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April 05, 2006
OS vs UI
OS vs UI: The operating system chosen for a new device will not be as important as the user-interface strategy chosen for that device. That's the conclusion of a Strand Consult report, distilled by a writer at Cellular-News. The cheapest, lowest-end phones will be pedal-to-the-metal in Java or a lower language, with little application compatibility across devices. A step up is providing a common service layer above varied phones, but still needing to make device-specific calls when making a full application -- the authors cite Opera Platform as an example here. Beyond that is the full Virtual Machine approach, where varying device capabilities are addressed by a common abstraction layer above, such as Flash Lite. (Desktop analogy: with Flash-in-browser work you don't have to worry about the Windows Sound API, the Macintosh Sound API, the various ways to achieve audio on Linux -- just call the sound and the VM deals with all the low-level mechanics.) One wrinkle not mentioned here is that Samsung is already using the Flash Virtual Machine as their native user interface for the device; branded, skinnable, tailored for various audiences. If you're not a subscriber in Korea then the only way you can see it right now is through Adobe demos, but this Samsung work is beautiful stuff, catch it if you can. Anyway, "How portable is my UI?", "How much new stuff do I have to do for a new model?", "How can I really lock in a subscriber with their own UI?", these are some of the questions on the supply-side end of things now, pushing towards Flash Lite technologies. It's not so much the underlying mechanics as how you engage with people up top.
Posted by John Dowdell at April 5, 2006 08:23 AM
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