BlackBerry OS 7 Web Inspector: Easily Debug BlackBerry Websites & WebWorks Browser Apps

by Ronen Halevy on November 18th, 2011 · Leave a Comment

Posted in Developer Featured News

I use Web Inspector all the time to work on BerryReview and other projects on my desktop and I was really glad to see it included on the BlackBerry PlayBook. I knew that RIM managed to stick it into BlackBerry 7 and I finally got a chance to use it this weekend. In case you have never heard of Web Inspector before then here is a brief explanation. Web Inspector is a feature in WebKit (usually only desktop clients) which allows you to view and edit the page source, CSS, live DOM hierarchy, script debugging, profiling and much much more. For example, you can see what it would look like if you changed the text color or you can navigate what your script has done to the DOM.

 

Back to the topic at hand. I needed to debug a JavaScript error on the mobile version of BerryReview along with an issue with our CDN that did not show images or styling sometimes on BlackBerrys. I had tried debugging this issue on my Bold 9930 when it launched but the Web Inspector did not work that well in the early builds.

Now on my BlackBerry Curve 9350 I have to say Web Inspector is the easiest way to debug and test any mobile web apps or websites for BlackBerry. It is essentially like having the Chrome or Safari WebKit based Web Inspector tool for BlackBerry. From what I understand it even works with the BlackBerry 7 simulator so you don’t need a BlackBerry 7 device. There are a few tricks to get it running so read below:

 

To setup Web Inspector on your BlackBerry 7 device:

Let us know if it works for you! I am amazed how responsive it is and how fast it is. Even when you hover over elements on the DOM it hovers them on the BlackBerry browser. Changes are instant. Great work from the Torch Mobile team on this one!

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International BBM Hackathons in Bangkok, Amsterdam, & London This Month

by the BerryReview Team on November 16th, 2011 · Leave a Comment

Posted in Developer News

 

Back in September we told you about a bunch of the upcoming BBM Hackathons for developers. Then we did not have the dates and details on the international events and it turns out there are three this month starting tomorrow! Planning very far in advance, Luke just posted the dates on RIM’s developers blog:

My guess is it might be a bit too late to sign up for tomorrow in Bangkok but you may want to try out Amsterdam and London if they are local. Check out the details at bbmappshackathon.com.

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MobiHand Says They are “Committed to Developer Success” & “98% of Accounts are Current”

by Ronen Halevy on November 14th, 2011 · Leave a Comment

Posted in Developer News

I have really been hoping that MobiHand would get in front of this issue and its nice to see them finally have a voice. Adriano just posted on their official Blog that they are “Committed to Developer Success.” Here are the highlights of what they had to say in what is turning into a he said she said type of drama:

MobiHand goes on to ask developers to:

…disregard sensational, derogatory, and destructive comments made by a few developers who are inventing or exaggerating information about our company.  Without the developer community MobiHand could not exist.  We are grateful for the opportunity to serve and we ask that you continue with us to provide great products and responsive customer service through the next few months and in the years ahead.

I really want to give MobiHand the benefit of the doubt on this one. They have offered a much better system than App World for a very long time and have had a pretty solid track record. So much so that over the years we rebranded their store on BerryReview as an additional value to readers giving us the ability to do contests and giveaways.

On the other hand quite a few devs have contacted me over the last week or two expressing concerns that they are not getting paid. This includes quite a few high profile long time BlackBerry developers who tend to not be the sensationalist types. I really hope this all gets resolved very soon. We have tried reaching out to MobiHand multiple times without a response so for now we just have to wait and see.

Let us know if you have any updates!

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Devs: BlackBerry Analytics Portal Getting Redesigned This Weekend

by the BerryReview Team on November 11th, 2011 · Leave a Comment

Posted in Developer News

Developers that are using RIM’s free BlackBerry Analytics service powered by Webtrends are getting a nice facelift this weekend. RIM sent out an email that the portal is getting redesigned starting Saturday November 12th from 7:30AM Pacific Time and lasting for “several hours.” The BlackBerry Analytics service will continue collecting data at that time but the portal will not be available. They are also not changing the available reports or SDK.

The main three changes are:

The BlackBerry Analytics Portal will remain at blackberry.webtrends.com

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Devs Share Their Stories from BBM Hackathon Events on Video

 

RIM started an interesting new video series on YouTube highlighting some developers that have attended their recent BBM Hackathons. The videos are done nicely and are interesting to watch if you want to gain some insight into why devs are attending the events. Check out the videos below or more in the BlackBerry YouTube channel.

Desktop Video Link | Mobile Video Link

Desktop Video Link | Mobile Video Link

Desktop Video Link | Mobile Video Link

Desktop Video Link | Mobile Video Link

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Find Upcoming BlackBerry Developer Events Worldwide on RIM’s Dev Calendar

My buddy Josep pointed out to me that RIM has posted up a nice microsite that shows all of their upcoming developer events. These are events hosted by RIM or ones where RIM will have a presence which is nice. All in all a good resource to find where you can meet up with RIM and pick their brains including Hackathons and other events.

Check it out for yourself at www.blackberrydeveloperevents.com

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Updated: BlackBerry PlayBook OS v2.0.0.3894 Developer Beta Available – App World Removed!

Update: RIM let us know that their note in their blog post this morning that said App World not being included in this version of the PlayBook OS 2.0 developer build ”was a typo that has since been removed.”  Hopefully that means RIM is not even considering it anymore. Now I can finally download the update and check for myself.

RIM has rolled out an update to the BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 Developer Beta bringing it to v2.0.0.3894. This is not the regular consumer build and to ensure that RIM has taken the DRASTIC measure of removing App World from the developer build in this update. That means you can only sideload applications for testing. The problem is that RIM has essentially turned the developer build from something you could more or less still use regularly and test on to a device that is for development only. There is a reason other OS development builds of upcoming OS releases like Windows, iOS, etc DO NOT DO THIS! It pisses developers off!

Either way if you want to update to this new developer build you will get updates that include two development improvements including:

I really hope RIM reconsiders this mistakenly altruistic idiotic approach of removing App World. Make sure to let them know on the BlackBerry Dev Blog. I for one will not be upgrading but let us know if there is anything new if you do.

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BlackBerry PlayBook OS v2.0.0.3894 Developer Beta Available – App World Removed!

RIM has rolled out an update to the BlackBerry PlayBook OS 2.0 Developer Beta bringing it to v2.0.0.3894. This is not the regular consumer build and to ensure that RIM has taken the DRASTIC measure of removing App World from the developer build in this update. That means you can only sideload applications for testing. The problem is that RIM has essentially turned the developer build from something you could more or less still use regularly and test on to a device that is for development only. There is a reason other OS development builds of upcoming OS releases like Windows, iOS, etc DO NOT DO THIS! It pisses developers off!

Either way if you want to update to this new developer build you will get updates that include two development improvements including:

I really hope RIM reconsiders this mistakenly altruistic idiotic approach of removing App World. Make sure to let them know on the BlackBerry Dev Blog. I for one will not be upgrading but let us know if there is anything new if you do.

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Devs: Respond to Millennial Media State of the Apps Survey for a Chance to Win $500

Millennial Media is working on their State of the Apps report for 2011 and they asked us to help them reach BlackBerry developers. Their survey covers info from the platforms you are developing for to your monetization goals for 2012. Their current survey is running until this coming Sunday (November 6th) and they are looking for more data on BlackBerry development. They share the report results publicly which is nice to see at the end and they also are offering up a $500 prize for those who fill it out.

To take the survey (and be entered for a chance to win $500) head on over to bit.ly/o6wZDR or check out their blog post on the survey.

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DevCon Americas 2011 Highlights: A Developer’s Perspective

For the fourth year in a row, I headed down to the San Francisco area for the annual BlackBerry Developers Conference (DevCon). By now many of you will have read the announcements and press releases so instead of rehashing them here let me share some first-hand experiences and highlights from the perspective of someone who has been developing for BlackBerry for a while now.

Lots of new faces at RIM. Surprisingly or not, many familiar faces of senior RIM execs from previous years were no longer to be seen. Clearly, the winds of change are blowing in Waterloo. I am hoping and crossing fingers that the new senior management steers the ship in the right direction.

The Android Player. One word for this one: amazing. The idea of the Android player is to run existing Android app on the Playbook, and subsequently on BBX devices. During DevCon RIM reps were manning booths that helped developers do exactly that – take their Android .apk files and show them how to transform them into Playbook apps.

RIM engineers have done an incredible job here. Even though the player was in beta all it took for the Android version of my app Viira to be repackaged as a Playbook app was a command line incantation – and that’s it. No code change required whatsoever and it ran beautifully without a glitch.

The Android player runs as a background system process so running Android apps on the Playbook is entirely transparent to the user – there is no need to manually start the player. The Android player will be pushed as part of the Playbook OS updates ensuring that Playbooks around the world have an up-to-date version. Expect to see the Android player in the 2.0 update to the Playbook.

No Java on BBX. To be honest, when RIM announced that Java will not be a supported way forward to develop on the BBX platform it left a lot of developers scratching their heads and wondering what the future of BlackBerry will look like. Has RIM gone mad? People were feeling anxious, to say the least.

One senior technical rep that I have gotten to know over the years put things in good perspective for me. With 70+ million non-BBX BlackBerry devices that will be around for some time to come (see no mention of QNX point below), does it make sense to worry [and get your panties in a bunch] yet? (stuff in brackets added by author)

Cascades: the way to the future. Developing rich next-generation user interfaces on the BBX platform rests on the shoulders of cascades brought over by RIM’s acquisition of The Astonishing Tribe (TAT). The demos presented clearly demonstrated some futuristic looks and capabilities. However being a bit of a sceptic here, from what I saw I wasn’t fully convinced that cascades will necessarily make it possible to develop bread-and-butter apps with ease. Only time will tell.

No mention of QNX devices. Normally, RIM gives developers a peak into the future of BlackBerry as early as possible. For this year’s DevCon, that glimpse did not include the much-anticipated and rumoured QNX devices. In short, QNX device availability was not mentioned at all. Does this mean that RIM does not plan on releasing those any time soon or does it mean they are simple mum to not distract potential buyers and upgraders to the new 9900 series and Torch models? Your guess is as good as mine on this one.

Conclusion

Overall, I have to say that this has been one of the most useful DevCons that I have attended. It was amazing to see the BlackBerry ecosystem mature from the “early days” of 2008 where people were trying to get their minds wrapped around what in retrospect looks like basic apps and concepts to the present where so many rich, complex and sophisticated applications and frameworks were presented. The RIM technical reps were incredibly helpful and that alone made the cost of admission well worth it.

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Devs: BlackBerry Java SDK & JDE v7.0 get Maintenance Release Update

RIM released an update to the BlackBerry Java SDK and JDE v7.0 in their latest maintenance release. This new release is not a huge update but has some goodies according to RIM. They did not put up a separate change log I can find but it includes:

Updates to the API documentation, code samples and an auto-complete feature. Multiple fixes to the BlackBerry smartphone simulator and MDS-CS Simulator are also included and the BlackBerry Java SDK now includes Mac.

You can read more about the release on the RIM DevBlog or download the updates at the links below:

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BlackBerry DevCon 2011 Sessions Now Online and Available Free?!?

Usually RIM does a great job of posting up the sessions from DevCon online including audio and presentations along with sample code. The thing is that content is usually limited only to registered attendees of DevCon. Josep pointed out a thread on the forums where Adam Stanley from RIM confirms that the sessions are now up. The thing is it looks like they are available to anybody who wants to view them for free as long as you fill out a relatively simple registration.

I just went to this link and registered with a new username and password for free and now I can download and view all the sessions from DevCon along with downloading all the content to my BlackBerry. You can watch all the general sessions along with all the specific sessions on Java, Web, Native SDK, Adobe AIR/Flash, Android, Enterprise, and others. They even have some of the sessions offered in Spanish and some of them also have text transcripts!

I am not sure if this is a fluke that everybody can register but if you are interested I would recommend heading to this link and registering free so you can download the content in case RIM changes their mind… Let us know if it works for you!

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RIM Explains Platform Strategy Including Lack of BlackBerry Java on BBX Platform

We told you that RIM officially said at DevCon last week that the upcoming BlackBerry BBX Platform would not support BlackBerry Java. Now Alec Saunders from RIM has detailed a bit more about that strategy on their DevBlog. They more or less explain that BlackBerry Java will not be supported on the BBX platform and what RIM’s future strategy is. Here is exactly what they have to say about BlackBerry Java:

While we will continue to support our BlackBerry Java developer community as they build for BlackBerry smartphones, after further investigation we decided against supporting BlackBerry Java on BlackBerry BBX. We concluded that the BlackBerry Java experience on the BlackBerry PlayBook platform would ultimately not satisfy us, our development community, or our customers as the platform continues to evolve.

The way to go forward on the BBX platform is either using the BBX C/C++ Native SDK or WebWorks apps or in RIM’s words:

RIM also confirms that the PlayBook and future BBX devices also support two development communities beyond the core super apps through:

The most important thing for BlackBerry Java Developers to read is the end of Alec’s strategy explanation:

So, the next big question on your mind may be: Is this the end of the BlackBerry Java SDK?

The short answer: Absolutely not.

There are currently over 70 million smartphones in market today running the BlackBerry operating system and this number is growing:

For more information on the various development options for the BlackBerry platform, check out the all-new landing page for developer.blackberry.com, as well as the newly launched microsites for theBlackBerry WebWorks SDK, the BlackBerry Runtime for Android Apps, and the BlackBerry Native SDK.

- Alec Saunders, VP of Developer Relations and Ecosystem Development

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PlayBook Native C++ SDK Now Open to All – Sample Apps & More

RIM has officially launched the Native SDK for the BlackBerry PlayBook today. This new SDK is available to all developers who want to pick it up and develop apps. They also mentioned that they have quite a bit going on in their GitHub page for the Native SDK so keep that in mind.

Check out the native SDK gold build at its new Microsite:

https://bdsc.webapps.blackberry.com/native/

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Alec Saunders Addresses His Top 3 BlackBerry Development Myths

Alec Saunders, RIM’s new VP of developer relations, had some fun on stage today trying to dispel some BlackBerry development myths. The first three hit things right on the head though you can get stats to say whatever you want. On the other hand he does have a point with the fourth myth that it is too had to develop for BlackBerry once you look beyond BlackBerry Java apps.

 

 

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Devs: RIM Rebrands Dev Efforts to “BlackBerry Jam”

RIM just pushed out their new BlackBerry Jam branding for their developer efforts. This includes their Sessions, Communities, and Zones. They just threw up their new BlackBerry Zones website. Check it out at http://us.blackberry.com/developers/.

 

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Android Devs: Port Your App at BlackBerry DevCon SF to Get a Free Pass & Free PlayBook!

If you are an Android Dev or know an Android dev who lives in the San Francisco area make sure to give them a heads up about this. We just heard that the App Express booth RIM has at DevCon San Francisco is open to everybody. That means that any Android developer can bring their app to port to the BlackBerry PlayBook with RIM’s assistance during the conference. Here is how RIM describes it:

App Express opens on Monday, October 17 and runs through Thursday, October 20. You don’t even have to be registered for BlackBerry DevCon Americas. Come by and try out App Express on us, and then stick around for the rest of the content, insights, networking and more at the conference.

We found out that means that you will get a free pass to the rest of the conference after you successfully port your app. From what we hear that means you also get a free BlackBerry PlayBook like any other BlackBerry DevCon attendee. Sweet deal right? Keep in mind you need to sign up for free BlackBerry code signing keys which can take up to 2 hours to get so get those first.

Check out the full details at the DevCon App Express page

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RIM Wants Developers to Prepare for Unannounced BlackBerry 9380 & 9790

RIM is once again leaking their own device announcements. This time they have gone around and confirmed the BlackBerry Curve 9380 and BlackBerry Bold 9790 through a blog post for developers. They are telling BlackBerry devs to prepare for the new devices and resolutions which is nice and early to get devs ready. The Curve 9380 wont take much for devs to prepare for since it runs at the same resolution and orientation as the Torch 9800. On the other hand the Bold 9790 mixes things up by offering the 480×360 resolution but in portrait view. So in other words apps that rotate well to landscape on the Torch will work just fine on the 9790.

Devs can now download simulators for both devices directly from RIM’s dev page

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RIM Wants Developers to Prepare for Unannounced BlackBerry 9360 & 9790

RIM is once again leaking their own device announcements. This time they have gone around and confirmed the BlackBerry Curve 9380 and BlackBerry Bold 9790 through a blog post for developers. They are telling BlackBerry devs to prepare for the new devices and resolutions which is nice and early to get devs ready. The Curve 9380 wont take much for devs to prepare for since it runs at the same resolution and orientation as the Torch 9800. On the other hand the Bold 9790 mixes things up by offering the 480×360 resolution but in portrait view. So in other words apps that rotate well to landscape on the Torch will work just fine on the 9790.

Devs can now download simulators for both devices directly from RIM’s dev page

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Devs: BlackBerry Analytics Service Comes out of Beta with v1.0

 

RIM announced their Analytics Service back in late September of 2010 and then launched a public beta at the end of February 2011. Now about 7 months later we have the final gold release of the BlackBerry Analytics Service v1.0. I don’t know if this official v1.0 version is any different than the current public beta but who knows. The Analytics Service remains free for all BlackBerry JAVA developers with up to 25,000,000 server calls per month included which should cover most users.

The service is still powered by WebTrends and offers up to 20 interactive reports for developers to see how their apps are being used. In short it gives developers an idea of what users like or don’t like about their apps or new versions. For example, I am hoping that Slacker Radio is getting a HUGE BLINKING error message every time it just hangs while loading on my BlackBerry Bold 9900.

Devs can register free for the BlackBerry Analytics Service. More info and implementation information can be found at the BlackBerry Analytics Service documentation page.

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