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Home»BlackBerry News»News & Rumors

BlackBerry PlayBook Native SDK reaches closed beta; developers can apply now

by Jared DiPane on 24 Aug 2011 11:36 AM
24
 

PlayBook

Ever since the release of the BlackBerry PlayBook we have been looking forward to the Native SDK to be available to the developers to see just how far they can take their development. We have seen the Adobe Air SDK as well as the WebWorks SDK but unfortunately we have been waiting for the official Native SDK to arrive. Well we just moved one step closer to it becoming a reality as today RIM announced on their Developers Blog that the Native SDK has reached a closed beta phase and they are allowing developers to apply now for access to all of the goodness.

The closed beta is limited in space, and will be on a first come first serve basis, so if you are an interested developer be sure to fill out the form now! This news is the start of many good things to come, let's hope the beta goes smooth and they are able to get this into the hands of all the anxious PlayBook developers.

Source: Developers Blog

Filed Under: News & Rumors; Tags: BlackBerry Playbook, development, Native SDK, PlayBook, sdk
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24 Comments

Posted by seb.hebert Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

GREAT NEWS! This is awesome!

 
 
Posted by frankdlr1972 Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

I really want a Playbook, however, I heard a podcast from another blog that the Playbook doesnt access secured WiFi's Is this true? This is how I want to connect to the internet while at home.

 
 
Posted by TongueDar Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

That's not true at all and doesn't even seem logical. What blog said this? Were they pro iPad? ;)

My WIFI is secured and hidden and I can access it just fine. It remembers my hidden network when I leave and always connects right away when I get home -- something that was an issue early on, but was fixed with an update.

And on this, the PlayBook is the only tablet certified to be used by the government, because of its encryption/security. So if wireless weren't secure, I'm thinking they wouldn't have been granted it.

Here's what the PlayBook supports for security;
Open
WEP
WPA Personal
WPA2 Personal
WPA Enterprise
WPA2 Enterprise

 
 
Posted by Jake Storm Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Yeah!

 
 
Posted by dasDestruktion Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Let the (decent) apps begin! :)
Great news.

 
 
Posted by sashas Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Real excited! Applied just now...

 
 
Posted by rapsball4 Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Applied. Been waiting for this for a long time. Most of what I have in mind could be done in Flash but I'm not as familiar with it as I am with C++ so I've been waiting and hoping for this.

 
 
Posted by 123berryaddicted Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Well its about time RIM!!! Maybe now we'll see some good apps?

 
 
Posted by xjrichb Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

This is great news!!! I think. Can someone tell me what this means, and what is SDK? lol Cut me some slack..I'm learning :)

 
 
Posted by Rob Robertson Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

SDK stands for software development kit. Basically, an SDK is the set of tools for making software for a platform. The native sdk is the set of tools specifcally made for the PlayBook. Apps made in the native SDK can take full advantage of the PlayBook hardware.

So far the only apps made with the native SDK have been from RIM (such as Facebook and Scrapbook) and ones made by EA (such as Need for Speed and Dead Space).

I am not a developer so feel free to correct anything I got wrong!

 
 
Posted by sk8er_tor Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

I don't think the Facebook app was done using the native SDK.

 
 
Posted by Rob Robertson Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

You might be right. I made the assumption because it was developed by RIM.

 
 
Posted by TongueDar Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Facebook and ScrapBook were built with the AIR SDK. It just shows the level of developer(s) competence. :)

Another thing, parts of the PlayBook's own Apps and GUI were built using AIR. I recall the CEO of RIM mentioning it during the ADOBE/RIM preview the other month.

 
 
Posted by arvind1983 Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Facebook was developed by Adobe for RIM using AIR SDK. Scrapbook was developed by TAT using Adobe AIR as well. The Playbook's UI was also developed on Adobe Air.

 
 
Posted by seemsixty7 Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

SWEET!

 
 
Posted by Cleric Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

SDK means Software Development Kit.

 
 
Posted by xjrichb Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Thanks!! Now it all makes sense to me. This is good news!! :)

 
 
Posted by infinus Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

late but better than never.
i hope they provide some tuts too.
pb is powerhouse.

 
 
Posted by Houshinto Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Glad they opened it up. Let's see what developers can put up. Personally I'm stoked.

 
 
Posted by parabola Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

They are really going out of their way to emphasize this is targeted at game developers.

 
 
Posted by ciscobear Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

Can one of your developer guys/gals explain to me why this seems like a cart before horse scenario? I am grateful but this seems like it would have turned away so many of you from developing for this product.

 
 
Posted by mapsonburt Wednesday, Aug 24, 2011 182 days ago

A native SDK allows us developers to easily port other POSIX compliant applications to take.full advantage of the PlayBook. For instance any of the open source torrent clients can now be ported to the PlayBook with not much more than a simple recompile. We could even start putting things like Eclipse and C++ compilers on it along with just about any UNIX/LINUX based application you can imagine. Think about it this way... AIR and Webworks provide a subset of the functionality... the native SDK will allow us to get close to the metal. Our applications will have just so much more potential.

RIM opened up AIR and Webworks first because its easier to write games/apps that way but the NDK will really open ip the power of this device.

 
 
Posted by ciscobear Thursday, Aug 25, 2011 181 days ago

Thank you for that explanation :)

 
 
Posted by crwblyth Saturday, Aug 27, 2011 179 days ago

Anyone got an email yet?