In an earlier post, I promised to come back with an overview of development tools for mobile apps and services, geared towards the "drag&drop" developer, or developer who doesn't want to work directly with, let's say, the SDKs and APIs for Android and iOS.
Most of these tools now support cross-OS publishing or builds, so one can get apps done in one go for Android, Apple iOS and MS Windows Phone. Or mostly, some tweaking to adopt to user interface and conventions per OS might be needed, but for single-task apps, that apps was all about in the beginning, and to tip the toe in mobile development waters, they are a great help and introduction.
OK, the list!
Erik Jensen, 08.11.2013
Most of these tools now support cross-OS publishing or builds, so one can get apps done in one go for Android, Apple iOS and MS Windows Phone. Or mostly, some tweaking to adopt to user interface and conventions per OS might be needed, but for single-task apps, that apps was all about in the beginning, and to tip the toe in mobile development waters, they are a great help and introduction.
OK, the list!
- Mobincube: Template based development, free for basic features, publishing to app-stores, add integration and really seems to be evolving very well. Great pish on HTML 5 side as well, so should be useable towards Firefox OS as well. The one I tried myself for some basic apps. recommended!
- Appery.io: Supports the usual OS suspects, drag and drop development environment, DB and cloud backend integration and more. Also has free edition for basic features.
- Conduit: Positions itself as the quick and easy alternative for cross-platform app development and has many great demos and use cases on their site.
- Widgetbox: Supports iOS and Android, another template and widget based approach to get apps "done in minutes".
- MobileNation: A senior in the market with a good track record, drag& drop approach, free option to get started
Any of these is a good choice to get started and acquainted with mobile apps and services development.
One important thing, besides ad networks integration, is to make sure you have full tracking on number of downloads, usually from app-store, and access to usage and traffic statistics for your app or mobile service as it reaches thousands and millions of users.
Some candidates for app usage and traffic logging, statistics (avoided the Big Data thing there):
- Keen IO: Extended app, or most anything else, service logging and statistics
- Google Analytics: Hard to avoid this one, now enhanced with mobile app and services tracking as well
- Good Data: Analytics-as-a-Service, and makes it easy to come up with good looking and useful service usage reports.
- Mixpanel
- KISSmetrics
- And to make your statistics look good on the big screen - Gecoboard
Erik Jensen, 08.11.2013
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