Question

We are starting new development on mobile devices. We want to do webapps (with strong offline behavior) and hybrid apps, and keep business logic the much as we can in JS.

After a long time googling around about Jquery Mobile and Sencha Touch, I am actually thinking that it is not what we need: we actually count with an incredible web designer, so we want to use his talent to create the screens. This go against JQuery Mobile and Sencha Touch philosofy, because is just what they do: UI interface.

So, if we want to use our own screens, is there any benefit in using JQuery Mobile or Sencha Touch for the business logic and/or back-end ? Wouldn’t it be overkill and in the end worse in terms of performance ? Would it be too much work to do our own business/back-end framework (ajax, jsonp, localStorage, filesystem access, etc…).

The much I see, the most I think that the only think that I would need from Sencha Touch are transitions (Jquery Mobile ones are terrible)…

Answer 1

You can use a combination of smaller frameworks that will provide you both with DOM manipulation and AJAX and local storage for being able to work offline.

• For DOM / Ajax / event handling:

  • Snack.js: http://snackjs.com/
  • xui: http://xuijs.com/

• For local persistence:

  • store.js: https://github.com/marcuswestin/store.js
  • Lawnchair: http://westcoastlogic.com/lawnchair/

They will do their part and stay out of your way to give your app the appearance you want.