Category Archives: iOS

Android, App Store, Fleet management, Global Positioning System, GPS, iOS, Mobile

New SkyRouter Mobile Satellite Tracking, Fleet Management Apps Support iOS, Android

Blue Sky Network today  launched its New SkyRouter mobile application, a fleet management portal for land mobile, aviation, and marine applications. New SkyRouter is a cloud-based solution designed to support connectivity with remotely dispersed mobile assets including Blue Sky Network’s advanced dual-mode GSM and Iridiumtracking and communication services. With the New SkyRouter application, fleet managers are provided around-the-clock connectivity with assets via most Android or iOS mobile phones or tablets.

“The reliance that we have toward our mobile devices has opened up new fleet management opportunities for Blue Sky Network,” said Jon Gilbert, CEO and founder of Blue Sky Network. “The New SkyRouter App provides fleet managers the same constant connectivity in a user friendly mobile interface. Our easy-to-use mobile application provides fleet owners and managers who are on the go, real-time access to asset information.”

Features of the New SkyRouter mobile application include GPS location, fleet asset lists, breadcrumb mapping, active asset indication, automated event reports, and drill-down on asset events. Leveraging the integration of Blue Sky Network’s industry-leading tracking hardware, the new application provides truly global coverage of assets located anywhere in the world. The New SkyRouter application works in combination with Blue Sky Network’s robust and Iridium certified hardware, which can be easily installed on land, aviation and marine assets.

The New SkyRouter Mobile application will be available for download at the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store in early October. The product is in beta release and slated for production in Q4 2012.

Blue Sky Network will also be showcasing the New SkyRouter mobile application at the MINExpo International 2012, taking place in Las Vegas during September 24-26, in booth number 21209.

For more information on Blue Sky Network and the new mobile SkyRouter application, please visit: http://www.blueskynetwork.com.


appMobi, iOS, Mobile, PhoneGap, Tools

appMobis privateStack Gives Enterprises a Secure Cloud Backend for Mobile HTML5

 

Image representing appMobi as depicted in Crun...appMobi today announced privateStack, a licensable enterprise version of its industry-leading mobile HTML5 app development and cloud services stack. privateStack was created in response to overwhelming interest from businesses, organizations and government agencies that require complete end-to-end control of mobile app deployments for security reasons.

With the recent explosion of mobile smartphone and tablet devices, many enterprises want to create hybrid and Web-based mobile apps for a variety of audiences – sales staff, service technicians, executives, operations personnel and customers. Unfortunately, CTOs have legitimate concerns about data security, service quality and the difficulty of distributing corporate apps in public app stores. Unless they wanted to build it themselves, CTOs were forced to hold off on participating in this exciting trend. privateStack was created to address this need.

“While the consumer market for apps has skyrocketed along with explosive smartphone and tablet sales over the past few years, enterprises and government agencies who wanted to develop mobile apps with data security and deployment control have had no real way to do so,” said Dave Kennedy, appMobi CEO. “privateStack provides enterprises the mobile application management capabilities to develop and deploy apps using the same technology appMobi uses in its commercial cloud services. Ironically, privateStack illustrates how open Web technologies like HTML5 and the mobile Web can be used to create highly secure mobile solutions that can’t be duplicated in closed, vendor-owned mobile ecosystems such as those of Apple and Google.”

privateStack gives enterprise CTOs the ability to support native-quality, HTML5-based, cross platform mobile apps with complete control over hosting geography, security, gateways into corporate data silos and user authentication. For enterprises, hybrid apps are very appealing because they greatly simplify app creation and deployment. Unlike native app development, which requires programming in arcane languages like Objective C, existing corporate Web development teams can create hybrid apps using HTML5. Using privateStack, those apps can be built into iOS and Android store-ready apps or they can be deployed on secure corporate intranets, avoiding the complications of commercial app stores.

In addition to appMobi’s HTML5 development tools, which support hybrid app development using appMobi or PhoneGap, privateStack incorporates the entire appMobi cloud services platform which includes:

  • Authentication
  • Rich Media Push Messaging
  • Mobile App Analytics
  • Remote App Updates
  • In-App Purchasing
  • Gamification – Badges and Leaderboards
  • Social Network Interfaces

appMobi offers privateStack as an Amazon Machine Image (AMI) that gives enterprises world-class uptime and instant, effortless scalability. privateStack is the first mobile HTML5 backend to be offered on the Amazon Web Services (AWS) store as an installable AMI, and it is available in both managed and custom configurations. For customers who want to host privateStack in their own corporate data centers, enterprise source licensing is also available. More information is available at www.appmobi.com/privatestack.


Accounting, Business Processes, FreshBooks, iOS, iPad, iPhone, Mobile

Freshbooks Takes SMB Accounting Mobile with new iPhone, iPad App

FreshBooks  today launched a new mobile accounting app designed to fit the lifestyle of today’s small businesses owners, giving them the freedom to run their business anytime, anywhere.

Following their recent re-positioning as cloud accounting, the free mobile app further demonstrates the FreshBooks commitment to being in the corner of service-based businesses. The mobile app strengthens existing features like expense management, P&L reporting and online payment integration to help make the lives of small business owners easier.

The new FreshBooks iPhone app works anywhere, whether you’re tracking time from the coffee shop, logging expenses from the airport lounge or sending an invoice right from the client’s office. Simple and intuitive, FreshBooks makes it easy to have an at-a-glance view of your business.

“The FreshBooks iPhone app was created so that small business owners could have even more flexibility with their FreshBooks account and access it from wherever their work takes them,” said Mike McDerment, FreshBooks co-founder and CEO. “We know that people go into business to pursue their passion and serve their customers, not to learn accounting. That’s the difference with FreshBooks cloud accounting: it’s simple, accessible everywhere, and saves small businesses time on their billing.”

The FreshBooks iOS app has all the key features of the web version of FreshBooks, including the streamlined ability to send professional-looking invoices, get paid online with Paypal and attach expenses directly to invoices. Invite staff or sub-contractors to projects to log hours as you work and generate invoices from timesheets to enjoy seamless collaboration. FreshBooks is designed to support businesses of all types: lawyers, marketing and IT professionals, plumbers, interior decorators, even an architect–anyone who creates value for their clients by applying their time and expertise.

Download the free iPhone app  to create a new free account.


Android, iOS, Mobile, Natural Language Understanding, Nina, Nuance, Nuance Communications, Speech recognition, Tools, Voice

Nuance Introduces Nina, the Virtual Assistant for Mobile Customer Service Apps

Nuance Communications today introduced Nina, the virtual assistant for mobile customer service apps. With Nina, companies can add speech-based virtual assistant capabilities to their existing iOS and Android mobile apps, enhancing the self-service experience for their customers. Nina combines Nuance speech recognition, Text-to-Speech (TTS), voice biometrics, and Natural Language Understanding (NLU) technology hosted in the cloud to deliver an interactive user experience that not only understands what is said, but also can identify who is saying it.

Nuance also announced that USAA, a leading financial services provider that serves members of the U.S. military, veterans and their families, has adopted the virtual assistant for use within its popular mobile app. A pilot is planned for August and the functionality will launch to all USAA members early next year.

“USAA’s innovative solutions are designed to make life easier for our highly mobile military service members, and increasingly for all members who now expect to get things done when, where and how they want,” said Neff Hudson, assistant vice president of emerging channels for USAA. “We believe that the virtual assistant has tremendous potential to make it simpler, faster and more satisfying for our members to manage their financial affairs on their mobile devices.”

Nina is significant because it is the first virtual assistant for mobile customer service apps to incorporate both speech recognition and voice biometrics into a single integrated solution. Nina is also the first solution that provides an open software development kit (SDK) to support the rapid integration of virtual assistant capabilities into existing mobile applications. In addition, Nina is the first to allow organizations to brand their own virtual assistant persona, including the visual appearance and implementation of optional custom TTS voices.

“Nina is a watershed innovation for the automated customer service industry, not only because it brings the virtual assistant directly into an app, but because it raises the bar through its level of interactive dialog and language understanding,” said Robert Weideman, executive vice president and general manager of the Nuance Enterprise Division. “Nina provides our customers a major competitive differentiator by enabling more successful self-service through their mobile apps. We are especially pleased to further our partnership with USAA, a company known for its innovation and approach to delivering a premier mobile customer service experience to its members.”


Android, appMobi, Free, iOS, Mobile, PhoneGap, Tools

storeView Offers Free Cross Platform App Store Analytics Service for HTML5, PhoneGap Developers

Image representing appMobi as depicted in Crun...

appMobi today announced storeView, a new, free, cloud-based reporting service for PhoneGap and hybrid HTML5 app developers that aggregates and displays detailed app analytics across all the most popular app stores in a single dashboard.“As game and app developers have begun to leverage HTML5’s ‘write once, deploy everywhere’ power, the issue of app store fragmentation has emerged as these apps have become successful across multiple stores and platforms”

With the explosion of new cross platform app development, developers are increasingly posting their apps to multiple app stores. Each of the app stores uses a different method to report sales and activity, creating massive fragmentation. This “App Store Fragmentation” issue prevents developers from understanding app performance and trends information that every developer needs to achieve maximum profitability. With the release of storeView, appMobi has stepped up to provide a completely free service that solves this issue for PhoneGap and HTML5 hybrid app developers.

“As game and app developers have begun to leverage HTML5’s ‘write once, deploy everywhere’ power, the issue of app store fragmentation has emerged as these apps have become successful across multiple stores and platforms,” said Sam Abadir, appMobi CTO. “We experienced this issue ourselves with Boom Town, the first massively cross platform HTML5 game, currently available in 7 different app stores. We also realized just how little information is provided by many of the app stores. For example, the only analytic provided by Apple’s App Store and Google Play is download count – that’s all they can tell you about your app! We created storeView for internal use and found it to be an invaluable tool. Now we’re giving it away for anyone who’s using HTML5 to create apps.”

storeView is a completely free cloud service. There will never be any charge for setting up an account, for adding apps to the system, nor for the number of users a particular app has. Adding storeView analytics to any HTML5-based app is extremely easy, with the addition of a single include file and just one line of JavaScript code. storeView provides deep, granular insight into the performance and activity of developers’ apps in each of today’s leading app stores, including Apple, Android (Google Play), Facebook, Amazon, Chrome, Mozilla and Barnes & Noble.

To view storeView analytics, developers simply log into their account and select from a variety of reports. The available reports include monthly uniques on all platforms, iOS starts by device, Android starts by device, app starts by platform, and 30 day uniques vs. app starts. Armed with this important data, developers can make informed decisions on allocating development and marketing resources, uncover unseen relationships between devices and platforms, and most importantly, optimize app store profits.

PhoneGap and HTML5 Developers can sign up for storeView free at http://www.appmobi.com/storeView.


AutoDesk, Autodesk SketchBook Pro, iOS, M&A Activity, Mobile, Pixlr, Socialcam, Video

Autodesk Buys Socialcam for Mobile Social Video

Image representing Autodesk as depicted in Cr...

Autodesk Inc., has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Socialcam for a purchase price of approximately $60 Million. Socialcam is a popular mobile social video capture, editing and sharing app and service that was launched in 2011. This transaction is expected to close in Autodesk’s third quarter of fiscal 2013 (which ends on October 31, 2012) and is subject to customary closing conditions.

“Mobile computing, the cloud and social media are improving and changing the way people design, engineer and create projects,” said Samir Hanna, vice president, Autodesk Consumer Group. “Video is an ideal medium for professionals and consumers alike to communicate and share their design ideas. We are excited to have Socialcam join our growing portfolio of applications, services and communities for digital art, personal design and fabrication, home design and entertainment.”

Socialcam is a smartphone application and web-based service that makes it easy to capture, edit and share videos. The Socialcam app has been one of the most popular mobile video apps in the iOS App Store and Android marketplace with over 16 million downloads since it was first launched in 2011. Autodesk will prioritize support for the existing Socialcam community, while investing in scaling the platform and developing a more comprehensive set of tools for Socialcam users. Autodesk also plans to use the Socialcam platform to help make its Academy Award-winning technology for professional film and video creators more accessible to a broader audience.

“Socialcam shares Autodesk’s mission of helping everybody imagine, design and create a better world,” said Michael Seibel, Founder and CEO, Socialcam. “Autodesk has a proven track record of acquiring and scaling fast-growing, early stage consumer businesses while staying true to their core audience and vision. With products like Pixlr, SketchBook and 123D, Autodesk is empowering creativity in millions around the world by making their award-winning technology accessible to everybody. We’re excited to join them and introduce this global community to simple video creation, editing and sharing.”


CloudTest, iOS, iPad, iPhone, Mobile, Mobile operating system, SOASTA, Tools

SOASTA Releases CloudTest Mobile Test Automation Platform for iOS

SOASTA today released CloudTest Mobile, to deliver complete performance and functional test automation of mobile apps across distributed mobile devices. The CloudTest Mobile platform provides precise capture and playback of all continuous touch gestures including pan, pinch, zoom and scroll on iPhones, iPads, and iPods. See the CloudTest Mobile demonstration here.

Today, mobile developers can easily automate the testing of their mobile apps on iOS 6. CloudTest’s unique approach of residing inside the app allows developers to precisely test their apps when new mobile operating systems are released.

“Starting today, developers are working on iOS 6 versions of their Apps and automated functional testing is a real problem for these developers,” stated Tal Broda, VP, Engineering, at SOASTA. “Today, CloudTest provides full support for capture and playback of any App running on iOS 6 including any gesture or any UI element.”

SOASTA also announced today support for Appcelerator Titanium 2.0 platform, which gives Appcelerator’s 300,000 mobile developers seamless access to CloudTest Mobile’s test automation capabilities. See release here.

“The explosion of web and mobile applications along with the proliferation of mobile devices, makes manual testing obsolete. With today’s rapid development cycles, time to market requirements and technology changes, developers require a new set of automation solutions to support multi-touch gestures and 3D gaming,” comments Tom Lounibos, CEO SOASTA. “Now, with CloudTest Mobile, developers can quickly develop, test and deliver their mobile applications with the quality their users expect. Our support for Titanium 2.0 will make this especially seamless for Appcelerator’s mobile developer community.”

CloudTest Mobile delivers affordable, accurate, and complete mobile app testing using real mobile devices. Traditional testing solutions have employed device emulators and optical recognition approaches that are not precise or reliable enough to test this generation of mobile apps. CloudTest Mobile captures the start and end points of each gesture, the journey between, and the speed with which the gesture is performed. It uniquely conducts testing from within the mobile app, replacing brittle optical recognition approaches and enabling validations based on variable values and internal app state changes. Distributed mobile devices are accessed over the air, eliminating the need for tethering or “jail breaking” and allowing mobile devices – anywhere – to be used in a test.

CloudTest Mobile is available today. Download your free version of CloudTest Lite here. SOASTA will be hosting a webinar titled, “Are Your Mobile Apps Rock Star Ready?” on Tuesday, June 19 at 10:00am PST. For more information or to register, please click here.


Apple, iOS, iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch, Microsoft Windows, Mobile, Windows

GraphOn Adds iPhone to iPad Windows Application Access App

Image representing iPhone as depicted in Crunc...

GraphOn Corporation today announced its new GO-Global iOS Client. Available immediately as a free downloadable app from Apple’s App Store, the new GO-Global iOS Client is used in conjunction with GraphOn’s GO-Global Windows Host solution to seamlessly deliver Windows applications to Apple iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch users.

The new GO-Global iOS Client replaces GraphOn’s popular GO-Global iPad Client. New and improved features include support for iPhone and iPad Touch platforms in addition to existing iPad support, enhanced navigation, voice-to-text input, auto-resizing on device rotation, increased performance, plus iPhone and iPad 3 Retina Display screen optimization.

“iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch users can now interact with their favorite Windows programs using just their fingers,” said Christoph Berlin, GraphOn’s vice president of product management and marketing. “Our GO-Global iOS Client uses intuitive, multi-touch gestures to achieve popular mouse and keyboard operations. Windows applications appear on the iOS device just as though they were running locally, retaining all features, functions, and branding.”

GO-Global Windows Host securely delivers server-resident Windows applications to virtually any location, platform, and operating system. Current GO-Global Windows Host customers can gain immediate access to their remoted Windows programs from their iOS device by simply downloading the free GO-Global iOS Client from the App Store at http://itunes.apple.com/app/go-global/id441263366?mt=8. iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch users who are not currently using GO-Global Windows Host, but who wish to evaluate its remote access capabilities, can download the free GO-Global iOS Client and then immediately connect to GraphOn’s online demonstration server running several popular Windows programs. No sign-up or registration is required.

GraphOn’s GO-Global iOS Client requires Apple iOS 5.0 or later.


Android, Apperian, Application lifecycle management, Blackberry, iOS, Mobile, Mobile application development

Apperian Rolls Out New Mobile Application Lifecycle Management Architecture

Apperian (www.apperian.com) today announced the latest release of its Enterprise App Services Environment (EASE), which will significantly broaden the capabilities of mobile application management (MAM).

Businesses have outgrown the basic functionality of “create, deploy and manage apps,” which used to define mobile application management. They now require a cloud platform that covers the full mobile application lifecycle management architecture, ranging from inspection of applications when they are imported for the first time, to socialization functions that foster better app creation and adoption. EASE now provides all of this in a modular solution, and all functions can be managed from a single admin console.

Aiming to provide businesses with the best products and services to meet their mobility requirements, EASE supports both native and third-party extensions, which are plugged into an “AppBus” in the platform. There are six core slots supported by the AppBus that cover all functions required for complete mobile application lifecycle management:

  • Inspect – Malware detection, automation, validation and signing
    services
  • Protect – Geo-fencing, data encryption, app delete and device
    level management
  • Extend – Dynamic policy, remote control, silent install,
    private app network and single sign-on
  • Personalize – Role-based apps, custom branding, targeted
    content and recommendations
  • Analyze – Adoption and usage of apps, compliance reports, app
    inventory and performance
  • Engage – Sharing and liking apps, app rating, crowdsourcing and
    gamification features

“Because the EASE platform is modular, IT managers can easily apply the exact capabilities they require for their mobile environment. This approach surpasses the current capabilities of mobile device management, which are out of date and cannot effectively support today’s world of employee owned devices, and the maturing application lifecycle,” said Carlos Montero-Luque, Apperian’s Senior Vice President, Engineering. “EASE brings together all the components and services required to support the full mobile application lifecycle, all managed through the EASE Admin Portal. The simplicity and elegance of this architecture significantly improves the development, adoption and security of enterprise mobile apps and devices.”

Apperian, Inc. is a mobile application management company. The Apperian EASE platform delivers enterprise mobility services that enable many of the world’s largest corporations to securely deploy and manage mobile apps for iOS, Android and Blackberry. Apperian is empowering the liberated enterprise to support the BYOD revolution.