IT & MODELLING APPS TECHONOLGY
RISE OF APPS T
he forecast was that Christmas 2012 would be a festival of tablets – not, of course, carved from stone proclaiming the second coming of
our saviour, but more likely sleek, portable handheld electronic devices loaded with ‘apps’, such as Angry Birds, and carrying the promise of an (even more) effective lifestyle. The clamour for the ultimate ‘electronic organiser’ evokes memories of the mad dash for a Filofax as the essential business accessory in the mid 1980s – a boom that lasted just a few years.
Kick-starting technology The technology driving today’s tablets was arguably kick-started by the advent of the iPhone, and it is just six years since Steve Jobs of Apple wowed his audience at the launch of the iPhone in January 2007. It was not the fi rst electronic handheld device to excite the techies, but it took hold of the media and, most importantly, the mass market. Expectations were set
for ‘space age’ handheld technology that would not only replicate the Star Trek communicator (and yes, there is an app!), but
also provide access to the knowledge of
the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, complete with the translation skills of the babel fi sh. And with the
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meteoric launch of the iPhone came the popularisation of the term ‘app’. An abbreviation of ‘application’, an app
is not the same as the software application that runs on the desktop of a PC – it is a specially written program that can (ideally) leverage the best performance from the device that it has been designed for. An app would typically be written for a
mobile device, such as an iPhone and iPad, Android device, Blackberry or the newly launched Microsoft Surface, and may be more clearly referred to as a ‘mobile app’. However, the term is also increasingly
used for web-based applications (online apps) that hold the main parts of the software systems in the ‘cloud’, allowing access from almost any web-connected device using a browser (such as Chrome, Firefox or Internet Explorer), irrespective of whether the user has a smartphone, tablet, desktop PC or even a smart television. The world of apps is at an interesting
point in this formative period. Tablets that are joining the commuters’ smartphone and umbrella as the essential accessory, and becoming de-rigueur at meetings, have powers that would previously have been envied in a laptop computer. Indeed, in the three years since the launch of the iPad, which invigorated the tablet market, devices the size of a paperback book (and far thinner) produce graphical performance – and progressively more
The Sun Surveyor app allows instant sun plots to be created
make your business life easier? It just so ’appens that Tim Dwyer has a few application-based answers…
With Sun Seeker, the tablet camera is pointed at a location and the sunpath diagram appears
January 2013 CIBSE Journal 25
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