Steve Wozniak admitted in his last interview for NBC Bay Area, that he is a happy owner of the Google Nexus One smartphone. He so wanted to test this new gadget that bought it on the first day of Nexus One sales. Moreover, according to Mr. Wozniak’s words, now Google phone is one of his most favorite gadgets. Although he is still using iPhone as the main phone for communication.
Wozniak said that he regularly buys new models of mobile phones from different popular manufacturers. Besides Google Nexus One he used phones based on such mobile application platforms as iPhone and BlackBerry, also he tested the Motorola Droid Phone.
RIM products caused the most serious complaints from Apple founder. Mr. Wozniak has been using BlackBerry phone for a few months and as a result he has remained dissatisfied with it. And as for Droid and Nexus (which mobile apps were developed on Android OS), he considers them as excellent phones, stressing, however, that not every phone with the Android platform on board will be as good as Nexus One.
Most users do not scroll… or they do, nevertheless
According to the research conducted by Jakob Nielsen, a famous usability consultant helping thousands of web developers all over the world, only 23% of users scroll web pages visiting a site for the first time. It means that 77% of users will not scroll web pages; they will look through only the upper part of websites. These data indicate how it is important to show the most significant information on the visible part of a web page. Nevertheless it does not mean that you should put excessive amount of information in the website header.
Basecamp shows how excellently can be used space of the main web page. It contains a great screenshot, subtitle, proposals, call to action, list of customers and video at the top of the site (height = 768 pixels).
So, those who working at web application development and custom programming services should put only key data on the home page:
1. A site name.
2. Your unique value proposition.
3. Navigation or links to the most important pages.
However, user habits change constantly. Recent studies show that in some situations users are ready to scroll to the bottom of the page with pleasure. Also web development companies should take into account a great variety of displays with high resolution.
If to consider the near future of mobile application development (2-3 years ahead) Android OS seems to be a very interesting option. Why? Because number of devices based on this OS is growing before our eyes. Such a giant as Google develops and supports this system, so it guarantees that Android won’t be lost and won’t be forgotten.
Analysts forecast that Android devices will overtake iPhone and even Windows Mobile in 1012-1013 years. Also, we must note that Google begins to inform its users (we mean users of Android phones) that mobile software will be provided in both variants, free and paid, as well as the company expands the list of countries, where can be accepted payment, also it expands payment options for users. These steps will have a positive influence on turnover of those companies who provide application development for Android (developed mobile apps –> money).
Google Android wins our hearts by its open source: any developer can write apps without any licensing applications. All development tools are also available in source code and free.
All mobile apps developers always face choice of the right platform. The existing abundance of mobile operating systems can easily throw you into confusion. Android, iPhone, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian — which of them is the best one? And moreover we should take into account a large number of the applications and frameworks developed by manufacturers of cell phones, communicators, PDAs and smartphones. Let’s come to know the particulars of all this mobile stuff.
First of all, a developer should define the main objectives:
professional development of commercial mobile software or amateur development (open source);
target audience;
competitive abilities and competitive environment.
All this seems rather complicated. With relation to monetization (commercial development) it’s better to choose such leading OSes as iPhone and Windows Mobile. This variant has some significant pluses. For example: a large number of users who are ready to pay for their software. But at the same time you will have to compete with more than 200,000 developed mobile applications for Windows Mobile and iPhone. And as is well known Apple follows a quite tough policy of apps submission. That is why it may take a long time before your new program is approved and appears in App Store.
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