First Android app: calculate your Italian TAX ID (Codice Fiscale)

During the last month I’ve been studying and prototyping some Android and iPhone apps, trying to find out the pros and cons of both environments.

The first test done with Android was a simple single-screen application that allows users to calculate their Italian TAX ID (a.k.a. Codice Fiscale). You can download it from this link, or find out what other users have to say on Cyrket.

Apart from the app’s rude user interface, here are some first considerations about the Android environment:

  • A visual user interface designer would be just great. Interfaces in Android are declared in plain XML files, so a GUI editor would be the most natural thing, but it’s just not here right now.
  • For J2ME developers, Android is the heaven of programming. Just think about a missing feature in your J2ME environment: Android just has it! And, even if you’re not a J2ME developer (what have you done the last 10 years? :) ), you’ll find one of the most complete programming environments in the mobile ecosystem.
  • Android Market, right now, cannot compete with iPhone AppStore. It’s just not attractive, with poor features to highlight local/regional content, and it’s closed to companies outside UK/US (at least, if you want to sell your apps).

I’ll just continue testing and tweaking, and hopefully come back with more detailed considerations in the next posts. Meanwhile, I’d love to hear your opinion and discuss about Android development!

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