Enterprise Distribution of Blackberry application

Question

Is there any enterprise distribution program for blackberry applications?

Is there any method similar to Apple's enterprise distribution of iphone applications?

While going through their documentation, they are talking about using a deployment server and distributing apps with it.

Note: for early OS versions of blackberry - OS 7 or previous versions are my target

Answer 1

As Peter said in his answer, you can use BES to distribute applications in an Enterprise environment.

In iOS, the Enterprise program is basically the only Apple-approved way to deploy software, other than via the iTunes App Store (ignoring how you deploy to your test team).

BlackBerry Java (e.g. OS 5,6,7) devices don't have the same restriction on apps that Apple has implemented. Normal jailed iPhones cannot install software from any arbitrary web server, but BlackBerry devices can.

So, another option is just to post your app (.jad and .cod files) to a (corporate) webserver, and let users download the apps themselves. This is called Over-The-Air (OTA) deployment.

I'm not endorsing this over BES deployment, just adding to your options.

Answer 2

Sorry, don't know anything about iPhone Enterprise distribution.

For BlackBerry, there are two 'variations' depending on whether you are talking BB10+ or BB7- phones. However in principle they are the similar, the BlackBerry Administrator makes an application available to the corporate BlackBerry devices associated with the corporate BES, and these can be pushed to the phone, or can be made available to the phone (for BB10).

A possible restriction here is that the application will only made available to BlackBerry devices associated with that specific BES.

There is more available from the link you have already found.

I think to give a more specific answer we need to understand what you are trying to achieve, and if this is targeted to BB10+ or BB7- devices.

Edit:

Since you have indicated that you are targeting BB7 and earlier, then I would recommend one of these approaches:

a) If you wish to force users to have your software, then the best approach is create a software profile on the BES

b) If the software is optional, then place it on a corporately accessible web server and OTA download as described by Nate. This is significantly easier to maintain than the BES distribution.