Rajan_Sma

Since the last decade of the 20th century, cell phone developers have been actively engaged in developing a cell phone / computer hybrid. The article discusses the emergence of smartphone technology and the exponential growth of applications.
 * The Benefits of Mobile Apps **

With the emergence of smart phone platform software such as Windows Mobile and Symbian, users were able to increase the productivity of their cell phones. Moreover, they were able to download applications that catered specifically to their life, making the smart phone a “personal device” for the first time. The only issue now was platform developers like Windows were trying to replicate the computer experience on the smart phone, which was a problem because of the device’s smaller screen.

With the release of the iPhone in 2007, applications have really taken off. Most apps these days are made for the iPhone, which is odd considering the iPhone has only 16% of global smartphone market share. The emerging trend in application development is to somehow use the cell phones hardware (Bluetooth, microphone, speaker, GPS) as sensory organs (similar to human eyes, ears, mouth, etc.). By giving them the power of sensory organs, the smart phone becomes almost like a “virtual human robot”, because it now has the ability to process, analyze, and respond to human data.

Application developers have used this model, and have used it extensively since the birth of the iPhone. The iPhone, because of its “senses” (GPS, Bluetooth, microphone, etc.), helped application developers develop apps that took advantage of the phone’s perception ability. Hence, they developed applications that encouraged the smartphone to engage in the world around it.