Also, discounts are news and news means more exposure. By lowering your prices, users will take notice and the news spreads virally, thus further helping downloads. PopCap has not commented on revenue, but said that sales during the discount period increased 20 to 25 times the previous volume.
Click through for tips and lessons learned that will help developers sell more software
Posted on July 14, 2009, at 12:22 pm .
Rhomobile is a company building an open source framework for business mobility solutions. This framework provides a new approach to mobile application development, that offers a comprehensive, modern, highly adaptable, and low cost solution for today’s smartphone app developer.
Tomorrow, Rhomobile will be announcing Rhodes 1.2 with support for push data on BlackBerry (and iPhone). The news is thanks to RIM making the push API’s available to developers, thereby imbuing BlackBerry applications with the power to instantly synchronize data.
Rhodes Features:
- Allows developers to write apps in HTML and simultaneously build as native apps for all smartphones
- Supports iPhone, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian and Android
- Makes developers five times more productive for even a single smartphone OS
- Support for Push Synchronized Data on iPhone and BlackBerry
- Full access to device capabilities: GPS, PIM contacts, camera
- Allows users to work with synced local data for rapid access and ease of operation when disconnected or offline
One of the complaints I hear from developers in the BlackBerry space, is that the BlackBerry development platform has fallen behind its competitors, in its ability to develop applications fast and with minimal overhead. While this is true in the consumer space, the development platform also provides a framework to develop robust applications that can service the most complicated of enterprise needs. Rhomobile could be just the framework needed to bring consumer application development up to par with the rest of the industry, while also giving enterprise a much needed boost of productivity.
The Rhodes framework is available at a flexible pricing range suitable for a variety of smartphone application efforts.
Posted on June 25, 2009, at 1:30 pm .
This article attempts to relay my experiences and lessons learned in the making of PodTrapper, my first mobile application for BlackBerry. It will cover development, pricing, marketing and sales in addition to other items I thought were relevant.
It all started in November of last year. I’m an avid podcast listener during my commutes, and at the time the only viable way to listen was to tote around my iPod. But I still needed my BlackBerry for work, so I was stuck with two devices. I had been toying with the idea of writing a podcast player for BlackBerry and with the announcement of the App World it was now or never. I’m hoping that the success of the iPhone App Store will enable other platforms to follow suit. Afterall, BlackBerry currently has more users and is shipping twice as many phones, albeit to users that may not know apps are available for their phone… yet. Plus the whole project sounded like a lot of fun.
I’ve read all the stories about iPhone developers making fortunes selling apps, how that may not really be the case, or even that people don’t even use the apps they download. I assumed that the truth was somewhere in the middle, but at the very least I wouldn’t have to carry two devices anymore.
So I bought myself a set of signing keys ($20) and went out to RIM’s developer site to grab their SDK. That’s when I ran into my first problem.
Continue reading Marcus Watkins’ experience developing for BlackBerry
