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Mobile Application Development

What is Mobile Application Development?

mobile & new media apps

A mobile application, most commonly referred to as an app, is a type of application software designed to run on a mobile device, such as a smartphone or tablet computer. Mobile applications frequently serve to provide users with similar services to those accessed on PCs, except apps are generally smaller and individual software units with limited function. This use of software has been popularized by Apple Inc. and its App Store, which sells thousands of applications for the iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch. Android phones tend to use a similar version called Google Play Store. A mobile application also may be known as an app, web app, online app, iPhone app or smartphone app.

Mobile App Functions

The purposes of these apps run the gamut, from utility, productivity, and navigation to entertainment, sports, fitness, and just about any others imaginable. Social media is one of the most popular fields of mobile app development and adoption. In fact, Facebook was the most widely used app in 2017 across all platforms.

Many online entities have both mobile websites and mobile apps. In general, the difference lies in purpose: An app is usually smaller in scope than a mobile website, offers more interactivity, and presents more specific information in a format that's easy and intuitive to use on a mobile device.

Operating System Compatibility

A mobile app developer creates an app specifically for the operating system in which it will run. For example, mobile apps for the iPad are supported by Apple's iOS, but not Google's Android. An Apple app can't run on an Android phone, and vice versa. Often, developers create a version for each; for example, a mobile app in the Apple Store might have a counterpart in Google Play.

Why Mobile Apps Are Different From Regular Apps

Many mobile apps have corresponding programs meant to run on desktop computers. Mobile apps have to work with different constraints than their desktop equivalents, however. Mobile devices have a wide range of screen sizes, memory capacities, processor capabilities, graphical interfaces, buttons, and touch functions, and developers must accommodate them all.

For example, mobile app users (like website visitors) don't want to scroll sideways to see text, images, or interactive touch points, nor do they want to struggle reading tiny text. An additional consideration for mobile app developers is the touch interface common to mobile devices.

Mobile First Development

Before the widespread adoption of mobile devices, software was first developed to run on desktops and laptops, with a mobile version coming after. Tablet and smartphone usage is outstripping that of desktop computers and laptops, reflected in-app sales trends. In fact, 258.2 billion apps were forecast to be downloaded in 2022. As a result, many developers have turned to a "mobile-first" approach, mirroring a similar trend in web design. For these apps, their mobile versions are the defaults, with the desktop versions being adapted for their larger screens and more expansive specifications.[1]

Why Mobile Applications Are Important; Especially Its Development

In the past few years, mobile app development has become a booming industry. Currently, it is estimated that there are 2.3 million mobile app developers who are devoted to keeping up with the industry demand. In fact, according to Apple, in 2013 1.25 million apps were registered in the Apple app store and accounted for 50 billion downloads and $5 billion paid to developers. With these types of industry numbers, it soon becomes clear that mobile app development is a key factor for business success.

With the growing number of people accessing the Internet via smartphones and tablets, mobile app development has the unique ability to access a large number of potential consumers. According to the Pew Research Internet Project, an estimated 67 percent of U.S. smartphone owners use their smartphones to access the Internet on a daily basis. Recent studies also suggest that by 2017 app downloads will have grown to 200 billion and the subsequent mobile app revenues will have increased to $63.5 billion. The reason behind these exceptional numbers lies in the continued growth of smartphone and tablet sales.

Not only have the sales of smartphones and tablets increased, but the number of mobile apps installed has also grown exponentially. The Pew Research Internet Project indicates that approximately 50 percent of all smartphone users have mobile apps installed; of this percentage, two-thirds of the individuals are regular mobile app users. These statistics show that mobile apps have a unique opportunity to engage with an entirely new type of customer, one who is constantly connected to the Internet and the global commerce space. In essence, a mobile app allows you to have millions of new customers at your fingertips. All that is left for you to do, is to develop an effective app and reap the benefits of your labors.

The Biggest Benefits of Mobile Apps for Businesses

There are multiple benefits to creating and distributing a mobile app. Below are a few of the top benefits for businesses across a wide variety of industries.

Build Loyalty Mobile apps work to consistently increase customer loyalty, especially in the retail sector.

Reinforce your Brand Mobile apps offer a unique opportunity for brand reinforcement through a new channel. Through mobile apps, customers are encouraged to download the free branded version, where they can customize preferences to fit their specific needs.

Increase your Visibility In 2013, there were over 50 billion mobile app downloads on the Apple store.

Increase your Accessibility Smartphone and tablet users are constantly on the go; this means that they don't always have time to sign into a mobile website. And these mobile websites are designed for readability and navigation, NOT for process management. Mobile apps allow users to have easy, functional access to information, products, services, and processes that they need in real-time and are optimized for hands-on interaction.

Increase Sell-through Recent analysis suggests that mobile app users spend more time on a company's mobile app, then they spend on the company's mobile website.

As we continue to evolve into a mobile-centric society, it comes as no surprise that mobile apps are at the center of the developmental push. Developing a mobile app can go a long way towards propelling your company into the hands of new customers and future business success. [2]

New Media and Mobile Application

With technology advancement, smartphones are compatible and also built to run on most new media apps. Consumers/people are no longer restricted to the home computer or PC because their applications are now available on their phones. From blog apps to games, news, entertainment (music, movies), social media, users/consumers can access anything from anywhere. Nowadays there are applications to help personal development in terms of health, habits, counting calories, meditation, and exercise. All these new ideas that use to be conformed to meeting a personal trainer or simple reminders written on a post-it note has transformed into a world of possibilities.

Understanding of the relationship between New Media, Social Media, and Mobile Application

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Nowadays, many people are confused with New Media and Social Media. According to Christopher Penn (2016), he claimed that "Social media is different in that the value of social media is our network of connections.... Social media and new media are not currently interchangeable terms. One can create new media without being social, but one cannot create social media without also being new media by definition" (What's the difference between social media and new media?[3]). New media exists in many forms such as smartphones, tablets, and smartwatches that are all mobile devices, and computers that are the non-mobile Internet. Regardless of either form, they all provide a medium function for the development of applications. Those applications on mobile devices called mobile applications are highly frequent using by most people. Social media applications are one of the application categories and can be downloaded on either computers or mobile devices. Therefore, New media is the carrier of Mobile application, and Mobile application is the incubator of Social Media.

Mobile Applications that advances New Media

Mobile applications play a larger role in new media than simply allowing you to access the Internet with you everywhere you go, it also helps in various aspects such as with creativity, organization, planning, developing, creating, entertaining, calming and communicating. Some built-in applications that are already installed in your phone or iPad/Android devices are deemed to be useful by the phone programmers--such apps include Weather, Messages, Safari, Music, iTunes Store/Google Store, Notes, etc. However, the App Store also has a lot more applications that offer a variety of ways to help with specific needs.

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Iwatch.jpg With the development of mobile applications, the form of new media has also innovated. Smartphones are pursuing thin and light physical shape but with large capacity inside the device. For example, iPhones have become thinner and thinner, but its storage capacity has been developed quite large and up to a maximum of 512 GB currently. In addition, Apple's smartwatch that has a tiny body but can contain almost the same volume and variety of mobile applications as an iPhone, and so does its function- connection to Airpods.

Mobile Applications Embedded New Media- Mobile Devices

Weather App

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Apple users will find that certain apps cannot be deleted, and one of those apps is Weather. The app proves to be very convenient because we no longer need to manually check our TVs or listen to the radio to learn about the news--we can see updates on the Weather through the app. It has a weather forecast for the upcoming week, with specific details regarding the humidity, temperature, and likeliness of rain in the context of the next 8-12 hours into the day. This helps with preparing appropriate outfits for the following days and also helps us to prepare for weather conditions, such as rain or snow.

Apple Pay App

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This electronic payment application is exclusive to Apple users. This application is bundled with the users' physical bank cards, and thus, Apple users can pay their bills by entering pins or scanning their faces. Apple Pay is a way of leading people to realize the cashless society. Because of this cardless and cashless payment, there is no great need to use a visa card, credit card, or cash. This is an extremely convenient payment method since by using this cashless payment, people do not need to bring cash and coins when they go shopping or just go outside. Moreover, crimes such as stealing money and robbery for money have decreased. Nowadays, there are so many franchised vending machines, supermarkets, shopping malls, restaurants, and entertainment parks that have already have an Apple pay or contactless payment logo on their cashier registers. However, this novel payment app has not been widely spread at least in America because there are too many people who cannot afford to buy an iPhone, and many petty dealers cannot afford to install this cashless and cardless system. Instead, they still choose to deal with cash, coins, and debit cards, etc. Thus, this cashless payment invention s great convenience for people, its popularization has still a long-term problem.

Mobile Banking App

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Mobile banking application is a necessary mobile app on most people's smartphone because this kind of mobile application can immediately give people the most accurate and complete private bank information such as balance remaining and recent transaction activity records. By inputting pin codes or scanning people's face ID, they have access to this information by themselves rather than go to the physical bank hall and wait for a long line. In addition, mobile banking can help people transfer money online nationwide or globally instead of doing this at the bank counter. There are other banking things people can do on their smartphones. For example, check deposit by photoing both sides of checks; make investments; find the local ATM& Branch by entering the zip code, etc. All in all, online banking saves time and energy for both their clients and banks. Almost every big bank has its own mobile banking, which aims to provide efficient and high-quality services.


Pandora App

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Pandora allows you to listen to music for free and gives you a personalized radio that plays what you love and continually evolves with your tastes. Instead of spending a lot of time finding and downloading songs that take up a lot of space on your device, Pandora offers a variety of selections of music that you can choose from and listen to while on the go. All you need is an internet connection and you can stream music anywhere you go while personalizing your station to listen to songs that interest you. This app helps to save time and space, but also provides entertainment and soothes you whenever you need it.

Clash of Clans App

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One of the less mainstream applications, but still popular is Clash of Clans. It was once the top game in the App store and with millions of active users, it grossed $2.3 billion in revenue with $930 million reported profit in 2015 alone. [4] This is an application that promotes creativity and changes the way we think about entertainment gaming. In this mobile game application, it forces you to think of strategies to create the best possible army and best possible village defense to continue building your village until you move to the highest league in the game. It promotes creativity because it allows you to choose how to assemble your army for attacking for normal raids, but also in war, when clans go against clans. It also allows you to be creative with how you choose to defend your village based on how you want to set up your walls, buildings and gold/elixir storages. Lastly, it allows for the customization of attacking methods. Not only is the game entertaining, it encourages creativity, strategy, and friendship--because you can communicate with other people who also play the game.

Flappy Bird App

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This application was created by Dong Nguyen. This was not a long-lived application but while it was it was taking the world by storm. The game was very simple, you just had to get your flapping bird to keep flying and passing the pipes. The more pipes that it passes through the more points you get. The game was not complex and at all but it was very addicting and very frustrating for the player. The Flappy Bird created collected $50,000 in revenue per day based on ad revenue.[5] Amazing how creating just a simple app and fun would create such a high source of revenue. Shortly, after its popularity, the creator decides to delete the app and return to his simpler life because of all the problems and issues that the app was causing him and others. [6]

Netflix App

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Sites such as Netflix and Hulu that allows users to stream over hundreds of movies and TV shows at your command is part of the new media era that replaced old media such as DVDs and movie rental stores. Blockbuster was one of the highest grossed movie rental stores until Netflix and other web-based applications came along and provided the same movies at a quicker speed and lower rate. However, Blockbuster isn't the only one threatened by Netflix, other paid television services are losing subscriptions to the cheaper streaming site. [7] The Netflix app allows you to stream from your phone and watch movies anywhere (with an internet connection)! This changes how shows and movies are normally watched, which is either on TV or in theaters. The franchise is so successful that it even makes its movies and TV shows--widely popularized ones are 'Orange Is the New Black' and 'House of Cards'.

Keep:Fitness & Workout Trainer App

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This application is a fitness coach application. Traditionally, people like to work out and lose weight by spending a lot of money on hiring a private fitness instructor in gyms. However, with the emergence and rise of mobile applications, almost everything can be mobilized included bodybuilding. Keep is a mobile app, where people can access various workout lessons and video guidance for home trainers for free. Besides, it connects to the user's "health app" which records people's walk steps, running miles, and calories burned to calculate, evaluate, and summarize people's daily, monthly, and yearly workout status. It's efficient and cost-effective for people to use this app instead of hiring and making an appointment with a real fitness coach. This mobile application allows people to work out whenever and wherever they want. Here is Keep's [8] official website, and you may want to have a look.

Healow: Health and Online Wellness App

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Healow is an app provides a secure means to manage your health and wellness. By using this application, patients can find their doctors online by name, specialty, or city. The Healow app simplifies your life by enabling you to access multiple Patient Portal accounts from a single location; personalize and manage your medications; obtain lab results; access your personal health record; control and view your past or upcoming appointments as well as the summaries of your past visits; receive interactive health alerts and messages from your doctor. Nowadays, people emphasize more on their privacy that includes their medical records. Healow preserves all the personal health data and information and protects privacy by the password created by the patients, and only patients themselves and their doctors have access to the records. This mobile application not only saves physical paper uses but also plays a good role in protecting privacy.

Ebates App

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Ebates was founded in 1998 by two Deputy District Attorneys who used to prosecute fraud and identity theft in Silicon Valley[9]. The idea behind the application is that every time you buy something through their application, they get a commission and they share part of the commission with you. This application itself revolutionizes the way we shop--not only can we shop for goods (and services) online now, but it offers additional incentive to shop for goods because you get some of your money back. Besides, it also conveniently gives you updates on all the hottest trending items, sales that are available for each store, and even coupon codes to help save you money!

MoviePass

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An app that is monthly charge as of $9.95 which allows the cardholder to was all movies for free in 30 days. First, you got to register an account which ties your credit card to the account. You will be charged automatically $9.95 for the first month. Once you complete the registration the company will send you a red MoviePass card with the size of a credit card, the start date will be automatically processed once you got the red card. Then, you select the movie theater you want to attend and the time of the movie you want to attend. Once you confirm that, you will have you use the red card at the register for the movie tickets. There will be no fees charged that this time. Plus, for each movie, you can only watch it once, and one movie per day. [10]

Yelp

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Yelp is a well-known mobile application that helps people select, evaluate, and determine certain places when they have no clues about or before they actually depart for. Yelp was established in 2004 by two former PayPal employees- Russel Simmons and Jeremy Stoppelman. It is a business-oriented and crowd-sourced review forum, but it also provides services like reservations, online orders, and recommendations according to the users' locations. In 2008, Yelp created an ability for business owners to interact with reviews, the existing customers, and the potential customers via this forum, and those business owners can choose to respond either privately or publicly. [11] From this, Yelp has realized the transformation of the restaurant industry's wide publicity, and it has increased interactions and communications between customers and potential customers, business owners and their customers, and business owners and other business owners.

Uber

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Uber is a ride-hailing company that boosts the gig economy and primarily provides the peer-to-peer ridesharing service, but later it leases electric bikes. What's more, it expands to the food delivery industry and has become the industry's leader. The Uber mobile application is the indispensably important communication and interaction medium since both Uber drivers and their customers rely on it to know each others' locations and contact information so that such a service model is highly effective and efficient. Currently, the Uber app not only displays its riding function but also embeds its electric bike rent and food delivery "Uber Eats" functions. Thus, different services can be switched freely, and users do not need to download three separate apps. This application combines technologies of GPS, map display, and cashless payments- bank cards, PayPal, and Venmo, etc. The Uber mobile application makes people travel freely and conveniently because riding systems like Uber has spread among the metropolitan cities where cashless society prevails all over the world.

Computer Engineering

Computer engineering is the branch of engineering that integrates electronic engineering with computer sciences. Computer engineers design and develop computer systems and other technological devices.

Back-end Development

Back-end development refers to the role of creating software that will be used behind the scenes that make an application or device work. In essence, they are the masterminds behind a product. They create the bridge that allows for communication between the browser/ server with the database.

iOS Development

XCode - iOS coding terminal

How to Develop iOS Apps? To develop an Apple app, you can use the X Code and 'C' language.

X code - is an integrated development environment (IDE) containing a suite of software development tools developed by Apple for developing software and mobile applications for OS X and iOS.

Xcode includes everything you need to create amazing apps for iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch. The Swift programming language has been updated and is now faster than ever, with great features that make your code even easier to read and write. And with the new playgrounds, you can experiment with new APIs or author gorgeous interactive documentation using embedded resources, additional source code, and rich text comments. Xcode’s user interface testing feature can even record your app in action and generate tests for you.

Apple iOS uses 'C' language. C is a general-purpose, procedural computer programming language supporting structured programming, lexical variable scope, and recursion, while a static type system prevents unintended operations. By design, C provides constructs that map efficiently to typical machine instructions and has found lasting use in applications previously coded in assembly language. Such applications include operating systems and various application software for computers, from supercomputers to embedded systems.[12]

Android Developement

AndroidStudio

How to Develop Android Apps? You can use Android Studio to develop your Android app. Another technique is the programming language Java.

Android Studio is an intelligent code editor capable of advanced code completion, refactoring, and code analysis. The powerful code editor helps you be a more productive Android app developer.

-New project wizards make it easier than ever to start a new project. Start projects using template code for patterns such as navigation drawer and view pagers, and even import Google code samples from GitHub.

-Build apps for Android phones, tablets, Android Wear, Android TV, Android Auto, and Google Glass. With the new Android Project View and module support in Android Studio, it's easier to manage app projects and resources.

Android is based on Java to develop its operating system. Java is a general-purpose programming language that is class-based, object-oriented, and designed to have as few implementation dependencies as possible. It is intended to let application developers write once, run anywhere (WORA), meaning that compiled Java code can run on all platforms that support Java without the need for recompilation. Java applications are typically compiled to bytecode that can run on any Java virtual machine (JVM) regardless of the underlying computer architecture. The syntax of Java is similar to C and C++, but it has fewer low-level facilities than either of them. As of 2019, Java was one of the most popular programming languages in use according to GitHub, particularly for client-server web applications, with a reported 9 million developers.

Front-end Development

Is the practice of converting data inputs into an interface. Developers create what we see and what we interact with. Each button we click directs us to something, the money in our balance goes up as we deposit money, we go to the next page when we swipe, etc. These concepts and practices are only applicable and functional because of front end developers.

UX/UI Design

Since the development of the internet and smartphones, there have been new industries and jobs created. This includes UX/UI design. UX/UI design refers to the User Experience and User Interface. The first UX job posting was in 1993.[1] This is still considered to be recent. From there, many companies, jobs, classes were created.

Currently, entry-level jobs in UX/UI can range from $50,000 to over $150,000. These roles have been in higher demand as more companies are going virtual and better software and online system need to be implemented.

With the incredible amount of mobile apps, user interface design has become a large focus. With so much competition, UX/UI differentiates apps with similar functions from one another. Similar to web design, programs such as Adobe are used to create mobile app interfaces. A new program called Sketch has become very popular for app design. The sketch is a program developed by Apple for designing iOS apps. This program is similar to Adobe Illustrator but is more fully integrated with iOS systems and products. The program comes with thousands of iPhone and iPad preset layouts, icons, and more. This program is often used along with the animation program, Flinto. Using Flinto, designers can import their app designs from Sketch and add animations and gestures to the pages. This is particularly helpful for designers to show the intended functions to the front-end developer.

The growing demand for front-end developers shows their importance in the modern technological era. To maintain audience and user engagement, the experience and interface have to be easy and seamless. They combine design, software engineering, as well as psychology. Great examples of great UX/UI designs are social media applications. Individuals can scroll through social media endlessly because of its ease of use and simplicity in going through endless amounts of posts on a feed. People are no strangers to losing track of time when browsing social media. The UX/UI designers take all of these ideas into consideration and try to get users to stay on their application for as long as possible.

External Application Programs

RPG Maker MV

RPG Maker MV is the eighth installment in the RPG Maker series. The series initially started as a Japanese video game maker, modeled after the original, infamous Final Fantasy. This program quickly took off in the West and due to popularity and user-created translations, the developers made future installments in English as well. The latest installment includes phone app integration. Now, one can export a game that can be played on the computer as well as iPhones and Androids.

Insight of Mobile Application development

Mobile app development is a technique of software development for mobile, and different mobile applications will run on a mobile platform.[13] Mobiles- the new media- always go with people wherever people go, and mobiles have already become the main marketing channel and business operating tool. For developing a business, an organization must have a website and mobile application in order to evolve their business, and for the business owners, due to their inventions of different mobile applications, people- the audience or customers acquire new information at their fingertips. By the notifications sent by mobile applications, customers know numerous news and novel trends in time. There are many benefits of mobile app development on business aspects: 1. "On-The-Go Marketing", in which customers can access the commerce anywhere and at any time; 2. "Future Marketing Trend" can be predicted since according to the source, more than 1 billion smartphone gadgets are using in the world and more than 50% devices connecting with the Internet; 3. "Increase More Sales" due to the assistance of mobile device in helping enhance brand awareness; 4. "Act As Socal Platform", where there is trading, there is communication. Almost all kinds of transactions involved in at least to laterals' interaction and communication; 5. "Improved Sales and Service" because the mobile app enables the customer to order and purchase whenever they want and wherever they are. Moreover, they not only can access different fields of the world but also connect those fields to each other. For example, with the development of e-commerce, online banking payments get developed as well; as the social media like Twitter and Facebook emergence and being widely applied, real-time updated e-news becomes ubiquitous and reachable at any places anytime.

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