An Easier Way To Develop Android Apps
An Easier Way To Develop Android Apps
Article by Eric Schwinn
Almost everyone with a smart phone uses apps. But how many people can actually make the apps that they use or contribute new apps to the marketplace?
Unfortunately, for as simple as they look, creating Android Apps is no easy task. Anyone who wants to build an app is expected to be fluent in the Java programming language, which is a language with a very high learning curve. Only a certain subset of programmers have the ability to code in this high-level language, which leaves a lot of other people out.Traditionally, programs are made with the Eclipse IDE and the Android SDK. Tons of books had to be read to understand these new technologies and to implement them in new ways. What made matters even more difficult was the fact that this method of developing was quite different from how programmers develop iPhone Apps. Because of this, many mobile developers did not want to make the transition and never entered the App market.At the same time, there are many users who aren’t programmers who would like to enrich the Android App Market. Although they didn’t have the computer science degree or the tech know-how, they still had creative ideas and new innovation that could be brought to the Android platform.
Realizing this discrepancy, Google labs has invented a new, user-friendly way to develop apps for the Android. Released in 2010, this brand new software, App Inventor, has taken the world by storm.
With a visual, “drag-and-drop” interface, virtually anyone can build a simple Android App. Highschool students with little programming experience have built twitter-like clients and stay-at-home mothers have built an instant messaging clone.
There are already many tutorials on App Inventor and Google has released some documentation to get you started. Fortunately, you can also just download the application and start experimenting with it yourself.
The greatest part about this all is that Google has released this software completely free of cost. So I urge you to experiment with it if you’d like to build Android Apps but are intimidated by the work it requires. This may be your solution. Having said that, will this replace mainstream programming? While many speculate this, experts in the field I highly doubt it. App Inventor is a visual interface made by programming with Java. All “groundbreaking” technology, to date, has used coding by hand. It is much more flexible, extensive, and has a lot more depth compared to applications like App InventorAt the end of the day though, it depends on what one wants to create. If someone wants to create something relatively simple without investing hours and hours in to learning how to code and hundreds of dollars on a technical firm to develop their App, App Inventor may be a promising solution
About the Author
Eric Schwinn is a web 2.0 consultant and Android App programmer. He blogs regularly at: The Android App Man and has written more abouthow to make apps with App Inventor
