Unplugged for Android

Unplugged Engine for Android®

Extend Lotus Notes® to Android, with mobile sync

With the Unplugged XPages Engine and HTML5, Teamstudio® introduces a simple yet powerful way to extend your Lotus Notes®/Domino® applications to Android devices. The Unplugged Engine works with the Domino Designer to create XPages apps that run on Android devices and update via mobile sync to Domino servers.

With its HTML5-based architecture, the Unplugged XPages Engine unleashes the full creativity of the mobile user interface designer. You can create touch-optimized, visual, customized mobile apps for Android which look as good as consumer apps. Not only does the Unplugged XPages Engine simplify the creation of these custom apps, it simplifies their maintenance as well. You create a single maintainable code base across all the main mobile OS platforms.

Use your existing design tools

The Unplugged XPages Engine dramatically simplifies the job of creating new, custom mobile sync-enabled apps for Android. It does this by extending your existing platform for collaborative applications, starting with Lotus Notes and Domino. Unplugged XPages Engine developers work with the standard Domino Designer tools within the standard Eclipse IDE. There is no need to climb the learning curve of a new and complex mobile application development platform.

HTML5 user interfaces

HTML5 is a new standard defined by the W3C, for structuring and presenting content on the Web. In conjunction with the Unplugged XPages Engine, HTML5 offers the benefits of :

• a single UI architecture
• a single maintainable codebase
• easier-to-use visual user interfaces, not just text fields and forms
• support for any mobile operating system platform
• support for online or occasionally-connected modes of operation

How does the Unplugged XPages Engine work?

The Unplugged XPages Engine acts as a miniature Lotus Domino server running on the Android device. This miniature server comprises a datastore, a JavaScript engine, a replication client and an XSP engine working together. This allows applications to be created in Domino Designer which can read and write to the local data store on the Android device via mobile sync. Any changes to the data are then synchronized back to the Domino server at the next replication event.

Choose your method

Unplugged XPages Engine applications are developed using either the “XPages Controls ” method or the “Freeform” method. Both use the same code and may be freely mixed within the same application. The XPages Controls method is useful for quickly putting together apps that do not require very fine control of the user interface. The Freeform method allows you to build a rich, visual mobile UI using all of the power of HTML5 and 3rd party script libraries.

Why use Unplugged?

A quick summary of the benefits from the Unplugged approach:

• Fully-functional custom apps can be created quickly on Android (as compared to primitive field-mapping apps)
• Reliable operation: Unplugged apps with mobile sync just work, even if signal strength is weak
• Easier-to-use visual user interfaces can be built quickly using HTML5
• No need to buy a specialized mobile app dev platform, just extend your existing enterprise app development environment
• No expensive specialized consultants required, use existing skillsets
• No need to develop a new set of enterprise software connectors
• A reduction in the number of system components means fewer points of potential failure

Unplugged roadmap

On the device side, Teamstudio is developing versions of the Unplugged Engine for all the major mobile OS platforms.  For more information on the Unplugged product roadmap, click here.

Arrange a demo

To see Unplugged for Android in action, request your very own personal demonstration today. One of our mobile integration specialists will be in touch to find a date and time that's suitable for you. We'll tailor the demo to suit your requirements, giving you the opportunity to ask questions along the way.