It is true that there are many other cross-platform mobile development options available – and for the record, I do refer to a few of the more popular ones in the book. The reason I support PhoneGap is that it’s the only cross-platform mobile development solution that allows you to write your apps with standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.
In other words, with PhoneGap, you write a normal web app and then drop it into native app wrappers for the various platforms. With all of the other cross-platform mobile options, you write code based on a proprietary framework that will only run as a native app.
For example, you can write a Titanium Mobile app using Appcelerator’s proprietary framework to create native apps. But Titanium Mobile won’t output your app in a way that will also run in a mobile browser.
Call me crazy, but I see the standards-based mobile web as the future of mobile computing. I don’t advocate cross-platform development approaches that conflict with this view.
Another thing to consider is the number of supported platforms. Titanium Mobile, for example, only supports iPhone and Android. As I write this, PhoneGap supports iPhone, Android, Palm, Symbian, Maemo, Windows Mobile, and Blackberry. And iPad and Windows Phone 7 are coming to PhoneGap soon.
If you have a big mobile project coming up, it would be a good idea to investigate your options. Ultimately, the best approach will depend on your target market and goals. My general advice to developers is that if you can build your app with standard HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, then you probably should leverage standards based technology.
Filed under: SDLC
Agree. You might want to write native apps if you were a game creator , you are building an app that does a lot of work locally on the device, or you are leveraging a lot of special features of the device (accelerometer, vibration, etc.) – or you are selling your app. But for a business that just wants to service its customers and sell products.. building with technologies the organization already knows, and supporting the widest base of users possible are key drivers to use a platform like Phonegap.