Application Ecosystem for the BlackBerry PlayBook

According to their press release, RIM has officially announced the ecosystem for applications that will run on the PlayBook tablet. Below is a quote from the release:

• BlackBerry PlayBook to support BlackBerry Java and Android apps
• Native C/C++ development support added, in addition to HTML5, Flash and AIR support
• Support from leading game engines: Ideaworks Labs (AirPlay) and Unity Technologies (Unity 3)
• BlackBerry PlayBook becomes a new market opportunity for all the developers who have already created over 25,000 BlackBerry Java apps and more than 200,000 Android apps 

The most important part for me, and something that I've been hoping for a long time, is the added support for Android. What RIM was lacking was an application ecosystem. This will not be the case anymore. And it is not only about Android in the end. Moving away from Java ME is the first step (still need it for existing applications). When you can write applications using HTML, Flash, C/C++, Java ME, and Android, you can't go wrong. There is no other ecosystem out there that provides such a diversity. 

Introducing BlackBerry 6

BlackBerry in Top 5 of Worldwide Mobile Phone Bestsellers

As per wired.com, RIM has replaced Motorola in the top five mobile phone companies worldwide based on Q1 2010 sales, and it's tied with Sony Ericsson for the number 4 spot:

This is not unexpected since when it comes to enterprise and messaging, there is nothing like the BlackBerry. On a side note, Motorola has actually had profit for the first quarter of 2010, earning $69 millions. Go Moto!

Perfect Mobile Platform

What would make up the perfect mobile platform? What characteristics should it posses? Here are some of them, in no specific order:

• User Interface/Experience - a rich user interface that provides a great user experience. When using the phone, everything should come naturally, with ease, and should have the WOW factor that makes you never want to leave the phone out of your hands. Doing common tasks should not take more than a few clicks. 
• Application Ecosystem - Having many applications to chose from is not as important as having quality applications, those that satisfy a particular need, like finding a place to eat, checking your email, or playing Doom. Integrating location, social networking, and sensors is a must.
• Internet Browsing - surf the Web from anywhere, on the go. A mobile browser should be able to render pages properly and fast, navigation should be done with ease, data should be compressed as to save bandwidth, and use the latest web technologies (HTML5, CSS, JavaScript, etc).
• Battery Life - it better not leave me hanging after a full day of use, or in the middle of a call, or while searching for a place to eat using the GPS. 
• Development Ecosystem - provide a rich set of APIs that can access all the features of the phone, and can provide the best user experience. Provide tools that can be used to make it easier to write apps. Publishing an application should not involve much hassle. 
• Openness - here I refer to not only an open and free platform, but to a platform that allows any mobile technology to work on it.
• Enterprise - features such as security, integration with email/calendar/notes/contacts servers, messaging, to name just a few. 

There is no one platform that satisfies all these needs better than any other platform. What is needed is a platform that has the user experience of iPhone and Android, the application ecosystem of iPhone (and Android very soon), the internet browsing of iPhone and Android (mostly any WebKit-based browsers), the battery life of the Blackberry, the development ecosystem of Android and iPhone, the openness of Android, and the enterprise characteristics of Blackberry. 

Will we ever have such a platform? I really doubt it. 

Smartphone Application Downloads Forecast

ABI Research has recently published a forecast for smartphone application downloads world wide for 2009 - 2015, and which can bee seen in the chart below:

While iPhone apps are still going to be the leading source of downloads, for the year of 2010, Android is expected to have over 800 millions application downloaded, a major increase compared to 2009. Beside iPhone and Android, Blackberry and Symbian are also catching up on sales. What all this means, at least for me, is that it is a great time to be a mobile developer :)

BlackBerry Flip and IBM's Spoken Web

RIM introduced the first BlackBerry Perl Flip 8220 smartphone. The official website for the phone can be found here. Taken from the RIM press release:

"The quad-band EDGE based BlackBerry Pearl Flip smartphone presents a sophisticated look with a sleek design and a chrome-finished frame surrounding its smooth, luminescent face. Packed with an abundance of powerful features, it weighs only 3.6 ounces and measures approximately 3.9” x 1.9” x 0.7”. Featuring two high-resolution, light-sensing color displays, the external LCD makes it easy to preview incoming emails, text messages and phone calls without opening the handset, while the large, 240 x 320 internal LCD displays messages, videos and web pages with impressive detail and contrast.

“The popularity of BlackBerry smartphones has grown tremendously around the world and the introduction of this exciting new flip phone will help extend the reach of the BlackBerry platform even further,” said Mike Lazaridis, President and Co-CEO, Research In Motion. “The BlackBerry Pearl Flip is a full-featured smartphone with a unique and friendly design and it is a natural choice for flip phone users who want to start doing more with their phone than just talk.”"

Voice quality is assured through the use of Speaker Independent Voice Recognition (SIVR) for Voice Activated Dialing (VAD). It includes "support for mp3 ring tones, smart dialing, conference calling, speed dialing, call forwarding, voicemail attachment playback and enhanced background noise cancellation. It also features a speakerphone and Bluetooth® 2.0 for use with hands-free headsets, stereo headsets, car kits and other Bluetooth peripherals such as a GPS receiver. The removable/rechargeable 900 mAhr battery provides four hours of talk time and over 14 days of standby time".

IBM is testing a voice-based web browser, developed under the "Spoken Web" project of IBM's India Research Laboratory. Some of the technologies used are Voice eXtensible Markup Language (VoiceXML) and HyperSpeech Transfer Protocol (HSTP). You can read more about it here.

BlackBerry JDE Plug-In for Eclipse

RIM came out with a beta version of the BlackBerry JDE Plug-In for Eclipse. You can now develop applications for the BlackBerry using my favorite IDE, Eclipse. The plug-in contains a subset of the features included in the BlackBerry Java Development Environment.

From the press release: "RIM values the Eclipse development community and recognizes the need for integrated tools that support the development of BlackBerry applications from within the Eclipse environment,” said David Yach, CTO for Software, Research In Motion. “The introduction of the BlackBerry JDE Plug-in for Eclipse builds on RIM’s robust offering of development tools to further enhance and simplify mobile application development for the BlackBerry platform."

Some of the characteristics are:

• Write, compile, and test Java Micro Edition-based applications that run on the BlackBerry smartphone.
• Simulates a wide range of BlackBerry smartphones.
• Includes several JSRs that you can use when developing your mobile application
• Leverages BlackBerry Enterprise Server
  

Read more about it here.