Applications

An application consists of two parts: the software user interface that consumes enterprise data from one or more data sources, and the definition created in SAP Control Center that allows the mobile application to be recognized by the runtime. Depending on the application type, the application definition on the server can establish the relationship among packages used in the application, the domain that the application is deployed to, the activation code for the application, and other application specific settings.

SAP Mobile Platform supports multiple options for development and deployment of mobile applications.

Object API applications – Object API applications are customized, full-featured mobile applications that use mobile data model packages, either using mobile business objects (MBOs) or Data Orchestration Engine, to facilitate connection with a variety of enterprise systems and leverage synchronization to support offline capabilities
Hybrid Apps – HTML5/JS Hybrid Apps support simple business processes, such as approvals and requests, and also use mobile business objects (MBOs) to facilitate connection with a variety of enterprise systems. With this approach, a hybrid web container is developed and deployed to a device, then one or more workflows are deployed to the container.
OData applications – OData applications are simple, mostly online mobile business applications that leverage standards-based approaches—OData protocol and RESTful Web Services.
Agentry applications – Agentry applications provide the ability to support one or more client device types and one or more enterprise information systems of varying types from a single application project, high levels of configuration and modification with minimal user impact, simple or complex multi-screen workflows, and high data volumes stored on client devices.
REST API applications – Applications developed using 3rd Party SDKs, such as Sencha and PhoneGap, for any device platform, and using any programming language that supports sending and receiving HTTP messages can use the SAP Mobile Platform REST APIs to call services provided by the SAP Mobile Platform Runtime.

While developers create the client application using either SAP Mobile SDK or a third-party SDK, applications must be defined, then managed and monitored by administrators in SAP Control Center. The stages in the life cycle of an application may be different for different application types.

Recommended Test Methodologies
There are several different test methodologies you can use, each having their own goals, procedures, and tools. Be prepared to perform functional, load, and performance testing on the applications you create before distributing SAP Mobile Platform applications to end users.
Best Practices for Testing Applications on a Physical Device
All applications should rigorous functional, load, and performance testing on a physical device before deploying them to your end users. Because there may be differences between development, test, and production environments, always use a physical device to perform these tests over the same network type that your end users will use.

Parent topic: Stage 1: Create