RIM's Future Hangs On Developer Support For 'New BlackBerry' 148
alphadogg writes "With its future up for grabs, Research in Motion at its annual BlackBerry World conference next week will focus on simplifying development for its soon-to-be-unveiled BlackBerry 10 operating system. HTML5 is one key technology in that strategy to create a viable ecosystem of applications for a new generation of mobile devices expected to ship by year-end. The simplicity is needed because BB10, based on a real time kernel acquired with RIM's buyout of QNX Software Systems in 2010, is a complete break with the software that runs on standard BlackBerry smartphones. 'It's a bit of a challenge,' says Tyler Lessard, formerly a RIM vice president in charge of the global developer program, and since October 2011 chief marketing officer at mobile security vendor Fixmo. 'There's very little or no compatibility between the old and new operating systems. Existing apps can't be carried forward to QNX and BB 10. The question is, once the BlackBerry 10 smartphones launch, can RIM have an adequate catalog of apps?'"
Bad Ecosystem = Business Failure (Score:3, Interesting)
In comparison, the Android development environment "just works". Toss Eclipse on Ubuntu, do a couple add-ins, and you are up and running in an hour or two. Very very low cost to develop an application. Clear instructions on what you need to do to get on the market. Amazon was pretty simple as well.
The banks and government business is the only thing keeping RIM afloat, and that can last a little while, but its a bad business model. RIM deserves to die.
Have that resume ready, RIM employees. You are going to need it soon.
Re:Doing it wrong. (Score:1, Interesting)
Why develop an OS, when a free one is there waiting for you to add to it.
Let's see... - on one side, you've got Apple - own OS + own hardware. On the other side, you'v got the army of "everybody else", Google's Android + own hardware. Now what possible difference could make on more addition to that Android soup ? I am glad RIM decided to forge it's own OS - that has the potential of making them a strong player in the smartphone contest. And what's event better - it's QNX based, which means - native apps, oh yeeeeaaah ! Take that, Java !
Re:Doing it wrong. (Score:2, Interesting)
Because Android is a laggy, buggy piece of trash that has horrible standby battery drain. Android is antiquated, a pre-iOS junkheap that should have been thrown away the moment iOS was first revealed. MSFT threw away Windows Mobile to develop WP7/8, Palm threw away Palm OS for webOS, RIM the old BB OS for the new QNX OS, and Nokia originally was transitioning away from Symbian for MeeGo. Google is the only one who decided to just rip off Apple as fast as possible by slapping on a touchscreen layer onto their outdated OS, and flip-flopped on Network Neutrality to sign a deal with Verizon to push the Droid brand.
That's why Android lags, and it's also got horrible battery life.