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everything about Mobility
A Changing Landscape
What many IT administrators may have once thought impossible has happened By Nancy Gohring
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s recently as
a year ago, many enterprises couldn’t have imagined that the iPhone would now be second place in terms of security features that enterprises require, behind
only the BlackBerry and ahead of Android and Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7. But at the end of 2010, that’s how many enterprises regard the smartphone landscape. Over the next couple of
years, experts predict that BlackBerry will hold onto the most securityconscious enterprises but that the other platforms will take up a growing share of the market. The release of iOS4, the latest iPhone software that came out in June 2010, marked a dramatic shift in the enterprise smartphone market. With that update, many CIOs grudgingly admitted that the iPhone had became “good enough” to meet the most basic security requirements that most enterprises need, said Tim Weingarten, CEO of Visage Mobile. Visage Mobile’s software manages 100,000 devices from US corporations of every size. Among those devices, BlackBerrys still outnumber iPhones and Android phones 10 to one, he said. Research In Motion currently has 51.2 percent market share in the enterprise, according to recent research from comScore. Apple follows with 22.7 percent and Android comes in third with 12.1 percent market share. Microsoft trails at 8.8 percent, comScore found. In the wider market, RIM’s share of the US smartphone market dropped from 39.3 percent in July 2010 to 35.8 percent in October 2010, ComScore said.
A Buyer’s Decision The smartphone mix in an enterprise often depends on who actually buys the phones. Corporations that decide to standardize on a platform and issue phones to workers tend to go with BlackBerry, said Tony Kueh, senior director of enterprise
mobility management for Sybase. But when companies offer to subsidize the users’ data plans and let workers buy their own phones, people are choosing iPhones, he said. Updates to the iPhone since it first launched have allowed it to be an option for corporate workers. “If you’d talked to someone in IT at a typical corporation prior to the launch of iOS 4, they would have said it was nowhere good enough and they weren’t going to support it,” Weingarten said. But there was “a sea change with iOS 4,” he said. Now the iPhone offers just enough security to make it palatable to most enterprises, he said. Onboard device encryption is built into the hardware and it supports remote wipe and kill as well as passwords. The iPhone supports 20 of about 40 policies built into ActiveSync, he said.
A Trailing Android Android has improved with version 2.2 of the software, but most enterprises say it isn’t there yet. “Android is a few steps behind the iPhone in terms of security capabilities,” Kueh said. Google has just released Android 2.3, which will first become available this week on the Nexus S phone. “I did not see any feature enhancements for enterprises in 2.3,” said Ken Dulaney, an analyst at Gartner. “I suspect and hope there will be announcements for the enterprise in 3.0 because right now the Android system is about where iPhone 2 was.” Rehabcare, a company that owns and operates hospitals, is one orga-
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n focal point | Mobility nization holding off on Android. “We’re still not satisfied with the security capabilities,” said Dick Escue, CIO for Rehabcare. He mainly deploys iPhone. Android 2.2 is the first version of the operating system to support meaningful enterprise security features, but it doesn’t support as many as iOS does, Weingarten said. Currently about 43 percent of Android phones are running version 2.2. IT administrators can enforce password policies and remotely wipe Android 2.2 phones. But other important
operating system on the market at any given time. “We are concerned about the fact that there are, and may always be, many different implementations of Android, which makes our ability to support them difficult,” he said. Experts have differing opinions on whether to expect Google to improve features that might appeal to enterprises. The release of Google Apps Device Policy, which allows for management of many phones including Android, indicates that Google is interested in and serious about serving
Webcor Builders, primarily uses BlackBerry devices but has begun using Good Technology to control the Android phones he supports. That allows him to securely send e-mail, contacts and other data through the secure Good servers and also remotely manage and control the phones. In addition, phone makers are adding their own features to Android, Weldon noted. For instance, Motorola’s Droid Pro includes a number of features that other Android phones don’t, including remote wipe of SD (Secure Digital)
Over the next couple of years, experts predict that BlackBerry will hold onto the most security-conscious enterprises but that the other platforms will take up a growing share of the market. Players like Android and Windows Phone 7, which are currently trailing behind, are most likely to catch up. features are missing. For instance, file system encryption isn’t available on Android, Kueh said. That means if users root their phones, they have access to the file system and can copy e-mail databases, he said. Even if there is applevel encryption, the key potentially could be found somewhere on the device, he said. “It’s pretty hackable,” he said. Android presents additional problems for enterprises with its open application store. That makes employers worry that workers might accidentally download an application that contains malware that could corrupt corporate data. In addition, Escue worries about the many different versions of the 44
enterprise customers, Weingarten said. “Android is behind but it’s going to catch up,” he predicts. Kueh didn’t sound so sure. “I would hope future versions will beef it up, there is demand for it,” he said. “The question is how committed Google is in terms of addressing the enterprise market.” Third-party vendors might help bring Android into the enterprise space in a big way. Mobile-devicemanagement software providers like Sybase helped the iPhone become more useable in the enterprise, said Kitty Weldon, an analyst with Current Analysis. She expects the same would happen in the case of Android. Gregg Davis, CIO for
cards, the ability to force users to create new passwords after a set time, and a VPN. Android 2.2 included device policy management APIs (application programming interfaces) that allow developers to write applications, which for example enforce minimum password strength, remotely set passwords, enforce regular password changes, remotely lock devices, set password complexity rules and wipe the phone after a set number of failed login attempts.
Window of Insecurity Despite Microsoft’s reputation as an enterprise vendor, Windows Phone 7 is at the bottom of the list in terms of features for corporate users — for now.
Of the 40 or so policies supported in ActiveSync, WP7 supports about 8. The phones are less secure than their predecessors running Windows Mobile 6.5. “They did rip out almost everything enterprises would have used to develop apps and you can’t manage it, other than the few things you can do through Exchange server,” Kueh said. WP7 devices are not compatible with Microsoft’s System Center Mobile Device Manager, software that lets IT workers manage Windows Mobile 6.5 phones. Microsoft had already started de-emphasizing System Center for mobile “because it got a bad reputation of being cumbersome to deploy,” Weldon said. It boosted ActiveSync capabilities slightly in response, she said. Because WP7 applications must be built using Silverlight, developers must essentially re-write apps that previously worked on Windows Mobile 6.5. In addition, the phones no longer have a lightweight version of SQL, meaning there is no database access on the device, Kueh said. Vendors and analysts expect Microsoft to add more features in future updates to the software. In addition, if Microsoft succeeds in attracting consumers to WP7, that could drive more enterprise adoption, Weldon said. “If Windows Phone 7 takes off among consumers, then you have the same thing going on with the iPhone and Android. People will bring it into the enterprise and maybe that’s the plan,” she said.
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Chrome OS vs. Android 3.0
Which Platform Will Prevail? Developers have two Google OS’ to choose from, but one platform may have an advantage in the long run. By Neil McAllister
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oogle says it
has a vision of the future of software. And since Google is without doubt one of the most important and innovative computing vendors today, independent developers would do well to pay attention. The question is, which vision should we pay attention to? The usual story casts Google and Microsoft as polar opposites -- Microsoft, the lumbering, oldworld behemoth of retail software, and Google, the young, agile champion of cloud computing. In a Google future, Web-based Google Apps would replace traditional office suites, databases, and messaging clients, while cloud storage and services would eliminate the need for onpremise data centers. To this end, Google is developing Chrome OS, an operating system for netbooks and connected devices that is essentially a browser in a box. Chrome OS supports no locally installed software, and it uses the cloud for its primary storage. Developers who want to write software for these devices will be writing Web apps, pure and simple.
But Chrome OS isn’t the only iron Google has in the fire. Android 3.0, previewed at a Google demo recently, sees the search giant’s smartphone OS blossoming into something more closely resembling a general-purpose computing platform -- including many features the Chrome OS folks told us we’d never need. In fact, if developers really want to write software “the Google way,” my money’s on Android, not Chrome OS.
Chrome: Already Old? Plenty of people have scoffed at Chrome OS before me, but there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with running applications in a browser. Web apps work well for countless enterprises today, and certainly for SaaS providers such as Salesforce.com. The idea of browser in a box is hardly objectionable, either -- provided you take a very narrow view of the future of computing. Chrome OS was conceived at a time when netbooks were the hot devices. The problem was that nobody really knew what a netbook should be. Were they just cheap, underpowered laptops, or were
they something else? With Chrome OS, Google created a platform that skirted netbooks’ limited processing capabilities by ditching the traditional desktop and making Web connectivity their most important trait. The trouble is, increasingly the future of computing doesn’t look like a netbook. Mobile browsers are already the preferred window to the Web for many users, particularly in Europe and Asia. Tablets are poised to flood the U.S. market beginning later this year. Some users are even browsing the Web using such oddball devices as TV set-top boxes or Amazon.com’s Kindle. What all these devices have in common is that trying to shoehorn a traditional Web browser into them is like hammering the proverbial square peg into a round hole. The classic browser view assumes the content will be narrow and users will scroll up and down to see more. That assumption doesn’t hold on devices that can switch the screen from landscape to portrait view at the drop of a hat and where users scroll using finger gestures. Rollovers? Hovering help tips?
Custom cursors? None of these tools are available when there’s no mouse pointer. And intermittent connectivity, coupled with mobile carriers’ tiered pricing, makes lightweight UIs a must for mobile devices, in contrast to the rich Web experiences touted by Chrome OS.
Android goes native A lot of folks don’t remember that Steve Jobs initially said the way to create apps for the iPhone would be as Web apps running in the mobile Safari browser. It didn’t take long for Apple to admit that wasn’t going to cut it and to issue a proper SDK. Today, many of the most popular apps you see in the iTunes Store are purpose-built UIs for individual websites, streamlined to take advantage of the device’s smaller screen and native UI widgets. Despite Google’s past dismissal of native apps, the Android market is following suit. Android 3.0 acknowledges this trend by offering a new UI framework aimed at improving user experience on a variety of devices, including a host of redesigned UI widgets and a new way to build modular, multipane UIs. The whole
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Android 3.0 Sneak Peek: A Screenshot Preview
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he next version of Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) will feature a new holographic look, five customizable home screens, a Windows-style taskbar and tabbed browsing. Google released a platform preview of Android 3.0 to third-party developers and a series of screenshots showing what’s new in Android 3.0 These screenshots offer a more detailed look at Google’s first Android version specifically designed with tablets and smartphones in mind. Here’s a look at what to expect in Android 3.0, Honeycomb. Ground Up: Google says Android 3.0 has been completely redesigned with a new user interface (UI) theme it calls “holographic.” Every app and system view in Android 3.0 will have a “system bar” at the bottom of the screen similar to the notification area in the Windows 7 taskbar. Google’s system bar gives quick access to things such as system notifications, OS is designed from the ground up to support larger screens and more versatile input methods, including USB keyboards. Another important trend is that chip vendors, ARM and Intel among them, have been steadily improving their mobile offerings by increasing processing speeds and bundling CPU cores with support components, such as GPUs and signal processors. To not take advantage of these components’ new features would be a wasted opportunity. Sure enough, Android 3.0 introduces accelerated 2D and 3D graphics and support for multicore pro46
system status and navigation buttons. When you watch a video the status bar will go into “lights out” mode for full screen viewing. Applications will use something called an “Action Bar” (not pictured) at the top of the screen for application-specific functions such as navigation and menu options. Customizable Home Screens: Honeycomb-powered tablets will have five customizable home screens that can be dressed up with specific widgets, app shortcuts, and wallpapers. You will have access to all installed applications on the device via the Android application launcher from every home screen. There will also be a dedicated search box on every home screen to help you find content on your device such as apps, files and contacts. iPad-style Multitasking?: When you want to see an active app in Honeycomb you touch a “recent apps” button on the system bar. This calls up all open applications and shows their current state. In other words, it shows
you what an app looked like before you switched out of it into another application. Copy-and-paste: Everybody’s favorite mobile device feature: copyand-paste is getting a redesign in Android 3.0. The new system sounds a lot like what happens on the iPad: press and hold to select a word and then adjust the selection area as needed. Google also says Android 3.0 features a new keyboard better suited to tablets. New keyboard keys include a tab button and easy access to voice controls to take advantage of Android’s text-to-speech features and search by voice. Tabbed Browsing: Taking a cue from Google Chrome, Android’s Web browser will include Chrome-style tabs instead of windows. You will also be able to sync Google Chrome bookmarks in Honeycomb. Bookmarks and history have been moved into a single, unified view, Google said. Tablet Camera: Rumor has it a rear-facing camera is coming to the next iPad, but Android will definitely get cameras with Honeycomb tablets, or at least
the software capability to have a camera. Android 3.0 has a new camera interface for tablets that includes quick access to functions such as exposure, flash, focus and switching between front- and rear-facing cameras. You will be able to view photo galleries in full screen mode on Android 3.0 tablets. Multi-pane UI: To take advantage of the increased screen space, applications can be broken into multi-pane interfaces. Such as this contacts application that shows a list of contacts, then a second pane for contact details and a third pane for editing contact information. Multiselect Drag-and-drop: Android 3.0 will also make it easier to manage lists such as messages in your inbox with a new multiselect system for functions such as drag-anddrop and copying. This would let you move multiple files around your system with just a few taps or select a number of items at once for deletion.
cessors. Google is working to add similar features to its Chrome browser, but in general Web-based apps don’t scale well to take advantage of hardware.
remained essentially unchanged since Netscape 1.1 — Android allows developers the opportunity to offer users something more, by combining HTML-based content and services with optimized native UIs. Astute readers will observe that this type of hybrid model is exactly what Microsoft has been touting with its “software plus services” mantra. While Microsoft remains wedded to thick-client applications, however, Google (and Apple) suggest a more lightweight approach, where most of the heavy lifting still happens in the cloud. Thick client or thin, I
think Android’s hybrid model will be the real future of software development, and not Chrome OS’s browser-centric model. Recently, I lamented that the HTML standard seems to have fallen under the control of the browser vendors. The most unfortunate aspect is the implicit assumption that browsers will be the primary consumers of Web content for the foreseeable future. Efforts such as Tim Berners-Lee’s semantic Web strongly suggest that this won’t always be the case; the evolution we’re seeing in the mobile software market all but proves it.
Software & services What’s important to note, though, is that for all Android’s advantages, nothing about it precludes the Chrome OS application model, either. Android ships with a browser based on the WebKit rendering engine, the same as Chrome OS. The difference is that while the Chrome OS forces every application into the old-world browser experience -- which has
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Mobility | focal point n simplify their approach to mobile applications and devices, and secure them will get the pervasive mobile movement under control, according to the Forrester report.
Enter Private Stores
Mobility will be the mantra for enterprises and SMBs alike in 2011. It will at the top of their priority list. By Shane O’Neill
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“mobile workforce” has been around for years, but in 2011, mobility will become even more of a priority for enterprises and vendors, according to a new report from research firm Forrester. Enterprise mobility is the biggest single trend across tech industry investment and innovation, even outpacing the cloud computing trend, states the Forrester report entitled, “Another Year of Outperformance for the Tech Industry — Forrester’s 2011 Tech Industry Predictions.” Enterprises and SMBs in 2011 will put mobile strategies at the top of the list by expanding the use of smartphones and investing in mobile applications that address the needs of all types of employees, from information and task workers to “mobile wannabes” who bring their personal smartphones to work. Forrester analyst and report author Chris Mines cites “the breakneck pace of consumer adoption of smartphones, tablets and applications” as a driver for enterprise IT to mobilize their own core applications such as CRM, ERP, he term
expense management, inventory management and time tracking.
Complex Benefits Indeed, an effective mobile strategy is no longer just something “nice to have” but is becoming a necessity for business growth. In an article on CIO.com about choosing the most secure mobile architecture, Sybase CTO Irfan Khan outlined the benefits of enterprise mobilizing.
In addition to helping workers get more done in less time, Khan writes that mobile devices and apps “can improve customer engagement, customer service, improve supply chain operations and partner/supplier collaboration as well as faster, more effective business decision making.” But with more mobile adoption comes more complexity on the security, networking and developer fronts. Companies that can
Yet Mobile Hurdles Remain Just getting your corporate apps inside a contained store will not resolve all enterprise mobile issues, as IT consultant Peter Gyurko points out in a recent blog post. Some bigger questions to ask about enterprise mobile apps, writes Gyurko, are: n What network are corporate apps going to run on: a private,
corporate Wi-Fi or the public cellphone network? n Are IT departments accustomed to BlackBerrys prepared for
corporate use of workers’ personal Droid phones and iPhones, which come with browser and coding complexities? n How do you slim down notoriously thick and data-intensive
enterprise apps so they can run on smartphones? “Enterprises realize the need and opportunity to extend internal applications to mobile devices, but still face many hurdles,” writes Gyurko. “Because of the small form-factor and inherent simplicity of current mobile apps, organizations must decide what enterprise features provide the most value in the hands of mobile users.”
One of the most efficient ways to simplify enterprise mobility, writes Forrester, is to build a private corporate app store in the vein of Apple’s App Store. “In 2011, we expect that 10 percent of enterprises will open private app stores, which simplify companies’ distribution of mobile-enabled corporate applications,” writes Mines in the Forrester report. Mobile app stores that cater to specific platforms like Apple’s iOS, Google’s Android, RIM’s BlackBerry and Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 have become hugely popular with smartphone users over the past few years. As consumers, users are comfortable downloading apps from an app store for everything from buying movie tickets to checking the weather to playing games like Angry Birds. The problem for IT departments, according to Forrester, is that 25 percent of workers are using such app stores to download work-related productivity apps for managing expenses and reading PDF documents. IT, in turn, has no way to monitor and secure these outside apps. “The emergence of private app stores, with a set of approved applications residing inside the corporate firewall, will let IT control and sanction approved mobile applications for employees.” — CIO.com
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