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

11.9 USING MIDP TO DEVELOP MOBILE APPLICATIONS

Now that the principle of J2ME has been described, we can return to our main consideration for this chapter, which is the ways and means of developing mobile applications, not just the technical processes underlying the technology. What we need to do is understand what it means to use MIDP to develop mobile applications, especially compared to the other two methods we have already identified and discussed; namely the embedded approach and the browser approach.

In essence, the Java approach is very similar to the embedded one. We write the application in a high-level programming language and follow most of the same production cycle for developing embedded applications. However, the key advantage is that the MIDP program, called a MIDlet, will run on any device in the market that is MIDP compliant. If we had written an embedded application for a Motorola device using the Motorola SDK, then the program would only run on the Motorola device. If the same device supports MIDP, then we can run our MIDlet on the Motorola device as well as any other MIDP device.

There is a huge array of devices in the market, especially in the mass-manufactured mobile phone category, which accounts for hundreds of millions of devices. If we want to develop applications to run on as many devices as possible, MIDP is clearly an advantage. Native embedded solutions will still be developed for utility applications, like the WAP browser for example, or a media player. ...