What is Mobile application development?
A mobile application connects to external computing resources through a network connection. Mobile application development simply involves creation for software applications for mobile phones. In totality, the mobile application development includes building software bundles (binaries, code, assets, and so on) that can be installed on target mobile devices, along with integration of backend services such as accessing data through APIs, and testing app on target devices.
Mobile App Development Demands Fool-proof Planning
The most crucial practice for app development, mobile or otherwise, is to recognize your (or your customer’s) business needs. Examine the desired capabilities to check their feasibility for inclusion in your mobile application. When you’ve already committed the time and money to build the web-based interface with supporting infrastructure, seeing that one or more of your critical client functionalities isn’t supported is both upsetting and counterproductive.
Alternatives for Developing Mobile Apps
When creating mobile applications, there are four key development ways to consider.
● Native Mobile Applications
● Hybrid Mobile Applications
● Cross-Platform Native Mobile Applications
● Progressive Web Applications
There are specific sets of benefits and drawbacks associated with each mobile app development technique. Therefore, developers assess the computational resources, desired user experience, and native features required for the app. They also consider time target, development budget, and resources available to maintain the app while selecting the development method for any project.
Native Applications
Native mobile apps are constructed using the programming languages and frameworks supported by the platform owner. So, they run directly on the operating system of the target device, be it iOS or Android.
Cross-Platform Applications
Native cross-platform mobile apps can be created using various frameworks and programming languages (not necessarily requiring platform owner support). However, the compilation is always done into a native app that can run directly on the target device’s operating system.
Hybrid-Web Applications
Hybrid mobile applications are bundled as app installation packages and constructed with conventional web technologies like HTML5, CSS, and JavaScript. Unlike native apps, they run on a “web container” which consists of browser runtime and a bridge that connects them to native device APIs using Apache Cordova.
Progressive Web Applications
PWAs allow businesses to avoid app store delivery, installation, and optimization. Therefore, they offer an excellent alternative to conventional mobile application development.
They are web applications that leverage a set of browser features to give users an ‘app-like experience, such as providing a link to the device’s home screen, running a background process, and working offline.
Mobile Web App Debugging and Testing
Debugging mobile web applications becomes a challenging and time-consuming task if you have to test it on multiple devices or install SDKs (which are always not accurate) for emulation of client’s preferred platforms.
In this regard, mobile web application development services offer one obvious benefit (in comparison to native mobile app development) of debugging for your application through regular browser-based developer tools.
Here are some prominent reasons why Chrome’s DevTools is favored:
Chrome’s DevTools has a mobile emulator: This may be an appropriate incentive to use Chrome for debugging mobile web apps on its own. Touch event emulation, network bandwidth throttling, user agent spoofing, geolocation overrides, CSS Media Type Emulation, and device orientation overrides are key features.
An editor that you can interact with: Ability to make on-the-fly changes to JavaScript or CSS.
High-quality Debugger for JavaScript: Allows for DOM breakpoints and the ability to profile the execution time of JavaScript code.
JSON and XML viewers are built-in: Removes the requirement for any server response inspection plugins.
USB support for the Android Debug Bridge (ADB) protocol: Allows for the quick start of a remote debugging session. (Google has a fantastic lesson on how to get started with remote debugging in Chrome).
Inspection of resources in real-time: Enables you to check local data sources (Web SQL or IndexedDB database), cookies, local and session storage, and cache resources for your app. You may analyze the visual resources in your application, such as photos, fonts, and style sheets.
You can use online tools like BrowserStack to assess the layout and cross-browser compatibility of your web application. Just by entering the URL, preferred browser, operating system, and version for your app, you can analyze the emulated view and loading speed for your app in the desired environment. CrossBrowserTesting is another handy tool for this purpose.
In conclusion
The demand for effective, user-friendly, high-performance mobile applications is projected to grow noticeably since mobile devices’ variety, quantity, and sophistication in the market and used today is growing rapidly. Consequently, being able to design these apps efficiently and adequately will continue to be critical.
All necessary points must be addressed when deciding between web, native, and hybrid mobile app choices. Each app type has its specific benefits, but mobile applications are undoubtedly the most cost-effective development (and thus time-to-market) alternative.
iWebServices, a mobile application development services company, can help you build fast, secure, and user-friendly mobile apps (iOS and Android) that cater to your business needs.