19 July 2010

Symbian’s web application development tools
and Nitobi’s PhoneGap framework make it easy
to create mobile apps for any device

Symbian Foundation, the non-profit organization responsible for the world’s leading open source smartphone platform and Nitobi, creators of the ground-breaking PhoneGap mobile application development framework, today announced an open source collaboration designed to simplify mobile application development.

By integrating Symbian’s web application creation tools and Nitobi’s PhoneGap 'write once, run anywhere' platform, mobile developers can now easily make app store ready applications for all major mobile platforms.

The companies will be showcasing this capability for the first time at OSCON, the open source convention, at booth number #700. In addition, Nitobi has contributed PhoneGap to Symbian, which is included in the in the Symbian^3 platform web extensions package.

With both of these developments in place, any web developer who knows HTML, CSS and JavaScript can now write a mobile application once and deploy it across multiple operating systems and devices. In addition, developers can access native device capabilities such as telephony, contacts, camera, accelerometers, orientation and location that can be modified or enhanced to improve the end user experience and device functionality.

"PhoneGap is committed to giving mobile web developers the ability to design fun, engaging and useful device-independent applications by using open standards," commented Andre Charland, CEO of Nitobi. "We have had a long standing relationship with members of the Symbian community and are thrilled to be working directly with this like minded organization to provide developers worldwide an easier way to tap in to the power of Symbian."

"This is a great partnership that will benefit app developers across the globe. For the thousands of apps that have been built using PhoneGap, developers now have the option of developing one app which will run across all platforms, including Symbian," said Lee Williams, Executive Director of Symbian.

"At the same time, our web tools allow developers on other platforms to quickly build rich Internet-based apps for Symbian and access the world’s largest smartphone market."

Also at OSCON, Symbian will be hosting a workshop that will include a presentation from PhoneGap regarding the partnership. It will be held on Tuesday, July 20th from 1:30 – 5:00 p.m. in room F150. .