Digitise Apps Components

A comprehensive, simple to use development environment designed to allow you to quickly and easily generate apps for mobile devices.

A central server-based service which synchronises data between your mobile devices and back-office systems, stores global configuration settings, manages which users have access to your apps and provides logging facilities for audit and diagnostic purposes. Uses a SQL database to store all its required information, see the App Server Configuration Database below.

Users' devices must be able to connect to the App Server machine to perform these functions, e.g. to transfer data, but, unlike an HTML-based app, they don't need constant access to work. A user can continue to use their app(s) when the device is offline and then transfer data later when they have access to a signal or WiFi.

Before you can run a new Digitise app or a subsequent update on a mobile device, either for testing or live deployment, you first need to 'publish' it to your App Server. When you publish an app, the App Server stores a copy of the app in its configuration database. Published apps can be configured to restrict access to specified users and/or devices.

SQL Server database used by App Server to store details about your Digitise apps, configuration settings (including access rights to your apps) and logging audit and diagnostic data.

A mobile app, the Digitise Apps Client runs your Digitise apps and communicates with the central App Server, using XML over TCP/IP, to synchronise data, obtain global settings and determine which apps are allowed to run on an individual mobile device.

There are two ways of using the Digitise Apps Client, although as we shall see later, there are some exceptions to these basic scenarios for Apple and Windows devices:

1. The Standard Digitise Apps Client

   The standard Digitise Apps Client is installed and configured separately on individual devices. Downloading and running Digitise apps is all done from within the Client. You only need to run a single copy of the Digitise Apps Client and it can download and run as many Digitise apps as required. Digitise apps can be run concurrently.

   Updates can also be downloaded from within the Digitise Apps Client and you can configure automatic updating if required.

   The Client includes a Settings page, giving access to the Client's configuration options, including specifying the App Server address and startup options. Users can access this page to configure the Client on their device.

   A pre-configured version of the standard Client can be requested allowing you to pre-set configuration options, such as the App Server address, and, optionally, prevent users from changing them. To obtain a pre-configured version of the Digitise Apps Client, you will need to submit a request to NDL's automated Digitise Apps Build System, which requires an Internet connection. App Studio provides a mechanism to submit your request to the Build System and to download the finished Client.

   Standard and pre-configured versions of the Digitise Apps Client cannot be deployed to users via the app stores.

2. Standalone Apps

   Standalone Apps allow you to create Digitise apps which are installed directly to your devices rather than via the Digitise Apps Client, making them feel more like other mobile apps and providing a more familiar user experience.

   These Digitise apps do not require the user to run the Digitise Apps Client explicitly; rather, users load the app from a standard icon or tile on the devices Start screen, Home screen or Desktop, just like other mobile apps on their device. The apps still use the Digitise Apps Client to run the app but, for the most part, this runs in the background hidden from the user.

   On most Platforms, a Standalone App bundles a copy of the Digitise Apps Client with a Digitise app into a single downloadable package.

   Each Standalone App runs its own private copy of the Digitise Apps Client and you can run multiple Standalone Apps concurrently.

   Users cannot download Digitise apps from within the Standalone App but you can optionally allow for manual or automatic updates to be downloaded. Client configuration settings, such as the App Server address and enabling/disabling updates, can be configured when the Standalone App is created so that you don't have to configure each device individually and you can also prevent users changing your pre-configured settings. If you don't pre-configure the settings, users will be able to edit them on their individual devices.

   Standalone Apps are created in App Studio and then submitted, from within App Studio, to our automated Build System, which requires an Internet connection. Once built, the Standalone App can be downloaded to your PC from within App Studio and can then be deployed to your users.

   We refer to Standalone Apps which will be deployed to your mobile devices using mechanisms internal to your organisation, such as via MDM software or via a standard network connection, as enterprise apps, whereas apps intended to be deployed via one of the public app stores, we call store apps.

Data and configuration settings are stored in one or more local SQL databases on the device – see Client Database below. Data is encrypted within this database and can optionally be encrypted for transit between the mobile device and the App Server.

One or more SQL databases created on the mobile device to act as a local store for data downloaded from your back-office systems, data entered by users within your apps and for internal configuration settings.

Uses an encrypted SQLite-based database, with option to include a password of your choice within the encryption cipher. The encryption ties the databases to individual devices so they cannot be copied and opened on another device.

A management utility which is used to specify which users or devices are allowed to use each of your Digitise apps, to configure the App Server and view logging (audit and diagnostic) information. App Manager interacts directly with the App Server Configuration Database and there is no contact between the App Manager and the App Server.