Blackberry Launches BB 10.3 SSK Beta

BlackBerry has launched its BB 10.3 SDK beta version for developers. The SDK OS is now available for download. It will work well on existing BB 10 smartphones. Once you download the SDK OS, you will be able to start testing apps.

The SDK version brings a lot of additional functionality that developers can take advantage of while testing apps.

What can a developer expect from the 10.3 beta SDK version?

The new SDK version comes with a variety of tooling improvements and new features. The moment you install the 10.3 SDK operating system or the 10.3 beta simulator on your BB 10 device you will notice that some styling changes have been made to core controls.

To help developers become more familiar with these changes in user interface, BlackBerry has updated their UI guidelines. In Native SDK, some of these new changes are marked as new functionality. Others are core control changes that will automatically be applied to the Cascades application.

Developers should also note that BB 10.3 is designed for the new device hardware that is going to be introduced towards the end of this year. The new device hardware will follow BlackBerry’s promise of retaining the 16:9 aspect ratio and the square screen with 1:1 aspect ratio, including BlackBerry’s common 1280 x 720 and 720×720 resolutions. When you run the 10.3 simulator, you will find another square screen. It is designed for the ‘new device’ with a 453 DPI pixel density and 1440 x 1440 resolution. However, BlackBerry is not yet ready to reveal more details about that new device. The company has so far kept it a secret.

Meanwhile the BB 10.3 beta simulator allows developers to see how their applications will work in this new DPI combination and resolution.

BlackBerry has got some more great news for its fans. The much awaited BlackBerry Classic will also hit the market in a short while. Now that BlackBerry has confirmed that its BB 10.3 is meant for the new device hardware and that the Classic device will be arriving this year, it is safe to assume that BB Classic will be launching with 10.3.1.

BB 10.3.1 will be available to existing BlackBerry 10 devices users as a regular OS update towards the end of this year. By spending their time testing the apps, developers can help BlackBerry get it ready for existing as well as upcoming BlackBerry 10 devices.

BlackBerry will release another SDK to support Classic.BlackBerry confirmed this saying that they will have a 10.3.1 SDK ready to give developers the time and APIs they need to ensure that their apps work well with the ‘toolbelt’ hardware of the BB Classic device. BlackBerry wants to ensure that all the goodness of 10.3.1 will come to BlackBerry Classic and other devices that are already available on the market as quickly as possible. Right now the BB 10.3.1 SDK is chiefly focused on supporting Classic device updates. BlackBerry is also planning to make a few SDK additions. BlackBerry expects that a gold release of the OS will be ready sometime soon.