What is Intel XDK?

 This is the age of mobile and mobile applications will be dominant in the coming years.

Intel XDK is a good tool to create cross-platform mobile applications for diverse device foot prints from Smart Phones starting with generation 3 all the way to 7 from diverse manufacturers, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Black Berry etc. Developers using Intel XDK can test their apps on their own device over Wi-Fi; test them in the emulators and debug them as well.

If you are interested there are various resources on the web. But first get to this site:
https://software.intel.com/en-us/intel-xdk.

 The support forum is very active with Intel staff answering questions from users.

You can do lots of stuff, these are just for starters:

 There are many step-by-step tutorials on our other site: http://hodentekMobile.blogspot.com.

Here are some direct links on the above site:

Part 1:Creating a Intel XDK project using a template; SideMenu project UI, SideMenu on iPhone6 emulator
http://hodentekmobile.blogspot.com/2015/11/develop-side-menu-app-using-intel-xdk.html

Part 2: Review of Controls and Layout as well as working with Pages. Pages in a SideMenu
http://hodentekmobile.blogspot.com/2015/12/develop-side-menu-app-using-intel-xdk.html

Part 3: Linking the pages and Navigation
http://hodentekmobile.blogspot.com/2015/12/develop-side-menu-app-using-intel-xdk_19.html

Part 4: Adding the BACK button to return to the previous page.
http://hodentekmobile.blogspot.com/2015/12/develop-side-menu-app-using-intel-xdk_26.html

Part 5: Adding pages and organizing controls  to the project
http://hodentekmobile.blogspot.com/2016/01/develop-side-menu-app-using-intel-xdk.html

The project you create will be on a server. For accessing the app from the server over Wi-Fi you need the Intel App Preview which is available for most devices and the software gets updated and the preview app is available from the app store (Apple store, Windows Store, etc.).

The Intel App Preview is available for the latest phones as well, such as iPhone 6, Microsoft Lumia 950 and many others.

For iOS devices from Apple Store:

 

For Windows Phone from Microsoft Store (Windows 10) :

I recently created several apps and naturally wanted to see how it works. I downloaded Intel App Preview for both iPhone 6S and Microsoft Lumia 950. I was surprised to find that generally Microsoft Lumia 950 did a much better hob, or rather the Preview fared much better on Lumia 950.
One of the biggest drawbacks of using the Preview on iPhone 6S was that once you click to look at an app, there is no way you can go back to the Preview activation link. You will have to delete Intel App Preview and reinstall again. For example, I opened an app, 'Hodentek Books', the page shows up neatly, but how do I go back?  The 'back' on the screen is actually a refresh to populate a 'iFrame' widget.

Iphone6_WidgetTest.png

On Microsoft Lumia Intel App Preview fared much better because of the software back button that takes you back to the quiescent state of Intel App Preview.

However the access time of the apps from both the devices over Wi-Fi were quite long and will not match with the patience of the audience.

On the fidelity of the app on the phones, the iPhone 6S was identical to the one on related emulator in Intel XDK. The Windows 10's rendition was far from perfect although the claim is made that styling issues have been fixed. However, the present emulator was really made for Windows 8.1 but tested on Windows 10. It may be noted that Intel App Preview claims to have been built for Windows 10 which perhaps is an optimistic statement.

I had a response from the Intel XDK Forums (User Forums| App Framework) that a new version for Windows 10 will be released soon. Perhaps things can get better.

What is a good size for an image to display on a Smart Phone?

This is a very broad question. Of course, 'Smart Phone' narrows it down somewhat. However there is still a large range of phone sizes. The following are my observations and should be tested in each case.

I had a need to place couple of dozens of images in an app (generic). I was developing the app with IntelXDK using just with HTML5, actually a web app. I wanted to make sure that I could fit in the images in my app. But what size? what file size? 

I experimented with the images you can take with a smart phone (1028x768) and resized images 75%, 50% and 25%. On an emulator they look the same. I had to set the size on the IntelXDK designer so that I can see the images properly on some of smart phones.

The details are here:
This next part (Part 6) is all about placing images and text formatting:
http://hodentekmobile.blogspot.com/2016/02/develop-side-menu-app-using-intel-xdk.html
Apple iPhone 6

 Apple iPhone 5

 Motorola Razor

 Nokia Lumia 920

 Samsung Galaxy S