[TBacker]

I came across this blog entry on the WebIS (Pocket Informant) web site. It is the developer talking about what it is like to develop for iPhone v.s. Windows Mobile v.s. BlackBerry.

It get's techie, and it is opinion, but the gist is that BlackBerry is last in the ease-of-development comparison. This may be a big reason why apps are slow to come to BB, and a lot of what is there is very basic or buggy.

Read more here.

[nalpakj]

I've never written an app for the iPhone so I can't comment on what it takes to build an app for it. But I've written a couple for Windows Mobile and just recently wrote my first for the Blackberry. I found it to be overall fairly simple to develop the app assuming you have development experience. You have to learn your way around the toolset but that's the case with any development environment. Because it's Java it's fairly common lots of people could jump into it quite easily.

One area I did not touch on in my BB app was graphics. It's not graphics intensive at all so that might be an area that is more difficult but I suspect not.

[nalpakj]

I just actually read the article. Forst off, it's obvious the guy personally prefers iPhone development. But that aside, I felt he actually made pretty good argumetns for all 3 environments and specifically stated at the end that none of them is necessarily better than the others. Each had their advantages and disadvantages.

[AJErvin12]

There are two apps I've been waiting patiently to see released for BlackBerry. The Sirius app and USAA's Deposit @ Mobile Banking app which has been released on the iPhone for months. Today USAA released the following message on their twitter account:

usaa_news Android phone users: We know you're anxious for the USAA App. Today is the day! As soon as it's available, we'll post on Twitter first.

I then replied to them and the following conversation ensued:

@usaa_news What about the BlackBerry app?

usaa_news We're trying but not for a while. BB is very difficult to work with. They're not set up for Apps and difficult to program for.

@usaa_news Very disappointing to hear concerning the delay on a BlackBerry app! You guys seem to keep putting us on the back burner.

usaa_news Trust me, if we could have a BB app ready we would have had it out there already. It's not a USAA problem. It's a BB problem.

From the tone of the last comment it will be a long time before I see my USAA app. Are they right, or blowing smoke? What do you developers think because I have no clue if they're spinning this or telling the truth.