And, if you’re attending BlackBerry DevCon Americas, be sure to check out the following session on Wednesday October 19th:

Tips and Tricks for Balancing Life and App Development from a Working Mother
Think application development is too time consuming? Come hear how a working mother with one-year-old twins used the time-saving features of the BlackBerry® WebWorks™ Platform.
Kathryn Lahrs with Self Employed

Register for BlackBerry DevCon Americas today and don’t miss it!

To carve out a presence in the mobile app world, Kathryn Lahrs needs the mobile app development process to be simple and fun. As a part-time developer, Kathryn has harnessed the BlackBerry® WebWorks™ platform to create several successful applications, from the nostalgic game Mash to the family-friendly Santa Tracker. Her current challenge takes advantage of a huge opportunity: full integration with the new BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) 6.0 platform. Between her job and her one-and-a-half year old twin daughters, Kathryn works to find time to develop apps.

Kathryn tells us about using the BlackBerry WebWorks platform, working with Research In Motion® (RIM®) and what exciting BBM™ 6.0 apps are coming in the near future.

Let’s talk about the apps you’ve been developing for BBM 6.0. How are they integrated with native applications?

The first app is PowWow, a social gathering app. You’ll be able to connect to any of your contacts, invite them to events and track their RSVP status – and the event details go straight into the calendar on your BlackBerry smartphone. The basic version will be free, and in the paid version you’ll be able to check your friend’s calendar for their availability – you’ll even be able to check their current GPS location if you’re lost or waiting for them. One of the best features is that it is all running in the background on BBM – you don’t even need to have the app open. The other app will also be plugged into BBM, but based on study groups. Doing these apps has been almost addictive. It’s been a great deal of fun to build them from scratch.

Tell me about the response that the Santa Tracker application received.

The Santa Tracker app was a fun Christmastime app that received a lot of attention. It sold more than 3,000 copies at $1.99 per download. The response was wonderful and families really enjoyed being able to use an app with their kids. When RIM found out about the app, they helped give it an extra push.

Why has the BlackBerry WebWorks platform been so useful for you?

I’m comfortable with environments like HTML, JavaScript®, and Visual Studio, so BlackBerry WebWorks was really simple to get into. After a quick learning curve, it’s pretty easy to see how everything functions and how data is passed and what I need to look for in apps. It also gives you options when working with Java code, so you’re not limited. And I really like the way the web apps look and feel. I think BlackBerry WebWorks is going to take apps to the next level. I’m a mother of twins and developing part time and it still only took me three weeks to develop Mash.

How has your relationship with the RIM team helped your app development?

RIM has been really helpful in a couple of ways. RIM feels like a family environment where everybody truly wants you to do well. I started with the BlackBerry WebWorks environment in its infancy and connected right away with RIM over email. They introduced me to a broad network of people within the company and they were all really supportive. I just didn’t see that hands-on, help-me-in-any-way-possible atmosphere anywhere else. The forums are the same way – BlackBerry developers genuinely want to help each other. Any time I’ve come up against a problem, I put it out there to other developers and typically I receive a great response.

Be sure to check out Lahrs Apps for the latest and greatest apps from Kathryn!

Have you ever wondered how playing video games can change the world? I’m thrilled to announce that visionary game designer and futurist, Jane McGonigal, will be speaking at BlackBerry® DevCon Americas 2011 on Wednesday October 19, 2011.

Her recent book, Reality is Broken: Why Games Make Us Better and How They Can Change the World, explores how some of the most difficult challenges facing humanity can be resolved by tapping into the skills demonstrated in gameplay. Think of how video games offer stimulating challenges, exhilarating rewards, epic victories and collaboration with trusted team members -and then imagine if those same skills could be applied to your next project!

Ms. McGonigal is an engaging speaker whose work offers entertaining and inspiring research. Her credentials include being the director of Game Research and Development at the Institute for the Future, Creative Director of Social Chocolate, and a successful game developer for reality games such as EVOKE, World Without Oil, Crypt Zoo and Superstruct.

As part of her participation in BlackBerry DevCon Americas, Ms. McGonigal will also hear five pitches from application developers and give feedback into how to improve their apps. Stay tuned on how you can be part of the collaborative session!

Don’t miss this inspiring speaker: register now to attend BlackBerry DevCon Americas on October 18-20, 2011 in San Francisco, CA.

Over last few weeks, we’ve featured some great success stories from our BlackBerry® developer community. In today’s post, we’re featuring the story of Jingu, a social app from Jingu Apps Inc. which leverages the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) social platform to allow users to create avatars, upload emoticons and chat with friends. Jingu counted over 700,000 downloads in its first month and has since soared past 1 million downloads – and still counting!

We asked Pankaj Gogia, founder of Jingu Apps Inc. (a BlackBerry smartphone app development company in Toronto, Ontario, Canada), about the inspiration for Jingu and their experience developing for the BlackBerry platform.

“I’ve been a BlackBerry smartphone user for more than 10 years – right from the beginning. And one of the key features is BlackBerry Messenger. BBM is so personal and the idea for Jingu – to create 500+ emoticons – was to stimulate conversations by allowing people to show their uniqueness and their personalities, with custom avatars and distinctive emoticons.”

“One of the big differentiators for Research In Motion® (RIM®) is that you can actually integrate with the native applications on BlackBerry devices, which I don’t think a lot of the other platforms allow. So you can make your app operate seamlessly.”

Pankaj goes on to say that the relationship with RIM was another key ingredient to success and lead to the integration of BlackBerry Advertising Service to monetize the app. “One of our contacts at RIM suggested we get on BlackBerry Advertising Service and it’s been really easy to use. And that relationship with RIM is another advantage.”

What’s next for Jingu?

“Well, I was surprised by how many downloads I was getting even before we were featured in the BlackBerry App World™ storefront. Within hours, people were already talking about it on social networks. One change will be to add an app payment capability on the next release or the release after that. For me, the big thing about the future is that my success so far has given me the confidence to invest more in the company.”

We wish Pankaj and the Jingu Inc. team continued success.

Stay tuned here for more developer stories! We’d also love to hear more of your success stories – please tell us about them in the comments.

Like many other Adobe® Flash® and Adobe® AIR® developers we’ve met since we announced the Adobe Flash-loving BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet, Robert Podgorski and Michal Wroblewski from FlexibleAIR have a great success story to tell when it comes to developing for the BlackBerry® Tablet OS. As a small team of Adobe Flash developers from Poznan, Poland, they created the extremely addictive game Doodle Blast, which has already racked up tens of thousands of downloads in the short time it’s been available.

We asked Robert and Michal what convinced them to develop for the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet over other tablets:

“There were a few reasons we were attracted to the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. For one, it is the first device with a true dual-core processing unit. We tested Doodle Blast on single core devices, and they didn’t measure up to the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. It was really the dual processing that enabled us to build a game that users are going to really love. The second big thing is the size. The BlackBerry PlayBook tablet is the ideal screen size for Doodle Blast because you need to draw lines by hand. We couldn’t play the game on a ten-inch screen.”

That’s so true! I thought about all the times I’ve played the game while on the move, where resting it on a table or my lap wasn’t possible.

And what can Robert and Michal tell us about their experience with the BlackBerry App World™ storefront? “BlackBerry App World has given us great advantages and has made it much easier to get through to users. The opportunity for growth has been a major advantage with the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, and we don’t think we would have the same success with other platforms.”

Of course, we couldn’t let Robert and Michal leave without asking them about their plans beyond the current free version of Doodle Blast. They said the team has plans to monetize their app with an exciting new paid version of the game that, for those Doodle Blast addicts among you, looks to be more elaborate than the first free version.

More Doodle Blast = I’m too excited to sleep!

In just a short couple of months, some of the best community developers, key partners and industry gurus the world has to offer will gather to lead more than 30 sessions at BlackBerry® DevCon Americas 2011. This year’s event runs from October 18-20 in San Francisco, California, and it’s a great opportunity to interact with experts on BlackBerry products and learn from their expertise.

Where else can you meet technical wizards from Adobe® for a bootcamp on Abobe® AIR® for the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet? Or hear first-hand from innovators like Xtreme Labs, Penrillian, and Magmic (a game-developer dynamo responsible for Rubik’s® Cube, The New York Times® Crosswords, THKLive and Ka-Glom)? This is the place to learn how Universal Mind built a fantasy football app, how Assanka created The Financial Times app and how PricewaterhouseCoopers builds corporate mobile apps.

What else are our community leaders covering?

• Learn how to use the time-saving features of the BlackBerry® WebWorks™ Platform to build BlackBerry apps
• Understand how to build and test BlackBerry applications using the BlackBerry Java® Development Environment
• Learn how to make stunning visual apps faster
• Find out how to squeeze more from an accelerometer
• Take your mobile campaign from basic to buzz with marketing tips

To tap into this vast community know-how, all you have to do is register for BlackBerry DevCon Americas 2011. For more details on community-led sessions at the event, please visit our session catalog!

BlackBerry® DevCon Americas 2011 is coming up fast – October 18-20 in San Francisco. We’re just putting the finishing touches on the session catalog and we’re so excited about the quality and quantity of the sessions this year, we couldn’t resist giving you a sneak peek.

More than 100 sessions will be led by experts from Research In Motion® (RIM®), our partners, and app-focused companies from around the world. It’s a great opportunity to take away tips, advice, instruction and even code that can make your development work go faster and smoother!

The session categories featured this year cover the hottest BlackBerry development topics, including:

• Java® Development for BlackBerry® 7
• WebKit and BlackBerry® WebWorks™ Platform Development
• BlackBerry® Tablet OS Development, including Native SDK, Adobe® AIR® and Adobe® Flash® and Android™ Player
• BlackBerry® Platform Services and the BBM™ Social Platform
• Tips and tools for debugging and optimizing your apps
• User interface and user experience tools and best practices
• Developing quality enterprise applications
• Marketing and distributing your applications

Make sure you check out the full session catalog when it’s ready in a few weeks. And don’t forget to register for BlackBerry DevCon Americas by August 26 to receive the early bird rate!

With the BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) v6.0 client now officially launched, we’re excited to announce that the BlackBerry® Partners Fund’s 2011 BlackBerry® Developers Challenge has just opened submissions for the ‘Most Addictive Social App Using the BBM Social Platform’ competition*! You can now test the apps you’ve been creating with the BlackBerry® Messenger SDK against the gold release of the BBM v6.0 client and submit them to the competition. If you haven’t created an app yet that integrates BBM features, you still have time to get to work. Submissions for the BBM competition close September 23rd and we’ve compiled a list of resources to help you get started:

Three-part webcast series: ‘Integrating with the BBM Social Platform, One Step at a Time’

• Step 1: Viral Distribution and the BBM Contact List
• Step 2: User Profile and Custom Profile Box
• Step 3: BBM Chat and Embedding Chat within your App

Blog posts:

• BBM Social Platform – Help Your App Go Viral!

Tools and Resources:

• Visit the BlackBerry Messenger Social platform landing page to download the latest BBM™ SDK and documentation. You can find the BBM v6.0 gold client in the BlackBerry App World™ storefront.
• Twitterview with Research In Motion® (RIM®) development experts on @BlackBerryDev – Tuesday August 2nd at 2:30pm EDT. Bring your BBM questions!

We look forward to seeing your creative ideas come to life through your apps! Submit your app to the ‘Most Addictive Social App Using the BBM Social Platform’ competition today and be among the first to be considered for an incentive prize package (see the terms and conditions). For more information on this year’s BlackBerry Developer Challenge, see http://www.blackberry.com/developers/challenge.

*No purchase necessary. Submission deadline: 11:59PM EST on September 23, 2011. See Terms and Conditions for complete details and restrictions. Void where prohibited.

The last few weeks have been very busy for the BlackBerry® platform teams! We’ve launched important updates to our BlackBerry® WebWorks™ SDK (v2.1) for both the BlackBerry Tablet® OS and smartphone OS, as well as the BlackBerry® Tablet OS SDK for Adobe® AIR® (in addition to working with Adobe® to include optimized support for the BlackBerry Tablet OS in Adobe® Flash® Builder 4.5!). Also, we’ve released BlackBerry® Messenger (BBM™) Social Platform SDK 1.0 for BlackBerry® Java® SDK along with a beta version of the platform for BlackBerry WebWorks.

We also shared lots of significant information including new screen resolutions and simulators for upcoming BlackBerry® 7 OS devices, stats about the new OS and the BlackBerry App World™ storefront to help you choose a target OS for your app (psst – 88% of free downloads and 94% of paid downloads originate from smartphones running OS 5 and OS 6!), and an article on using BlackBerry WebWorks to build both Tablet OS and smartphone OS apps — plus we’re running a series of webinars on app development for BlackBerry 7 OS and the BBM Social Platform.

While all of this was going on, we’ve also been hearing some great stories from our developer community, and I wanted to highlight just a few. Stay tuned here for more stories as we plan to make success stories a regular feature on the blog!

• Have you heard of Jingu? This social app from Jingu Apps Inc. allows users to create avatars for BBM, access a wide assortment of new emoticons and participate in a new social environment. In a very short time, Jingu has surpassed a million downloads.
• Spice Labs Pvt Ltd. have seen more than 16 million downloads of their paid and free applications, which include Hangman and HangmanKids. Spice Labs is focused on games with an educational twist and look to engage and teach children and youth.
• WeatherEye HD is an application for the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet that was built using the BlackBerry WebWorks toolset and is not only visually rich, but is also designed to take advantage of the BlackBerry WebWorks tools to create a deep app experience. In a short period of time, this app has seen more than 50,000 downloads.
• Doodle Blast on the BlackBerry PlayBook is an addictive game that has hooked family and friends. Users create “ink” pathways to get balls to fall into a container and achieve levels. They have had almost 50,000 downloads since the launch of their application.
• Crystal Balls from ingames is a simple game where players must combine three or more balls of the same color to make them explode – it’s like TETRIS® meets Gem Swap. The Crystal Ball Free version is almost at one million downloads now.

So obviously, not only have we been busy, but clearly our developer community has been busy too! Way to go BlackBerry Devs! Please leave us comments with your success stories – we love to hear them.

As we plan excitedly and build passionately towards BlackBerry® DEVCON Americas, BlackBerry DEVCON Asia and BlackBerry DEVCON Europe, we’re taking the opportunity again to ask you about your highlights from 2010 and requests for BlackBerry DEVCON Americas – the first stop in our world series of developer events.

My top three personal favorite moments from 2010 were:

• Meeting with BlackBerry Developer Group Managers from around the world at a special reception in The View lounge on the 39th floor of the Marriott Marquis. The managers also shared their experience and tips for launching groups at a special community session.
• At a special evening event, we highlighted some of our favorite Super Apps from the 2010 BlackBerry Partners Fund Developer Challenge (go here to enter the 2011 challenge!)
• Mike Lazaridis welcoming an excited and passionate Dan Dodge of QNX on stage to talk about the ultra-powerful BlackBerry® Tablet OS. So much energy on stage and in the crowd!

Check out the BlackBerry DEVCON 2010 highlights photos and videos section for even more!

Your feedback from BlackBerry DEVCON 2010 is embedded in every aspect of the BlackBerry DEVCON Americas plan. One significant way we’ve implemented your feedback is that the conference is now three days instead of four – although we’ve kept the very best of the fourth day’s content in special community sessions throughout the event. That said, what else do you want to see at BlackBerry DEVCON Americas 2011? Let us know your ideas in the comments below!

We’re committed to making BlackBerry DEVCON Americas 2011 the biggest and best yet, and are excited to be offering great deals on our conference access, as well as alumni and hotel discounts. In order to give everyone the opportunity to register at our early bird rate (only $699 plus tax) we are extending this offer until August 26th – register now!

See you in San Francisco!

We also saw an increase of users with BlackBerry® smartphones running 6.0 OS downloading free applications in BlackBerry App World – 31% of free app downloads come from a 6.0 smartphone. Also, the majority of free application downloads in App World originate from smartphones running OS 5.0 and 6.0 smartphones, totaling 88%.

Looking at the numbers in terms of paid apps downloaded from App World, 94% of BlackBerry smartphone users have devices with OS 5.0 and 6.0 software. An increasing number of customers with 6.0 devices are now purchasing paid apps as compared to last quarter; with 6.0 devices making up 54% of all paid app downloads.

These stats reflect a growing opportunity for developers to target a customer base with applications that support the latest smartphone OS, 5.0 and especially, 6.0, so if you haven’t yet updated your app for 6.0 support ensure you check out the 6.0 development tools, simulators and development guides.

We’ve also recently released BlackBerry 7 simulators on Developer Zone. Don’t be late to the party – download the new simulators today!