Rhomobile Updates Smartphone Development Platform

By James Alan Miller on February 22, 2010 12:23 PM

Rhomobile recently announced the latest version of Rhodes, its cross platform framework for developing smartphone applications.

The Rhodes smartphone app framework enables developers to use existing HTML and Ruby knowledge to build native mobile applications, which take full advantage of smartphone capabilities such as GPS, PIM data, geo-location and camera. Using Rhomobile's RhoSync, users of Rhodes-based applications can work with their synchronized local data even when they are offline and disconnected.

The upgrade promises to make it easier for developers to build native mobile apps for most major smartphone platforms, including iPhone, BlackBerry, Android, Windows Mobile and Symbian. New features include the ability to debug in real-time and support for database-based logging.

Another addition to Rhodes is support for the BlackBerry Java Development Environment v5.0, native mapping for BlackBerry and an API for returning screen size. The screensize API enables developers to conditionally handle different screen sizes smoothly, an important tool when approaching diverse platform environments including the BlackBerry and iPad, according to Rhomobile. After the break is a comprehensive list of new and existing Rhodes features.

Rhodes New Features:
-- Support for BlackBerry Java Development Environment v5.0
-- Native mapping for BlackBerry
-- API for returning screensize
-- Mac OSX debugger for Rhodes
-- Spec-driven test dr iven development
-- Support for new Ruby gems: net/http(s), JSON, REXML (XML), crypt, openssl, digest, lang, set, fcntl
-- Database-based logging (from Ruby in Rhodes)
-- Extension framework for adding third party extensions (gems)

Rhodes Features:
-- Built from the ground up to leverage smartphones in the enterprise
-- Allows developers to write app interface in Ruby and HTML and simultaneously build as native apps (not web apps) for all smartphones
-- Supports iPhone, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian and Android
-- Makes developers five times more productive for even a single smartphone OS
-- Support for Push Synchronized Data on iPhone and BlackBerry
-- Allows users to work with synced local data for rapid access and ease of operation when disconnected or offline
-- Full access to device capabilities: GPS, audio and video, PIM contacts, native mapping, camera

See here to learn mroe about the Rhodes framework