A High-Level Overview of the Diff erences in Android and iOS App Development

APPLES TO ANDROIDS

Siena Aguayo, Mobile Software EngineerIndiegogo Girl Geek DinnerAugust 20th, 2014

People looking to get into mobile developmentPeople curious about the mobile dev landscape

SCOPE

MAJOR HIGH-LEVEL DIFFERENCES

iOS Android

Developed By Apple Google

Primary Language Objective-C Java

Open Source? No Yes

Developer Cost $99/year $25 once

Package Management

CocoaPods Maven Central

IDEs Xcode, App Code Eclipse, Android Studio

US Market Share* 32.5% 61.9%

Global Market Share**

18% 78%

** http://bgr.com/2014/07/01/android-market-share-2014/** http://www.businessinsider.com/iphone-v-android-market-share-2014-5

iOS Views managed by

ViewControllers Each app manages its

own stack of ViewControllers through a NavigationController

Diffi cult to open your app to specific ViewController from outside app

APP FLOW

Android Views managed by

Activities Activities are launched

by intents—either from the same app or from other apps

Easy to launch a specific activity from any outside app

iOSStoryboards (generated XML) and XIB files

Allows for WYSIWYGAutoLayout allows for responsiveness, but difficult to use

AndroidHuman-readable XML files

“Design” mode for XML layouts not very powerful

Responsive by default

LAYOUT

Experienced developer? Either

Not much development experience? Android or iOS with Swift

Great mobile developers are hard to find. We’re hiring!

siena@indiegogo.com@dotheastro

WHICH TO LEARN FIRST?