Blackberry open opprtunity to developers

RIM has announced the future of  the BlackBerry Widget Software Development Kit (SDK) to enable third party application developers tobuild rich, integrated applications for BlackBerry® smartphones using common web technologies. With the new BlackBerry Widget SDK, developers can build web-based applications for BlackBerry smartphones with advanced features and functionality, a capability only previously available for BlackBerry applications written in Java®. 

A BlackBerry Widget uses the BlackBerry® Browser engine torender an application's user interface using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.Developers are able to use existing web content to create BlackBerry Widgets and extend the capabilities of their web applications using BlackBerry Widget APIs.

Using the new BlackBerry Widget APIs, developers can, for example, create seamless interaction between a widget and the BlackBerry email and calendar applications, create widgets with the ability to view or editfiles and documents stored on the smartphone, access location-based services orthe media player, and more. Developers can also take advantage of RIM's unique push technology, enabling dynamic widgets that can run in the background andprovide proactive alerts to users in a timely manner.

"BlackBerry Widgets open up a world of opportunities for developers to build and bring to market web applications for BlackBerry smartphones that offer advanced, integrated functionality and an always-on user experience," said Alan Brenner, senior vice president, BlackBerry platforms at RIM. "We are very excited by the prospects of this new widget developmentplatform which combines the ease of development of standard web languages withthe rich functionality of Java development."