Almost every IT vendor has to have a mobile strategy these days or risk being crushed by others who do.
As a company with a foot in the hardware, software and services worlds, Hewlett-Packard Co. can offer a multifaced approach. On Wednesday it deepened the software side of things by announcing what it calls application transformation solutions.
Arguably the centre of the announcements is an overhaul of its HP Anywhere application development platform to make it easier for developers to write an app once using standards-based tools for three mobile operating platforms. To encourage developers to use HP Anywhere the company has also created an online developers Web site filled with resources.
Also announced were new enhanced services enterprises can hire HP for to help staff design mobile apps, as well as to integrate enterprise apps into hybrid clouds.
HP Anywhere now links into the Eclipse integrated development environment. Developers can use HTML5,JavaScript or Apache Cordova, and there is also support for Sencha Touch, Enyo and jQuery Mobile. The resulting apps can be deployed on Android, iOS and Windows 8.
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The new version of HP Anywhere also allows developers to build apps with containers that can separate personal and corporate data. Not only does that mean IT can remotely wipe a mobile device without touching personal information, Evans said, it can also integrate mobile apps with on premise corporate applications.
For organizations that need a hand in app development, HP said it has enhanced its design services to help clients design and build applications.
HP [NYSE: HPQ] also announced two new or updated solutions it says provides greater visibility into application performance running on mobile devices.
They are Real User Monitoring (RUM) has been updated to version 9.22 software for monitoring the user experience of mobile applications running on the Android platform; and HP Performance Anywhere, a software as a service for monitoring the performance and availability of mobile applications and wireless networks.
Performance Anywhere can be bought in one of three packages: starter, professional and enterprise. The enterprise version has custom pricing. The professional version is priced at $39 monthly per transaction from public location or $29 (all prices US) monthly per transaction from private location. Application server monitoring costs $199 a month per operating system instance.
These are very helpful tools in app development.