I have a multi-platform mobile app that I am releasing on iOS, Android, Windows Phone 8, and Blackberry 10 (WebWorks). For the other three non-BB platforms, I have a way to distribute the enterprise app via a web server (user installs by clicking a link on a web page inside of a mobile browser). However, for BB10 Webworks, I can't seem to find a documented way to distribute a .bar file in this same manner.
Options:
1) I have seen docs that discuss placing Java-based apps (.jad and .cod files) on a web server for OTA distro, but can't find any documentation on being able to do the same with BB10 .bar files.
2) Blackberry App World - but this is public, which is not what I want for this enterprise app
3) Blackberry App World for Work and BlackBerry Enterprise Service 10 - both of these seem to be overkill for my modest purpose. I only have a single app and simply need a download link, not full app/device management, app catalogs, etc.
Is it possible to do #1 with .bars? Or is there another option I have not considered?
Thanks
I was not aware that sandboxed users could see apps other users couldn't, as mentioned in the one of the answer - something for me to try!
The only other option I am aware of is to "side load" the bar file, you can side load with various tools which you can find if you search, such as:
http://forums.crackberry.com/blackberry-10-os-f269/how-get-bb10-hardware-id-sideload-app-bar-file-into-blackberry-10-a-780773/
http://forums.crackberry.com/android-app-sideloading-f279/how-sideload-apps-bb10-device-easy-way-windows-825656/
I haven't tried out these tools, sorry.
I actually do it using the tools you get with the Android Command line toolset - available from BB web site here:
http://developer.blackberry.com/android/tools/
but this approach are not 'user friendly'. I use it because I have converted a few Android apps to run on BB10 and so got to know the tools.
I can't say that these tools are safe, since I don't actually know them, but what I can say is that I am not aware of any way that a PC based tool sending something over the internet (or USB) to your BB10 could break it, nor am I aware of any way that a side loaded app could break your BB10. The days of bricking your BB devise with a dubious bit of software do seem (thankfully) to be over.
Edit: Just thought I would update this given the options that Nate has found, which I also didn't know about!
Both the sites Nate has found seem to work in the same way as the tools I mentioned above. My understanding of all these tools is that they run a deploy utility, that connects to the BB10 device via a TCP/IP connection (which could be routed over WiFi or USB), and sends the bar file over this connection. The connection is initiated by the deploy utility, which is why it has to be in the same network.
There is likely some BBRY proprietary protocol involved, which includes an exchange of the password, as the password supplied to the deploy utility must match the development password on the device.
Now I strongly suspect that BBRY have not published the specification for this communication. I also strongly suspect that the password is never seen in the clear, so you could not use some tool like Wireshark to reverse engineer this. My suspicions therefore is that the tools, including the two I have pointed you at, all run something like the Android Command line tool under the covers - and they got this from BBRY. So perhaps you can build something like the web sites yourself - assuming you have the time and inclination of course.
Just a thought and just my opinion.
There is probably a better way, but I don't know about it. Anyway: you can deploy an app to the BB World, but not put it up for sale, then add users accounts to your sandbox. They, and only them, will be able to download your application, which will not be shown on the BB World to anyone else.
This isn't natively supported on BlackBerry 10, but it looks like there are a few hacks that people have already figured out to make this work.
Depending on your needs, these may or may not work for you (see especially the security caveats on the FAQ pages).
https://sideswype.me/
https://barinstall.com
These appear to take advantage of a VPN security hole. BlackBerry has previously patched this hole, but according to the BarInstall site, the owner just added support for 10.2, to work around the patch.
Both of these services do charge a modest fee, but it may be easier for you than maintaining a BES server.
Peter Strange's answer is quite comprehensive for the time it was written. I will just add that with the release of BB 10.2 you have the option to distribute your application OTA as an APK. Since you are using HTML5 for development I suspect there will be little performance difference between running the APK and running the BAR. But that is something you can check out if you have, or know someone with a BB10 device. Performance should improve with the release of 10.3.
Related
I've been asked to develop a simple app that allows the user to enter some information, hit a button, then it will do a look up on our Microsoft SQL Database and return the results to display to the user. However, I have some limitations.
For one, I'm on Windows 7 computer. This means Xcode isn't a viable option. I could possibly acquire a mac within the office, but that's a bit iffy at this time. Secondly, I understand from what I've researched that Xcode doesn't have any viable options for looking up data in Microsoft SQL. Closest I saw was using SOAP. Last problem is that I need to deploy onto my own phone for demonstration purposes and any apps developed will only be for in house use.
So, what options should I be looking at to get this done?
You have to get a mac. Then install Xcode and start development. There is a library you can use for accessing the MS SQL database. It's name is SQLClient. You can find it here.
I'm developing a sophisticated engineering calculation iPad app for a specific customer (much like the poster of this question). I'm getting ready to release a first version to them, and trying to get this distribution issue sorted out. There are pretty much 5 methods covered throughout that post (general App Store, B2B, Enterprise, Ad Hoc, and stuff requiring Jail Breaking), and most of the searching I've done has shown those same 5 options. I've been looking into TestFlight to manage the Ad Hoc distribution for beta testing right now, but down the road I'm going to need to allow my customer to mass install my app onto as many devices as desired (hopefully without needing to involve me at all by that point). So in the end, none of these 5 options are really attractive as a final solution.
A colleague found this App Doc that mentions something call packagemaker, which sounds like it's a Terminal tool, but I can't really find much on it (the Apple Doc simply says "create the package as you normally do", which is pretty much meaningless since I normally don't - and everything else I can find is from around 2009, and I've learned that anything described in those old posts is almost certainly wrong by this point when it comes to the Apple world). From what I can tell, packagemaker should let me build an installer executable that I can send to my customer, and they could just run that installer and it would put the app on their device. This is how we currently distribute similar software for Windows environment devices, and it would be ideal for what I'm trying to do.
Does anyone know if packagemaker can be used as I've described to install iOS apps? If so, can anyone point me toward a beginner-orientated tutorial on how to use it?
Packagemaker sounds like overkill. The old tuts should still work though, it hasn't changed much (or at all) since 10.5. It's a separate download from Apple Developer center.
You could use testflight, though I presume you want to install B2B apps, and not ad-hoc apps for testing.
In that case just create a bash script that builds and/or deploys your app to a connected device with xcodebuild and related tools. If you're concerned that your end user will find Terminal use appalling, write a tiny Cocoa app to support & run the script, and put the script and your iPad app into the bundle.
For example the app's User Interface could query the user for paths, the device, and whatever is necessary to deploy your app and pass it to the bash script which you can run easily with NSTask.
This is certainly going to be many times faster than getting into PackageMaker, and figuring out how it works - cause it really doesn't work in a straightforward way, unfortunately.
I have this idea of writing an application to automatically sync files to a specific place for an ipad every time the ipad is plugged in the computer.
The problem is I've never developed a software like this before. Right now I have these two big questions:
- How to detect when an ipad is plugged in the computer?
- How to connect to and copy files over the ipad?
To make things clear, the application I want to develop should have similar functions like iTools (not iTunes).
Does anyone here have experiences in developing this kind of application? Would you please share with me how to start with this project, because I'm clueless :(
There is a rather simple option; use a internet based service to accomplish this task - just as DropBox, iCloud and similar services do it already. Maybe you can get a lot closer to your goals by simply connecting to the API of DropBox, SugarSync or alike.
Using a direct (USB-) connection to the device will be rather tough to implement and, to my knowledge, will prevent you from selling the resulting software through Apple's channels. I am not saying that it was impossible (see iExplorer) but I am saying that such endeavor will involve a lot of reverse engineering of undocumented functions to a degree that might be considered illegal in certain countries. Additionally, maintaining such software will be very demanding as Apple frequently introduces changes within their communication protocol/s.
I'd like my Blackberry devices to get and possibly set data to the server, and am a little confused by all the options:
RIM-Push/Pap-Push. Use any library that is able to compose a HTTP GET request to the MDS-CS service (not MDS-IS). This is a one way operation from the server to the device.
RIM-Push (Push a URL and or shorcut to a device for possible offline viewing)
PAP-Push (Same as above, BUT allows for message confirmation of delivery)
WebServices: Use Visual Studio 2008 to create a Web Services only project. I'm unclear if this is supported anymore, or if MDS-IS is used. This is a 2 way operation.
MDS-IS: Use Eclipse to develop the applications and Java is required, I am unsure of what client libraries are able to do (2 way operation).
Let me know if missing any option, or if I need to revise my understanding of the basics
This is actually quite a broad question - there are a lot of ways for a BlackBerry device to interact with a server, and the ideal way depends heavily on your specific application.
Generally:
MDS Studio: the Visual Studio 2008 method is no longer actively supported. It was a mostly visual forms designer, but not a great solution for a lot of reasons. Basically, don't use it.
Mobile Web: Depending on what you need to do, this might work. Everything server side. The thing to be aware of (and why this doesn't work for a lot of problems) is that prior to BlackBerry 6 the browser wasn't very capable, either in terms of HTML support or JavaScript support. You can, however, create shortcuts to mobile web sites which appear as icons on the BlackBerry homescreen. And you can use BlackBerry Web Signals: http://na.blackberry.com/eng/developers/browserdev/websignals.jsp to push changes to mobile web pages to devices
Widgets: Supported in BlackBerry OS 5 and higher. http://na.blackberry.com/eng/developers/browserdev/widgetsdk.jsp These are packaged much like 'native' BlackBerry apps, but written using HTML and JavaScript. Can be a good option for rapid development if you're ok with just targeting OS 5, and with the limitations of the BlackBerry Browser. Lots of JavaScript hooks to system functions, so they give you more functionality than pure mobile web, and you can distribute them through App World and the like.
Java Apps: Most development work, but you get potentially the best user experience, and the most functionality. Too broad a topic to cover adequately here, but there are a lot of questions related to these on SO and elsewhere. A good starting point is the BlackBerry developer zone: http://www.blackberry.com/developers RIM Push and PAP Push both fall into this category, as they interact with Java apps, though there are other methods that you can use to achieve similar results (client polling, or I've even seen SMS or email used to push info or wake up a client, though this isn't recommended by RIM).
For a deeper overview of the options I'd recommend a book by my friend John Wargo, called BlackBerry Development Fundamentals. He covers the various options pretty well.
Just got a car with the Microsoft sync system in it. Did a quick search online and was curious if anyone is aware of any SDK that may exist, sample open source add-on applications, etc.
Thanks in advance.
UPDATE:
Looks like Ford has finally released their SDK:
https://developer.ford.com/
Ford has a website SYNC Mobile Application Developer Network but the SYNC SDK does not look to be available yet (their site mentions possibly later this year). It appears they are stilling working on the API before releasing it. All they are offering now is a way to register to be notified of new info as it becomes available.
From their About page:
Ford is hard at work developing an API
to allow developers to integrate their
Smartphone applications with SYNC. The
Developer Program website will educate
developers about the Ford SYNC
platform and how to interact with it
via the API. There will be a full set
of documentation, example
applications, reference libraries, and
even a developer forum so you can
reach out to the community for quick
help.
With the available SYNC API's, mobile
application developers will be able to
do some of the following:
Create a voice UI for your application using the in-vehicle
speech recognition system.
Write information to the radio head display or in-vehicle touchscreen
Speak text using text-to-speech engine.
Use the in-vehicle menu system to provide commands or options for
your mobile application
Get button presses from the radio and steering wheel controls.
Receive vehicle data (speed, GPS location, fuel economy, etc.)
The official API and full website
launch is set to be targeted for later
this year.
It looks like the SDK is coming very soon. The story was just posted on Engadget:
http://www.engadget.com/2009/12/18/ford-to-give-sync-some-app-store-flavor-opening-api-to-devs-in/
Now just imagine what you could do with access to your automobile functionality!
I don't think there is any. Its a closed ecosystem.
http://www.autoblog.com/2009/01/09/ces-2009-sync-could-one-day-add-app-development-like-iphone/
From what I understand it is based on the CE 6.0 platform using windows automotive 4.1, but I could be wrong. We really need a forum to get this going. Hurry up Ford! Release the SDK!
Given the way Windows automotive is there is only two ways of putting a ROM on Sync. Using JTAG to put your own custom bootloader (forget it), or though the USB. Which you will need to know how to sign the file so sync will think it is an OEM ROM. So at this point even if you were able to come up with your own custom rom by using Microsoft eMbedded Visual C++ you would still have no way to get it on there.
BTW, the SDK they are talking about releasing will only be to develop apps for applink. (not modifying the OS). However, to upload the apps we might be able to find out how to sign the .bin file for sync to accept a ROM through the USB.
Then again this is just from my understanding... I am no great developer or anything.
Ford launched sdk in ces, check it out: http://techcrunch.com/2013/01/08/ford-launches-its-openxc-sdk-and-hardware-specs-to-let-developers-access-its-cars-sensors-and-metrics/