GDG Cluj-Napoca will hold its first 2013 meetup on the 19th of January at Cluj Hub! They will have an interesting agenda filled with technical presentations, geeky talk, snack and wine.

If you want to find out about what’s new in Android, how to approach UI/UX design on mobile, Google Summer of Code or how to make money out of your free published apps and many other interesting topics, join them on 19th of January and stay tuned on their Facebook and Google+ pages for more details.

From one of their sponsors, StartApp from New York, they will have as speaker Tal Futeran. She will tell us how you can make money out of your free apps through the use of search monetization, a concept StartApp introduced to the mobile world.

Sponsors: StartApp, Robofun.RO and Droidcon Eastern Europe

In order to register please fill in the Registration Form:http://goo.gl/ofzcI

Keep an eye on the Facebook or Google+ pages for updates!

Although Droidcon was mainly destined to programmers, it was equally interesting for everyone, regardless of their main interests. I was pleasantly surprised that all the participants remained in the room throughout the entire event, eagerly engaging in dialogues with all the speakers, which is not that common, especially with events that take place during the weekend.

I believe that any specialized event should cover also sales, marketing and design presentations and that it is useful when discussion panels are clearly bounded. Although many programmers are very skilled in code writing, they also need to wrap their applications in attractive and functional designs. This would especially benefit the independent developers, providing them with the resources needed in order to gain a better know-how that they might use for promoting and selling their applications.

Droidcon offered its participants a series of useful presentations. I am especially fond of the presentation held by the boys at GTUG, who pointed out a number of extremely valuable observations on user interface design. Marius Mailat offered a highly dense pack of informations and presented very relevant applications which mirrored the use of best practices. Chiu-Ki Chans’s presentation was memorable due to the speaker’s enthusiasm and the use of appealling examples and analogies. I strongly believe that the communities should attract more and more people with the ability to hold such presentations.

Developer communities are such fertile environments. In my opinion, Android Romania, the community founded by Marius Mailat, is among the most dynamic and collaborative communities in the domain. Its main functioning principle is the cooperation between the members, which is the opposite of competitiveness trends that might very much limit the spreading of knowledge.

I also believe that the location chosen for Droidcon ensured a great visibility for everyone in the room and a productive overall communication. Add that to the networking opportunities and a very good event planning, and you’ll get the picture of an awesome event!

There will be three days dedicated to MobX:

• November 15 (Thursday): workshops, pre-conference party
• November 16 (Friday): conference day 1, conference party
• November 17 (Saturday): conference day 2

This conference is for all the creative minds out there who deal with User Experience, interfaces and interactions in mobile contexts. MobX is designed for those who love small, mobile interfaces and smart experiences, good usability and consistent behaviour.

There are a multitude of mobile gadgets, phones and tablets out there, with a mind-boggling variety of interfaces – with often dubious usability. We operate small screens in cars, trains and planes and many other places.

A line-up of international experts and mobile thinkers will give presentations about this and other key topics.

The promotion code “augmentedcitizen” will give you a 200 euro discount per ticket (VAT already included).

For more information, visit http://mobxcon.org.

Then, along with Alexandr Negara, we agreed on the fact than people’s need of mobility is increasing more and more and that predictions and socialization are being used and are extremely useful in many industries and for many purposes.

The boys at GTUG in Cluj Napoca, Andrei Catinean and Eugeniu Arbuleac, pointed out how valuable Android apps ought to be made. To sum up, in order to build amazing gaps, the design of an app must submit to the following three principles: simplicity, beauty and functionality, with a strong emphasis on the last one. In order to demonstrate that, the boys created an alternative app for one of the most downloaded news app in the country. They improved the app so that it would offer a better user experience. As a result, their proposal was far more simple, neat, easy to use, intuitive, fast and good-looking than the original app. This session engaged a great part of the audience and that is why, at the end of the day, the boys received the prize for the best junior presentation.

Daniel Popescu, Computer Scientist at Adobe, told us a PhoneGap story. He compared both the advantages and the drawbacks of native apps, web apps and hybrid app and pointed out why developing PhoneGap is best: it uses native installers and standard web technologies and writing once means having it run everywhere. You will want to use PhoneGap if you’re after extending in-browser apps with mobile features. Daniel assured everyone that buiding a PhoneGap app is very similar to building a website. We feel that we must share with you the funny hightlight of the presentation. Here it goes:
Q: Why do Java Developers wear glasses?
A: That is because they cannot C-sharp.

Then, Iustinian Nita, Project Manager/Technical Leader at CVU Intelligence, spoke about MVC implementation on Android. The first step consists in building a Controller (Base Activity Class), secondly you need do build a Model (Service Class) and the the views (which are representations of the Base Activity).

Roman Mazur, Kyiv Google Developers Group co-organiser and head of Android unit at Stanfy, took over the stage and performed a highly detailed and useful presentation on Android REST-client applications. Roman’s intervention was highly rated among our jury members who gave him the award for the best senior presentation.

Next, we had a lot to learn from Aurelian Dumanovschi, senior Android Developer at Work in Progress, as he provided many insights on how to make sure that the web service and the Android applications are designed in such a way that will improve applications development time and will increase overall Android applications performance. We are about to share some of the tips we received on creating a web service: firstly, build an API call that returns images in the request size and shape; secondly, never trust the client – do your own security and policy checks server side also; and last, but not least, use a signature to secure your every call.

The final presentation was held by Marius Mailat, technical lead Appseleration, owner Androider.ro, whom the participants already met yesterday. Today, more of half of the mobile users use apps to play games on their way to/from work, around shopping and going out and concurrent with more traditional media such as TV. But what is the way to developing 1000 applications – the outcome of Appseleration team at the end of a 2-year period? Well, in order achieve this, you must create realistic and attractive offers that tops the client’s expectations, understand the business and technical reqirements and follow your client on his journey of understandind everything in your work that might actually make a difference for the business. You should also make a habit out of using visuals and mockups for intermediate feedback and apply the corrections during the implementation process.

At the end of the day, developers who submitted their application in the race at barcamp and received very good reviews received prizes.

As this edition has come to an end, we thank all the participants for their interest and their
enthusiasm during these two days. We also wish thank our speakers for creating an excelent content and a great learning and networking opportunity for all those who joined us this year, as well as our sponsors for their great support and the prizes for the Droidcon winners.

The business rules took a different course over the past years and mobile marketing is playing an increasingly important role in setting today’s standards. Here is where Appscend comes in. Mihai Cristian Petrescu, Lead Android Developer at Appscend says that developers can design an application within a week, a day or a couple of hours, depending on the complexity of the application. The platform is constantly evolving and improving, innovating as rapidly as the fastest growing industry in the world demands. The clients’ needs are constantly changing and evolving, and the challenge to build smart applications is handed over to developers.

Appscend, the Mobile Experience Igniter, is taking this challenge very seriously, with the company offering a complete solution to whomever wants to easily develop an application for the mobile segment. That is why over 500.000 users are currently using the applications developed with Appscend platform.

Marius Mailat, team lead Appseleration and owner at Androider.ro is going to explain you how a mix of good developing technologies, define processes, automatic build tools can bring you near ambitious objectives. If you think that being a good developer and counting on a good sales department is enough to design a huge number of applications for several external clients that are fully satisfied with the performance of your work, you are missing something. Proficiency never comes without a great deal of effort and a touch of vision.

Our guest is going to take over the stage at Droidon on the first day when he will show you how aiming high is not about dreaming at all – it is about building.

Through our participation in Droidcon Bucharest, our goal is to meet players of the Android world to share, exchange information with them about our products and of course discover and understand their expectations.
The Android world is changing very fast and we need to understand the cogs of this system to remain responsive, flexible, and even anticipate these evolutions in order to offer products that meet Android users’ wants.
And indeed, today the Droidcons are those places which are becoming essential to understand users’ needs and also to participate in this evolution.
We believe that by participating in these Droidcons, we act as actors of this change.

And for sure, we have a large range of Android smartphones and tablets to present at our booth.
But, to learn more about these products, I invite you to come to our booth.

2. Is it the first time you take part in an event of this kind?

We participate in Droidcon events since 2010.
For us, Droidcon events are really important places to meet the Android community, communicate about our products and present these products.
This year, we have increased our participation, being present at Droidcon London, two weeks ago, and we will be present, also, at Droidcon Bucharest, Amsterdam and Murcia.
It’s really exciting for all the company and we are proud to be sponsor of this kind of events.
And we hope we could develop our participation for 2013.

3. What do you think are the challenges of working with Android as an operating system?

It has been 5 years that Android was announced and we were amongst the first in the world to get involved with it.
Clearly, for us and for the entire mobile landscape, Android has enabled the industry to evolve very quickly, but not without a challenge.

If you look at the history of mobile, these past 5 years have been most prolific in terms of innovation, evolution, creation, than the previous 20 years.
Working with Android we evolve day after day, which allows us to offer products with higher performance, in line with customer expectations and of course always in line with our values; “be smart, be simple, be different”

4. When will we see a new Alcatel One Touch smartphone running on Android?

ALCATEL ONE TOUCH’s history with Android started in 2009, only 2 years after the platform’s creation. We joined the Open Handset Alliance and launched our first “Android Phone” smartphone. It was the first Android phone with a slide-out keypad form factor. And with a design which inspired some other brands.
In 2010, we met the strong Android community, in France, thanks to frandroid.com, the popular French Android related website. It was an opportunity to present this OT 980 phone and understand the expectations of this community…
To improve the relation with them, through the philosophy, products and others, ALCATEL ONE TOUCH decided to participate in the Droidcon conference. And have done so every year since 2010 in many locations.

At present, 3 years after our first smartphone launch, we have reached the number of more than 50 Android phones marketed, worldwide.
Currently, we are proud to present, at Droidcon Bucharest, some Android smartphones and tablets which are in tune with the times, thanks to their designs, accessibility and features that meet the needs of all.

5. What is your opinion of Eastern-European applications developers? How do you see them in the global context?

Clearly, nowadays, the Android community is a worldwide community which is increasing very highly.
The Droidcon events offer the possibility, for the whole community, to meet some actors of this area and vice versa.
Moreover, We know that Eastern-European applications developers are really dynamic, creative developpers.
We already met some of them during the Droidcon London, and the dialogue was pretty interesting.
The market in this area is increasing, evolving and we are sure that if we have the opportunity to work, exchange with them, we could develop the Android community overthere develop the relationship between our products and those users to enhance the accessibility of Android technology, for all.

6. What special something can Alcatel One Touch bring to the Android Developers Community in East Europe?

With the ALCATEL ONE TOUCH devices, the developers have the opportunity to test and develop some applications on a large range of devices, from the smartphones to the tablets, at an affordable price.
Moreover, we have to highlight that we provide devices with the latest technologies like NFC, Wifi Direct, BT 4.0, developing new usage and innovative applications.

The ALCATEL ONE TOUCH Team.

The real fun begins in the second part of the session. Do you know that intriguing sport called Sumo? The one involving one-to-one confrontations and a great deal of technique? Imagine a number of preprogrammed robots which are ready to enter the ring and wrestle on command. Playing has never been more fun – the participants will have the chance to battle head-to-head in a Robotic Sumo game, using Android phones for engaging the robots.

Finnaly, the last part of the session consists in a demo – the smart house with Android and Arduino. The boys are bringing a series of demonstrative devices which they will use in order to show how Arduino may be used to control the devices that can be found in a regular house and all that by using an Android phone.

To put it all in a nut shell, Viorel Spinu & Robofun are going to provide 3 hours of exciting novelties, juicy technologies and energizing playing. Therefore, we’re counting down the days until Droidcon!

This session will be held by Marius Mailat, technical lead Appseleration and Owner at Androider.ro, who is going to introduce you to the field of Android application development, by getting into the specific techniques and development environment. At the end of the training session, the participants will master a series of instruments and techniques which will allow them to develop Android platform applications by using Java as the programming language. As you may imagine, it is mandatory that participants have Java knowledge. Our teacher also recommends that you bring a PC/MAC with Android development environment. The installing instructions are available here.

The course will span over the following topics: Android system architecture and resources, development, environment, deployment and setting-up, emulated or on-phone testing, UI controls, Services and Broadcast Receiver, working with SQLite databases in Android, location-based notifications.

Eager to perfect your Android App developing skills? We thought about giving you a hand on that one!

This training session proposes an introduction in the field of Android applications development approaching the specific techniques and development environment. It is addressed to specialists that are interested in implementing Android apps and were not exposed to any formal and structured education providing them exposure to the essential set of implementation instruments and tools.

Training goals

At the end of this training session, the participants will master a series of instruments and techniques that will permit them to develop application for the Android platform, using Java as a programming language. They will develop and practice abilities in successfully unroll Java projects, starting from basic development to Google Play publishing knowledge.

The 3 hours training is based on the online training course Android for beginners.

Training themes

During the 3 hours training, the following themes will be approached: Android system architecture, development environment installation and setting-up, emulated or on-phone testing, UI controls, Services and Broadcast Receiver, working with SQLite data bases in Android, location-based notifications.

Trainer

The training will be developed and delivered by Marius Mailat.

Marius has been developing commercial software since 2000. His focus is mobile applications architecture and development for Android, QNX and iOS. He is an experienced Java developer who spent the majority of his career building large-scale Java applications for Xerox and Sabre Travel Network in Germany.

Android projects in which he has been involved are banking interfaces and shopping tools for Android. His interest in the secrets of Android platform was geared towards building Defense Squad Mobile Security app, a free, simple to use and innovative Android security solution.

Marius is leading a team of 20 mobile developers for Appseleration in Germany and he is the founder of the Romanian Android Community Androider.ro, which has now around 4000 active members.

Agenda

The ideal list of points Marius is going to discuss and demo to you are:

Java/Android fundamental concepts

• Android OS architecture
• Activities
• Views
• Resources
• Android manifest

UI Controls

• Interaction with buttons and other controls
• LinearLayout
• UI development from code and from editor
• Menus
• Intents

ListView and ListActivity

• ListView
• ListActivity
• Adapters

Services and Broadcast Receiver

• Services
• Broadcast Receive
• Intent Filters

Multitasking and networked communication

• Apache HTTP Client
• REST
• JSON
• XML (RSS)

What you need for this training

To participate in this training is recommended that you have Java knowledge. Since the whole training is geared towards teaching you to develop on Android Platform, a PC/Mac with Android development environment installed is recommended. For the installation instructions please check this page.

Additional information

For additional information contact Marius Mailat using the contact form.