I need to create a mobile app for iOS and android (so 2 apps). The app will use some native mobile functionality, and lot of functionality is related to displaying static/ dynamic information. I am planning to move the information on web app and simply embed the web pages (HTML5) in the mobile apps (basically call the urls and display info).
Is this a common way of developing mobile apps? Or there can be issues with following hybrid approach? Are there advantages of native app over hybrid app (or vice versa)
Thanks
Kamal
I’ve mostly done native Android development, but I’ve also helped debug a few apps that were created using the “cross-compile” platforms such as PhoneGap and the cross-compiled apps have a few quirks that it’s nice to just let the platform handle for you if you build a native app.
For example, one of the ones I debugged lately didn’t implement handlers for back button events, which was a really uncomfortable user experience. In a native Android app, and I assume it is the same for iOS although I’ve never tried building for iOs, the system handles back button presses for you, because it knows what Activity was running before the current one and can rebuild it’s UI. In PhoneGap, it’s essentially a webkit browser wrapped in an Android application, so it doesn’t have access to things like the backstack.
If you keep in mind that the system isn’t going to handle those kinds of events for you, and you don’t need access to all the sensors on the phone, then you could probably get away with using one of these frameworks