Possible to cross-platform develop Watch/Wearable applications?

Question

since I am new in the world of developing apps for watches, and the fact that it exists for smartphones the following frameworks:

1. Xamarin
2. PhoneGap
3. appcelerator
4. kony
5. Cordova
6. ...

I wonder if there exists for watches apps similar frameworks? So that you code once but run overall.

Thanks

Edit 1:

At this day (12.05.2015) regarding to the answer of a nativescript maintainer here. I will go with nativescript to start writing app for wearables.

Farahfarand

Answer 1

Cordova/PhoneGap apps don't work directly on the wearable devices/watches. Cordova/PhoneGap is basically a javascript API which can run on WebKit/WebView on all the mobile OS's. But the Android Watch and Apple Watch doesn't support WebKit and so the apps developed with Cordova don't work directly on Watch devices. But if want to extend some of the features from the existing Cordova app to the wearable app, you need to create the extension app in native language and the extension should be able to communicate with the paired app on the mobile device. The extension on the Watch will have only UI and the bussiness logic etc runs on the Cordova app on the mobile. It is possible to establish communication between these apps which will drive the display on the watch devices.

I am not sure about the other frameworks you listed above on how much they support wearable devices.

Flub

Thank you for your Answer! is there such a framework only for wearable devices? Because i want to develop only for wearable devices! – Farahfarand

As far as I know, NativeScript team is working on some thing similar and there is an expected release in May which supports wearable devices with same code base. – Flub

nativescript.org/roadmap looking here but no support for wearable planned! But thank u! it's a great framework! – Farahfarand

From the nativescript google group i saw this answer from a nativescript developer (i guess) : groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/nativescript/iI_J9OdKaqY so kiran answer match that one. – Farahfarand

Answer 2

As @kiran and @NRimer have mentioned, these cross platform frameworks are relying on the WebKit/WebView which is the almost universal layer supported on every mobile device. They dont run directly on the device, but device runs WebKit platform that runs these cross platform apps. So comparing the capabilities of the native app with cross platform app, native app is bigger, because it can have a hands on device hardware related features. The thing particular to the smart watches is that they mostly rely on other smart phone device, and it uses it's communication protocols, that are hardware specific, and WebKit doesnt have its hands on it.

Sisk

Answer 3

It depends on what you're looking to do with the framework. Watch apps build off data provided by their containing app. For example if you want to provide custom notifications on the watch, the app (or server for remote notifications) constructs them. When your watch app needs information, it makes a request to the containing app. Lets say you have a group of apps that you want to provide the same notifications or functions on each of their watch apps, you could make a framework that handles these functions for the containing app. As for the watch portion, think of it as more of a display of information provided. Unfortunately i dont think there's a way to generate frameworks for watch apps yet. If you're looking to have a lot of code within the watch app this might be more difficult but for simple display of information you should be alright.

Ranaerancagua