Mobile Application Architecture & Design Considerations
Mobile application design and development is a tricky balancing act
. High levels of application performance and usability must be achieved while working with many device-related constraints. The following are some of the important application architecture and design considerations:
Development Methodology:
Use an iterative development methodology that includes rapid iterations of design, prototyping, development and continuous testing
Architecture & UI Design: Design a layered architecture appropriate for mobile devices that improves reuse and maintainability. Depending on the application type, multiple layers may be located on the device itself. Use the concept of layers to maximize separation of concerns, and to improve reuse and maintainability for the mobile application. Mobile devices require a simpler architecture, UI, and other specific design decisions in order to work within the constraints imposed by the device hardware. Keep these constraints in mind and design specifically for the device instead of trying to reuse the architecture or UI from a desktop or Web application.
Target Devices:
Consider the types of devices that will be supported and its constraints. Design decisions are highly influenced by target devices screen size, resolution, orientations, memory, CPU performance characteristics, Operating Systems capabilities & limitations etc.
Memory:
Store data on the device selectively and archive less frequently accessed data on the server. When working with the native part of the app, consider macro elements and static processing. The idea is to minimize the memory use, in terms of space and allocation frequency. Consuming all the memory is one issue, consuming less memory but continuously creating objects and destroying them is also bad.
Processing:
Manage content intelligently; reduce size and reformat if required (e.g. resize and crop large bitmaps). Design applications such that majority of the processes run from the server. Maximize the use of Push strategy for updates that are behind the scenes, delivering data before the user needs it.
Security:
Physical Security Mobile devices will likely be misplaced, thus giving whoever finds them access to the data on them. While
the device can be disabled, this is still a risk between the time the device is lost and the time it is disabled. Mobile applications
can do the following to mitigate this risk:
Ensure that all data written to the device is encrypted.
Avoid writing sensitive data and personally identifiable information (PII) to the device when possible.
Store all data on fixed platforms that are under your administrative control.
Dont store sensitive information such as passwords and credit card information on the device.
Communication Security Securing sensitive information as it is communicated wirelessly to/from the mobile devices is vital.
There are many ways to do this such as enforcing encryption, digital signatures, or using a Virtual Private Network (VPN).
However, unlike other kinds of applications, mobile applications are usually on devices with constrained by battery life and that
are more likely to be used in areas with low bandwidth network access. Because of this care must be taken to ensure that the
process of securing the applications transmission is done as efficiently as possible.
by: AnB_PreludeSys
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