Developing an internal application can be complicated with mushroomed demands and security challenges; that is why many organizations often rely on Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP). It’s one of the solutions that is leveraged by the enterprises to develop an application, MEAP has added functionality that will assist the enterprises with the management of applications and mobility. As a development tool, Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) improves the productivity and assisting the developers in building seperate applications and writing codes for each operating systems.

Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) is used by the enterprises to unify the process of development for developers assisting them in developing an application for the different operating system, saving cost and saving time to develop different OS.  MEAP ensures that the centralized management and integration of mobile application is achieved for the enterprises, offering common features such as storing data, push notifications, and offline synchronization.

Before selecting the MEAP solution enterprises need to consider several factors, below we are highlighting three common factors.

1. Support for multiple operating systems

Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) was first coined by Gartner a research firm way back in the year 2008 before Android or iOS had disrupted the application platform. Gartner after through observation, concluded that MEAP is needed if you want to do three underlying things: Support different mobile Operating systems, support three or more backend data sources and support three or more mobile applications.  The need to support multiple operating systems can be a major beneficiary factor for the enterprises that have implemented the BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) policies, where employees have the freedom to bring their own device. Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) policy for enterprises is a potential way of cost saving, where the device investment is curtailed while it has resulted in the adoption of numerous operating systems and mobile platformsMany large enterprises have employees that work from different regions, making them use the different operating system, so a mobile application supporting all the systems need to adapt their mobile applications to work.

2. Customized applications Vs. Template applications

One of the foremost use of the Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) is to assist the enterprises in developing the next generation of internal applications. It’s more useful for the businesses that are looking to induct mobile applications into their daily operations and rapid increase in the complexities of mobile operating systems. Over the last few years, enterprise application developers have been integrating new technologies that are used developing Artificial Intelligence, augmented reality, and Internet of Things (IoT).

In the environment of complicated applications and more concentration of development, resources will mean that enterprises have to be critical when they have to quickly deploy certain types of applications. To assist the enterprise’s application platform (MEAP) provides the developers with several templates for application, so if a user requires an immediate application, it can be important for certain employees who require a basic and immediate solution.  In addition to providing template application, the platform provides the enterprises with an objective that empowers developers to customize these templates or improve the aspects of them to create an entirely new application. It will also give the users with required customization functions that can assist the developers of the enterprises and deliver business value to the enterprises.

3. Initial Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) challenges

The initial offering by the Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) tend to offload the challenges, but they are, however, more prevalent for the enterprises using it for the first time. As with any new solution that enterprises are using they do present an initial challenge for the enterprises. Upon the adoption, an enterprise needs to update the applications based on the platform changes and handle various issues that happen with the bugs. All of the content in the application must be updated during the initial adoption phase, with security for both public and private data. MEAP could be adding the significant cost during the early adoption with added responsibilities that are all set to change for the IT with application functionality that might differ.  

The initial phase can be an added burden for the developers and IT staff, but once the application is established, business can promote the reduction in cost for application life-cycle management and easier data integration. A Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) ensures that enterprise is rapid when it comes to mobile application development and assist them in deploying mobile apps across multiple operating systems. After the added deployment, MEAP can be an asset that can be used for managing applications and updating them, adding numerous advantages to the MEAP once enterprises survive the challenge during the initial adoption.

Conclusion

Businesses around the world have heavily invested in application development; however, it’s added the cost of development, security, and the update pushing them to find alternative solutions for connecting employees with data. Enterprises need to develop a Mobility Enterprise Application Platform (MEAP) in an effective way that reduces the required development time and brings added agility in application management once they are developed. Most MEAPs use techniques that don’t require writing code to extend them. Businesses can use the industry standard integrated development environment such as Eclipse; some tools have a hybrid model that uses JavaScript based on UI design SDK, such as Dojo Toolkit, YUI Library, jOuery Mobile and a new JavaScript-based Device featured API encapsulation is plugged in the IDE. It means that a custom app can be used for mobile devices feature without any 4GL coding or native coding and make it once developed or deployed anywhere.

To know more, you can download latest whitepapers on mobile enterprise applications management.