As I prepared to teach the Mobile Application Programming course of the Conestoga College Computer Programmer/Analyst (CPA) program for the fall 2012 school term, I chose the new BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and BlackBerry 10 platforms because they are both developer and student-friendly. In this blog post, I will present my top three reasons for choosing the BlackBerry platform.

1. The BlackBerry Platform has excellent HTML5 support

In fall 2012, the BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 had an HTML5Test.com score of 373. The recently released OS 2.1 update continued to lead with a score of 411.

Under the mobile category, the upcoming BlackBerry 10 browser has an HTML5Test.com score of 484 – higher than iOS 6 or Android 4.0. TechVibes recently published an article entitled “BlackBerry 10 is going to have the best web browser of any mobile platform”.

The independent HTML5test.com score measures how well the browser supports HTML5, and the new BlackBerry Platform has scored very high. This is great for BlackBerry developers and students who want to test new HTML5 features on a tablet or mobile device. Having excellent HTML5 support means that HTML5 features working on desktop computers will likely work on the tablet or mobile device without recoding. It also means that richer apps can be built using HTML5. More recently, CNET Australia published an article stating that the BlackBerry 10 browser beats every desktop browser.

2. The new BlackBerry Platform has lots of FREE tools and online resources

A computer programming course is effective only when there is a lot of hands-on programming assignments and projects. The new BlackBerry Platform has lots of excellent software development tools and online resources, and the best part is that they are all FREE. Using both free and online tools provides equal opportunities to all students.

All the BlackBerry tools and documentation can be downloaded with ease. Some of the most downloaded free software includes:

• Ripple Emulator plugin for Google Chrome
• VMWare and BlackBerry simulators (Tablet OS, BlackBerry 10 Beta)
• BlackBerry WebWorks SDK and Native SDK (Tablet OS, BlackBerry 10 Beta)

Several online resources were also available, including:

• The Main BlackBerry HTML5 Page
  • Provided easy instructions and links to tools, documentation and sample code
• The BlackBerry Support Forums
• • Provided many relevant articles
  • E.g., the Remote Web inspector can debug web content running on a live device or simulator
• Free and up-to-date BlackBerry Jam recordings
• BlackBerry hands-on labs and resources
• • Hands-on Labs for a Mini-Course on Mobile Application Development
  • Open-source frameworks and sample code for the BBUI.js framework is available in GitHub
• To learn about the changes to the new BlackBerry Platform, there are webinars and online sessions available for free

In addition to the free tools and online resources, RIM donated BlackBerry Bold 9900 smartphones and BlackBerry PlayBook tablets as part of the BlackBerry Academic Program Canada (http://bit.ly/TFaBur ). These devices allow students to test their apps before final submission and release to the public. At the start of the term, a class survey was conducted, and the survey found that 33% of the class had their own BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and 36% have their own BlackBerry smartphone. In addition, 94% of students were satisfied with their being no mandatory textbook for this course. Furthermore, approximately 33% of students indicated that they will acquire a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet on their own. The BlackBerry PlayBook tablet WiFi 16 GB currently retails for less than C$130. This price is affordable given that the price of most mandatory textbooks can be over C$100.

3. The new BlackBerry Platform is open, flexible and future-proof

RIM has started to build partnerships with open-source leaders. BlackBerry WebWorks and the Ripple Emulator are shared on GitHub, and many code samples for BlackBerry WebWorks and Cascades are also freely available on GitHub. As of this writing, there are now 330 samples in the BlackBerry GitHub catalog. This allows students to get the latest source code and extend the framework, learn sample code, and customize them to satisfy their project requirements. The new BlackBerry Platform has SDKs on Windows, Linux and MacOS. With this selection, students can use their favorite OS to build their mobile apps.

The new BlackBerry Platform is flexible. It supports many development platforms: HTML5 WebWorks, Native C/C++ and Cascades, ActionScript Adobe AIR, and Java Android Runtime. Although HTML5 and Mobile Web provides the opportunity to build one mobile app code base for multiple platform devices (i.e., Android, BlackBerry and iOS), there are instances where the Native Development option is a better approach. Students who want to build mobile applications other than HTML5 can either port their existing Android applications or build new Native SDK/Cascades applications and make them available on the new BlackBerry Platform.

Teaching mobile programming is challenging because the mobile technologies change frequently. Using mobile web technologies such as HTML5, JavaScript, jQuery Mobile and PhoneGap to build mobile apps is the first step in future-proofing mobile apps. In Part 2 of this blog post, I will discuss other future-proofing characteristics of the new BlackBerry Platform.

The new BlackBerry Platform is developer-friendly and student-friendly. Do you believe I made the right choice for using the new BlackBerry Platform to teach mobile application programming? Do you want to know the results of student assignments and projects and how they compare to student projects from the past two years? In Part 2 of this blog post, I will answer these questions with examples of student projects.

[ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

Hi everyone! We’ve got a special treat for you today – Mathias and Fredrik, our friends at The Astonishing Tribe, have put together a great blog post about the Arduino™ platform. If you’re searching for E.T., this might be your best weapon – how? Find out below… – Ed.

Today’s consumer devices pack an unparalleled bang-for-your-buck, giving end users blazing-fast and high-performing products. This is more than “fine and dandy” for users in the intended demographic of the device, but what about users like ‘The Prototyper,’ ‘The Hobbyist,’ and ‘The Startup Techie,’ to name a few? You recognize them from their desire to change the way that we use devices; to disrupt the established models; to get their hands dirty and create something new.

Yep, people like us are especially excited by new devices, and in our experience the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet’s power and performance has no equal for tinkerers.

With the relative complexity of today’s electronics, it’s not feasible to start from scratch; you need good building blocks to implement your vision. You’ll want to use commercial off- the-shelf (COTS) components as much as possible and you most likely don’t want to be bound to a bulky PC.

Fortunately, we have the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. It’s a powerful and portable consumer tablet, with a great user interface and an open SDK. We find it is an ideal platform to host your UI, crunch data, and more.

So how do we get started prototyping our ideas with the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet? For electronics concepts: enter Arduino.

Arduino is:

“an open-source electronics-prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software. It’s intended for artists, designers, hobbyists, and anyone interested in creating interactive objects or environments.”

(via
http://arduino.cc/
)

Arduino platform has spawned an innovative and affordable range of products, ranging from various Arduino boards to meet your form-factor requirements to I/O boards (“shields”) that facilitate connectivity.

A Real World Problem

We need to catch the milk thief! Is there no justice in the world?

How can we protect our milk from aliens? Perhaps we can rig a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet and use its camera to capture a photo of the nefarious milk thief. But the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet camera can’t see in the dark, making it difficult to detect intruders in a dark kitchen at night.

We’ll need a BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, an infrared (“IR”) sensor, a servo to pan the sensor, and a way to control the servo as well as to handle the IR sensor.

Connecting

Done!

Implementation

The Arduino board uses an IR range sensor to find targets. The IR sensor is placed on a servo to scan the area of interest (e.g. kitchen). The data is sent to the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet, on which we’ve built an application to present a sonar map and look for movement. If movement is detected, the application will sound an alarm and take a picture. The video above shows the system in action.

Now, let’s catch that thief and bring an end to domestic lactose thieving!

Here’s a quick rundown of what’s available in the 2.0 beta 1 release of the Native SDK:

• Added Sensors API (magnetometer, gyroscope, and accelerometer support) (device only for now, not available for the simulator at this time)
• Added Payment Service support for subscriptions and in-app purchasing
• IDE improvements in usability, performance, and reliability
• Scoreloop SDK 1.0 Beta 1 is included – try out some social game features for your apps, such as leaderboards

Please note that the BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 Developer Beta is available for developers and is NOT designed for consumer use. If you’ve installed this build and would like to return your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet to the current version, check out our guide on the Inside BlackBerry Help Blog.

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook OS to the Developer Beta Build

The information needed for native developers is being hosted off the Native SDK developer microsite. If you wish to upgrade your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet to this Developer Beta release, you will need to register your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet PIN using a form hosted on the microsite.

From the link to register your device PIN, simply enter your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet PIN and your email address; review the Terms and Conditions and check the box to indicate your agreement; then click “Submit”.

Within an hour, you should see a icon in the status bar on your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. You’ll have 24 hours to complete the upgrade, which can be done by following these simple steps:

1. Tap in the top-right corner of the screen
2. Tap “Software Updates”
3. Tap “Check for Updates”
4. Complete the update.
5. If the update is still not available after an hour, or you experience any issues with the update, please visit the support forums.

Keep on coding – and send us your feedback!

A new version of the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ OS v2.0 Developer Beta is now available for developers to test their applications on the BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet. The Developer Beta contains support for the BlackBerry® Runtime for Android™ Apps as well as the latest versions of the BlackBerry® WebWorks™ and Adobe® AIR® SDKs for BlackBerry PlayBook OS (for more info, be sure to read our BlackBerry PlayBook OS v2.0 Developer Beta post).

Please note that this build is strictly designed for developers and is NOT a build designed for consumer use, since some apps built for BlackBerry PlayBook OS v.1.0.7 may not work correctly. If you’ve downloaded and installed this build by accident, or if you’d like to return your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet to its previous state, check out our guide to downgrading on the Inside BlackBerry Help Blog.

BlackBerry PlayBook OS v2.0.0.3894 contains two improvements to aid developer testing:

• BlackBerry WebWorks applications can now successfully call GPS
• Wi-Fi® profiles are now saved and no longer disappear during tablet reboots

How to update your BlackBerry PlayBook OS v2.0 Build

Registering is quick and easy from the Android and HTML5/BlackBerry WebWorks developer sites. Once you’re on one of these sites, look to the footer for the Support heading; under this heading, locate and click Register your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. With the page loaded, we recommend that you quickly review the notes at the top of the page and scan the Frequently Asked Questions at the bottom of the page to ensure the BlackBerry PlayBook OS v2.0 Developer Beta build will meet your needs.

When you’re ready, enter your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet PIN and your email address; review the Terms and Conditions and check the box to indicate your agreement; then click Submit.
Within an hour, you should see a icon in the status bar on your BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. You’ll have 24 hours to complete the upgrade, which can be done by following these simple steps:

1. Tap in the top-right corner of the screen
2. Tap Software Updates
3. Tap Check for Updates
4. Complete the update.

If after an hour the update is still not available or you experience any issues with the update, please visit the support forums.

Happy Coding!

[ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

Here’s a guest post from our friend Anders at RIM TAT! – Ed.

Cascades is the user interface (“UI”) framework that TAT has been using for many years to create numerous advanced UIs and applications, such as Scrapbook for BlackBerry PlayBook. I’m happy to announce that it will soon be part of the BlackBerry Native SDK.

Here’s a short list of Cascades features:

• Great performance, including amazing transitions and animations
• Flexible UI layouts including free form lists.
• 3D support
• Support for mixing pre-packaged UI components with custom components
• Core UI feature support

Cascades was originally developed to enable development of really innovative and unique applications. This put hard requirements on the flexibility and extendibility of the UI framework. The need for designer/developer collaboration was also one of stronger driving factors when developing the framework. Let’s dig deeper into how Cascades will aid the development of rich and compelling UI.

The flexibility of Cascades enables UI innovation

Cascades has a unique level of UI building blocks. In other UI frameworks, when stepping beyond the set of standard UI components, developers must often resort to low level OpenGLES-commands. Cascades provides higher level building blocks for many of the tricky but application-defining UI scenarios. Features like Flexible List layouts, 2D/3D transformations, mixing of 2D UI and 3D objects are all made accessible to developers.

The Cascades workflow helps designers and developers collaborate

In Cascades, UI elements are exposed both programmatically and through mark-up. The mark-up also provides scripting support making it a suitable environment for more design-oriented developers to work with, allowing for quick turnaround times and prototyping to find best possible UI design.

The markup also enables strong tool support including a Photoshop plugin making it easy to take and .psd sketch to a working layout in an application.

Cascades has beautiful pre-packaged components

Not every developer is a designer, full of ideas around 3D layouts and crazy infographics. For developers who prefer pre-designed and pre-packaged components, Cascades provides a strong set of Core UI components with great look and feel. They come with a number of built in effects and interaction design that will risk making your app look prettier than you can take credit for.

Availability of Cascades

Cascades will be released as a Beta during the Fall of 2011, with more and more advance features coming in future releases.

To get a firsthand account of how the Native SDK for the BlackBerry PlayBook OS and the Scoreloop SDK beta will help BlackBerry game developers, I sat down with Eudaimonia CEO, Ezequiel D’Amico. Eudaimonia is a game development and publishing studio based in Buenos Aires that focuses on online and mobile games with social components, using their proprietary engine for cross-platform development (Ezequiel is also speaking at BlackBerry DevCon Americas during the DEV15 – Game Makers Dream: The BlackBerry Native SDK for BlackBerry PlayBook OS session, so be sure to check it out).

Where does BlackBerry fit in today’s mobile gaming ecosystem? What is most surprising about BlackBerry games?

BlackBerry smartphones and the BlackBerry PlayBook are great platforms to deliver cutting edge games and applications. BlackBerry has an incredible audience for games, despite what people might think. The average BlackBerry user wants great gaming applications on their mobile device.

With the global success of the BlackBerry platform and through distribution on BlackBerry App World, we have achieved incredible success in the development and publishing of MTV Entertainment applications; a global brand that is highly focused on reaching young people with their fresh and cool entertainment content.

What makes BlackBerry the top mobile gaming platform from your perspective?

We believe in making BlackBerry smartphones the top mobile gaming platform. With the availability of new hardware and the great development tools available, there is not a single reason to not believe this.

BlackBerry App World has unique advantages compared to other application stores, as it holds the biggest market share here in Latin America and the second biggest worldwide; more than 165M BlackBerry smartphones have been shipped.

We just need to start delivering high quality games, focusing on great user experiences, in order to achieve this goal. There is a huge market out there waiting for our games.

[YouTube link for mobile viewing]

How is the introduction of the Native SDK for the BlackBerry PlayBook significant for you and what new opportunities does it present?

Primarily, this was an enabler for us to integrate the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet into our MoWeb! engine. This greatly facilitates our ability to quickly bring great games to the device. Also, with the availability of the Scoreloop SDK beta, we are able to easily integrate social features that are now so critical to succeeding on mobile platforms. We are proud to be launching an original and extraordinary social game at BlackBerry DevCon Americas, showcasing the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet‘s gaming capabilities combined with the social features powered by Scoreloop.

These two tools were the key factors in developing our plans for 2012 – to deliver a very high quality game every single month and revolutionize the games on BlackBerry.

You mention how social integration has become critical to success on mobile platforms, why is this and from Eudamonia’s perspective, what makes a social application successful?

Everyday human activities are social; working, playing sports, even studying is a social interaction between teacher and student. Therefore, it is only natural for users to have social interactions when playing games on their mobile devices.

But social is not enough. You need it to be viral so that the app can essentially distribute and spread itself. If the app quality is high enough, the user experience is excellent and enjoyable to play, people will instinctively want to share it with their friends.

With the availability of the Scoreloop SDK beta for the Native SDK for the BlackBerry PlayBook, developers now have suite of social gaming features available to them. Can you share your integration experience?

Integrating Scoreloop features was very straightforward. They have really good documentation supporting their APIs, making it incredibly easy to integrate social features into our games. With the availability of the Scoreloop SDK beta, we can make any of our games social with very little effort, allowing us to focus on delivering exceptional user experiences and maintaining our reputation for developing high quality apps.

What has been the key to Eudaimonia’s success as a mobile entertainment developer and publisher?

MoWeb!, our proprietary engine, is the only cross-platform engine that is compatible with many of the BlackBerry OS smartphones. With our technology, we have developed award-winning games for very well known and established brands such as Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, MTV and Discovery Kids. With the introduction of the Native SDK for the BlackBerry PlayBook, we have been able to expand the capability of MoWeb! to that platform.

What is Eudaimonia’s plan for success in 2012?

Our plans for 2012 are quite simple: make BlackBerry smartphones and the BlackBerry PlayBook our new top gaming platforms, develop very high quality games, and deliver one rocking game every single month of the year. Creating blockbusters for these platforms will make all other game development studios turn their attention to bringing their content to BlackBerry, generating a gaming revolution.

The goal of the NDK is to make you, the developer, more productive in creating Native Applications for the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet. To accomplish this, the NDK includes tools: a compiler, a linker, the Eclipse-based QNX’s Momentics IDE, and command line tools as well as samples, documentation, and libraries, and is paired with the Developers/Native micro-site. The micro-site is brand new (we also released Android and HTML 5 micro-sites) and provides information on most common actions, and… it also provides pointers to Open Source Components!

As is the case for BlackBerry® WebWorks™, Open Source is a key part of our native story. We use Open Source licenses, and transparent development, to deliver samples that developers can use to kick-start development, or to learn from in general. The NDK comes with a small (4) set of samples, available under an Open Source license. But the micro-site mentioned above links to a larger and growing set of samples all hosted at our GitHub Organization and ready for you to use, or fork and modify.

We are also porting popular Open Source libraries to complement those that are already included in the BlackBerry PlayBook OS. Libraries already available include physics engines like Bullet Physics and Box2DX, scripting languages like Lua, multimedia libraries like OpenAL and SDL, gaming frameworks like Cocos2DX and general-purpose libraries like Boost and Qt. We will continue growing the list and welcome your suggestions!

Also available under an Open Source license are a few new libraries like GamePlay, a new 3D native gaming framework, and TouchMapOverlap.

We are using GitHub to anchor this and other initiatives. All libraries have a homepage that provides additional information on how they apply to the BlackBerry PlayBook OS. In most cases there will also be a code repository that holds the specifics for the port. For example, the OpenAL home page is
blackberry.github.com/ndk/components.html#OpenAL and the repository is github.com/blackberry/OpenAL. Ideally the port specifics will be accepted into the upstream community; what we want is for the library to work on the BlackBerry PlayBook OS out of the box.

We will continue to expand our involvement in the Open Source community; it’s more efficient for us, better for the developers, and creates a much more open communication channel for everyone. For more details on RIM’s Open Source activities, visit
http://blackberry.github.com
.

P.S. Also check out George’s announcement at WebKit-Dev about our renewed public participation in WebKit!

Do you use GitHub to develop? Have you checked out the BlackBerry GitHub page? Share in the comments!