Much has been written about how cloud computing, open source software, and programming frameworks have reduced software development costs exponentially in the last decade. As more than a few pundits have said, “anyone with a good idea and an Amazon Web Services account can now create the next Facebook!” Sure, the hyperbole is for dramatic effect, but the underlying point is true: anyone with programming skills can now create a web or mobile application faster and more cheaply than ever before.
The benefits of these advances are clear in the world of startup companies and developers of consumer applications. But how do enterprises, with a far more complex set of requirements and stakeholders, benefit? How do enterprises leverage “agile” and “lean” software development practices, tools, and infrastructure to be more competitive and meet the increasingly demanding expectations of customers, business partners, and their own employees? And how does the technology shift to cloud infrastructure relate to the explosion of “bring your own device” mobile usage at work?
There’s no single silver bullet answer to these questions, but several important trends are relevant to how developers of business apps should be thinking about the intersection of cloud technologies and mobile to make their projects successful.
- HTML5 is ready for prime time as the best front-end standard for companies that need to build and deploy applications that work on desktop computers, tablets, and phones. HTML5 enables companies to write one application, instead of having to write entirely separate applications for the desktop, iOS, Android, Windows, and other mobile OS platforms.
- Front-end mobile development toolkits like PhoneGap and Sencha and frameworks like jQuery Mobile and Angular.js will gain market influence since they complement platform- independent development across mobile and web. These toolkits enable developers to package a single application for installation on all mobile operating systems. Users can easily download and install these packaged apps onto their mobile devices just as they would a normal “native” mobile application from an app store.
- Likewise, the mobile back-end stack for mobile applications will largely be open source, standards-based, pre-configured, highly secure, and architected specifically for mobile usage. And the mobile back-end will not be subject to someone else’s control. You can install it on your own cloud infrastructure or data center. This is the area that we at DreamFactory are tackling. We’ve written more about this in a blog post about the evolution and design goals of the Dreamfactory Services Platform.
- Developers will benefit enormously from both front-end and back-end simplification and standardization. Now an individual or small team of application developers can quickly create a prototype app, iterate on the design, create the application, and deliver it to end users in a production environment. Standardization also enables reusable design patterns (and reusable source code in many cases). We’ve written more about this in a blog post about the rise of the front-end developer.
- The promise of these game changing trends is exciting but enterprises are by necessity risk averse and therefore reluctant to introduce new technologies that haven’t been battle tested in production environments. Enterprises need the flexibility and control to use the core back-end infrastructure that suits their application requirements, whether public cloud, hybrid public-private cloud, or on premise. Back-end service platforms like DreamFactory must be easily installed on the desired server infrastructure and must also integrate seamlessly with existing IT development, deployment, scaling, and security tools and practices. We’ll be writing a lot more about this topic in future posts. Stay tuned!