Addressable Market for Magic xpa Android Client Reaches 400 Million Devices

Tuesday night Andy Rubin, Senior Vice President of Mobile and Digital Content at Google announced that "there have been half a billion android activations to date, with over 1.3m added every day."

The increase in Android activations from 900,000 per day in June to 1.3 million per day now demonstrates remarkable growth for the platform. For mobile app developers this means that there are a considerable and growing number of buyers for apps. The Magic xpa application platform allows you to develop applications that reach 81.7% of those 500 million activated Android devices. In other words, all of the devices since Android 2.3’s release. So while Ice Cream Sandwich developers are celebrating their ability to reach 100 million users, Magic xpa Application Platform developers are celebrating their ability to reach a market of potentially more than 400 million Android devices with the Magic xpa Android Client. The Magic xpa Android Client overcomes the problem of Android platform fragmentation (in addition to cross-platform fragmentation issues).

What is the Magic xpa Android Client? The Magic xpa Android Client is a native device OS RIA application designed to take advantage of the mobile device capabilities, while being connected to a scalable, robust enterprise server. The Magic xpa Android Client implements a subset of the capabilities of the Magic RIA client for .NET Desktop, as they are applicable on an Android device.

When developing apps for Magic xpa Android Client it is important to remember that while Android is a multitasking OS, only one app appears in the foreground at a time while all others run in the background. Just to be clear: apps running in the background do not have screen access. However, users can see and switch between apps. Pressing the Android’s ‘Home’ button will move the current foreground app to the background. This is normal and expected behavior on an Android phone.

The Magic xpa Android Client developer should also keep in mind that apps can run multiple windows. However, Android supports a simple stacked window model where windows are inherently modal, occupy the full screen, cannot be moved or resized and run one at a time.  Users familiar with Android know that you use the “Back” Key to close the current window and return to the previous one. As a developer, you can also provide ways so that the program itself can raise the internal “Exit” event. The Development for the Magic xpa Android client provides a way so that the app itself can raise the internal Exit System event. And the developer must be prepared for the fact that the user can terminate the application by using the ‘Back’ button from the first screen of the application at any time.

Magic xpa Android Client developers need to know that Android OS supports local file operations using the appropriate functions. The naming conventions for local folders and file names are according to the Android OS. In general, it can be said that with Android, names are not case-sensitive; folder separators are defined using a slash character (/) and Android apps can access multiple folders (unlike iOS which only allows access to the temp folder).

Magic xpa developers will also want to pay special attention to the use of fonts and colors in your Magic apps for Android. Android OS includes its own set of fonts that are usually different from the fonts found on a Windows desktop. As the mobile RIA client uses the same font table as other interfaces, it is recommended to define separate font entries for use on each device. Since it is not possible to select mobile fonts using the Windows fonts dialog box, in order to enter these fonts, you need to edit the fonts table directly using a text editor. On Android you need to send the font family name and the style of the font you want. The system will find a matching font for you. For example: "Android Serif bold, Droid Serif,12,0,0,Bold".

Developers should pay attention to colors as well. Magic mobile applications use a color table and do not support Windows “System” colors.  You will program your app with exact RGB values for both background and foreground colors. The Magic xpa Android Client will support transparent colors, where applicable. If a system color is used for a form or control, then the device default color for the form or control will be shown. On Edit and Push Button controls, to see the border you must use a color with a system color (to get the device default). And on Combo controls, to see the arrow you must use a color with a system color (to get the device default).

Magic xpa provides special capabilities for querying the device OS as well as the specific build, device serial number and existence of a touch screen. You can query the height and width of the screen, which varies from device to device. And, of course you have access to the GPS which returns latitude and longitude.

These android specific functions are in addition to all of the normal app development capabilities of the Magic xpa Application Platform mobile offering.