Friday, May 27, 2011

Want to Build Your Own Sync Platform? We did! And Here's What Happened...

Back in 2008, we wrote a super cool mobile app that helps young hemophilia patients track bleed-events that get shared with their doctors and nurses. Back then, the most popular smart phones ran Windows Mobile, so it was written for that platform. The foundation of the solution was our PointSync Pro Mobile Platform.

Fast forward to 2010...MobileDataForce was asked to make an iPhone version of the application because many of the patients had started carrying iPhone's as their device of choice. This presented an issue, because at that time PointSync did not support synchronization and management tasks for anything but Windows Mobile devices.

To solve this, MDF engineers decided to build a sync tool from scratch, using Web Services to synchronize patient events from the iPhone to the database in the cloud. They started out by building the solution with very basic requirements, which consisted of only data synchronization. At completion of this first phase, they were 400 hours and $25,000 into it.


As patients began using it, it became evident that some critical pieces of the solution were missing. For example, when a sync issue came up, there were no auditing or troubleshooting tools to help support staff diagnose and resolve the problem. MDF engineers went back to the drawing board and added basic troubleshooting to the solution, causing the overall cost to rise far beyond the original expectations. In the end, only 10% of the functionality found in PointSync was incorporated into this custom sync solution.

With over 500,000 lines of code and a strong history since 2005, PointSync Pro 2.5 (and higher) now supports iPhone devices. In fact, we now support iPhone, Android AND BlackBerry devices.  If you're considering building your own sync technology for your mobile enterprise solution, carefully consider everything it should do.  Your list should include:
  • Data synchronization and application/file deployment
  • Cross-platform support for iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and Windows Mobile
  • Support for end-to-end data encryption
  • Allow mobile workers to work in a disconnected mode when connectivity is unavailable
  • Logging and auditing to help diagnose and resolve technical issues
  • Robust integration to databases (SQL Server, MySQL, DB2, SQL Anywhere) and third party systems
  • An administrative interface to manage the entire system
At the end of the day, our experience has proven that there's no reason to re-invent this wheel.  PointSync is ready to bolt into your environment right now to provide these necessary functions.  If you need assistance building your mobile application as well, we can help with that too.

For more information on PointSync, please contact our sales team at (208) 384-1200 or visit the MobileDataForce website at www.mobiledataforce.com or the PointSync website at www.pointsync.com.

Tuesday, May 24, 2011

Mobility in Light of Tragedy...

Wow, can mother nature deliver a blow or what?   Looking at the destruction caused by the F4-F5 twister that roared through Joplin, MS shows the stark reality that in just minutes, a reset button can set back decades of development.

More devastating is the loss of human life, personal injury, loss of property and the despair many feel in seeing what they've built and labored over become a scattered pile of rubble.  Our thoughts go out to those that are suffering the great loss caused by this vicious tornado.

We don't want to exploit tragedy as a way to drum up business, however scenarios like this inspire thoughts on using mobile technology in remote or damaged areas.

Take a look at the picture on the left.  Notice anything left standing over about 10 feet tall?  Those 190mph winds took down everything in their path, including access to basic services such as electricity and cellular services.

In situations like this, mobile solutions can really shine for people generating insurance claims and gathering other types of information.  The lightweight form factor, long battery life, photo capture and signature collection enables claims adjusters and inspectors to gather data for an entire day without needing to connect to a power source.  More important, properly engineered, mission critical mobile solutions will allow the operator to continue to collect data in places of devastation where an Internet connection may no longer be available.

We preach about the expectations of 100% connectivity and how building mobile solutions that require an Internet connection generally leads to frustrated users, loss of productivity and unacceptable contingency plans.  To know more about how mobile solutions can work in areas of natural catastrophe or limited connectivity, we have years of experience building mobile solutions for such environments. 

Thursday, May 19, 2011

Picking the Right Mobile Business App Developer

Right now, there are 350,000 applications available on the Apple App Store.  The Android Market Place has around 250,000 apps available.  There are tons of mobile apps out there.  Some are pretty good and some are pretty much junk.  Making a solid mobile app takes experience and good understanding of the hardware. Even well known software companies like Skype are learning to make mobile apps that work as advertised and don't have nasty side-effects like dead batteries by 3pm in the afternoon.

So how do you select the right company to develop a mobile app for your business?  If it's for business, the app must first meet the needs of the users, know how to manage the capabilities of the hardware and be steadfast in handling and delivering data.  As you shop for a partner to build your mobile solution, consider these 5 factors into your decision making process:
  1. Can the mobile solution work with hundreds of users, tapping into the same database at the same time?
  2. Can the mobile solution integrate with third-party accounting software, CRM's and other systems?
  3. Does the mobile solution include a robust synchronization engine that contains built-in tools that make sure databases don't become corrupt, database conflicts get resolved and data doesn't get lost somewhere in the "cloud"?
  4. Does the mobile solution rely on having an Internet connection?  Can the app continue to collect data with a weak or absent connection?
  5. Can the mobile application fully control internal hardware (like a barcode scanner) to maximize battery life, while providing functionality when it's needed?
MobileDataForce does not focus on making games, calorie counters and apps of that nature.  We build mobile solutions and data synchronization tools for business use.  If you need to perform inspections, assign/complete work orders, track company assets, enter a sales order or integrate mobility with your existing system, the guy who just wrote a cool checkbook app is probably NOT the right choice.

Whether your business needs a custom mobile solution, or you want to bring a robust sync engine into an app you've already developed, we can help.  For 10+ years we've focused on mobile development, starting way back with the original Palm devices!   And since 2005, our PointSync product has been the backend sync engine for thousands of mobile users.

Want to know more?  Contact us by phone (208-384-1200), email (sales@mobiledataforce.com) or on our websites:  www.mobiledataforce.com or www.pointsync.com.

PointSync Professional 2.6 Ready - Adds Android Support

We are pleased to announce the release of PointSync Professional 2.6. 2.6 was created with one thing in mind, to offer our customers and partners the ability to support Android devices.  This rounds out our existing support for iOS (iPhone/iPad), BlackBerry and Windows Mobile devices.

In case you missed the 2.5 release in February 2011, there were a handful of fixes, device support (iOS and BlackBerry), and features which includes support for 64-bit Windows servers.

Want to know more about where PointSync fits into your organization or as a partner possibility? Visit our website or call us at 208.384.1200.

Tuesday, May 17, 2011

MEAP and the Mobile Enterprise...

If you've been around enterprise mobility, you might have seen the term MEAP come up from time to time.  Since our PointSync product is a "MEAP", we're pretty comfortable using the term.  But, for those who are not familiar with what a MEAP is and does, here is a 5 minute crash course.  Enjoy!

What Is A MEAP?
MEAP stands for Mobile Enterprise Application Platform.  In laymen’s terms, a MEAP is a server-oriented software that provides specific tools and functions targeted at the deployment and management of the mobile devices in an organization.  Mobile devices are generally viewed as handheld devices and smartphones, but can also include tablets and laptops.

Why Is It Important?
Mobile devices have become a necessary component in business.  Where email was once the “killer app”, today's “must have” apps extend business functions like inventories and customer details to almost anyone working outside the office.  A MEAP is responsible for making sure the sales, inventory, customer, etc data makes the one or two-way trip between the office database and mobile devices.   On a more granular level, a enterprise-class MEAP will know exactly where to place data, where it came from and how to avoid database conflicts.  If you're thinking, "yeah, that's all important stuff!"...  We completely agree!

Where Does PointSync Fit Into the MEAP Product Category?
First, PointSync is a mature product that was introduced in 2005 and includes over a half-million lines of code.  Second, its synchronization technology (the most vital for mobile solutions) is based on industry leading technology from Sybase.  PointSync’s main function is rock-solid data synchronization.  Whether you have 10, 100, or 1,000 mobile users, PointSync masters incoming and outgoing data like a super-powered traffic cop, making sure your data gets to its destination.  Along these lines, PointSync includes special features that roll back data when a sync encounters problems, makes sure devices use unique record ID’s, can restart a problem sync where it left off and allows users to work, even when an Internet connection is not available.  In addition, PointSync contains app deployment tools, database viewers, report generators and allows quick add/delete of synchronized fields.  On a device level, PointSync supports all the popular mobile platforms, including iOS (Apple), Android, Windows Mobile and BlackBerry.

Who Uses A MEAP?
The following three types of organizations can benefit from using or deploying a MEAP:
  1. Companies can use a MEAP internally to manage their own fleet of mobile workers
  2. For System Integrators, a MEAP is a positive way to provide full solutions which include mobility
  3. ISV’s who are looking to increase revenue from a new product stream
Thinking About Building Your Own Synchronization Engine?
We did this and have a great story to tell in a future blog.  If you’d like the details contact our Marketing department for a sneak preview of the details.

Got questions about MEAP's or PointSync?  Please let us know and we'll be happy to give you all the details.  After-all, we've been in the mobility space for over 10 years!

Thanks for reading...  Tim Cerami, Information Architect