14 DAY TRIAL // One of the hottest new features the BlackBerry 6 OS came to the market with was the new BlackBerry Browser. The solution was meant to enhance the experience users receive from the new OS, offering support of WebKit and HTML5 in BlackBerry 6, and through providing enhanced performance levels when compared to previously available solutions.
The inclusion of WebKit on BlackBerry marks a new step in the evolution of RIM's mobile operating system, as it makes it compatible with some of the latest technologies in the area.
According to a recent post on the BlackBerry Developer's Blog, Research In Motion sees these changes as beneficial for the OS.
Along with the newly launched BlackBerry Widgets, these additions should offer web developers the possibility to easily come up with rich, compelling apps that look and function the same as native applications.
The BlackBerry implementation of WebKit and HTML5 should include the same elements as the can be used on desktop browsers, offering a simple solution to all developers interested on building apps for mobile devices.
Basically, this means that web developers should be able to bring to mobile phones a series of solutions that were not supported by these devices before.
With the addition of HTML5 to the BlackBerry Browser, RIM aims at luring more devs on its side, so as to offer users access to new games, interactive media, 3D graphics, and more.
“HTML5 contains lots of new elements for developers to leverage, including elements to help make web content easier to index and optimize for search engines; elements that enable you to play media in your application; elements that let you take it offline; and a plethora of other features to make your application a thing of beauty,” the post notes.
Among the said elements, we can count Canvas, Parsing, Video, Audio, Forms (partial implementation), Geolocation, Workers, Timers. All of them are detailed here.