A Students' Perspective of Native and Cross Platform Approaches for Mobile Application Development
One of the software industries with the most significant growth nowadays is the mobile application industry. In this paper, we study the differences between two mobile development approaches: (i) native (the development that's specific for each platform) and (ii) cross platform (when a standard code is shared among different platforms) Inexperienced teams, students, and all newcomers in mobile development might find difficulties in choosing among approaches and frameworks. Our goal is to provide a comparison of these approaches from 3 different surveys with 166 participants, from students to experts perspectives, and study the factors that might influence the choice between them. We focus not only on quantitative aspects but also on qualitative and practical considerations that may also affect this decision (e.g. project requirements, final product category, and platform support) The results can aid students and inexperienced teams to obtain a more unobstructed view of the most recommended mobile development approach in a specific context and guide them to systematize their choice. Through our research, we observed that even when the quantitative aspects point towards a hybrid approach, it may not be the best decision due to other qualitative and practical factors. We found two nontechnical characteristics that may impact the selection of the best approach: previous team experiences with the chosen technology; and how well established and consolidated the technology is. With that in mind, we propose a mapping between project requirements and the benefits/drawbacks of each approach.
ICCSA