Windows & .NET Watch: Apple leaves bitter taste
April 16, 2010 —
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Software for Windows Phone 7 can only be developed in C#. Software for the iPhone can only be developed in Objective C, C++, C or JavaScript. Why then do I say the iPhone restriction is absurd, while I think the Windows restriction is fine?
In previous columns, I have praised Apple’s AppStore for reinvigorating the small retail ISV market, and the iPad for delivering the attention to a great form-factor, which has languished for half a decade. In this column and in my consulting business, I have singled out for praise Novell’s MonoTouch development stack, which marries the worlds of .NET and Cocoa Touch development. There are vastly more C# developers than Objective C developers, especially in the corporate software development world, and for in-house software, MonoTouch can provide significant flexibility for a company that isn’t sure about the wisdom or cost of a team dedicated to Mac-centric development.
Following the recent announcement of the iPhone 4.0 OS, two restrictive clauses in the new SDK license rapidly leaked out and became public knowledge. While the iPhone has always excluded interpreters and virtual machines, now programs must be “originally written in Objective, C, C# or JavaScript,” and “applications that link to Documented APIs through an intermediary translation or compatibility layer or tool are prohibited.” Taken at face value, this would ban tools such as MonoTouch, Corona (a Lua development tool), and Unity3D (a game development tool) from being used for software sold via Apple’s AppStore. (Apps deployed internally within an enterprise do not seem subject to these sections of the license.)
The proximate cause for these new restrictions is clearly Adobe’s Packager for iPhone, which precompiles ActionScript 3 (a.k.a. Flash) projects into native iPhone applications, and is part of Adobe’s forthcoming release of Creative Suite 5. Apple has been very public in its frustration and disdain for the quality of the Flash player on OS X, and Steve Jobs has not given an inch on the prospect of a Flash browser plug-in in the iPhone or iPad.
Related Search Term(s): Apple, mobile development
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