I develop and test applications for BlackBerry 4.5, 4.6, 4.7 and 5.0, but have done testing only with the respective simulators. Now I am about to buy a new BlackBerry device to test my applications better in a real scenario.
Can anyone suggest which device suits my needs?
Hi
I'm not sure about this model but i do know that in other cellphones you need to change the software version every time. Because you mentioned that you want to build apps for different OS versions.
You should try to locate a device that is the easiest one to change OS version and be able to downgrade and upgrade without any errors.
thanks
The current BB devices on the market are generally 5.x and up. You have to define a minimum version you'll support. As long as your app doesn't do too much hackery JDE versions are upwardly compatible.
Simulators generally model real devices well except for the networking. You see some differences especially GSM vs. CDMA devices. Ex. if you ask for the device's phone number (in the NAMP) it may or may not start with a 1.
If you're on a budget or decide to buy multiple devices you might want to try Curve 8520 - it's one of the cheaper new models, comes with BlackBerry OS 4.6 upgradable to 5.0, but still has most of the functionality you might need, except for the GPS.
Additionally it has one of the lower resolutions RIM has to offer (320x240), so if your apps are UI intensive you can see if they work well with entry level models.
Hope it's of any help.
Related
I am trying to construct an up to date device matrix for our dev teams that lists the mobile devices that we should target.
This is a question that I see come up over an over again. I appreciate that there is no ideal device matrix as each project will have its own requirements, but I think that it could be easy to say that the most popular devices and OS' such as iPhone 5 and iOS 7 would be included as they are a market leading device and OS combo.
Other devices such as iPhone 3Gs would have fallen off the list because now it is just not a significant device in the market.
Ideally the matrix should include Android and iOS phones and tablets.
In general I am looking for one that captures the majority of the market but excludes those that are not worth testing for.
Are there any resources that present this in an up to date clear consumable format?
For iOS devices, take a look at the iOS Support Matrix.
Well, if you are interested in market shares of Android, then go to the play developer console, create an app and take a look at the statistics. It will show you which versions of android are most used in the category that you set for your app. To get an idea of what phones are most used, take a look at this chart http://www.appbrain.com/stats/top-android-phones Testing on some of these and some lower end phones should be satisfying.
In case of iOS for graphics performance, test on a iPhone 4. That has retina display but not very good GPU. If that performs well, then it will do well everywhere.
Otherwise, regarding any mobile stuff, test on any device that satisfies the requirements of your application. Test for screen size and performance if that is crucial.
i* resolutions: http://www.iosres.com/
Android resolutions: don't suppose anything, plan for flexibility
Once you are Ok with what you see on your device and in the simulator, then go ahead and start a private beta with TestFlight, Hockey App or any other platform.
In general, everything depends on your app. Whether it has hardware needs or should work on any device, or only with OS versions above some level... The definitive answer depends on your exact requirements. There is no holy grail and you should rather plan the way you'll handle any issues.
We have a fairly simple mobile application, completed for iPhone and Android that does the following:
queries a web service to verify the user's account information
display an animation to show that the user, in fact, has a valid account
We got the application working very quickly on a PlayBook by using the Android version.
Now the customer has asked us to explore getting it to work on other BlackBerry devices.
None of us know that much about BlackBerry, and the main source for our question returned from google searches (http://us.blackberry.com/developers/choosingtargetos.jsp) comes up as 404 page.
According to this chart there is still a wide variety of devices in use. Which ones does it make sense to target?
Thanks
I had posted an answer last year about this here on stackoverflow, but as you noted, that link has recently broken.
The only thing I've found that's similar is this BlackBerry developer page. It shows, for example, that paid apps are being purchased by devices that are about 97% on OS 5.0 and above.
From what you've told me, I don't know that your app is going to be that different on different devices, aside from maybe the obvious smartphone vs. Playbook difference. Different devices certainly have different screen sizes, so you'll need to make sure your UI is coded to handle that gracefully.
If you guys are new to BlackBerry, you might want to stay away from OS < 5.0. There are some things in prior OS versions (e.g. location services / maps, browser, and networking) that are a little tough to work with, and with such a small percentage of paying customers still on OS < 5.0, it probably isn't worth it to you.
So, I guess I'm recommending that you target specific OS levels (e.g. 5.0+). That will be a bigger driver for how you build your app, than a specific set of devices. This is because each OS version adds more and better APIs to use.
Once you've decided which OS to target, then you should download the SDK for each major OS. For example, if you use the Eclipse BlackBerry plug-in, you can install the 5.0 SDK (aka component pack), the 6.0 SDK, the 7.0 and 7.1 SDK.
Once you have those SDKs installed, you'll then have a bunch of simulators (each SDK has a simulator folder). Run your app on all those simulators, and that'll probably be a good start.
Of course, there's no substitute for running on real hardware, too, but if your app does mostly standard things (not interacting with hardware sensors, just displaying web pages, and making HTTP requests), the simulators should give you a pretty good test environment. They certainly will give you all the screen size configurations.
Hi i need to buy a blackberry to test my applications. I want to buy a device which supports more OS versions (I will be happy if it supports all versions). Which Blackberry device will supports OS 4, 5 and 6 ?? can any one help ??
BlackBerry devices only ever tend to support two major OS releases so you're out of luck trying to run all three on any one handset.
If you can only buy one handset then I suggest you buy one the later ones. This is because a phone running OS7 can also run applications written for OS6,5,4.5 etc
There are still quirks you will run into, but even the two phones running the same OS may function differently. E.g. if the internal storage is based on a microsd card or not.
RIM has done an excellent job of providing simulators for every type of phone so in the first instance you can download and try these.
If you run into a problem that's specific to one device and you cannot replicate it on the simulator then another option is to subscribe to services like DeviceAnywhere
In my opinion if you are designing a UI it's essential to be able to test touchscreen and trackball devices. Therefore I suggest the Torch or Bold 9900 as be good candidates for you as they can do both.
There is no BlackBerry device that supports all versions: OS 4.x and OS 5 and OS 6.
I am deciding between which library to use for development: jQuery Mobile or Sencha Touch. The application I am building will specifically target enterprise (Fortune 500) BlackBerries. The application will not require any hardware features, but the user experience/UI rendering should be as good as possible.
I am not familiar with BlackBerry OS adoption/upgrade statistics so I don't know what platform is my lowest common denominator. Are most enterprise users on BlackBerry 6+ or 5+ or 4+? I just don't know and I don't know where to find those statistics. What is your recommendation?
In my opinion the first step should be studying the audience of your future application.
What model do they use, do they use the most recent models, or they tend to keep working with old models.
The main point is that RIM stops releasing device software for old BlackBerry models.
For instance for BlackBerry 8800 the most recent available device OS version is 4.5
But your customer may have a lot of empolyees who use this device.
Devices with device OS version 4+, but before 5.0, do not work properly with complex html/javascript pages.
In version 5.0 there was implemented better support for complex html/javascript functionality in your applications.
Conclusion: If your potential customers are not using old devices, then start supporting device OS versions 5+, otherwise use SDK version 4.x according to the target devices.
As best practice, I would jump into learning and developing for the latest Operating System, which would be 6. I know all of our customers are working on Bolds a Torches, which means they'd be using 6.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BlackBerry#Operating_system
Additionally, I would look into creating Adobe AIR applications. They work for Application 6 and Playbooks as well.
http://us.blackberry.com/developers/started/bbdevapproach.jsp
You will likely found RIM's own "Choosing a target OS" page helpful. It has stats on current active devices as well as narrowing down to those devices that use the AppWorld.
I'm planning to create an app for blackberry. The Android and iPhone Versions are almost done. Next on the list is the blackberry one.
So my question is: how good are the simulators? Do I need a real device to test? Which one would you recommend?
It is unlikely you'll be able to create a bugless app without a real device. However totally ignoring simulators would also be a mistake. Simulators are quite good, because they allow to test a substantial part of features on a wide range of device models/OS versions. It would be quite expensive to have a dozen of real devices. :)
Usual points to bear in mind while working on simulators:
real devices are slower in times.
simulators do not support permissions (simulators act as if permissions are always granted regardless of what you actually see).
real device may not support the same type of network transport that your simulator has (TCP, WIFI, BES).
big wireless providers (e.g. Verizon) usually install a slightly customized version of BB OS on their devices, and sometimes it results in a different behaviour (or even bugs).
I've had fairly good luck with the simulators. I've been using the Storm, and I have a real curve. I have a colleague with a real storm so I run everything by him as well.
There have only been 2 times that having a real device has helped me. 1. Making sure I had my install files correct. Since Eclipse just copies them out to the simulator it took me 2 attempts on a real device.
and 2. When testing creating & using a database on the sim card. I got about 95% there on the simulator, and the other 5% was really just verification.
That said, which one depends on what version you're writing for. Storm and some curves are 5.0 (and can be upgraded to 6.0) The Torch is only 6.0
Blackberry simulators are really good
They are exact replicas of the devices
I have worked with storm and also the torch devices
I have faced problems during the connections to the internet
and while using the SD cards (SQLite databases)
Getting images from the SD Card which is not possible from the simulator
If you are developing an application which needs the basic UI components and the native blackberry components, simulators are fine
But if you are really developing something out of the box device is a must
It would be more better if an app can be tested in the device before rolling out
Try your luck
Thank you.
The Blackberry simulators are fine. I believe they are built using the same code as actual devices, so they are pretty much identical to real devices. The only thing that makes a difference is the software that they run.
The simulators will provide you with almost all the same functionality with the exception of things like GPS. I believe I've used an image from an SD card before using the simulator as well...
As far as I know, simulators are set at a specific OS version, whereas in the real world there are tons of different OS versions being used (minor revisions). There have been cases where a feature has worked on the simulator but once it was built and launched on the device, the device shows something different. So if you want to get your app tested, you should test on your TARGET device and OS on simulator and real device.