Targeted devices identification

The set of targeted devices is a critical point to address from the beginning of a Rich Media Application definition and planning. Indeed such decision will impact:

• The amount of constraints to take into account for realizing a Rich Media Application that will work properly on / be compatible with all targeted devices,
• The affordable overall experience offered by the Rich Media Application (features, interactivity...),
• The amount of time required for developing the  Rich Media Application, especially handling per device adaptations (to be limited but most of the time present),
• ...

The up-to-date list of supported devices is available here.

Storyboard definition

The storyboard shall consider all constraints:

• The mobile network (limited and variable bandwidth...),
• The targeted devices (screen resolution, capabilities... see this article),
• The overall user experience (quick access, loading latencies...),
• ...

During the conception phase the storyboard should also be completed with the following decisions:

• Data sources specification: back-ends (databases, XML, web services…), streaming server...
• Extensive append mode usage (share reusable rich media content between multiple scenes)
• Extensive components usage (reuse configurable pieces of code)
• Scenes distribution: local / pre-embedded scenes vs remote scenes identification
• Client cache management
• Client cache prefetching (multiple scenes simultaneous download, queued scenes background download)
• Server cache level 1 (preprocessed scenes)
• Server cache level 2 (predownloaded scene resources)

Loading latencies handling

Considering loading issues in your Rich Media Application - starting from its storyboard - is key for the end-user experience. Delays when transiting between scenes or when downloading heavy media contents into a scene can be significant, so the end-user may experience them as a failure and finally reject the application. The end-user must experience visually (usually facing an animation) that something is currently awaited by the application, in order to avoid the "blank page" or "freezed page" effect.

2 types of loading animations can usually be displayed:

• Non-dynamic looped animation: is independent from the content download progression
• Progressive animation: reflects the amount of content being downloaded

One can use the provided Progress and Loaders components for this purpose.