1 - IONIC
IONIC is one of the most promising HTML 5 mobile application frameworks. Built using SASS, it provides many UI components to help develop rich and interactive apps. It uses the JavaScript MVVM framework,AngularJS to power apps.
Two-way data binding, interaction with backend services and APIs makes AngularJS a mobile developer’s common choice.
2- Mobile Angular UI
Two-way data binding, interaction with backend services and APIs makes AngularJS a mobile developer’s common choice.
2- Mobile Angular UI
Mobile Angular UI is an HTML 5 framework which uses bootstrap 3 and AngularJS to create interactive mobile apps.
The main features of Mobile AngularUI include:
- Bootstrap 3
- AngularJS
- Bootstrap 3 mobile components such as switches, overlays and sidebars which are missing in normal bootstrap.
- AngularJS modules such as angular-route, angular-touch and angular-animate
Responsive media queries are stripped out of bootstrap as separate files, you only need to include what you need. Mobile Angular UI doesn’t have any jQuery dependencies, all you need are some AngularJS directives to create awesome mobile user experiences.
3- Intel XDK
Intel XDK is a cross platform application tool developed by Intel. Getting started with Intel XDK is easy, all you need is to download their application which is free and available for Linux, Windows and Mac. It provides a number of templates to get started and supports a number of UI frameworks such as Twitter bootstrap, jQuery Mobile and Topcoat.
Intel XDK provides a live preview on the connected device whilst you are developing along side many other useful tools.
On a personal note, I think development using Intel XDK was the easiest. It uses a drag and drop approach, although it does create a lot of unnecessary code.
4- Appcelerator Titanium
Appcelerator’s Titanium is an open source mobile application framework that provides an environment to create native apps for several mobile platforms
Titanium is a complete solution for creating hybrid mobile apps with all you need in one place. To get started with Titanium download Titanium studio. The Titanium SDK is equipped with a number of mobile platform APIs and Cloud service to use as an app backend. It comes with platform independent APIs which makes it easier to access phone hardware.
Titanium uses Alloy, a MVC framework to enable rapid development of mobile apps. Modules created using Alloy are easy to reuse across different apps, hence significantly reducing the development time and the lines of code.
5- Sencha Touch
Sencha Touch is an HTML 5 mobile app framework for creating apps for several platforms including iOS, Android and Blackberry. It has been in existence for some years now and is popular among hybrid mobile application developers.
Sencha Touch scores highly against it’s competitors by providing a native look and feel across all of the platforms it supports.
Getting started with Sencha Touch isn’t that difficult but in order to get the best out of Sencha Touch, one needs to invest a considerable amount of time.
6- Kendo UI
Telerik’s Kendo UI is an HTML 5 framework for creating cross platform mobile applications. Kendo UI relies heavily on jQuery and has a number of jQuery based widgets.
Learning Kendo UI is not difficult, developers familiar with jQuery will find Kendo UI easy to learn. Kendo UI has open sourced most of Kendo UI’s toolset and JavaScript framework features. However most of the commonly used widgets are still under a commercial license.
7- Phonegap
PhoneGap is the odd one out in this list as it’s not a framework for creating an app, but for packaging and releasing an app. PhoneGap is based on the open source Cordova and is the commercial version owned by Adobe. With a dedicated support team, PhoneGap is popular amongst many mobile developers.
You can use any choice of JavaScript or UI frameworks to get started with PhoneGap. jQuery Mobilealongside KnockOut.js or AngularJS is a nice combination. Once you are done with your code, PhoneGap takes it from there and wraps it based on the intended platform. Applications built using PhoneGap use a web view to render their content. PhoneGap has a minimal set of web APIs to access phone hardware features and it’s possible to write custom plugins to suit requirements.
8- Onsen UI
Onsen UI is relatively new but giving a tough competition to Ionic. It is open source and available under Apache license. Onsen UI also utilizes Angular directives and Topcoat framework for most of its UI components.
For jQuery fans, it comes packed with jQuery based components. One can choose not to use Angular in favor of jquery to build hybrid apps. Onsen UI features a large collection of ready to use components, responsive out of the box that allows you to build mobile, tablet as well as desktop versions of your apps, Allows you to write apps in HTML5 and JavaScript and push through Phonegap & Cordova to go native.
It has ease of use, flexibility, semantic markup and performance that Onsen UI brings on table. Onsen UI like Ionic is open source and free to use, read more about Onsen UI at - onsen.io.
9- Framework 7
Framework 7 leads the race among hybrid app frameworks in iOS mobile apps development space. It is not an apple to apple comparison between Framework 7 and other frameworks like Ionic and Onsen UI since Framework 7 doesn't provide support for building cross platform hybrid apps. But it definitely is the finest and most feature rich framework for iOS hybrid apps development.
The main advantage of Framework 7 is that it empowers developers to build iOS apps with just CSS, JavaScript and HTML, the technology that web developers already know. Framework 7 is so close to native iOS apps that it even provides features like swipe back, out of the box. There are many other ready to use UI elements including list views, media lists, side panels, modals etc., that can be used as is without the need to get into JavaScript.
Framework 7 is completely free and open source under MIT license. You can read more about Framework 7 at its official website -Framework7.
10- Famo.us
Famo.us is another powerhouse html5 apps development framework and targets to provide near native experience in hybrid apps. The main difference between famo.us and other hybrid html5 frameworks is that it focuses more on graphics rendering, 2d and 3d and hence is more suitable for games development.
BENEFITS
- Developer can use existing web skills
- One code base for multiple platforms
- Reduced development time and cost
- Easily design for various form factors (including tablets) using responsive web design
- Access to some device and operating system features
- Advanced offline capabilities
- Increased visibility because the app can be distributed natively (via app stores) and to mobile browsers (via search engines)
DRAWBACKS
- Performance issues for certain types of apps (ones relying on complex native functionality or heavy transitions, such as 3D games)
- Increased time and effort required to mimic a native UI and feel
- Not all device and operating system features supported
- Risk of being rejected by Apple if app does not feel native enough (for example, a simple website)
How to Choose Hybrid Apps Framework for your App
ReplyDeleteThe Next-Generation of Apps for the Mobile Technologies is the Hybrid Apps. Why you have to use the Hybrid Apps for the Business nor going to use Native Apps Development? Some of the Technologies, Frameworks and library benefits to do fast development and get the lead for your Business with low budget Apps.