Mobile development

Two weeks ago Mike Schroepfer, a Mozilla developer, announced that they’ll launch a version of Firefox that can be run mobile devices. If you own a Windows Mobile device, you’re probably craving for a better browsing experience, just like I am. I’ve seen Deepfish, a new browser by Microsoft, but it’s in early betas.

The interesting part however is that, according to Mike Schroepfer, mobile devices currently outsell computers 20 to 1.I remember Microsoft saying in some article or at some conference that by 2010 a total of 1 billion people will be accessing the internet using mobile devices. These numbers hopefully make you consider if the mobile market is worth investing in, especially being a developer.

At Class-A we’re busy with our own mobile development training. We’re not using standard Microsoft (MOC) material, but creating our own, so we can incorporate best practices and use .NET Compact Framework 3.5, which Microsoft probably won’t have material for, for a long time. This features LINQ and WCF which are great enhancements. I’ve just blogged about the .NETCF 2.0 application I’ve been building, and the next step is to build it again in .NETCF 3.5.

If you experience the Compact Framework for the first time, it might be a though start. But once you get it, it’s a really fun experience building on an entirely different platform. It’s not the C# that’s difficult, it’s the new challenges like the user interface, different screen resolutions, connections and synchronizing data between your device and the server, performance considerations that are completely different from the full .NET Framework, etc. But when you put some time in it, it’s really rewarding to see your application running on a mobile device and having other people enthusiastic about it.

Although LINQ is the ‘expected’ next evolution in programming, I think people can’t even start to wonder what will happen in the mobile world. How it will advance on both hardware and software. Will we keep small screens or walk around with large origami like pc’s? What will be possible on your mobile, especially with Silverlight mobile on the way.

The mobile platform is sure something that has my attention and I hope more people will join me. Together we can create a great future.