On Technology and the Future: Education, IoT, AI, Mobility, Games

Tag: fragmentation Page 1 of 2

Motoblur & Android Fragmentation: The Follow-Up

By

On 13/10/2009

In 1

Yesterday, I blogged about Motorola’s Motoblur UI, which adds an additional SDK for its specific APIs beyond the standard Android stacks. I reckoned that this might mean more fragmentation, which would push it a step closer to the nightmare that was/is J2ME.

I received two quick reactions to this: one reader commented that this was only bad if you wouldn’t have good tools and compilers. To him (@tederf), I would respond that, while it is certainly true that good tools reduce the friction, raise efficiencies and alleviate overall pain, the smallest common denominator is always just that. In my previous companies, we used to produce up to seven or eight different J2ME builds in order to maximise performance of our games on the huge spread of handsets. Could we have done with one build? Probably. Would the result have been great? Almost certainly not!

Anyway, the more interesting reaction came from the good folks at Motorola themselves. They reckoned (via Twitter; they are @motoblur) that:

with all due respect, I feel you’ve misunderstood motoblur, and android fragmentation concerns are a wee bit overblown.

Now, now. I offered them a guest post here in order to explain this further. I have unfortunately not yet had a response (which I take, applying Twitter attention spans, as lasting silence). But I still wanted to use the opportunity to elaborate a little more on this (and, no, I will not lament Moto’s lost opportunity to feature their wares on this humble site).

To clarify a couple of things outright:

  1. I would be delighted would I be mistaken (and note that I am not a techie, so this is a distinct possibility!).
  2. I would be equally delighted would Motorola manage to regain some of its lost ground. The world clearly would be a better place with another strong manufacturer regaining old strengths (although maybe with better UI this time around – which Motoblur certainly seems to offer [see picture on the right of the Motorola CLIQ!).

But let’s go back to the general issue of Android fragmentation threats (the fact that I pointed this out – again – en cas de Moto is of course purely coincidental).

So let’s dive in: with open source software, there is always the intrinsic possibility that fragmentation will occur. Why do people customize it? Because they can! vendors, developers and operators that make up the Open Handset Alliance (which releases Android) can tweak is in whichever way they like (or “need” to) and for any number of reasons: to protect IP, to optimize performance on their network or for certain devices or simply because they feel they need some distinguishing factors, some degree of uniqueness. The result can be, however, as one analyst puts it that

there will be multiple flavors of Android, all of them incompatible with each other. That, in turn, necessitates different versions of each application or updates to accommodate the entire device ecosystem. On the whole, such activity negates the cost efficiencies inherent in the idea of a standard, open operating system, and potentially makes the Android Market a confusing place to shop for widgets.

And that’s what you call fragmentation. Interestingly, there were rumours that Google had made the Open Handset Alliance members sign “non-fragmentation agreements” but it seems that this is either not true or not enforceable.

Others point out that HTC, Samsung, Dell, Verizon, (may I add Motorola?) all have phones on the way that run on different software to the others. Reports of version conflicts, lack of backward compatibility, etc, etc. I mean, hell, there is even an “alternative” Android app store (with 223 apps as of tonight)… Sounds familiar?

Dear Motoblur, if it is different with your SDK, please enlighten us! I am sure I will not be the only one applauding!

Image Credit: http://www.visionmobile.com

The New Mobile Apps: Head in the Cloud!?

By

On 12/07/2009

In 1

Everyone with an iPhone will by now have seen and “played” them: the first generation of multi-player games where most of the computing is done in the cloud, relieving the handset from such labourious tasks. This, according to new report, will soon (well, by 2014) be the norm and will in fact erase downloadable apps (games and other) as we know them today.

The huge advantage of this approach is that it would largely do away with the fragmentation nightmare of the handset market: multiple operating systems, a plethora of screen sizes, all sorts of “interesting” middle-ware solution imposed by either carriers (Sprint anyone?) or OEM to “tweak” an OS to their specs, with the sole result of making things even more cumbersome for developers. It is one reason why the Apple iPhone ecosystem thrives as it does: one OS, one model, one distribution channel, worldwide deployment. If the heavy-lifting is done in the cloud rather than on the handset, one can – presumably – do away with less complex front-ends reducing the work necessary to port the app to various handsets (and, no, please do not choose iMob as the benchmark!). Coding for the cloud would resemble web development rather than today’s mass market application development with armies of post-production and QA engineers filling offices (and overall development costs).

Another, easily overlooked, advantage is battery life: the more (and more complex) processes are computed on the phone hardware, the more the device will consume of the precious and scarce juice; battery life is better with cloud computing!

The obvious downside of mobile cloud computing is a blue sky: no cloud, no app. In posh tech lingo: intermittent network availability, which is to say that the app won’t work if you have no coverage (so no displacing downloadable apps in Oklahoma or on the Scottish isles then…). The aforementioned report suggests HTML 5 and its more sophisticated caching options as the solutions but I am fairly skeptical in that respect: you will not bring about the “unprecedented” sophistication with a little bit of cached data.

Anyway, the more likely scenario is an abundance of network availability by 2014 anyway: by then, large parts of our computing will be done over the air and LTE (and further evolved) networks will surely rule good parts of the world.

So, will it work? The report points out iPhone apps for the likes of Amazon, eBay, etc and, yes, for such apps I am sure it will work: they basically extend a front-end of a web service to a mobile device. The “app” is basically a client that facilitates input and serves as a crutch for the smaller screen where it is necessary to optimise the available data so as not to overburden the little available space with non-core information.

Will it work for more complex apps, in particular games? It will depend. On what? On the type of game of course! How many online racing games do you know? I mean really good ones. None? Ah… Why is that? Because not even the abundance of bandwidth and computing power available today gets to a game experience even close to the 50+ frames per second that the top iPhone racing games can do today (check out Firemint’s Real Racing!). The experience on next-gen consoles is even more astonishing. Need for Speed: Under Cover on XBox 360 or PS3? Woah! All these games require very serious hardware acceleration to convert the high-end graphics into smooth, fast, flowing action. And broadband networks aren’t good enough for that. Period.

For other games, turn-based card games, board games, the Sims, or indeed full-blown MMO, this is another story. These games may require a lot of data but the speed is not as important for good gameplay. So for this group (which is arguably the larger one), cloud computing will probably be the way forward. The opportunity exists in particular (and will be largely sufficient) for all “serious” business applications: these feed for the most part off server-side data sets already and a light mobile client (or browser?) is all they need to provide serious productivity boosts to the corporate world.

So will these run in a (mobile-optimised) browser or via (lighter) downloadable front-end apps? Due to the constraints of the small screen, I believe it will remain very beneficial to the UI and playability to have a specific front-end (and core graphics and processes) on your handset because it will optimise the user experience on a mobile device. To keep this bit as generic and light will be key. Otherwise, it would be porting hell all over again.

But we’ll get there! Just watch out!

Games Pulsating Through One Platform?

By

On 12/03/2009

Here’s one that nearly slipped through the (well, at least my) net: according to a recent press release, the Eclipse Foundation is set to unveil a unified development platform. It is said that some major players, including Nokia, RIM, Sony Ericsson, IBM and Motorola have joined this initiative already though Android and – predictably – Microsoft and Apple are notable in their absence.

The concept is oh so simple: a developer goes to the site, downloads the platform and is ready to rumble. The platform (called Pulsar) would pull together vendor-specific SDKs and off you go. It is clearly geared to tackle the fragmentation of the many, many handsets to be addressed when publishing to “mainstream” mobile phones.
At present, it’s an initiative (as there have been so many) and the presence of industry heavyweights does not always guarantee their success. I am (cynicism coming with age…) cautious over black box approaches (remember Tira Wireless?). I would love to see this succeed but let’s see what it comes to…
Image credit: digitalvish.com

Juniper to the Rescue…

By

On 27/11/2008

In Apple, OEM

We can depend on the researchers from Juniper after all (or maybe they simply felt bad after reading my post on their last report). Whichever the reason, apparently the mobile content industry could be worth a hefty $167bn (!) if – yes, if – the operators would resolve to allowing a workable commercial environment, namely by limiting themselves to lower revenue shares. Whatever the caveats (which are, as usual, hidden in the expensive main report) this number is topping even the loftiest predictions to date; right on in times of the doom and gloom. The key apparently lies in whether operators would act as dumb pipes (no richness for anyone) or a smart pipe (lots of play money for all players on the value chain). In their own words:

“If MNOs are to benefit financially, they need to move away from their Dumb Pipe roots to the Smart Pipe model, though they will clash with the content providers which already dominate the Smart Pipe. A compromise needs to be found.”

A smart pipe is understood as one where operators would offer flexible, application-centric value configurations, allowing lean, efficient content offerings from third parties. A dumb pipe is one where content (and value) would merely rush through the pipe without any value being added by the operator. The prevailing model in the mobile games world, namely the on-portal approach where operators implement comprehensive vertically-integrated models (“walled gardens”) is suggested to be somewhat doomed as content providers would gain bargaining power (presumably through consolidation of the supply side plus entry of meatier traditional media players in music, video and TV).

This is all pretty speculative though, and without some background it is quite frankly impossible to analyse the numbers some more. Mobile content appears to include (as per their report from March) games, music, video, TV, social networking, adult content, gambling and so on, and so forth. However, the exact calculatory basis is again hidden in the depths of the report, so I don’t know (do they e.g. take the gross gambling revenue or on;y the rake, which is only a few percentage points of the former). Anyhow, due to these foggy conditions, commentators seem to either merely re-print the PR blurb or mock it (Stuart Dredge thinks that “only gas could do that kind of money”), which is a shame really; just think what you could with this much money…

Et tu, Juniper?

By

On 19/11/2008

It must be truly bleak: even the best friend of every young telecoms entrepreneur on the fundraising trail whose reports rarely failed to feature as a footnote in an investment memorandum for the next big digital thing now sounds a word of caution. Juniper (whose reports I still cannot afford) issued its latest report on mobile gaming and it actually reduces (for the first time, I’m sure, even if I haven’t checked) its prior predictions on the growth and size of the sector in the next, erm, 20 years…

They see growth stifled by the restrictive operator business models. Dare I say it? May they be right? They refer to Apple‘s AppStore, which is the anti-christ to every operator’s walled garden: free for all, free price-setting, Darwinian survival of the fittest (or least-charging), thousands of applications, games, etc, etc, and relatively generous revenue shares on top (although 80% of $0.00 is not very much at all).

Juniper points however to 2 important and true factors: the tolls demanded by the operators to access their precious customer base are very high indeed considering that many do not provide a very compelling service in return. Secondly, marketing and marketing opportunities on-deck normally – well – suck. This was all well and good as long as their were no alternatives (other than the likes of Jamba, Thumbplay and few others). But with the ascent of the iPhone, everyone seems to erupt into a frenzy of trying to replicate the “beautifully simple and compelling UI” for which the purveyors of the Big Black Turtleneck are so famed for. This, Juniper fears, will lead to players exiting that business (I have heard unconfirmed rumours that SEGA decided to call it day on internal J2ME development following their huge success with Super Monkey Ball on the iPhone). 
Other than that though, not much new. And Juniper would not be Juniper if they would not predict “significant” growth in the next 5 years (conveniently long in order to be basically unpredictable): they see the market to roughly double in the next 5 years, which would be 20% growth per year (on today’s terms), which is not all that bad after all. 

Fragmented?

By

On 11/09/2008

In OEM

Funny. Sometimes a theme somewhat haunts you… After I have posted about the demise of Tira Wireless (and added some alternative views on the labyrinth that is platforms and handset fragmentation; also go and revisit my posts on the same topic here and here), today we can read that it will all get worse (or maybe not). I bet they read my recent post on the issue… 😉

The article only mentions somewhat curtly two new platforms, namely iPhone and Android (both of which I have covered before, namely here, here and here – amongst others), and then goes on to report on a panel at CTIA where a panel sponsored by the “Symbian stakeholders” apparently dismissed the whole notion, stating that the market would solve it. Now, it will have to, I guess. However, it is not all that bleak: Symbian, UIQ, Linux, BREW, Win ME and ultimately the iPhone OS are all C-based. Most of them (with the notable exception of the iPhone) also run Java Virtual Machines (JVM), so you can either code in J2ME (which is arguably the most widely supported language) or go native and code native in C+/C++ with then much easier ports to the varying iterations.
The challenge naturally remains (and, yes, I have voiced this previously) with a view to supporting all those odd handsets here and there and everywhere but, let’s face it, a lot of them are being imposed on publishers by the carriers who want to make sure that even that last customer that hangs on to his SE T-610 will be served with content (even though he won’t ever download a piece). Wouldn’t it be so much better marketing if they would simply return a message telling that poor customer:

“Hey, we noticed you tried downloading content to your T-610. You may not have realized that this phone is utterly outdated and will give you no joy when playing games. We would like to offer you a discounted upgrade to the brand-spanking new N76/ W880i/ Pearl/ iPhone/ Viewty/… and your life would be so much cooler. We are confident that you would then also have more luck with the girls/boys… Best. Your carrier”

What I am trying to say is that a lot of the fragmentation issues are (nowadays) artificially imposed, not technologically warranted. Any carriers reading this? Think about it, folks. It won’t harm you, I bet!

Re Tira: there are others!

By

On 10/09/2008

My post on Tira Wireless‘ apparent demise triggered a few e-mails, and it was pointed out that, whilst my observations generally seem to have been accurate, I forgot a few players that actually do deliver porting solutions across platforms (e.g. from J2ME to BREW) rather successfully (and do work with some of the larger publishers, too). There is for instance Innaworks, whose Alchemo solution is pretty powerful.

So, I stand corrected: it is actually possible to ease porting nightmares with smart transcoding solutions. I would still maintain though that porting from a single J2ME build (rather than a reference code base) to all devices under the sun is only possible with severe constraints. If that is understood though, the likes of Innaworks and Metismo provide a great ease of pain!

Page 1 of 2

Next

Powered by WordPress & Theme by Anders Norén