Rating:
Author: John M. Wargo
ISBN : B008EK6HVY
New from $16.00
Format: PDF
Direct download links available Free PhoneGap Essentials: Building Cross-Platform Mobile Apps [Kindle Edition] from 4shared, mediafire, hotfile, and mirror link
PhoneGap is Adobe’s distribution of the free and open source framework (originally developed by Nitobi) that is now also available from the Apache Foundation as Apache Cordova™. Using PhoneGap, developers can build native mobile apps using standard HTML5, JavaScript, and CSS, and then deploy those apps to every leading mobile platform with little or no recoding. Up to now, though, PhoneGap was lacking complete, practical documentation. PhoneGap Essentials fills that void: It’s the first concise, yet complete, tutorial for succeeding with PhoneGap in real-world development.
Experienced mobile developer John M. Wargo thoroughly introduces the PhoneGap platform, explaining what it is, what it does, and how it works. He then guides you through configuring PhoneGap environments—creating complete mobile apps—and building them for the Google Android™, Samsung bada, BlackBerry® devices, Apple® iOS, Symbian™ OS, and Windows® Phone. Through realistic examples, you’ll master key PhoneGap APIs for everything from GPS to the file system, contacts to camera, device to events, and more. Wargo also demonstrates how to take full advantage of PhoneGap Build, PhoneGap’s cloud-based packaging utility.
Coverage includes
The anatomy of a PhoneGap application (what makes an application a PhoneGap application)
Understanding the impact of cross-platform development issues
Exploring the entire PhoneGap development process, including testing and debugging
Expanding PhoneGap’s capabilities with third-party development tools and plug-ins
Building cross-platform apps that use the device camera, compass, accelerometer, and other hardware
Reading from and writing to the contacts database and the device file system
Installing tools needed to develop PhoneGap apps for Android, bada, BlackBerry, iOS, Symbian, and Windows Phone
Reacting to events and notifying users
Using the Media API to record and play media files
Building for multiple platforms simultaneously using PhoneGap Build
About the Website
Downloadable code projects, additional information, and errata are available at phonegapessentials.com.
Direct download links available for Free PhoneGap Essentials: Building Cross-Platform Mobile Apps [Kindle Edition]
- File Size: 16060 KB
- Print Length: 384 pages
- Simultaneous Device Usage: Up to 5 simultaneous devices, per publisher limits
- Publisher: Addison-Wesley Professional; 1 edition (June 21, 2012)
- Sold by: Amazon Digital Services, Inc.
- Language: English
- ASIN: B008EK6HVY
- Text-to-Speech: Enabled
X-Ray:
- Lending: Not Enabled
- Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #123,267 Paid in Kindle Store (See Top 100 Paid in Kindle Store)
- #7
in Books > Computers & Technology > Apple > Home Computing & How-to > Mac Administration & Networking - #26
in Books > Computers & Technology > Mobile Phones, Tablets & E-Readers > Programming & App Development - #67
in Books > Computers & Technology > Apple > Development & Programming
- #7
in Books > Computers & Technology > Apple > Home Computing & How-to > Mac Administration & Networking - #26
in Books > Computers & Technology > Mobile Phones, Tablets & E-Readers > Programming & App Development - #67
in Books > Computers & Technology > Apple > Development & Programming
Free PhoneGap Essentials: Building Cross-Platform Mobile Apps
I really wanted to like this book better, however as a more advanced Javascript, HTML, CSS developer I found the book tedious. The level of detail (click here, type this, right-click there) makes finding the hidden gems (what does/doesn't work on certain devices, oddities and pitfalls of doing certain things) a real pain. Mostly I would have prefered to see a high level summary at the start of the more detail sections. For example, a statement such as: "In the next 20 pages we are going to download and install Eclipse, build the following directory structure, and create files that can be found on pages...". Instead one must read through the entire section, which I notice today when I picked up the book again to write this review, is very difficult to re-read (i.e. skim for information you remember reading near another subject, but don't remember all the details).
The third section discusses all the basic functionality that PhoneGap offers and in places offers some sage advice. But, it's again hard to find and would have benefited from a lot of "Warning!" and "Note" type call outs making the re-finding of them much easier. Instead it's organized exactly like the PhoneGap API website and with things changing a much as they are it's hard to say which is the better resource.
The only great part of the book is the first section where a high level overview of the history, development, building, testing, and general knowledge you can't find easily on the web are presented. I found this section well organized and it helped me to understand better how PhoneGap is setup to run on all devices it runs on.
Overall, it's a fine book for the beginner.
This book provides an excellent introduction to PhoneGap. I wish I'd had it six months ago.
I've been using PhoneGap and PhoneGap Build for several months. PhoneGap works as documented and PhoneGap Build is an excellent service. But if I'd had this book at the start, I could have saved a month of Google searches, hit-and-miss on a dozen websites, and looking at numerous code snippets on Stack Overflow.
The author provides a nice overview of PhoneGap and its history. He illustrates and describes the PhoneGap architecture, how it fits into a mobile application, and how it provides a bridge to native device interfaces. The PhoneGap APIs (and their numerous quirks) are covered in detail. The section on installing and setting up a PhoneGap development environment for each device type is excellent.
I had to chuckle at the characterization, "When a developer see a gap in a product, especially an open source project like PhoneGap, it doesn't take long before someone builds an enhancement." That's not my observation. I think a book like this begs for one more section - an example of writing a simple PhoneGap plugin, for two or more architectures, top to bottom.
I know this is sort of the opposite message of "see how easy it is to use PhoneGap." But if you are doing a very sophisticated mobile device application, you will quickly see that there are numerous native interfaces, events, etc. NOT currently addressed by PhoneGap. And if you are waiting around for PhoneGap to support W3C DAP Working Group APIs "as they become standardized" you'd better have a lot of patience and something else to do.
With that said, the PhoneGap architecture is still the best approach in this area. It's standards-based, forward looking, and open source.