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Getting Started with Airplay SDK for Mobile Application Development

By Editorial @stacktips, On Sep 17, 2023 Blog Posts 2.3K Views

Airplay saves development time by writing app using vanilla C++ in the IDE of your choice. It supports all versions of Visual C++, and the Airplay Mac SDK supports Xcode. The deployment assets are converted using the Airplay Studio tools and added into the application built using the Airplay SDK. This creates a single binary that can be used by the deployment tool to create an application to run on any of the different platforms.

Airplay SDK

Supported platforms: iOS, Android, Symbian, bada, Windows Mobile 6.x and webOS
Language Used: C/C++
IDE Used: Microsoft Visual C++ and Xcode
GUI Support:

  • Style sheet / Re skinning
  • Dynamic layout
  • 2D drawing support.
  • Image format – BMP, GIF, PNG and TGA
  • Font – System & Bitmap
  • Single drawing API supports OpenGL ES 1.x, OpenGL ES 2.0
  • 3D user interfaces for games
  • 3D screen transitions

Audio Video Support: Audio Support: WAV, 3GP, MP4, ACC, MP3 and PCM

Multi-threading and networking support

  • HTTP
  • GPS (location-based web services and accelerometer input)
  • Camera Support:
  • Snapshot API
  • Image stream, Image load and save
  • Support for performing background tasks such as file loading and network activity
  • Multi-threading support with a pthread API

Input Methods: Accelerometer, Keyboard, Pointer

Hidden features:

  • Dynamic portrait/landscape screen switching handled identically for all devices
  • Compile for ARM, using GCC or RVCT compilers, without leaving the IDE
  • Airplay SDK provides a flexible and extremely easy-to-use resource management framework. Resources (images, fonts, audio and video files, 3D models, etc.) are simply listed in text files.
  • Test and debug actual ARM code on the desktop, at source or disassembly level, without having to deploy to device
  • Deploy your application as a standard OS installer package, for all supported operating systems, using a single click
  • Build rich 2D and 3D applications using powerful tools and graphics libraries
  • Support software rendering, OpenGL ES 1.x and OpenGL ES 2.0 from within a single application, without rewriting rendering code
  • The EDK (Extensions Development Kit) allows developers to call native APIs from within the Airplay SDK.
  • The EDK is currently supported for iOS, Android and Windows
  • Use of native platform code is also supported on Android through the JNI (Java Native Interface) S3E Extension. This allows you to include Java code for Android, either directly in the C++ source files of your Airplay application, or by building and executing standard Java source files and assets

Limitations:

  • AirPlay support is not included for video streaming
  • Streaming videos on the camera roll is not supported
License TypeEvaluationiPhoneIndieProPro Support
Duration of license30 daysAnnualAnnualAnnualAnnual
$ Annual Turnover (or top line revenue) of your businessN/A<$100K<$100K>$100K>$100K
Price per seatFreeFree$99$2500 $1000
  • iPhone License (free): permits public distribution of iPhone/iPod/iPad apps. These have no visual watermarking. Deployments to all other platforms have an “evaluation only” splash screen, and public distribution of these deployments is prohibited.
  • Indie License, $99 per seat per year: permits public distribution on all supported platforms. No mandatory visual watermarks or splash screens.
  • Pro License, $2500 per seat per year: permits public distribution on all supported platforms. No mandatory visual watermarks or splash screens.
  • Pro Support, $1000 per seat per year: offers a private support ticket channel with 48-hr response time Service Level Agreement; dedicated Account Manager; access to Beta releases of the next SDK version.

Example Applications in market:

Example 1

Example 2

Operating System support:

  • Airplay supports the following operating systems
  • Mac OS X 10.5 (Leopard) or above running on an Intel Mac.
  • Microsoft Windows 7
  • Microsoft Windows Vista
  • Microsoft Windows XP SP2 (or above)

Supported 3D Modeling Packages:

  • Airplay supports exporting assets from a number of 3rd party 3D modeling packages/ exporters
    3D Studio Max 8 / 9
  • 3D Studio Max 2008 (32bit, 64bit) / 2009 (32bit, 64bit) /2010 (32bit, 64bit) / 2011 (32bit, 64bit)
    Maya 7/ 8/ 8.5
  • Maya 2008 (32bit, 64bit) / 2009 (32bit, 64bit)/ 2010 (32bit, 64bit) /2011 (32bit, 64bit)
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Editorial

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