The HTML5 standard turned out to be not so standard when it comes to cross-platform implementations - from handling touch events, to CSS transitions, to WebSockets, to performance. This presentation will share some of the lessons we learned the hard way developing the TitanFile mobile app using HTML5/JavaScript/CSS3.

1. Building a Real-Time HTML5 App
for Mobile Devices
Tony Abou-Assaleh
Co-founder & CTO, TitanFile
taa@titanfile.com
Twitter: @tony_aa
Mobile P2P – November 14, 2012

2. About me …
• PhD in … natural language processing
– Not mobile
• Ex-Googler .. in ads
– Not mobile
• Hardcore backend programmer
• Past year - TitanFile: RT SPA
– HTML5/JS/CSS/Async/Django/…

3. Agenda
• Why HTML5?
• Challenges
• Design Tips
• “Real-time” Tips
• Mobile HTML5 Myths

4. Why HTML5?

5. Why HTML5?
• Cross-platform
• W3C standard
• Open source
• Lots of libraries
• Transferable skills
• Cordova = native
• It’s easy! Just HTML + JS + CSS + Backend

6. Or so we thought …

7. Why not HTML5?
• Not cross-platform
• Standard-in-progress
• Open Source – yeah right!
• Lots of libraries that don’t work
• Cordova Native
• It’s NOT just HTML + JS + CSS + Backend

8. So why HTML5?

9. So why HTML5?
• Gets you to give a talk at mobile P2P
• Still easier than native
• Transferable skills

10. Challenges

13. Website Web App
• Single Page App
• Background Data Sync
• Asynchronous Processing
• Responsiveness
• Design

14. Web App Mobile App
• Usage Patterns
• Touch Events
• Drag-and-drop
• Scrolling
• Pixel Ratio

15. Web iPad Android PlayBook BB10

16. Design Tips

17. Design Tips
• Start with design, not prototype
• Images, not button
• Avoid text links
• No modal dialogues
• Use CSS media queries
• Provide hi-res images as needed

18. “Real-Time” Tips

19. “Real-Time” Tips - Tools
• Use Font-end Framework
– Backbone/Marionette/Relational
• Use Back-end Framework
– Django/Tornado/Celery
• Use WebSocket Wrapper
– Socket.io or SockJS
• Use a CSS Framework
– Bootstrap
• Write your own!

20. “Real-Time” Tips - Data
• Server push-events
• Asynchronous Processing
• Incremental Loading

21. “Real-Time” Tips – Front-end
• Only render visible DOM
• No anchor tags
• No HTML5 drag-and-drop
• Use native scrolling

22. Mobile HTML5 Myths

24. Myth 1: HTML5 is Cross-Platform

25. Myth 2: HTML5 is Slow
• Not if …
– Load data incrementally
– Only render what’s visible
– User global event listeners
– User WebKit CSS transforms
• Hardware Acceleration

26. Myth 3: Not as effective as Native

27. Summary
• Developing HTML5 mobile apps is …
– Easier than native
– Cheaper than native
– Tricky
– Fun!