Programming iOS apps with PhoneGap and/or QuickConnect

Question

A friend of mine told me that some frameworks (PhoneGap and/or QuickConnect) can transform my HTML/JS/CSS code to an iOS App.

Personally, I hate this kind of frameworks because when you get a bug, it's very hard to debug. But, on the other hand, as i'm starting learning iOS programming, I find Objective-C hard to learn.

Did anyone tried these tools? What are their limits? What about performances?

Thank you,

Regards.

Answer 1

These frameworks are handy if you are coming from web development world. Since they allow you to develop using HTML/CSS/Js you'll be able to get going quite rapidly.

Even though they offer more interaction with the native capabilities of the device (contacts, camera, accelerometer, etc.) than pure web development (using Sencha Touch or jQuery Mobile for example) they are still more limited than a native application.

Webkit

Most of these solution are focused on devices using a WebKit based browser for the rendering. Which is used by many of the main mobile OS :

Symbian, iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Bada, etc.

Main exception being Windows Phone which uses Internet Explorer

Cross-platform

Their goal is to enable cross-platform development ever by wrapping your web development into a native app (PhoneGap, Titanium) or by "translating" to the appropriate language for the targeted device (RhoMobile Rhodes, MoSync).

iPhone specific

Aiming several platforms implies that some phone specific features might not be so easily supported. And the UI won't look as native since it's targeting different OS. So if you are only aiming iOS4 you could maybe try some of the more specific solutions such as:

• iWebKit
• Ansca Corona

Performances

For standard apps you should'nt notice much difference. But if you are planning to develop games some of these frameworks are probably not the best solution. Corona claims to be appropriate...

Caution

If you plan to develop a commercial application beware of Apple's policy.

Applications must be originally written in Objective-C, C, C++, or JavaScript as executed by the iPhone OS WebKit engine

Many applications using these tools/frameworks are still accepted but there is nothing official.

Edit: As stated by Rydell the policy has changed since September 9.