Next Generation Wireless Applications: Creating Mobile Applications in a Web 2.0 and Mobile 2.0 World, 2nd Edition

10.7 SUGGESTING A GENERIC DEVICE ARCHITECTURE

Let us now develop our previous discussion to start expanding our understanding of device architectures, leading to an exploration of what possibilities are open to us in terms of developing software services to run on mobile devices as part of any mobile service offering.

We reiterate that there are three basic modes of application on a mobile device: CS, P2P and standalone.

We have posited that, no matter the mode, a basic layered model for a mobile device can be constructed consisting of; interfaces, interface software, services software, network connections. The guts of our service are enacted in the services layer. We may like to refer to this as the ‘business logic’ of the mobile application to draw a parallel with the software approach we witnessed with J2EE (refer to Chapter 8).

Thus far, we have only considered the layered model as a notional concept, but we have tried to convince ourselves that it is a sound and complete model. The issue remains as to how we actually deploy services using such a model (or architectural basis).

We can begin to approach the basis for software and applications deployment by adding some sound software patterns to our model. We shall tackle this process from two sides. First, we shall examine what framework we need to deploy software on a device, regardless of its mode or function. In other words, we shall introduce basic software practices for embedded devices. Second, we shall propose common ...