Mobile Development, Part Three: RIM BlackBerry

This is part three in a five part series. Click here for part one. Click here for part two.

Microsoft was a heavyweight in the computing and browsing markets when it entered the handheld world. Like its desktop operating system, Microsoft has multiple versions of its embedded OS, under such monikers as Windows CE, PocketPC, Portable Media Center, Windows Mobile Classic, Windows Mobile Professional, and Windows Mobile Standard. In this manner, Microsoft had an OS for every taste. Compared to this, Research In Motion (RIM) positing the BlackBerry hardware and with its one operating system seems to be contrary, yet RIM maintains the enterprise market share for handheld devices.

Part III: RIM BlackBerry

Where Microsoft attempted to take its desktop knowledge to the handheld world, RIM started in the handheld world and "worked its way up". While originally focused on embedded systems, RIM hit the jackpot with the BlackBerry and Good devices.

Like Windows Mobile and unlike Palm OS, the BlackBerry OS is multithreaded, allowing for multiple applications to run at the same time. Most applications written for the BlackBerry are in C++ and Java, though for some underlying capability applications must be digitally signed with a trusted certificate authority, which can put a barrier to more sophisticated applications for hobbyists.

C++ and Java are very open, and with Eclipse or NetBeans, tools and addons exist that support rapid application development. Java's Mobile Edition in particular has a rich subset of the common Java libraries, similar to how the .NET compact framework assists in producing sophisticated applications for Windows Mobile, including its cryptographic and socket libraries. Additionally, all BlackBerry models utilize Trible DES or (more recently) AES for wireless communication a priori, saving the developer the trouble of encrypting and decrypting data sent over the wire(less).

For a while, RIM and Microsoft split the smartphone/enterprise handheld market, but tomorrow we will visit the system that was predicted years before it came out, and still exceeded expectations, taking not only a large share of the enterprise market, but the consumer share as well.

Erhan J. Kartaltepe,
erhan.kartaltepe-at-utsa.edu

Palm Reading

At the Institute for Cyber Security, secure software development for mobile devices is a core concern, so any handheld news (news on handhelds, not news you hold in your hands) catches our collective eye. So we were very interested when Palm opened its doors to its aptly named Palm Software Store today. Hot on the heels of Apple's iPhone App Store and Google's Android Market (and soon to be followed by the Blackberry Application StoreFront early next year), Palm hopes to galvanize its user base and perhaps steer them away from its industrious competition.

The Palm OS and the titular device have a long and storied history, bringing an intuitive and natural interface to a handheld computer, almost singlehandedy bringing about the mobile revolution. The current generation of Palm OS (5.x), however, is over six and a half years old, and even "newish" devices like the Centro still run the venerable operating system. Compare this to its previous operating system releases, almost one a year from its inception! Meanwhile, Microsoft's Windows Mobile and the aforementioned rivals continue to innovate rather than stagnate.

Palm Nova, its next-generation operating system that almost no one knows anything about, is scheduled for release early next year. and perhaps the Palm Software Store is its harbinger, of sorts. As huge fans of the Palm OS (and all mobile devices), we at ICS look forward to its release and hope its emergence will usher in a revitalized Palm, and a charged mobile device market.

Erhan J. Kartaltepe,
erhan.kartaltepe-at-utsa.edu