Phonegap vs native for ease of developing? [closed]

Question

I know it has been asked many times before but I am still confused. I need to develop an application that works mainly with data, something similar to facebook for example. I want to target both Android and ios. I do know some Html/css/javascript though I am not an expert. I find it very difficult to work with Javascript, difficult to debug etc. Will it be easier to work with Java/ Objective C? From my experience .Net is 100 times easier then Javascript. Is it the same with Java/Objective C?

Also I am looking for the long run on how to work in the next projects(which will also be information based), so I am willing to sacrifice time and learn platforms. What will be the learning curve for on against the other, and once you know the platforms, what will be easier?

Another question: do you think there will be a demand for phonegap developers in the future? since I don't think that now it is in demand/use, as the expectations were from this platform.

Answer 1

I'll try to answer some of your questions:

• If your app is data-intensive (facebook example, a lot of multi threads to load a lot of data) you should use native language for your app because it will be a lot less slow. I develop both in iOS and Android, the learning curve really depends your own experience.

• If you are better at object-oriented languages and have experience
  with listeners Android will be easy as pie. But learning to develop
  in ObjectiveC requires to have some experience with pointers and
  structure/funcion-oriented languages (C,C#,C++). I find Android to be easier for beginners tho ;)

• Phonegap at the moment is a very good choice for small, light apps, and it's community is growing bigger and bigger (you got Cordova also, works just like Phonegap) and if you have experience with web development and design it will be a LOT easier to develop your first app.

There is a big BUT in using Phonegap/Cordova: the UI is slow at the moment, by that I mean that when you click a button or icon it is somewhat slow to react compared with native...if your app is client-oriented I wouldn't use Phonegap. This "slow" effect worsens with data-heavy apps so take care what you decide.

Hope that I've helped you out, feel free to ask anything ;)

Answer 2

1. Will it be easier? Not so much when you get the hang of it. I have made a web app using PhoneGap and I still liked writing it in the native enviroment (PhoneGap did not produce the results which I have hoped for).

2. If you really have time and you're willing to learn then you should go native. That way you will learn more languages which will benefit you more in the long run. Java is going to be easier if you're used to OOP. But don't be scared of anything. Go for it!

3. In the future? Well JavaScript, HTML5+CSS3 is already popular and might grow even more.

4. Use PhoneGap for small and light apps and not for "Facebook" type apps:)

Thats just my humble opinion.