Sprint Opens Up Platform for Developers

By Contributor Wireless and Mobile News on December 9, 2008 10:29 AM

Sprint wants to help developers develop apps for its phones and has opened up its software for developers.

The Sprint Open Software Platform, will be opened first, via the Sprint Titan platform for Windows Mobile devices. It will give mobile developers the same codes, tools and resources used for desktop applications The platform is the first of its kind from an operator.

Sprint's Open Software Platform

The Sprint platform is an open, standards-based mobile Java ecosystem that extends desktop computing and Web 2.0 capabilities to devices operating on the Sprint Mobile Broadband Network. To get started, developers can access the full suite of Sprint Titan development resources at http://developer.sprint.com. It is the first of several open software platforms that Sprint will make available to developers.

The platform supports existing MIDP Java ME applications and adds the more capable CDC/Foundation Java Virtual Machine and OSGi framework for new high-capability applications. Support for the Eclipse embedded Rich Client (eRCP) application model means the platform can run generically written rich GUI applications across a broad range of devices and desktop computers. Support for the Widget application model provides Web developers the ability to develop rich Web applications that take full advantage of the device's functionality. This allows developers to easily move Eclipse-based or Web applications from the desktop to Sprint devices. The platform also includes APIs to give developers access to Sprint-specific device features, such as location, messaging and multimedia, which can be useful in a variety of business- and consumer-oriented applications, such as field service or unified messaging.

As part of today's launch, the platform is available with its own set of developer tools that plug in to Eclipse IDE and support both mobile and non-mobile application development and deployment. The toolset leverages existing server or desktop frameworks and provides on-device debugging and profiling, along with device emulation.

For enterprise customers, the open platform leverages the same JAVA application development framework that many customers already use for desktops and servers. This means applications can be easily extended to Sprint wireless devices with little resource training or additional investment beyond what is already in place today. In addition to extending enterprise applications to the mobile environment, the platform enables device management functionality so account administrators can remotely manage their devices and applications.