With feature phones representing more than 80% of the global handset market, there's a huge opportunity for developers to distribute rich content and applications to these devices. The Java Platform, Micro Edition (Java ME) enables your content to reach more end users than any other mobile applications platform. By attending this Webcast, you will learn how developing on Java ME gives you a competitive edge and helps you reach the broadest audience possible. 

In particular, the webcast focuses on the following topics:

• Market dynamics and trends in India, China, and South-East Asia
  
• Application distribution and Monetization models
  
• Case Studies and Success Stories

Register and view this important on-demand webcast today

It's been a good week for Java ME.  Although much of the hype in so-called "developed markets" is focused on smartphone platforms, the majority of the world continues to use feature phones and the best way to bring applications to these devices is with Java ME.  In India alone, feature phone users outnumber smartphone users by a factor of 18 to 1!  Because of the vast number of Java ME enabled phones, app development for the platform represents a significant market opportunity for mobile app developers. With minimal code modifications developers can reach hundreds of millions of feature phones.

Well, a couple of events have occurred in the past week that reinforce this opportunity.  Remember Snaptu, you know, the company that enables Facebook to run on billions of phones?  Facebook decided this week to shell out $70 million dollars and acquire Snaptu outright.  Why?  Well, by some estimates there are around 1.4 billion personal computers in the world. 1.4 billion might seem like a huge number, but a number of estimates peg the total number of mobile subscribers at close to 5 billion or more - more than 3 times the number of personal computers.  In addition, Facebook has been striking deals to enable users to access their mobile portal for free in certain geographies.  Through applications that deliver "smartphone-like" user experiences on lower-cost devices and through free access in key geographies, Facebook has the opportunity to significantly improve their reach.

Another company making headlines this week is Bitstream, whose new Bolt SDK enables developers to "build feature rich Java (Java ME) applications that work just as well on entry-level feature phones as they do on high-end smartphones."  The Bolt browser is one of the more popular Java ME applications and one of its key benefits is that it can take advantage of compression technologies on the back-end to improve the on-device experience, enabling users to render full web content on low-cost devices.  With its new SDK, Bitstream is empowering developers to leverage the capability of the Bolt browser from within their applications. 

If you are interested in learning more, check out our webcast: Mobile Java Applications in Feature Phones, A rich Opportunity for Developers

Attention Boston area developers!  Oracle has been running a series of free one-day Java Developer events in the US, Europe, and Asia since last November, and on March 3rd, this highly popular series is coming to the Westin Copley Place in Boston. 

The Java Developer Day will include four tracks of sessions and hands-on-labs designed for developers interested in Server, Desktop, Embedded, and core Java SE platform topics.  Technologies covered include Java EE, Java ME and Java SE (including the JDK).  From the event page:
 
Come to this free event if you are interested in:

• Evaluating the Java platform
• Using other languages on the JVM
• Building server side Java
• Constructing Rich Web or Desktop Applications
• Understanding the JVM and its built in diagnostics
• Making Smart Devices even smarter
  

Check out the event" page to read more and/or register.  The event is free, but space is limited so register" today!

Java Verified has just announced that GameLoft is the first developer to receive its new Trusted Status!  Java Verified is an industry-recognized Java testing and signing program backed and funded by companies such as AT&T, LG, Motorola, Nokia, Oracle, Orange, Samsung and Vodafone, and chartered with making it

easier for mobile developers to certify and deploy applications for use across the billions of mobile handsets that run the Java ME. 

Because of its breadth and diversity, Java ME provides an unmatched opportunity to reach more than 3 billions consumers, but at the same time, developers are faced with the challenge of working with multiple distribution channels and a range of handsets. To this end, the Java Verified program provides a suite of tests that help to validate identity, functionality, integrity, and quality. 

Since its rebirth in 2010 as an independent organization, the Java Verified program has been actively working to make it even easier to create and distribute Java ME apps.  Example initiatives include updates to the Unified Testing Criteria to make it easier to test "Simple Apps," community outreach to better understand and address developer pain-points  and a new "Trusted Status."  In the words of the Java Verified Program, Trusted Status is:

a privileged status to be granted to developers who will have proven that the quality of their Java ME apps is of a consistently high standard. These are developers who will have earned the trust of Java Verified by demonstrating unfailingly that testing to the UTC standard is a crucial part of their product development activity

The first developer to be awarded this status is GameLoft.  By achieving Trusted Status Gameloft can now test their applications to the Java Verified standard without needing to provide Java Verified with the evidence.  The apps then automatically get signed with the Java Verified signature enabling GameLoft to benefit from reduced costs and time-to-market for their new Java ME applications from here on out. 

Learn more about the exciting news or apply now for Trusted Status!

Julien Dubois's informative article, "Part 3: Making Jersey and JQuery Work Together", the third in a series, further explores the advantages of JQuery, a popular open-source JavaScript Library that provides many advanced and cross-browser functions that can enhance web applications.

From the article itself:

"We will connect the JQuery-enhanced Web page from the second article to the Jersey-based Representational State Transfer (REST) interface that we built in the first article. We will begin by introducing Ajax, which is now a very common technology, and then work on our ArticleEvaluator sample application in order to see how we can use Ajax to send and receive data between JQuery and Jersey. The result will be a working, JQuery-powered Web application that can make Ajax calls to our Java technology-based REST application.

Read the entire article here: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/articles/java/jersey-jquery-177519.html.

Java EE 6 was the star of these last 2 days, its first time at Devoxx! (Java EE 6 was released in December last year, after Devoxx.) Antonio Goncalves, senior software architect, and Alexis Moussine-Pouchkine, developer advocate, presented a Java EE 6 tutorial. They spoke about the power of the new Java EE 6 features. Ludovic Champenois presented a separate session on the latest development in Java EE 6 to accommodate NetBeans, Eclipse, Oracle OEPE, and Intellij development tools.
 
The conference for the next three days will have 3,000 attendees from 40 countries under the Metropolis* theater roof. Members of 70 Java user groups from all over Europe are converging on Antwerp as we speak. The atmosphere at the hotels downtown and at the conference is already festive and you meet groups of developers in passionate discussions.

*Now I know where the name Javapolis came from!

Learn more:
Oracle at Devoxx
Java EE 6 Technologies
Java EE 6 Downloads

Attention New York area developers!  Oracle has just announced a free, full-day developer event.  Being held at the Millennium Broadway Hotel, the Oracle Developer Day will include four tracks of sessions and hands-on-labs designed for developers interested in Mobile, Desktop, Embedded, and Server topics.  Technologies covered include Java ME, Java EE, and Java SE (including the JDK).  From the event page:
 

Come to this event if you are interested in:

• Evaluating the Java platform, or using other languages on the JVM
• Building server side Java
• Constructing Rich Web or Desktop Applications
• Creating Mobile Applications
• Making Smart Devices even smarter

Check out the event page to read more and/or register!

The energy level here at the San Francisco Hilton is electric as JavaOne 2010 has officially kicked off!  The first technical sessions kicked off this morning and there is a huge amount of anticipation around the JavaOne Opening keynote tonight.  If you were not able to join us live here in San Francisco, there are a couple of ways that you can follow-along from afar.  First, Oracle Technology Network is streaming 3-4 hours of live interviews (see schedule) throughout the week with technologists from Oracle and Oracle partners.  In addition, there will also be live streams for all of the keynotes available at the same URL.  So grab a beverage of your choice, sit back, and enjoy the show!

JavaFX Expert Jim Weaver has recently penned an excellent article entitled, Real-world JavaFX Applications: loadUI for the Oracle Technology Network. 

If you missed Terrence Barr's excellent webinar on the Lightweight User Interface Toolkit earlier this week, we've got you covered!  Simply register here and you will be emailed a link that will let you view it as many times as you want for the next 12 months!

Would you like to discover how the Lightweight User Interface Toolkit can help you deploy better mobile Java applications? We're hosting a live webinar tomorrow with Oracle Evangelist Terrence Barr. 

The webinar will be tomorrow, September 16th at 9:00AM PDT (Pacific Daylight Time).  If you would like to attend, please click here to register.  Hope you can make it!  

The Lightweight User Interface Toolkit (LWUIT) is a small-footprint user interface library that helps developers create better looking and more consistent Java ME applications. LWUIT supports visual components and other advanced UI features such as 3D graphics, animations, transitions, touch input, themes and more.

Key features for the new 1.4 release include:

• XHTML Component - LWUIT 1.4 enables rendering of HTML documents that conform to the XHTML Mobile Profile 1.0 (XHTML-MP 1.0) standard. This component enables rendering of  HTML text embedded locally and web content accessed remotely from within the application - making it easy for Java ME developers to add rich and dynamic content to their applications
• BlackBerry support - With the new LWUIT binaries for Blackberry OS, developing for a BlackBerry device is now simple and easy.
• Enhancements to the Virtual keyboard - The virtual keyboard included with LWUIT can be easily used within Java ME applications. The enhancements include the ability to customize the look and feel of the virtual keyboard, the ability to add new language support, and the ability to bind it to a text field to improve user experience
  
• New UI Controls - includes components such as Tree, Table, Buttons, List, etc. inspired by Swing

Please visit the LWUIT page on the Oracle Technology Network for more information 

If you answered YES to this question, you might be interested in checking out this excellent article written by the JavaFX team entitled, "Tips for Developing to the JavaFX TV Platform."  And with the new JavaFX TV emulator included in JavaFX 1.3, you'll be able to build and prototype TV applications directly on your Windows-based desktop.