Build Cross-Platform Mobilized Applications

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January 14, 2009 11:00 PM PST


Abstract

Introducing the Mobile Reference Model series of tutorials, articles, and source code providing developers with everything they need to create cross-platform, mobilized software solutions.

Introduction

Individual workers' computing environments increasingly involve a variety of devices, some of which are desk-bound and some of which are mobile. Those devices have a wide range of capabilities in terms of processor power and memory, and they may be connected to a network constantly or only sporadically. Business applications that allow people to work effectively from any of these devices bring a competitive advantage to the ISVs that develop them.

This series of articles, tutorials, and source code uses a reference application called Mobile Reference Model 1.0 to support the business needs of a hypothetical real estate agent as she works in a single, unified data space from her desktop PC, her laptop and her PDA, both online and off. Along the way, she exchanges data from all those platforms with her back-end corporate database, remote Web services and other data sources.

Developers are encouraged to take advantage of this entire series, including the application source code, which is freely reusable. This tour explains the 1.0 version of the Mobile Reference Application. Additional functionality has been added to Version 1.5.

Articles

 

Tutorials
  • Mobile Reference Application: Digital Media Processing and Scene Recognition
  • Mobile Reference Application: Configuring Wireless Security
  • Mobile Reference Application: Building an Occasionally Connected Application
  • Mobile Reference Application: Porting Mobilized Software to the .NET*
  • Mobile Reference Application: Location Aware Programming with GPS Integration
  • Mobile Reference Application: The Managed Environment of .NET*

 

Source Code

A complete version of the Mobile Reference Application 1.0 source code used in this series is available for download. The article Tour of the Mobile Reference Application gives an overview of the application's architecture, as well as the requirements for setting up your system to run it properly. Users are strongly encouraged to read this article before downloading the source code.

Once your environment is prepared, you can download the Mobile Reference Application 1.0 Source Code and extract the contents. In the root folder for the application, you will find MRASetup.exe. Execute this program to install the client and server Mobile Reference Model databases and set up the Mobile Reference Model Web service.

Once the setup has completed, you can open the solution file for Mobile Reference Application (MobileReferenceApplication.sln) in Visual Studio .NET*.