J2ME makes mobile projects difficult, so use FlashLite :)

I wrote some times ago about J2ME development versus FlashLite development and I listed some topics on why Flash Lite could be better than Java.

During last Mobile Monday in London the main topic was  mobile JAVA device fragmentation and what emerged was how much is difficult to develop for ‘all’ mobile JAVA devices.

These are some notes took from the event by MobileDevelopment :

J2ME fragmentation makes mobile projects difficult 

Don’t discount WAP (or even SMS solutions) as these are easier, more flexible to change with time and are already set up for use on peoples’ phones

J2ME fragmentation isn’t likely to be reduced in the short term as measures currently being put in place will take several years to come to fruition

J2ME development implies doing lots of testing on target devices

Mobile development is always harder than first anticipated

So again this is the demostration that FlashLite is the right choise for some type of mobile applications rather than Java (J2ME).

Comments

[magomarcelo]

I totally agree with Antoine, it's not possible to underestimate the device fragmentation issue, it must be explicitly addressed, it's like that since wap came out... and I still can't make a lot of flash lite apps work on my sony ericsson p900 because of its input method which is so different from nokia, that is the platform on which most of these apps are developed...

[Antoine Quint]

Marco,

In my opinion, you can use the same arguments against Flash Lite. A year from now, there will potentially be three different versions of Flash Lite (1.0, 1.1 and 2.0) with very distinctive features, introducing fragmentation in the Flash Lite market. Also, following Flash Lite newsgroups and mailing-lists, it turns out that there are discrepancies in terms of memory allocation, frame rate, APIs capabilities, etc. even today with Flash Lite 1.1 given the particular devices. Additionally, compared to J2ME, the audience for Flash Lite outside of Japan is tiny.

I think the points above are just something we have to cope with today when dealing with mobile technologies, and I don't think a single technology has solved it all for now.

-- Antoine