We’re excited about the future of BlackBerry® as our strategy unfolds. The end-to-end BlackBerry environment offers the highest level of security for our enterprise customers and our commitment to BlackBerry 10 remains strong. We’ll continue to invest in and evolve the platform. As we move forward, we want to provide more details on our app platform for our developer community.
BlackBerry 10.3.3
We will keep developing and enhancing the BlackBerry 10 operating system. In fact, we are confirming plans to release platform updates focused on security and privacy enhancements, with version 10.3.3 scheduled to be available in early 2016.
App Development
BlackBerry will continue to support our current development environments for Native, Cascades and Web app development. Additionally, new BlackBerry 10 OS releases will be tested against our current toolset to ensure you can continue to build BlackBerry apps.
- Native – Our current development environment is robust and, as such, there are no plans to schedule releases of new SDKs and APIs. New APIs will be released as required.
- Cascades – We currently support Qt 4.8 on BlackBerry 10. There are no plans to move to Qt 5.x.
- Web – WebWorks applications are supported through the latest updates to Apache Cordova. Cordova is an open source project under the Apache Foundation, with significant community support. WebWorks 2.0 is based on an older version of Cordova, but you can update your applications to the newest Cordova and BlackBerry platform with minimal impact, using just two commands. Your existing applications will continue to work on future BlackBerry 10 releases. Any further updates to our web platform/plugins will go into Apache’s Cordova project.
- Android Runtime for BlackBerry 10 – BlackBerry 10 will continue to support the current release of the Android Runtime (ART) and packaging tools to create a .bar file to submit to BlackBerry World. There are no plans to remove the Android Runtime from BlackBerry 10.
App distribution
BlackBerry will also continue to support BlackBerry World for distributing apps for BlackBerry 10 and BlackBerry OS subscribers. It is the place to find business and productivity apps.
The Amazon Appstore is the place for the latest apps and games on BlackBerry 10*.
As always, developers can choose to distribute their apps through whichever store they wish.
Ready for Work
BlackBerry will continue to support BlackBerry 10 app development for enterprises through BES12 to securely connect mission-critical systems and data behind the firewall. The corporate apps managed through a BES environment will continue to support deployment and management of new and existing BlackBerry 10 apps.
We also provide a secure approach to managing and distributing native Android and iOS apps using Secure Work Space, Samsung KNOX, and Android™ for Work. As always, BES can be relied upon to easily manage cross-platform devices.
BES12.2+ support for Android for Work means fast, simple and secure integration with your enterprise environment. Seamless integration with Google Play™ for Work allows for easy access to IT-managed apps through BES12.
We still love our Devs!
While there are many changes for BlackBerry, our commitment to our developer community is unwavering. We’ve recently refreshed Developer Zone at http://developer.blackberry.com to provide easy access to all the different types of developers visiting the site.
For enterprise developers, our BlackBerry Enterprise Partner Program provides the tools, resources and support to help Independent Software Vendors build enterprise apps and help corporate app developers build in-house apps for their organization.
Finally, we continue to support all developers on our support forums, developer blog, BBM Developer Channel and other social channels to keep important information flowing between us and the committed BlackBerry developer community.
*The Amazon Appstore is available on BlackBerry 10.2.1 devices and higher.
