Twimbow announces BlackBerry 10 app is coming

By Michelle Haag on 5 Jun 2012 10:52 am

The team at Twimbow has officially announced that their Twitter client is under development for BlackBerry 10 devices and will be available when the phones launch later this year. Currently Twimbow is only available via the web, and they have chosen BlackBerry 10 as their first mobile platform. They list many reasons for choosing BlackBerry 10 over Android or iOS.

BlackBerry 10 is the most open OS available for smartphones, way more than Android (and capable of running Android apps as well). The set of tools developers can use is incredible and you can basically port any app to that OS very easily.
HTML5 performance: as many tests already confirmed, HTML5 performance on BlackBerry 10 is far superior than iOS or Android. It is actually outstanding. Given that Twimbow is a rich HTML5 app, porting it to BB10 is very easy and can offer incredible performances to our users
BB10 is capable of running an HTML5 app as a native app, with a deep integration with the OS (notifications, BBM integration, UI etc.) and taking advantage of the real multi-tasking capabilities of the BB10 OS, something not available in other smartphones.
The opportunity to be in the BB App World for the BB10 launch is huge, so we want to be there ;-)
Some of the countries that are very important for Twimbow are historically very important for BlackBerry as well. An example? Indonesia, #2 country in terms of Twimbow registered users and now #1 in terms of daily users.

Check out the video above of Twimbow running on the BlackBerry 10 Dev Alpha device to get a feel for how the app will look once it's available. Of course, as it's still under development, a lot could change with the design and UI, but it looks really good so far, and full of features that Twitter users look for when choosing an app. If you're not familiar with Twimbow, you can sign up for the web client at www.twimbow.com and see for yourself what they have to offer currently.

Source: Twimbow blog

Topics: Twitter BlackBerry 10 Twimbow News & Rumors BlackBerry Apps

Michelle Haag 1140 (articles) 1618 (forum posts)

53 comments

morpho4444 Jun 5, 2012 at 10:56 am

Did I see Skype?

BarracudaBob Jun 5, 2012 at 11:07 am

It's a bit fuzzy, but it does look like the text under the icon says "Skype BETA". It's probably the same Android port as we have for the Playbook that only allows test chat.

bbschorsch Jun 5, 2012 at 10:58 am

probably the chat only version

Roscopcoletrain Jun 5, 2012 at 10:58 am

lol knew skype would be the first comment

Joe257 Jun 5, 2012 at 2:18 pm

Yeah, Skype is a must have on BB10. As much as I love what RIM has done with Video Chat in OS 2.x, there are many folks who just don't own a PlayBook. RIM's oversight in releasing BB7 devices without video chat capabilities meant a very small community of Video Chat users.

I'm certain Skype will be available in BB10. RIM won't miss that now that they've seen how many folks have been petitioning for it.

123berryaddicted Jun 6, 2012 at 12:56 am

I think another smart idea would be for RIM to make a free video chat app for the pc and mac which would connect to the playbook video chat, this way you don't actually need a playbook to communicate in that fashion with playbook users. You'd see a HUGE video chat adoption from this, compared to the minimal usage the app currently gets.

titanjhb Jun 6, 2012 at 3:58 am

Disparishun Jun 6, 2012 at 1:53 pm

YES. That goes for all the BB apps, actually -- I find it a real pain not to be able to access my Calendar (including BB Groups calendars) and even Inbox on the desktop.

Rootbrian Jun 6, 2012 at 1:56 am

You do realize that RIM doesn't make or develope the skype app right?

undone Jun 5, 2012 at 11:00 am

yea looks like it.

mphillips828 Jun 5, 2012 at 11:00 am

It said Skype (Beta), probably just an android port...but what I am curious about is that when I saw the Dev Alpha at BB World, it was running a modified PlayBook OS, which I believe meant the keyboard as well...now this video shows the BB10 Keyboard on the Dev Alpha! Was that released with the latest Dev Alpha update? thats amazing tho! to see developers have applications working under BB10 already! :)

bounce007 Jun 5, 2012 at 11:19 am

So the dev Alpha has the android player??

Ebscer Jun 5, 2012 at 11:34 am

Of course

Joe257 Jun 5, 2012 at 2:13 pm

BB10 will support Android. RIM is hoping to get support for Ice Cream Sandwich sometime later after the BB10 launch, but I think the plan is to support Android 2.3 at launch.

Bold_until_Hybrid_Comes Jun 6, 2012 at 2:17 am

How would bb10 support android??? Thats like saying when windows 8 comes out windows 8 will support linux. You mean bb10 will support android apps. You certainly cant install ICS or 2.3 on it

etlahrs Jun 5, 2012 at 2:13 pm

The Dev Alpha devices the developers received are running a modified PlayBook OS with the PlayBook keyboard. As of right now, we have not received an update to the OS with any other features. But, and I could be wrong, I think some of the major players have received Dev Alpha devices running OS 10. The presenters at BB World and BB Jam were definitely demoing on BB10 devices running OS 10, so that may be the case. Again, I could be wrong about that, but that it my thoughts.

sf18443 Jun 5, 2012 at 11:15 am

Glad to see someone from out side the normal pool of BlackBerry developers bringing their app to BB10, and glad to see them excited about it! The list of reasons they cite is proof that RIM's dev relations strategy is paying off! I R EXCITE!

Blackberry_boffin Jun 5, 2012 at 11:20 am

For coming to BB10 first, I will be using this app.

mphillips828 Jun 5, 2012 at 11:26 am

What about the native Twitter app that has been shown off in drawings for BB10?

morpho4444 Jun 5, 2012 at 11:57 am

Well competition is always good right?

mphillips828 Jun 5, 2012 at 12:29 pm

Absolutely! Competition is great, just saying that RIM is making a brand new Cascade interface Twitter App which may be hard to compete against considering it will be free, and like the PlayBook most useful Twitter apps are paid, which will be tough to compete against a free powerful native Twitter app...although this app looks very nice! :) love what im seeing

drew.bb Jun 9, 2012 at 4:18 pm

That app is usually made by Rim and not actually Twitter itself like it does for Ios and Android

dbmalloy Jun 5, 2012 at 12:10 pm

Where this is exciting is that for a change we have a APP directly develoiped for BB not some port from another OS.... For RIM to survice... this is what they need more of..... Something unique to the BB Platform.....

Kiddo_24 Jun 5, 2012 at 12:37 pm

gng11 Jun 5, 2012 at 1:17 pm

HootSuite for BB10 please!! Would love to see that happen!

BB_Bmore Jun 5, 2012 at 1:23 pm

This is a great looking twitter client. If it's working on the dev beta why not bring it to playbook?

WiseShepherd Jun 5, 2012 at 2:05 pm

Wow... That's really unresponsive.. Let's hope this is due to developer and not platform. :*(

Rello Jun 5, 2012 at 2:18 pm

What video are u watching???

Very fluid imo

WiseShepherd Jun 5, 2012 at 2:39 pm

lol.. are you kidding? Do you have any experience in UX design?

Look at every single time the user taps to interact with the app. Each time, the user taps and nearly 0.5s goes by before any reaction occurs. When you're dealing with a touch screen, you need some sort of immediate visual indicator to show that the touch event has been received.

If you have no experience in UX, you'll think that 0.5s is nothing and you'll try to argue that I'm being finicky. But the reality is that things like this hugely affect the user experience.

syn-ack Jun 5, 2012 at 2:59 pm

.5 seconds? Are you on fastforward? are you travelling near the speed of light?

At worst (the first time the home button was clicked) it was closer to .2 seconds. very respectable considering there was probably a download involved.
the rest of the clicks were near instant.

Maybe your internet is slow and the video buffering needed to catch up. for the rest of us, it was very fluid.

WiseShepherd Jun 5, 2012 at 4:31 pm

Your reply shows your ignorance toward UX design.

"...very respectable considering there was probably a download involved".

If you had any expertise in UX design, you would know that when something like downloading is happening, there should be some sort of indicator towards the user. To simply accept lag and say "oh, the system was probably doing something" is utterly flawed from a UX perspective. The user should at all times know why something isn't responding.

Whether it was 0.2seconds, or 0.5 seconds or whatever, the app should immediately (<<0.1seconds) provide some sort of visual feedback showing that the OS is responding to the touch. This is not at all an unrealistic expectation. Please explain to me why iOS immediately shows a response, whereas this example does not? As soon as I touch my finger to an iPhone screen, the item being touch immediately highlights. It's NOT unrealistic to expect this behaviour.

Note: If I was watching the video on FFWD, it would have appeared as less lag (perhaps you are the one watching on FFWD).

Note 2: If i was travelling near the speed of light, the lag would still appear the same to both of us, assuming I'm watching my own video of it and you are watching your own video at your reference point. If you mean to imply that we are both watching the same video source located at your reference point, but that I am moving away at the speed of light, then I'd love for you to explain to me how the light from the video screen would ever reach my eyes if I am moving at the same speed as it.

Note 3: Please don't speak for "the rest of us" when you are replying in such an ignorant manner.

syn-ack Jun 5, 2012 at 5:37 pm

I was being obviously sarchastic... I thought you were too.
Come on, really? You are being serious about .1-.5 second response time? wow.

Don't worry, "the rest of us" excludes you.
We are happy, you are not.
We think this is a great looking and flowing product. You don't seem to.
You don't speak for us either.

Time to move on.

WiseShepherd Jun 5, 2012 at 5:49 pm

*It's sarcastic, not sarchastic.

Anyway, you're wrong. "We are happy, you are not." Who is WE?!??!?!?! Because last time I checked, iOS and Android were selling in MUCH higher numbers than BB. Therefore, "we" or "us" or people in general, are NOT happy with BB.

The problem with RIM is that they have people like YOU running the company. People who don't see the importance in paying attention to detail.

Luckily, this is not an official video from RIM and so it's not necessarily any indication of what the final product will be like. Let's hope they tighten things up!

Note: In a sense, I do speak for the subconscious of "us". Most people are choosing Android and iOS because they are a pleasure to use. They don't dissect each platform to figure out what makes them a pleasure to use. They just know they enjoy using them. I do dissect what makes each platform great, and so when I nit-pick about things like this and I say they are unacceptable, I am speaking for the typical user, aka, "us".

TomCanuck Jun 5, 2012 at 6:37 pm

I gotta agree, that app looks horribly slow to respond. But I'ma going to assume that it's because it's an app in the alpha or beta stage running on an alpha device which is running a hackjob OS lol.

Bla1ze Jun 5, 2012 at 7:35 pm

100%. Everyone is arguing about UX design, has nothing to do with it. The Alpha Dev isn't exactly a great device to base any sort of opinion on.

123berryaddicted Jun 6, 2012 at 1:01 am

Exactly..... We're talking about an ALPHA device running a BETA app..... Man alive people!!!! Oh sorry.... Sorry to have included everyone in on that... Apparently it's only one individual complaining..... It's alpha..... And it's beta..... Give them a cotton-pickin-break.

Joe257 Jun 5, 2012 at 2:11 pm

Gee, wonder why HTML5 performance is so important :D

Indeed, developers are taking note of BB10's awesome HTML5 support. At a score of 447 out of 500, the BB10 browser is already turning heads! It is currently the top rated HTML5 browser available -- desktop or mobile!

Apple's iOS 5.1 Safari scores 324.
Android's 4.0 Chrome beta scores 364.

Apple, Android: Read. Weep.

Despite what the markets might suggest, RIM is very much alive and kicking! Still innovating and pushing forward towards a grand BB10 release this fall.

WiseShepherd Jun 5, 2012 at 2:57 pm

LOL. where have I heard this line of chatter before? Oh right... When the BB fanboys were all saying how great Flash support was and how the rival platform didn't have it.

Let's get one thing clear: CONSUMERS DON'T CARE ABOUT STUFF LIKE THIS. They only care about the user experience. And when you compare the user experience of a platform like iOS vs BB, it is obvious which one is more enjoyable (the sales numbers speak for themselves). Let's hope BB10 can drastically improve over the BB experience of years past but, as I've been saying for a while now, BB has shown absolutely zero indication that they know how to pay attention to the detailed required to make a great user experience. It's not like RIM has gone out and made some major new hires that would indicate a shift in the UX ability. I'm hoping for the best but fearing for the worse.

ps: Though they did hire TAT, they still havent' shown any indication of being able to harness their ability to make something truly slick and amazing.

cas118 Jun 5, 2012 at 5:53 pm

It's not users that care about HTML results - it's the developers. The better performance and compliance in the browser, the easier it is to create apps.

That's why when RIM has posted HTML test scores, they have been through the BBDev account - not that you'd notice from the way bloggers and commentators jump on the 'misguided' bandwagon.

As for TAT - have you not seen the cascades SDK? Or maybe the BB Flow as part of the BB World keynote?

Sheesh.

MasterOfBinary Jun 5, 2012 at 11:57 pm

+1 for trying to talk to a brick wall.

jejohnston15 Jun 8, 2012 at 6:18 pm

Your right iOS users like to be told what they want or what is cool, I have to admit when the iPad came out I was ducked into the iCrap world briefly and at first it wasn't bad but after using the PB the user experience is far and away better on PB which is only going to be even better once BB10 is released. And try telling my daughter that flash doesn't matter 80% of her websites use flash, if you ask me someone else is being terribly shortsighted by dismissing flash.

Ps: I smell a troll

kdna Jun 5, 2012 at 2:14 pm

Was that the new BlackBerry keyboard or just an image overlay? Good to see developers sharing their progress.

siddo_d Jun 5, 2012 at 2:17 pm

why does the dev alpha display look so fuzzy on camera and I really don't like the keyboard above the shortcut things

John.P Jun 5, 2012 at 3:55 pm

The video camera had troubles focusing that closely.

Joe257 Jun 5, 2012 at 2:27 pm

I'd like to see folks like EA bring some of their other hard core games to the PlayBook. Where's NBA, FIFA, NHL, MoH, StarWars, Battlefield? Build it, I will buy!

notinbeta Jun 5, 2012 at 3:03 pm

I'm sorry, but this is a horribly designed app. Now that they have the power of BB10, I'd like to see some iPhone/Android-level of UI design, or even better.

mjgallaway Jun 5, 2012 at 4:26 pm

I could care less about this. There's too many twitter apps to start with anyways.

Michelle Haag Jun 5, 2012 at 8:40 pm

Except as of right now there are no Twitter apps for BB10, though I'm 99% sure Blaq will be available at launch time as well.

uyicn Jun 5, 2012 at 6:51 pm

Seeing the reason they listed here make me want to buy RIM's stock