Cross Platform Phonegap App Development

As we all know, the world is moving towards cross platform app development. It is very important to choose appropriate technology for cross platform app development. In this blog, we will explore technologies for developing phonegap app.

The main building block of cross platform app is Javascript and hence deciding right javascript framework is very important. Framework should be

• Easy to understand
• Code should be maintainable
• Should takes care of memory optimization

Overview

The cross platform mobile app is nothing but a Single Page App executing in mobile OS environment. There are many javascript frameworks available for this, you can use any of these for cross platform development.

The two main components of the app architecture are

1. UI Technology
2. Backend Javascript Framework

Phonegap wraps around these components, which gives you cross platform app. You can select these two component separately and bundle them or there are many pre bundled frameworks which you can directly use.

UI Technologies

You can use from following alternatives

1. Bootstrap
   Bootstrap is one of the most popular CSS framework and has a strong community base. It provides plenty of the plugins which gives you almost similar look that of the Native UI component.
   
   
2. Zurb
   Zurb Foundation claims “Most Advance responsive front end framework in the world”. Foundation has good support for responsive design and has basic UI component as well. It’s easy to set up and learn. But currently it has less community support.
   
   
3. TopCoat 
   TopCoat also has some good UI component, you may check.
   
   

Javascript Technologies

1. AngularJS
   AngularJS getting popular very fast when it comes to javascript framework. Though at present it’s not that matured for mobile app development but its certainly one of the best. This video might help you get started with mobile app development using AngularJS.
   
   
2. BackboneJS 
   BackboneJS provides the MV* structure to your app. Its easy to learn and has great community support. But one place where it lags is it doesn’t provide any automatic way to avoid “Memory Leaks”, which is very important in SPA apps especially when you work on mobile browser (webview). In BackboneJS you have to take care of this stuff.
   
   

Bundle of UI and Javascript Technology

There are many pre bundled frameworks which provides you both UI and Javascript framework. We will explore few of them

1. jQuery Mobile 
   jQuery Mobile is one of the first framework that comes to your mind when you start with cross platform mobile development / responsive website. It’s very simple to work on it, especially for those who are already familiar with jQuery. But personally I don’t find its UI component that good looking also it also don’t provide any MV* structure to your code which is a must for the code maintainability when you have big project.
   
   
2. Sencha Touch
   Similar to ext.js Sencha provides the MV* structure and has its own UI component but learning Sencha or ext is tough initially.
   
   
3. PhoneJs
   PhoneJs is a commercial HTML5 based hybrid mobile app development framework. It has some good UI component if that suits your requirement and you are ready to empty your pocket then go for it!!
   
   
4. Ionic Framework
   Ionic is built on top of Angular.js and have some good UI component too, at the time of writing this its in Alpha phase. If it proves itself then it may become developers choice as popularity of angular is growing these days.

Few others frameworks are Kendo UI, Enyo, ChocolatechipUI  etc.

So that’s it for this post, comments are welcome!!