Moving Forward with Mobile Development

After a year of publishing DevProConnections, we've sifted through feedback, talked to some of the smartest developers we know, and paid some respectful attention to the juggernaut that's changing everything from the content we create to the way we present it—mobile application development and delivery. As business users and consumers increasingly expect to get content, services, and applications on the go, mobile application development and delivery is exploding. Juniper Research recently predicted that the mobile application market would be worth about $25 billion by 2014. With stakes that high, the market currently resembles the Wild West. Major market shifts seem to come every quarter, and anyone involved with app development anxiously awaits the results of the most recent mobile device shoot-out. Most recently, of course, Microsoft entered the fray with what many consider the company's first serious effort to compete with the iPhone and Droid: Windows Phone 7. Although more than half of the 6 billion mobile applications predicted to be downloaded in 2010 will be for the iPhone, the story will almost certainly be different in 2011.

So, how are your mobile development skills? Does extending your experience across various platforms sound like a good insurance policy for a lucrative career? In 2011, we'll help you sort through the market madness and develop skills that can port from platform to platform. Although we've featured several mobile development articles in the magazine in 2010, we'll pick up the pace in 2011. We'll supplement the magazine offerings with content from our other publishing properties that tie into the mobile app world, bringing you a uniquely holistic view of the players and forces shaping this market. We're joining forces with our fellow Penton Media publication, Connected Planet, to broaden our coverage of the network service providers' market. These vendors (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile) are building the mobile data networks that deliver the apps, and they're intent on enticing developers to build apps that leverage their services. These network providers are also getting into the cloud computing game by delivering hosted services. Although we've delivered cloud computing technology information in the past few years through Windows IT Pro, we're expanding that coverage in 2011 with additional content that provides strategy insights to help you navigate these converging markets. The crown jewel of our new publishing initiative will be our co-located Mobile Connections and Cloud Connections conferences set for April 18-21, 2011, at Bellagio in Las Vegas. (For more information, visit www.mobileconnectionsevent.com). The conference will provide cross-platform development boot camps, platform-specific development tips, and panel discussions with market luminaries.

Gurus Continue to Guide in 2011
Although we'll be sure to keep you up to speed on mobile development topics in 2011, we won't abandon the bread-and-butter information on which the magazine was founded, including expert technical advice about ASP.NET, Visual Studio, and Silverlight development. We'll also continue to feature some of the industry's leading experts in the magazine. Richard Campbell, our new technical director, will kick off the January 2011 issue with a column that introduces the monthly theme and offers observations from his seasoned view of the developer world. Many of you know that Campbell is one of the driving forces behind the wildly popular .NET Rocks! and RunAs Radio audio shows, and he is a frequent contributing speaker at our DevConnections conferences. In addition, we've brought our longtime senior technical director, Michael Otey, into a front-and-center position with DevProConnections, advising us on the magazine content and sharing his technical wisdom gained from years of database application development. Otey is the author of the SQL Server Developer's Guide series and Microsoft SQL Server 2008 New Features, published by Osborne McGraw-Hill. We'll work closely with Campbell, Otey, and our other longtime expert authors—such as Tim Huckaby, Michele Leroux Bustamante, Dino Esposito, and Kathleen Dollard—to bring you useful advice for developing apps.

We want your feedback about the magazine, the website, and the Connections conference. Look for our all-new, web-based editorial surveys coming soon, and in the meantime feel free to email your comments to DevProConnections content manager Anne Grubb at [email protected].


Michele Crockett ([email protected]) is editorial strategy director of Penton Media's IT and developer publications, including DevProConnections, Windows IT Pro, SharePoint Pro Connections, SQL Server Magazine, and Connected Planet.