January 2012
Intermediate to advanced
178 pages
4h 31m
English
book
Building Android Apps with HTML, CSS, and JavaScript, 2nd Edition
by Jonathan Stark, Brian Jepson, Brian MacDonald
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O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
Chapter 1. Getting Started
Before we dive in, I’d like to quickly establish the playing field. In this chapter, I’ll define key terms, compare the pros and cons of the two most common development approaches, and give a crash course on the three core web technologies used in this book.
Web Apps Versus Native Apps
First, I’d like to define what I mean by web app and native app and consider their pros and cons.
What Is a Web App?
To me, a web app is basically a website that is specifically optimized for use on a smartphone. The site content can be anything from a standard small business brochure site to a mortgage calculator to a daily calorie tracker—the content is irrelevant. The defining characteristics of a web app are that the user interface (UI) is built with web standard technologies, it is available at a URL (public, private, or perhaps behind a login), and it is optimized for the characteristics of a mobile device. A web app is not installed on the phone, it is not available in the Android Market, and it is not written with Java.
What Is a Native App?
In contrast, native apps are installed on the Android phone, they have access to the hardware (speakers, accelerometer, camera, etc.), and they are written with Java. The defining characteristic of a native app, however, is that it’s available in the Android Market—a feature that has captured the imagination of a horde of software entrepreneurs worldwide, myself included.
Pros and Cons
Different applications have different requirements. ...
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O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.Julian F.
I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.Addison B.
I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.Amir M.
I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.