Anyone had experience with time-saving toolkits for Mobile Development?

I've done both iOS programming for iPad/iPhone and Android programming. All in the native platforms - Objective-C for iOS and Java for Android.  Conversion between the two is much easier than porting to basic or an other non-C-derived language, but still takes no small amount of effort.

There are toolkits that claim to make the development and porting much easier.  Specifically, MonoTouch by Novel and a tool called Sencha-touch.

Does anyone have an experience with these?

My past experience with toolkits that claim to save time has been much to the opposite.  Generally there is less initial development time, but maintainence becomes clumsy and cumbersome.

Any thoughts?

Views: 166

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Dan Woods on May 27, 2012 at 8:41pm

But why not use phonegap?

Permalink Reply by Nemanja Nesic - NEM- on May 27, 2012 at 8:41pm

Take a look at PhoneGap http://phonegap.com/

Permalink Reply by Kevin Neelands on May 28, 2012 at 8:28am

Have you used phonegap?  And if you did. did it save man-hours in the long run?

Permalink Reply by Richard Dean on May 28, 2012 at 11:17am

Yes, I would also like to hear about other's experience with PhoneGap.

Kevin Neelands said:

Have you used phonegap?  And if you did. did it save man-hours in the long run?

Permalink Reply by Jackie Gleason on May 28, 2012 at 2:10pm
Phone gap and titanium are good although you would have to follow their convention. I would say givin you are used to working in a c-based language you just use c then just implement the UI in objective-c or java. Or even better use a open gl es based UI library then it will run on both (basically what some frameworks do). I have been toying lately with the idea of using node native modules compiled for arm but I am still working on that.


P.S. you can compile objective c natively on android but not all the cocoa libraries (uikit) are open sourced yet.
Permalink Reply by Vlad Sanchez on May 28, 2012 at 2:21pm

Check out Corona. Although it is mostly used for game development, I've known many people using it for database applications lately. I've attended their last Meetup and it was an inspiring experience.

I personally was looking to overcome the fragmentation issues. After the meetup I realized there are no silver bullets. It's even a topic many people avoid talking about.

I hope this helps. Try Corona, it's free to try and very cheap to use commercially.

Permalink Reply by Jackie Gleason on May 28, 2012 at 6:36pm
Corona looks interesting but -1 for needing to buy and -1 for not having a responsive website

RSS

Happy 10th year, JCertif!

Notes

Welcome to Codetown!

Codetown is a social network. It's got blogs, forums, groups, personal pages and more! You might think of Codetown as a funky camper van with lots of compartments for your stuff and a great multimedia system, too! Best of all, Codetown has room for all of your friends.

When you create a profile for yourself you get a personal page automatically. That's where you can be creative and do your own thing. People who want to get to know you will click on your name or picture and…
Continue

Created by Michael Levin Dec 18, 2008 at 6:56pm. Last updated by Michael Levin May 4, 2018.

Looking for Jobs or Staff?

Check out the Codetown Jobs group.

 

Enjoy the site? Support Codetown with your donation.



InfoQ Reading List

Google Launches Gemini CLI: Open-Source Terminal AI Agent for Developers

Google has released Gemini CLI, a new open-source AI command-line interface that brings the full capabilities of its Gemini 2.5 Pro model directly into developers’ terminals. Designed for flexibility, transparency, and developer-first workflows, Gemini CLI provides high-performance, natural language AI assistance through a lightweight, locally accessible interface.

By Robert Krzaczyński

Databricks Contributes Spark Declarative Pipelines to Apache Spark

At the Databricks Data+AI Summit, held in San Francisco, USA, from June 10 to 12, Databricks announced that it is contributing the technology behind Delta Live Tables (DLT) to the Apache Spark project, where it will be called Spark Declarative Pipelines. This move will make it easier for Spark users to develop and maintain streaming pipelines, and furthers Databrick’s commitment to open source.

By Patrick Farry

Experiences from Using AI as a Software Architect

Artificial intelligence excels at refining language and processing large text volumes, but lacks human-like contextual reasoning and emotional intelligence, Avraham Poupko said. Many human traits come into play when doing software architecture. As an architect, he suggests using AI for exploring tradeoffs and refining language with clarity and precision.

By Ben Linders

Presentation: Security or Convenience - Why Not Both?

Dorota Parad shares the BLISS framework (Bulkheads, Levels, Impact, Simplicity, Pit of Success), explaining how we can eliminate productivity sacrifices made in the name of security. She discusses optimizing security practices to reduce friction, improve developer experience, and build more resilient systems that meet compliance without hindering innovation.

By Dorota Parad

DevSummit Boston: Key Lessons from Shipping AI Products Beyond the Hype

Phil Calçado, CEO of Outropy, shared key insights at the InfoQ Dev Summit on scaling generative AI products. He highlighted the need for effective workflows and agents in AI development, advocating for iterative approaches that leverage proven software engineering principles. His insights promise to guide teams in building resilient AI systems without reinventing the wheel.

By Andrew Hoblitzell

© 2025   Created by Michael Levin.   Powered by

Badges  |  Report an Issue  |  Terms of Service