• Coding

  • UIWebView (iphone) and WebView (android)

I recently developed a website using JQuery Mobile (to look like a native app) that runs perfectly on iphone/android/bb web browsers.
Later, i created an iphone and android app that only have UIWebView and WebView (correspondingly) to connect to the website and display its contents. So the 2 apps act much like a web browser.

Will these apps be accepted by apple store + google play?

What if i changed the contents of the website after the apps are on apple store and google play? (this is why i asked the first question)

--So why do i want a website to be launched from an app and not from a web browser?
because:
1- the website looks like a native app
2- an app is "cooler" than a website (and is much easier to sell)
How about building the app as a PhoneGap project? It is a framework that allows you to build mobile apps using the web technologies such as JS and HTML5 while providing a bridge for some native device access such as accelerometer, gps etc...

It basically wraps your web app into a mobile app that behaves mostly like native ones. You can use any UI framework within your project such as Kendo UI and JQuery mobile. So converting your mobile website into a PhoneGap app won't take much time nor effort.

Plus Phonegap supports up to 7 platforms and with their new Build service you can have your app compiled and packaged right in the cloud!
i can't use PhoneGap for 2 reasons:
1- the website has server side code (C#) -i should have mentioned this:)
2- the website will be updated on weekly bases (so keeping the website "online" will provide automatic updates without the user's intervention)
Well if that's the case, I'd personally build a RESTful web service on the server independent from the site itself and uses the site database for info, redo the app with phone gap, and use the same client side UI (JQuery mobile) and write some additional java script to issue requests against the service via and process the returned data locally. Communication would be via JSON or XML. That's the ideal way of doing it.

Other than that, regarding an app that behaves as a browser i don't think app stores should have a problem with it. After all there are many browsers out there, it can be thought of as just another mobile web browser. But I personally think that this is not an ideal choice for the long run in case later on more demanding features spring out such as the need for local storage and caching app data for offline use etc... Yet that could be just an opinion depending on what the app is and the plans for it.
Hi scatman, appstore and google play will accept your app.

Phonegap is mostly a Webview rendering an html with javascript hooks to native functions.
That html can be remote so I am not sure why you can't use it if you have server side code.
@Ayman
I'll give it a try. I assume the app will run much faster in this way, especially if i used local storage or caching.

@jsaade i thought PhoneGap embeds the html+JS to the phone so the app becomes completely native. But yeah, there is no reason that prevents it from connecting to a server and retrieve the html from there.

I'll soon submit my app to apple store hoping it will get accepted. I'll keep you posted:)
5 days later
You won't have problems with the appstore if your application works offline or displays a message that it requires an internet connection.
In other words, iframes aren't an option.

The best thing you can do is to build your application entirely offline and data fetched from a RESTful API > then saved into localStorage/WebSQL for offline use (if it fits your needs).

Some Phonegap tips:

- Avoid DOM animations or jQuery Animate and rely on CSS3 transitions. (consider adding jquery animate enhanced).
- Never forget deviceready before firing your scripts.
- Rely as much as you can on localStorage or WebSQL for offline storage.

Good luck =)