Posts tagged developer
Web app developer, SEO specialist, operations director and 40 more – Silicon Prairie News
May 18th
|
Web app developer, SEO specialist, operations director and 40 more
Silicon Prairie News The SPN job board is sponsored by Hudl. Have any CPA-certified friends that brag a little too much about their mad spreadsheet skills? Hudl has just the job for them. Check out hudl.com/jobs to find out more. |
View full post on SEO – Google News
10 Developer Tips To Build A Responsive Website [Infographic]
Apr 16th
Many website owners say to themselves, “I want my site to look great on mobile, but I don’t know where to start.”
If you are in the business of building and designing websites, you cannot ignore the fact that many people are going to be visiting your sites on their smartphones and tablets. The Web and the mobile browsers remain one of the top ways that users interact with websites and if they have trouble on their smartphone, there is a good chance they are not coming back.
That’s where responsive design can help.
Responsive design is a concept where you build your website once and then format it so it can adapt to any screen size that accesses it. Designers use HTML5 and CSS to build the sites and set parameters so the content will resize itself whether the user is in vertical or horizontal viewing mode, on a tablet, desktop or smartphone or even a screen as large as a television.
We employ responsive design here at ReadWrite. Go ahead, test it out. If you are on a PC browser, shrink or enlarge the window and watch the content respond. If you are on a tablet or smartphone, switch between portrait and landscape.
See what happened? ReadWrite looks great no matter what size it is, no matter what device you are using.
Responsive design has been in vogue since about 2011. One of the first sites to employ it was The Boston Globe when it launched its new digital publication, BostonGlobe.com.
“We are now looking at how we display and order content differently from screen size to screen size,” said Jeff Moriarty, Boston Globe VP of digital properties in an interview last year. “This ‘responsive content’ concept is emerging and we are starting to see in data that users want different types of content depending on their context and the device they are on. We have to now think about how content performs differently from the biggest screens to the smallest, how that content is organized and even how headlines are written from platform to platform.”
What’s The Best Way To Build A Responsive Website?
The first thing to think of when building a responsive site is simplicity. Web designers love to show off that they can design the hell out of a website. They fall in love with their code and all the cool things that it can do.
“I think the challenge for me is to use it cautiously – and not try to be overly artsy with it,” said Ryan Light, a website designer working at CoachUp, a startup in Boston.
Light says that some website builders may over-design for the desktop, making some websites fun to play with but absolutely impossible to navigate.
“I find that a lot of people overdo it on their actual websites that are rendered in the browser,” Light said. “I find responsive design helpful for mobile browsing – but clumsy for Web typically.”
So designers, keep it simple.
Best Practices
There are a variety of ways to go about building a responsive website. French e-marketing company Splio aggregated some of the best practices in a very long infographic, shown below.
The idea is to focus around content and avoid the pitfalls that certain aspects of websites can create. For instance, pictures and advertisements can be a problem.
Check out the infographic below. What is your approach to building a responsive site? Let us know in the comments.
View full post on ReadWrite
Time For Apple To Buy Developer Love With A 0% Cut?
Apr 16th
It’s getting harder to make a dent in the mobile app market, especially for Apple and Google. While it’s easy to point to the billions being paid to app developers, the reality is that Apple’s and Google’s 30% cut on such revenue is a rounding error. Given Apple’s struggle to fend off Google, and the comparative peanuts it makes on mobile app sales, it may be time for Apple to give even more revenue back to developers to encourage a continued “iOS-first” policy.
Apple CEO Tim Cook crowed at an investor conference earlier this year that Apple had paid $8 billion to developers since the App Store’s launch. While this may sound impressive, that equates to around $3.4 billion to Apple over five years, or about $170 million per quarter.
Sound like a lot? It’s not.
The $170 Million Rounding Error
After all, just last quarter Apple notched $54.4 billion in revenues, nearly $31 billion coming from sales of the iPhone alone. $170 million in mobile app sales? Apple makes 3X that amount in the first day of a quarter.
Not that app sales are immaterial to Apple’s business. On the contrary, apps make Apple’s hardware more appealing. As beautiful as Apple’s devices are, few would bother to buy them if they didn’t come with a massive app ecosystem.
So apps matter to Apple. It’s just the app revenue that really doesn’t matter. Not even with the overall mobile app market blossoming to $25 billion in 2013, according to ABI Research. That’s not where the real money is.
The Mobile App Economy
At least, not for Apple. But developers? They could use that money.
Even as app sales boom, generating revenue from mobile apps is something of a bust for developers, and it’s getting worse. According to a VisionMobile report, 35% of mobile app developers “live below the app poverty line,” in that they don’t make enough money from app development to sustain themselves. Furthermore, research firm research2guidance recently released data indicating a 27% drop in average revenues per paid app, from $26,720 in 2011 to $19,560 in 2012.
That drop in top-line revenue is already hard to swallow, but becomes even more so for iOS developers, given how pricey they are to create relative to other platforms:
Hey, Apple, Can You Spare A Dime?
As such, and given Android’s continued market share domination, it may be time for Apple to further encourage developers to stick with it by dropping its App Store cut. While dropping its share from 30% to 20%, 10%, or 0% won’t hurt Apple’s revenue profile, it could go a long way toward keeping developers’ pockets full.
Of course, Google could (and likely would) simply follow suit. After all, Google, like Apple, doesn’t rely on app revenue, instead monetizing mobile through advertising.
But by moving first, Apple would not only generate goodwill, but it would reinforce developers’ preference for iOS, as a recent Appcelerator and IDC survey shows:
Apple, in other words, doesn’t need to win over developers, so much as it needs to give developers a bit more incentive to keep it top platform for them. As volumes start to shrink relative to Android, letting developers keep a bigger chunk of their App Store haul could go a long way toward encouraging developer loyalty.
View full post on ReadWrite
Working With an Outside Developer: How to Make Your SEO Campaign … – Search Engine People (blog)
Apr 15th
|
Working With an Outside Developer: How to Make Your SEO Campaign …
Search Engine People (blog) You're on a call with a client, discussing changes that need to be made to the site to make it SEO-friendly, when you hear the words that make your blood run cold and your hand start to reach for aspirin. "Wait, I need to talk to my developer." It … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
Intel Acquires AppMobi’s HTML5 Developer Tools And Staff
Feb 21st
Intel has gutted the HTML5 mobile-app development firm appMobi, acquiring its tools and related staff – but not the startup itself. The move is part of Intel’s bid to build out its own suite of developer tools for mobile applications.
According to documents obtained by ReadWrite (see below), appMobi will turn into a pure play cloud services provider, offering developers backend service support for HTML5 mobile applications. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
ReadWrite’s 2012 Most Promising Company
ReadWrite named appMobi “the most promising company of 2012” for its work on creating HTML5 solutions for mobile application developers. The company aimed to rethink how developers can use HTML5 for audio and video as well as accelerating performance for Android and iOS. It created Mobius, a mobile video standard that aimed to kill Flash (which ended up dying in mobile anyway) and helped create innovative ways for HTML5 developers to monetize their products.
appMobi’s most innovative (and controversial) product came in the form of jqMobi, a HTML5/JavaScript framework designed to give mobile developers a mobile-ready JQuery. The company created a proof-of-concept, fully HTML5 game called BoomTown to show game developers that, yes, fully functional mobile games can be built using a mobile browser as a backbone.
Tools And Migration
Specifically, the tools that Intel is acquiring from appMobi include the XDK IDE (Integrated Developer Environment), PhoneGap XDK, GameDev XDK, jqMobi and jqUI developer frameworks, directCanvas HTML5 acceleration, the Mobius Web browser along with testing and debugging tools.
The tools most important to Intel will be the jqMobi and directCanvas products which give developers environments to build HTML5 applications and to accelerate them on mobile devices.
Developers that are currently using appMobi’s tools will not be effected by the move to Intel except for a one time re-registration to Intel’s systems. The HTML5 tools will continue to remain free to use through Intel.
Ultimately, this will be a smart move for Intel as it tries to validate its presence in the mobile development space. By acquiring a robust set of HTML5 tools it can give developers the option of creating cross-platform apps that will work in any environment on any device and (most importantly) any computer chip.
Here’s appMobi’s email to developers on the Intel move, followed by a FAQ also produced by the company:
View full post on ReadWrite
Mobile developer, UX designer, SEO superstar and 51 more – Silicon Prairie News
Feb 1st
|
Mobile developer, UX designer, SEO superstar and 51 more
Silicon Prairie News Link Building Strategist (i.e. PR for SEO), Red Nova Labs (Westwood, Kan.) – Red Nova Labs is a cloud and mobile software think-tank, with a horizontal interest in tech business development and startup partnerships/investments in Kansas City. (See … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
SEO Audits & the Web Developer Plugin: 12 Helpful Features for the Technical SEO
Dec 6th
When performing SEO audits, the right tools can make it easier to collect the necessary intelligence. Here’s a walk-through of 12 helpful features of the Web Developer Plugin (for Firefox and Chrome), which provides a boatload of functionality.
View full post on Search Engine Watch – Latest
SEO Audits & the Web Developer Plugin: 12 Helpful Features for the Technical … – Search Engine Watch
Dec 6th
|
SEO Audits & the Web Developer Plugin: 12 Helpful Features for the Technical …
Search Engine Watch Technical SEO audits are one of the most powerful deliverables in all of SEO. They definitely provide the most bang for your SEO buck. Thorough audits take time, need to be guided by experienced SEO professionals, and need to leverage the right tools … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
IDC: Developer Disinterest Could Kill RIM & Windows Phone
Nov 30th
There is no doubt, 2013 is going to be a very interesting year for the mobile industry. Apple and Google will continue to strive for worldwide domination with iOS and Android – making it very difficult for other competitors to squeeze out profits. The day of reckoning may be at hand for old school mobile players like Research In Motion and Microsoft even as manufacturers like Nokia , HTC and even Google-owned Motorola also fight for their lives.
On Friday, analyst firm International Data Corp (IDC) released its top 10 predictions for the information technology industry for 2013. Among several data points, IDC predicts a coming reckoning for RIM and Microsoft in the mobile industry if the companies cannot generate more developer interest in their mobile platforms.
App Developers Hold The Key
“The market power of these competing platforms – iOS, Android, Windows, and other mobile software platforms – will depend completely on the ability of each platform to attract large numbers of application (app) developers,” IDC states.
IDC goes on to cite its quarterly report in association with mobile services company Appcelerator of developer interest for each mobile platform. Android (smartphone and tablet) and iOS (iPhone/iPad) lead the way in developer interest, while Windows (33%) and BlackBerry (9%) trail significantly.
“IDC predicts that either of these two that fail to crack the 50% barrier [in developer interest] by the end of 2013 will be on the gradual track to demise for their platform,” the report states. “Expect some potentially radical changes to Microsoft Windows and Windows app pricing and licensing to help juice up Windows’ attractiveness to mobile app developers and mobile device users.”
How To Woo App Developers
Microsoft has long tried to encourage its developer ecosystem with various incentives, from free development tools to paying developers outright to build apps for its platform. In general, though, developers go where the eyeballs (and dollars) are – and right now that means iOS and Android. Microsoft will need a huge boost in Windows Phone sales from its primary manufacturing partners Nokia and HTC to generate any real interest from developers. Even with those challenges, Microsoft’s 33% interest rate from developers for Windows 8 and related operating systems makes it much better positioned for 2013 than is Research In Motion.
RIM has spent a good portion of 2012 traveling around the world trying to rally developers to its upcoming BlackBerry 10 platform. The BlackBerry 10 Jam World Tour has made stops in North America, Europe, Asia and Latin America. Clearly, RIM does not need to be told that the success of its new operating system will hinge directly on developer enthusiasm.
Earlier this week, RIM rebranded its BlackBerry App World to BlackBerry World and announced several incentives for developers that move to build for the BlackBerry10 platform. In conjunction with Appcelerator, RIM is offering free BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha devices to the first 1,000 developers that submit applications for review. In addition, up to 10,000 developers will be eligible to receive one free year of Appcelerator Cloud Services and Analytics through RIM. Appcelerator has made its Titantium development platform available to BlackBerry app creators and the two companies showed off the integration this week in Bangkok, Thailand.
RIM also recently commissioned an independent survey of developers and touts some of the findings as encouraging. For instance, RIM states that 8% of developers surveyed consider BlackBerry to be their primary development platform, a 5% increase.
While those numbers may buoy RIM’s hopes, they don’t come close to satisfying IDC’s threshhold of 50% developer interest required to avoid a certain demise. We’ll know soon, enough, though. BlackBerry 10 interest will likely spike at the end of January 2013 when RIM finally unveils the first smarpthones running the new operating system.
App developers: What could incent you to build apps for BlackBerry 10 or Windows Phone? Are smartphone sales the ultimate determining factor or can RIM and/or Microsoft sway you with free services, tools or other ? Let us know in the comments.
BlackBerry Windows “Frankenphone” artist conception by ReadWrite.
View full post on ReadWrite
Leading Orange County SEO Company Hires PHP Developer and Marketing … – San Francisco Chronicle
Sep 30th
 San Francisco Chronicle |
Leading Orange County SEO Company Hires PHP Developer and Marketing …
San Francisco Chronicle September has proven to be a busy month for ByteLaunch, a leading web development and SEO company in Orange County. On top of moving offices to a more suitable facility for their growing company, they've also hired several new employees. This new … |
View full post on SEO – Google News
