Smartphone / app development

[Old Greg]

OK - am exposing my technical ignorance here.

I have an idea... to exploit some industry (healthcare) niche expertise and contacts I have to develop an app and pitch it to a former client with whom I have an excellent relationship. I have never written a line of code in my life and have no intention of starting now, but I feel I need to know a little bit about how to approach this before I get a freelancer in. Here is my current thinking and please forgive a technical numpty his numptiness:

- It must function on iOS, Android and Windows smartphones and tablets that are personally owned by users, rather than corporately owned.
- It will be free to users, but the client will pay costs.
- It is not functionally rich, but displaying information. If it were a website, there would be a home page with three filters that would take the user to one of 48 pages / branches (with overlapping content between them). Most of these 48 pages would have further filters that would create additional branches with a leaf. There will be some links between pages.
- There are probably about four styles of page which will each contain different content - but nothing fancy, really just text, URLs and the odd diagram perhaps.
- It needs standard navigation of Home, Forward, Back
- There is no data storage.
- It must be available off-line as the users do not have guaranteed Internet connectivity.
- There will be a need to update content every year or thereabouts.

Now, in my simple mind, it is a website that is contained within an app and stored on the device. It could easily be built as a relatively simple website, but as I say, it needs to be available with no Internet connectivity. Any ideas of where to go to start building a basic understanding of my options? HTML5 has been mentioned...

Thanks in advance

OG

[TheFaQQer]

For cross-platform compatibility, then HTML5 seems a smart option (or just HTML if it doesn't need to be too flashy!). I'm not sure how feasible that is for offline browsing, though.

Quite a few vendors are writing stuff in HTML5 because then you don't have to worry about jumping through Apple's hoops to get the app into their store.

[Old Greg]

For cross-platform compatibility, then HTML5 seems a smart option (or just HTML if it doesn't need to be too flashy!). I'm not sure how feasible that is for offline browsing, though.

Quite a few vendors are writing stuff in HTML5 because then you don't have to worry about jumping through Apple's hoops to get the app into their store.

Thanks, buddy. So how does the app get onto the iPhone? Can it be downloaded straight from a 3rd party website? I am not clear on HTML5 and offline browsing.

[eek]

For cross-platform compatibility, then HTML5 seems a smart option (or just HTML if it doesn't need to be too flashy!). I'm not sure how feasible that is for offline browsing, though.

Quite a few vendors are writing stuff in HTML5 because then you don't have to worry about jumping through Apple's hoops to get the app into their store.

lookup phonegap

[Old Greg]

lookup phonegap

Noted. Will do. Thanks.

[DimPrawn]

lookup phonegap

And other similar tools.

PhoneJS - JavaScript framework for mobile hybrid apps
Appcelerator Inc. | The Mobile First Platform

So, yes, a cross platform (Win, iOs, Android) development is the way to go.

HTML5 supports offline applications.

Offline - HTML5 Rocks

Including data caching and a local database.

[DimPrawn]

For cross-platform compatibility, then HTML5 seems a smart option (or just HTML if it doesn't need to be too flashy!). I'm not sure how feasible that is for offline browsing, though.

Quite a few vendors are writing stuff in HTML5 because then you don't have to worry about jumping through Apple's hoops to get the app into their store.

Yes, Apple are complete tw@ts when it comes to getting stuff approved. Constant rejections of useful apps, but they let in 1000's of useless joke apps.

I can take months to get an app into Apple store.

[Old Greg]

Thanks dim for both posts.

Looking at it from an (e.g.) iPhone user's perspective, I think I need an icon that sits on the desktop (or whatever it's called on an iPhone). It needs a one click entry into app by the user, or they won't use it. And that sounds like going via app store to me. Or am I wrong?

[eek]

Thanks dim for both posts.

Looking at it from an (e.g.) iPhone user's perspective, I think I need an icon that sits on the desktop (or whatever it's called on an iPhone). It needs a one click entry into app by the user, or they won't use it. And that sounds like going via app store to me. Or am I wrong?

You can create your own home buttons if they bookmark the site in the correct way but that is hard to explain so yes you want an app.

However what you describe is not difficult any of the phone development tools mentioned above will do what you want. The difficulty will be in finding the development tool that provides the app with appropriate look and feel for the platform.

Also look at http://www.icenium.com/ .

[Bunk]

Thanks dim for both posts.

Looking at it from an (e.g.) iPhone user's perspective, I think I need an icon that sits on the desktop (or whatever it's called on an iPhone). It needs a one click entry into app by the user, or they won't use it. And that sounds like going via app store to me. Or am I wrong?

Those things aren't a problem. You can add a bookmark to a web page directly to the home screen so it appears just as any other app would, and once the user has logged in, (if they have to), their credentials can be saved as you would on any other web page, eg CUK. The problem I can see is the amount of information you might want to store to enable the app to be used offline. I haven't done a huge amount with web based local storage on mobile devices so I don't know what limitations you might run into there.