BlackBerry Payment Service Launched in Beta

The BlackBerry WebWorks SDK for Tablet OS was not the only new release from Research In Motion at BlackBerry DEVCON Asia, as the company also made available the BlackBerry Payment Service in a beta version, accompanied by a BlackBerry Payment Service SDK in Beta, and some other updated tools as well.

The BlackBerry Payment Service can be integrated into an application as a library, so that developers would have more ways to monetize their applications.

The new service was meant to offer app builders the possibility to “incorporate options such as subscriptions, feature unlocking and pay per use,” RIM states.

All these would be available through the Payment Service SDK Beta, which was released for fast integration with apps.

“The Payment Service SDK Beta is easily integrated into your app as a library. This allows you to determine when and where the purchase experience will occur, without leaving your application,” RIM notes on its website.

“To enable the Payment Service, your app must be distributed through the BlackBerry App World storefront. The Payment Service provides you with the same revenue share available within BlackBerry App World, across whatever payment type users specify in their BlackBerry ID.”

According to RIM, the digital goods in the application would be described and priced in line with the pricing tiers that are presented in the BlackBerry App World vendor portal. Developers would have the possibility to manage and track sales of both the new application and the digital goods in it.

As stated above, other tools from RIM were also updated, including the BlackBerry Push Service SDK, which comes with a new Subscription Check API for enhanced management of Push operations for Content Providers, as well as with features like simpler Statistics Gathering and Query Capabilities.

Through the new Subscription Check API, one can check the registration status of a smartphone with the specific application through a server-side framework, so that Push only occurs for devices that are subscribed to the application.

Another upgraded tool is the BlackBerry Java Plug-in for Eclipse, now version 1.3, which was meant to ensure that the Java development is more productive on the BlackBerry platform.

Download the BlackBerry Payment Service SDK

Download the BlackBerry Push Service SDK

Download the BlackBerry Java Plug-in for Eclipse for Windows

Download the BlackBerry Java Plug-in for Eclipse for Mac