There's no shortage of trade organizations for computing professionals, but a new group aims to serve a segment that it claims is underrepresented: mobile app developers. The Application Developers Alliance, announced this week, will kick off a marketing blitz at next week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) and other events, with the aim of attracting thousands of developers for such platforms as Apple iOS, Google Android, Microsoft Windows Phone, and RIM BlackBerry.
The alliance plans to offer its members online collaboration and networking services, access to product-testing facilities, training and certification programs, and discounted rates on cloud services from Rackspace. In addition, it will act as a lobbying organization on behalf of developers, seeking favorable legislation on such issues as online privacy and intellectual property protection.
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One topic that hasn't been mentioned, however, is whether the alliance will focus on easing cross-platform mobile development. Currently, the leading mobile operating systems are all vertically integrated "walled gardens," and developing versions of the same app for multiple platforms is both challenging and costly.
As the volume of new apps flooding the market grows, the ability to create apps that bridge the platform divide will be the hot issue for mobile developers in 2012. But unless developers come together to bring pressure to bear on the major vendors, the chances that writing cross-platform apps will get any easier seem slim to none. Unfortunately, I doubt the Application Developers Alliance will be of much help.
Apple and Google tighten their grip
As 2012 begins, however, those hopes appear all but dashed. Judging by the various platforms' respective app stores, Android and iOS are the clear winners with developers, leaving all other candidates far behind. BlackBerry App World and Windows Phone Marketplace each offer less than a tenth of the apps that the iTunes Store does, and HP's WebOS App Market offers but a fraction of that.
Why have these also-ran platforms failed to attract developers? It's not for lack of trying. WebOS, in particular, has worked hard to woo developers from the very beginning. When it began to falter, Microsoft stepped in to offer WebOS developers free smartphones and training if they would jump ship to Windows Phone. And maybe RIM could use a little help reaching developers, but if anything, it offers them too many SDKs to choose from.
No, the real reason why developers are skipping these platforms is that they simply aren't selling. BlackBerry was once the darling of the mobile business set, but its recent missteps have seen its market share tumble to 6.5 percent. HP's mismanagement of WebOS is becoming the stuff of legend. And for all Microsoft's efforts to push Windows Phone into the market, including an ambitious partnership with Nokia, it can't seem to gain a foothold.
Lacking a large user base to which they can market their apps, developers have little incentive to target these platforms over Android and iOS. Unfortunately, this leads to a kind of feedback loop: Customers who perceive that a platform lacks a rich app catalog will go elsewhere, and developers who perceive that a platform has few users won't create apps for it. As a result, it would be virtually impossible for any newcomer to loosen the grip of the entrenched market leaders.
Who will speak for developers, really?
This creates a good opportunity for outside vendors to develop tools to aid cross-platform development, and a number of companies are already enjoying some success. Unity is one cross-platform toolkit that has gained a strong following among game developers. Adobe has a lot of potential in this area, particularly with its recent acquisition of PhoneGap. Xamarin is developing cross-platform mobile tools based on the open source Mono project. And Oracle has hinted it has not yet given up on positioning its Java and JavaFX technologies as cross-platform mobile solutions.
So far, however, none of these solutions is ideal, and neither Apple nor Google has had much to say about them. Apple, in particular, remains hostile to third-party runtimes, and any apps developed with cross-platform toolkits must still pass through Apple's own tool chain before they can run on iOS.
Competition in the mobile OS market is in the best interests of consumers and independent developers alike. But until it's no longer a hassle to port apps from Android and iOS to other platforms, and vice versa, emerging platforms have little hope of upsetting the dominance of the Big Two.
That's where an organization like the Application Developers Alliance could help. By organizing app developers from all across the mobile OS market, it could act as a unified voice to put pressure on Apple, Google, and others to lower barriers to entry for their platforms. As such, it could become a truly valuable resource.
Will that happen? It seems doubtful. The alliance says it will require membership dues someday, but for this initial phase it plans to get its funding from sponsors. Two candidates mentioned are Google and Research in Motion -- both of which, obviously, have incentive to promote their own platform above all others. As long as it's being underwritten by leading proponents of the status quo, it seems unlikely that the Application Developers Alliance would rock the boat by taking a stand against walled-garden-style mobile platforms.
Will anyone else step up to the plate?
This article, "Mobile developers of the world, unite!," originally appeared at InfoWorld.com. Read more of Neil McAllister's Fatal Exception blog and follow the latest news in programming at InfoWorld.com. For the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter.