Term for cross-browser/desktop applications? - terminology

Is there a term that describes applications that can compile as both browser and desktop applications? An example would be an Adobe Flex application being compiled as a Flash application for display in a browser and also being compiled as an Air application to be run as a desktop application.

I think I've somewhere heard something along the lines of "Rich Internet Application with out-of-browser experience/functionality". Wikipedia on Adobe AIR says something like "browser-less RIA".

SAP seized the term "cross-client" for their own solutions and it's a shame.
I think that "cross-client app" is the best term (brief but yet comprehensive) to concisely define:
" an application that can be run as executable in any OS, and as a web app in any browser ".

Related

Using libGDX for business app

I am just looked at libGDX
Wikipedia says
It is cross-platform, supporting Windows, Linux, Mac OS X, Android, iOS, and web browsers with WebGL support.
Can I use it for non-game development, e.g. business app (that usually are database centric)
Are there widgets library and advanced widget like table?
Maybe there is some real cross-platform alternative (PC+mobile+web)...
Thanks to #Tenfour04
Scene2d.ui is starting point, there is dedicated page for Table
and generally read more at wiki

What means "runtime" in Intel XDK?

I am completely new to mobile development and i interested to hybrid apps and of course Intel XDK. When i reading Intel XDK's documentations i faced to "runtime" word.
What is mean of this phrase and actually what is it's mean when they saying
Crosswalk is a HTML5 runtime, ...
in their blog post.
Apologize me if I asking one of stackoverflow's stupid questions.
"Runtime" generally refers to the time a program runs, as opposed to other times in the programs life cycle like compile time. Software is typically written, then compiled, then deployed or installed, then run. These different phases are often referred to as "compile time", "install time" and "runtime". E.g. "at compile time, the compiler will ...".
"A runtime" is a software package that is necessary at, well, runtime. E.g. a library, interpreter, virtual machine or other such supporting packages. Crosswalk is a system that takes in HTML 5 "apps" (including HTML, Javascript etc.) and, well, makes them work. Executes them. Runs them. It's essentially a browser engine, but not packaged as a browser, just as a system that can interpret and run HTML 5, which you can embed into whatever other software you want.
So you could write your application in HTML 5; then to make that work like a native desktop application which can be downloaded and installed, you write a tiny Windows application and an OS X application which basically just contains Crosswalk, which runs your actual application inside it, cross-platform.
Run-time - the length of time it takes to execute a software program
The Intel XDK includes the Crosswalk runtime as a supported target of the cloud-based build service.
Crosswalk runtime can be used for creating HTML5 application with a dedicated runtime that can be run on multiple platforms without any dependency for webview. It can be used for creating application that uses HTML5 features like WebRTC, hardware-accelerated WebGL support and bleeding edge HTML5 features.
For more information please follow this resources..
crosswalk-runtime
more resources : Using the Intel XDK “Crosswalk for Android”

making Desktop Flash AS3 Air application without installing AIR

Well the title say it all.
So far i've been using flash IDE and publish it as AIR to make desktop app. But the down side of this is that users have to install adobe AIR in their computer before they can use this app.
So:
1. Is there a way to make desktop app without users installing adobe AIR using Flash IDE (coz AS3 is my favorite lang so far).
2. Is there another language or software I can learn, so when ever I make desktop app or perhaps mobile app users can just install it in their devices whithout having to install anything else.
I need all the insights I can get, So thanx in advance to all you guys :)
Since FlashBuilder 4.6 and Flash Professional CS6 you should be able to export your release build as "Signed application with captive runtime". If you choose so, the user will not need to install the AIR runtime.
MDM Zinc as .exe file! or else. http://www.multidmedia.com/ also for desktop Apps.
regards aktell
Users cannot use AIR apps without having AIR installed.
But do you really need AIR functionalities? Because you can publish .exe files with Flash, which simply embed Flash Player inside. If you target Windows platforms and you don't need anything special from AIR - this is a good choice.
Other than that - there are a lot of languages that can publish desktop apps, just browse around. .NET is one of the most used ones.

MVC4 mobile Web app into app store

I have developed an web app using MVC4- mobile and HTML5. Every things is working fine when we enter URL from any phone. But i am wondering how to convert my web app into hybrid app so that i could upload in istore or GooglePlay.
Please help me with the procedure or steps i need to follow and is there any tool other than phoneGap that i could use.
Thanks in advance.
There are few options but I will mention only two of them.
Most commonly used is a Phonegap/Cordova app wrapper framework (Also my main choice). Cordova is a new name for a Phonegap framework. It will give you an access to common mobile phone functionalities (Android, iPhone, Blackberry and WP7+). It is rather easy to use and there are a lot of vorking tutorials available, you can even find them in youtube.
Here's an phonegap link: http://cordova.apache.org/. There you will find tutorials how to install/configure it on all available platforms. This is a older link: enter link description here, it still has usable informations.
If in doubt always search for phonegap examples instead of cordova. For some reason Phonegap is still a mostly used name.
Here's an Phonegap + jQuery Mobile example: http://therockncoder.blogspot.com/2012/07/jquery-mobile-phonegap-and-camera.html, there you will find a github link for Android and iOS implementation.
Through the PhoneGap javascript APIs, the "web app" has access to the mobile phone functions such as Geolocation, Accelerometer Camera, Contacts, Database, File system, etc. Basically any function that the mobile phone SDK provides can be "bridged" to the javascript world. On the other hand, a normal web app that runs on the mobile web browser does not have access to most of these functions (security being the primary reason). Therefore, a PhoneGap app is more of a mobile app than a web app. You can certainly use PhoneGap to wrap a web app that does not use any PhoneGap APIs at all, but that is not what PhoneGap was created for.
Now some disadvantages. With PhoneGap for each platform you have to maintain a different project. The burden for that increases when there is a need to use multiple PhoneGap plugins because you need to search and update different files on each platform.
Mosync is also an excellent solution. This framework has a few things better handled then Phonegap. Like:
With MoSync you’ll have only one project to maintain for all the platforms. For iOS you will still need to use Xcode because MoSync outputs a project for it but, other than just building it, there is no need to dig deeper in Apple’s IDE.
The entire provided functionality for JavaScript is placed in the same file for all of the operating systems. There are no files for plugins because it has none (at least that I know of), but the same extensibility is achieved in ways described in the next section.
If there is some functionality that MoSync doesn’t provide on the JavaScript side, there are no plugins that you can use, but there is another way. MoSync provides a lot of features from the C++ side and if they aren’t accessible from JavaScript by default they can be easily made available. I’m sure that in the future the MoSync team will add more features to the JavaScript library.
With MoSync you are not restricted to only JavaScript frameworks to replicate native UI, you can truly create native UI elements that are more responsive using only JavaScript.
Rhomobile on the other hand is much less used thus a lot less supported.
I heard few good things about this framework but never had time to learn/use it.
RhoMobile applications are OS-agnostic, able to support enterprise-
and consumer-class operating systems including Windows® Embedded
Handheld, Windows® CE, Windows® Phone 7 Series, Apple® iOS, Android®
and BlackBerry®. You have complete control over how applications
behave on different devices. With RhoMobile Suite, you are finally
free from OS design constraints, able to create business applications
that are every bit as elegant looking and intuitive as their consumer
counterparts (This was copied from their main site).

Windows phone 7 and HTML5

I'm completely new to Windows Phone and the Windows galaxy in general as far as programming goes. For a project of a phone app that has to run on a windows phone, I started exploring the resources and I have some questions.
One of the problems I encountered is that things change very quickly. For example, answers to this question say that browsers in Windows Phone will most likely not support HTML5. However, there are many online tutorials (for instance here) introducing ASP.NET MVC 4 and how it is appropriate for mobile apps.
I would personally like to go the "HTML5+javascript" way instead of learning how to develop with Silverlight, which apparently has been discontinued by Microsoft. However, my first concern is evidently to be able to create an application that works!
So with that in mind, my questions are the following:
My impression is that HTML5+JS is being introduced in replacement of Silverlight and will be more used in the future. Is that correct?
Knowing that I have to build an app which should be able to play videos and audio, record audio, and connect to a library to do some speech processing in the background, should I use Silverlight or can I try using ASP.NET MVC 4? (From what I gather, Silverlight would be better than XNA)
Are there limitations to using HTML5+JS as compared to Silverlight or the other way around?
Can you package a web app (i.e. using HTML5+JS) to be used locally on the phone if there is no access to a distant server?
Any specific pointers or answers on these specific issues will be more than welcome! :)
Currently, Windows Phone 7.1 does not support full HTML5+JS as a replacement for Silverlight. In Windows 8 (NOT the next version of windows phone, but the next version of Microsoft's desktop OS), HTML5+JS is presented as an alternative to using XAML and C# (it's a little confusing because on Windows 8, "metro" apps do not run Silverlight, but they still operate using XAML and C#). But that's neither here nor there... To summarily answer your question(s): In the phone's browser, there is very limited HTML5 capability.
From what you've described, you definitely want to use Silverlight for your Windows Phone app. The answer to that part of your question has never changed, Silverlight from the beginning of WP7 would be your best option. XNA is exclusively designed for gaming development.
To answer all of your questions, point by point:
My impression is that HTML5+JS is being introduced in replacement of
Silverlight and will be more used in the future. Is that correct?
This has not been confirmed (as of this post), but speculation is that this will be the case in some future release of the OS (no word on when that may be). But no, this is not currently an option, and there is no promise from Microsoft that it ever will be.
Knowing that I have to build an app which should be able to play
videos and audio, record audio, and connect to a library to do some
speech processing in the background, should I use Silverlight or can I
try using ASP.NET MVC 4? (From what I gather, Silverlight would be
better than XNA)
Silverlight. Silverlight. Silverlight. :) ASP.NET + MVC will not work. XNA is intended to be used for building games. Attempting to build more standard user interfaces using it would give you a migraine to say the least, and would not look anywhere near good.
Are there limitations to using HTML5+JS as compared to Silverlight or the other way around?
and
Can you package a web app (i.e. using HTML5+JS) to be used locally on the phone if there is > no access to a distant server?
As answered above, there is no way to do this on the phone.
As for pointers on all of this. I strongly encourage you to simply google (or bing if you're into that kind of thing) "getting started with windows phone" or "windows phone tutorials". Best source I could point you to is the Windows Phone Developer website. It's got some great tutorials that don't assume you know lots about windows phone. Best to get this material from Microsoft. It'll be more reliable, more well written, and ultimatly more useful. I've been writing Windows Phone apps since before the phone was released, and I still use it for learning the basics of something new. Great place.