Mobile Software Design Guru Reading?

January 14, 2010 5:24 PM

where can I read about the system and software design for mobile? preferably something written within the last year or two? any particular mobile code gurus out there? primarily focusing on mobile web. Any of these books worth getting? They appear to have positive ratings and relevant content descriptions on Amazon. 0321269314 1847193439 0596155441

i'm looking for balance between the systems design theory, but also at least some concrete examples of mobile apps that follow design/coding principles.

more weight toward recent theories, ones that take into context more recent platforms and frameworks such as iPhone, HTML5, etc.

posted by k7lim to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

What sort of software are you trying to make? The challenges of designing software for mobile devices are not too different from the challenges of designing software for desktops. The main differences are in interface design, latency, speed/memory constraints, and the various restrictions imposed by the vendors.

The books you linked to all seem to give a very broad overview. 1847193439 in particular seems to claim to cover everything about three different styles of phone application. Services that communicate using basic phone features ('touchtone services', sending/receiving SMS), old-style mobile web applications (WCSS? Something to do with WAP, I think. And 'supporting keypad navigation'?), and a final note on developing for the latest wave of smartphones. Actually, that summary has the look of an old text given a few tweaks and updates and perhaps a new cover and title. And there is no way they could cover all of those topics in detail in 236 pages.

If you (like most others) are looking to develop for the newest smartphones, your best bet is either to choose a platform (Android, iPhone, Pre, Windows Mobile) or to use standard web technologies that will work on three of those four. Then you can either buy a book that is written with that platform's particular idioms in mind, or buy a book on html5 / css / javascript / interaction design / other web-development related topics. I'm not sure the books you linked to would help you very much.

It's hard to recommend reading without knowing what kind of mobile software you are trying to make. Could you elaborate a bit?
posted by iktomi at 9:46 PM on January 14, 2010

Response by poster: iktomi, good question. i'm primarily interested in the actual "best practices" in the industry right now. having built apps for different clients with different needs, it's my goal to be able to communicate the software design principles to future clients. kind of the evolution of my job, as i see it.

specifically i want to build mobile web applications that transcend the specific smartphone camps and are usable by any phone with a browser.
posted by k7lim at 9:35 AM on January 15, 2010

I recommend Dive Into HTML5.
posted by mbrubeck at 12:27 PM on January 15, 2010