Everything and the Mobile Software Universe…

Let’s find out why this shift means a lot for Rich desktop and Mobile Applications

Google web APIs are simply the most used and prevalent today, allowing a full range of mash-ups and new web services…but what not a lot of people know is that it was simply not legal to use Google maps APIs outside of a web site, so namely in an application!

This is why only Google were providing native applications around their maps services for mobile phone (iPhone apps, WinMob, J2me), and PC (Google Earth)

And now they changed their mind:

There were both technical and legal challenges blocking AIR support in our API. AIR has a different security model, which required a number of changes to the “internal plumbing” of the API in order to implement our delayed-loading model, where the actual implementation of the map’s functionality loads dynamically from Google’s servers once the application launches. Also, our Terms of Service used to specify that the Maps API could only be used for online web applications.

Now that both the API and Terms of Service have undergone a facelift, we are releasing the first version of the API that will allow Flash/Flex developers to bring Google Maps to the AIR runtime.

Google developer blog

This is is a big acknowledgment from Google of the relevance of desktop and mobile rich applications to access “in the cloud” data, the browser is no more the only deployment method for web services, and the nice work done by Adobe around AIR/OpenScreen is pushing this idea making it more and more mainstream…iPhone apps for the most part are specialized access to web resources, and what to say about Android? This trend is also followed by Nokia through its Trolltech acquisition for the QT technology, check my little post about this one here.

So thanks Google! let now see what’s coming from the web…and this old boy called desktop and its mobile children!

For those that are following this blog…you’ve seen that I’m talking frequently (hum not as my posting recently ) about low cost phones. It’s just because I mean it, we know how hard it is to complete a phone software on very cheap platforms. But here we are! A phone is out, and it’s a Sony-Ericsson one, well yes we are proud checkout the press release (it is just all over the web today):

Open-Plug Powers the New J132 Mobile Phone From Sony Ericsson
Monday November 24, 3:00 am ET

- The Open-Plug Software Suite for Mobile Phones Will be Rolled out in Large Numbers Across Europe and Asia

SOPHIA ANTIPOLIS, France and LUND, Sweden, November 24 /PRNewswire/ — Open-Plug, the specialist in software development environments for mass-market mobile phones, announces today that its ELIPS application suite is embedded in Sony Ericsson’s J132 mobile phone. The J132 is a talk and text phone with FM radio and stereo hands free kit.

"We are very proud to be cooperating with Sony Ericsson, one of the top leaders in the mobile phone industry", said Eric Baissus, CEO of Open-Plug. "This is an additional demonstration of the maturity and performance of our ELIPS solution."

Open-Plug has developed the ELIPS software suite to address the strategic market of low cost and mass-market phones. The demand is exploding and drives very significant volume worldwide. Thanks to the performance and flexibility of its underlying award-winning component technology, ELIPS enables fast development of new mobile phone models and simplifies implementation of new software features and user interfaces.

Open-Plug’s solution is a major step forward towards the reduction of development time and costs for handsets and mobile applications. ELIPS is attracting more and more software developers and handset makers who want to re-use their investment from one platform to another and develop variants in record time. It is the result of 5 years of R&D and includes several patented technologies.

About Open-Plug

Open-Plug creates and commercializes ELIPS, the first open application development environment designed for mass-market mobile phones. Already shipped in millions of devices, ELIPS enables software companies, handset makers and operators to create and deploy mobile applications, rich user interfaces as well as complete software solution, in record time.

Founded in 2002, Open-Plug is a private company financed by leading international venture capital investors. Headquartered in France, the company also operates in Taipei, Taiwan R.O.C. Open-Plug is a member of the LiMo Foundation (Linux Mobile Foundation).

For more information, visit http://www.open-plug.com