The status of HTML5 for mobile devices

Posted in: Android, Blog, iPhone by openhanced on January 29, 2010

After doing some work on cross platform web app deployment (Hybrid Mobile) the conclusion is that it isn’t easy to do but doable with a few workarounds. As anyone knows Google has pushed Google Gears for a while and did not support HTML5 in the Android 1.5 and 1.6 (not 100% sure of this last one). Apple with the iPod, iPhone and iPad however does support HTML5 for the features that mobile developers need.

As a web app. developer that brings in a few difficulties. Probably you would prefer local storage of private information (possible in HTML5) and that works for Android 2.x, and all Apple devices. However, this rules out the G1 and Hero (HTC refuses to release the update till now). In practice this means you have to either use Google Gears (lof of problems till now) or stick to the cookie solution or live SQL storage (slower). A cookie solution is ok but has some security issues if not programmed in a decent way.

That basically means your web apps. have to support two methods till every Android device is upgraded to version 2.x. Luckily Google is now giving heavy support to HTML5.

Till that moment Openhanced and other developers have to stick to both above described solutions