What is Mobile Application Development

 Mobile Application Development

Mobile application development is a process that involves designing and writing code that runs on a mobile device. The mobile development process includes software engineering, testing, and distributing the resulting application for use. An application’s source code may be written using an object-oriented language such as Java, or a lower level language like C. The developer also needs to produce graphics and user interface artwork, obtain access to backend services such as data access with an API, implement these services by writing server side code that interfaces with the database, etc.

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Mobile Applications and Device Platforms

There are two dominant smartphone platforms in the market, one is the iOS platform from Apple Inc. The platform powers Apple’s popular line of iPhones, and allows developers to build apps for it. The second is the Android platform which is based on Linux and supports a variety of devices that run its operating system.

The operating systems for iOS and Android operate in quite different ways. Although there are some similarities between these two platforms when developing applications, there are various software development kits (SDKs) and development toolchains required when working for iOS versus Android. Apple only utilises iOS for its own devices, whereas Google makes Android available to other businesses as long as they follow certain conditions, such having certain Google applications on the devices they sell. By focusing on these two platforms, app developers may create software for hundreds of millions of devices.

Alternatives for Building Mobile Apps

When developing mobile applications, there are four main ways.

· Native Mobile Applications

· Cross-Platform Native Mobile Applications

· Hybrid Mobile Applications

· Progressive Web Applications

Each of these methods for creating mobile applications has a unique mix of benefits and drawbacks. Developers take into account the desired user experience, the computing resources and native features needed by the app, the development budget, time targets, and resources available for app maintenance when deciding on the best development approach for a project.

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Why Choose the Hybrid/Cross-platform Approach?

Native mobile applications require a highly specialized skill set to build. There are smaller, less vibrant developer communities for platform-specific versions of those languages and their respective integrated development environments. Companies often have difficulty hiring and retaining skilled native app developers on staff. In order to build their apps for them, they often resort to outside 3rd party design and development houses so they can efficiently deliver the native experience that users expect from their devices.

How Hybrid and Cross-platform Frameworks Work?

In contrast to native mobile apps, which are created using the platform’s native language, hybrid mobile apps let developers create web applications using HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript and then encapsulate those web applications in a container to make them behave like native apps on the device. The majority of the code from a web app can be utilised to construct a mobile app because hybrid mobile apps are simply web apps running in an embedded browser environment. For web developers who want to create mobile apps rapidly, hybrid development is a feasible solution as the rendering and runtime speed of mobile browsers continue to improve.

Similar to traditional web applications, PWAs are created using traditional web application programming languages and are initially accessed through a browser on the device or PC. These languages typically include some variation of JavaScript, HTML5, and CSS.

For better performance, some cross-platform frameworks, like Flutter and Xamarin, compile cross-platform code into native code, while others, like React Native and Native Script, provide native components to work with cross-platform code.

The Mobile Application Development Lifecycle

The “Front-End” of the mobile application, which is located on the mobile device, and the “Back-End” of the supporting services are its two interconnected key elements.

Front-end vs. Back-end

With the increased use of smartphones and tablets, more and more people are using their mobile devices as the central access point to applications. These applications have become increasingly complex with time, with some comprising of millions of lines of code. With this complexity, it is becoming difficult for developers to keep track of all the different dependencies between those services and data flows, especially when coupled with the fact that services are changing rapidly.

How Front-end ‘Talks’ to the Back-end?

Mobile applications often access services owned or operated by third parties through APIs. In order to use these services, developers may need to sign special contracts, which govern how much it will cost, how data can be transmitted, and what rights the developer has over their API. The mobile application developer may also need to pay a fee in order to obtain credentials and keys that allow them access to the APIs.

Why do Developers Use a Cloud-backend?

You may be creating an application that is highly dependent on back-end services. It can be difficult to manage these back-end services yourself, especially if you don’t have any experience managing cloud infrastructure or hosting servers. It is in these situations where using a cloud provider can really pay off by removing the need for you to worry about spinning up servers, installing software and maintaining the resource requirements of any infrastructure your application requires.

Key Mobile Application Services

This course will help you learn how to use and integrate various third-party services such as payment processors, setting up push notifications and analytics, logging user activity, managing app subscriptions and more. You’ll get an in-depth understanding of what each service does, why they are important and how they interact with the rest of the mobile application ecosystem.

The developers of today’s mobile applications have to deal with many issues that are not as common in an application development environment like a desktop or web. For example, they do not have the ability to run networks of devices in a lab environment before releasing a product and they do not have access to all of the tools they would like to help them handle the challenges of dealing with thousands or millions of users all trying to interact with their devices at once. What we have seen is that some organizations have made it easier for their developers by providing a development environment which makes integrating, using and consuming the most commonly required capabilities into their device easier.

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