Chapter Preview
TopBackground
The arrival of app stores has come through the arrival of mobile devices for consumers. Mobile devices are out numbering PC’S and laptops around the world. Apps are simply becoming more beneficial for businesses to reach their consumers. Now a days when a car breaks down and a person does not have breakdown insurance, they simply reach for their mobile, type “car breakdown” or “garage” and the nearby listed breakdown services will appear. Those who advertise on Google are more likely to get that new temporary customer.
In general, mobile industries have two main services which are voice and messaging. However with both of these services are seeing revenues falling. This has been expected in the mobile industry and is a reason behind the quest for the killer app. Ringtones becoming popular between 2004 and 2006 showed the mobile industry an insight into what content a customer might demand on mobiles devices. But this demand became a fad, and the popularity of ringtones began to decline. Many mobile service providers are still trying to emulate the success of the ringtone downloads.
Key Terms in this Chapter
HTML5: A language for structuring and presenting content for the World Wide Web, and is a core technology of the Internet originally proposed by Opera Software.
Web Service: A Web Service is a software component that is described via WSDL and is capable of being accessed via standard network protocols such as but not limited to SOAP over HTTP. It has an interface described in a machine-processable format (specifically WSDL).
Gowalla: Gowalla is a LBSN which only allows users to share location information with a pre-determined subset of people.
Markup Language: A markup language is a modern system for annotating a text in a way that is syntactically distinguishable from that text.
Mobile App: short for mobile application or just app, is application software designed to run on smartphones, tablet computers and other mobile devices.
Foursquare: Foursquare describes itself as a mobile application that makes cities easier to use and more interesting to explore. It is a friend-finder, a social city guide and a game that challenges users to experience new things, and rewards them for doing so.
Social Network: A social network is a social structure made up of individuals (or organizations) called “nodes,” which are tied (connected) by one or more specific types of interdependency, such as friendship, kinship, common interest, financial exchange, dislike, sexual relationships, or relationships of beliefs, knowledge or prestige.
Protocol: An agreed-upon set of rules that facilitates the exchange information between two computers or devices. A protocol includes formatting rules that specify how data is packaged into messages. It also may include conventions like message acknowledgement or data compression to support reliable and/or high-performance network communication.
Location-Based Service (LBS): A Location-Based Service (LBS) is an information or entertainment service, accessible with mobile devices through the mobile network and utilizing the ability to make use of the geographical position of the mobile device.