Icenium, the cloud based mobile app development platform has been updated with a new Visual Studio extension, which enables .NET developers to fully leverage the Icenium mobile development tools directly from the IDE to quickly develop cross-platform apps for iOS and Android.
The extension also provides access to iOS and Android device simulators from within Visual Studio and cloud-based Apache Cordova builds for iOS and Android. Moreover, developers will be able to create new cross-platform Icenium mobile projects with jQuery Mobile and Telerik Kendo UI including the ability to manage and configure mobile app settings and custom cordova plugins.
With the help of the extension, developers will be able to make use of Team Foundation Server (TFS) and Subversion (SVN) source control providers and integrate Icenium into their existing development workflows.
InfoQ had a brief discussion with Brandon Satrom, Program Management Lead, Cross-Platform Tools and Services, Telerik to know more about Visual Studio extension for Icenium.
InfoQ: What is the real benefit of integrating Icenium with Visual Studio?
Integrating Icenium with Visual Studio allows developers to build hybrid mobile apps using Visual Studio as their IDE, while still leveraging the great cloud-based services that make Icenium indispensable for building Hybrid mobile apps (Simulators, Debugging, Cloud build and packaging services etc).
InfoQ: Can you share with us the advantage of integrating Icenium with Team Foundation Server?
By supporting additional source control systems like Subversion and Team Foundation Server, Icenium enables developers to leverage our tools within their existing infrastructure. Now, if an organization prefers or mandates TFS or Subversion, Icenium will fit right in without needing an exception.
InfoQ: Can you elaborate on the advantages of using Cordova 3.0 with Icenium?
By supporting the latest version of Cordova, Icenium continues it's support for the best in Hybrid Mobile development. Our support means that developers can depend on the latest and greatest that this popular Open Source project has to offer, including a streamlined API and redesigned Plugin support. The latter feature also benefits Icenium customers because it makes the process of including custom Cordova plugins in Icenium apps a snap.
InfoQ: Do you have any estimate of approximate number of developers who build iOS and Android apps using Visual Studio?
We don't no, but we do know that Visual Studio support has been the #1 requested feature from Icenium customers almost from day one, so there's no doubt that Visual Studio developers are building for mobile in large numbers.