Cross-platform model-driven development of mobile applications with md2

Mobile applications usually need to be provided for more than one operating system. Developing native apps separately for each platform is a laborious and expensive undertaking. Hence, cross-platform approaches have emerged, most of them based on Web technologies. While these enable developers to use a single code base for all platforms, resulting apps lack a native look & feel. This, however, is often desired by users and businesses. Furthermore, they have a low abstraction level. We propose MD2, an approach for model-driven cross-platform development of apps. With MD2, developers specify an app in a high-level (domain-specific) language designed for describing business apps succinctly. From this model, purely native apps for Android and iOS are automatically generated. MD2 was developed in close cooperation with industry partners and provides means to develop data-driven apps with a native look and feel. Apps can access the device hardware and interact with remote servers.