RIM to give developers Web, push tools

Research In Motion will give developers tools to build Web applications that work offline, expanding beyond the Java platform that has been at the core of BlackBerry applications until now, the company said Tuesday.

Support for the Gears Web application framework and other tools will help to make Web applications into “first-class citizens” on the BlackBerry, said Alan Brenner, senior vice president of the BlackBerry Platform, at the company’s first developer conference. Support for Gears, the Web development plug-in first developed by Google, is set to become available next year.

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An audience of hundreds of developers applauded Brenner’s announcement. Java has been the foundation of applications on the BlackBerry, but with the maturing of the mobile Web with faster networks and full Web browsers, it is becoming a major platform for smartphone software.

Also Tuesday, RIM said it will add support for SQL Lite for tying BlackBerry applications into relational databases, with the capability to keep using the applications offline with Java. Developers will also be able to use Web Signals to make their applications deliver live icons to the home screen of the device that give quick information updates and let the user click to get more details.

In another move that could open up new possibilities to BlackBerry developers, RIM will expose the APIs (application programming interfaces) for its push technology that has made the BlackBerry a hit with instantly available e-mail. This will let third-party developers create their own push applications for the platform, though the APIs will be rolled out only gradually over several quarters.

RIM would roll out its APIs more quickly but is concerned about security, said David Yach, CTO for software. The company is concerned that exposing APIs might expose potential holes, he said.

“All of us … are in a world of hurt if there’s some serious security problems on the BlackBerry,” Yach said.

Also on Tuesday, RIM followed the lead of Apple’s App Store with the BlackBerry Application Storefront, where developers can sell their applications directly to consumers. It is expected to become available in March. Through a partnership announced Tuesday with PayPal, buyers will be able to use the popular online payment service at the store.

RIM will make the terms for the Application Storefront as clear as possible, said Jeff McDowell, vice president of global alliances. The company wants to prevent developers from creating applications for the Storefront, only to find out at the last minute that they don’t meet RIM’s conditions.

“We’re gonna make sure that never happens,” he said, to scattered applause. Apple has come under fire for allegedly removing applications from the App Store based on policies that weren’t clear.

The expanded development and delivery options come as RIM focuses on extending its powerful brand from the enterprise world to consumers.

“The consumer wireless data market is taking off, and that’s the opportunity to all of you today,” said Mike Lazaridis, president and co-CEO. Demonstrations at the event on Tuesday leaned heavily toward the consumer side, including the Gameday baseball news application from Major League Baseball’s MLB.com and Dipdive, a social music and content-sharing application that was presented by Will.i.am of the pop group Black-Eyed Peas.

Other moves announced Tuesday that should make life easier for developers included a bug-tracking database and new beta-test versions of plug-ins for the Eclipse and Visual Studio development environments.

Several developers at the conference welcomed the ability to write BlackBerry applications with Eclipse, the open-source development platform. One attendee, a senior software engineer at a research institution in California, said the ability to write for the BlackBerry using Eclipse, Visual Studio or Java would give him more flexibility in assigning developers on his team to work on BlackBerry applications for internal use.

Another developer at the event was encouraged by the promise of the Application Storefront.

“Finally having an app store is going to be good for them,” said Matthew Shannon, mobile technologist at Tanner Research, which makes the ClearSync calendar-sharing application. ClearSync is now available for PalmOS, but the company is looking at additional platforms, including BlackBerry and iPhone, for expansion.

The announcement of Gears support was a highlight for Arvind Goyal, chief technology officer and vice president of engineering at Vaultus, which sells financial applications for mobile phones and supplies mobile technology to vendors of other financial software. In addition to providing for both online and offline operation, Gears should help Vaultus write BlackBerry software that is less affected by latency when making calls to servers over the network, he said.

But Arvind said the biggest news for him was RIM’s plan for a bug-tracking database. The database will allow developers to view bugs that others have reported to RIM and vote on the importance of each one. That should help to get bugs fixed quickly, Goyal said. Currently, when Goyal’s team reports bugs to RIM, the fixes don’t come in time to be useful, he said.

“Right now, it’s a total black box,” Goyal said. He also looks forward to finding out about bugs that other developers discovered before he runs into them.