Wondering what the title Declarative Versus Programmatic actually means then here we go. Declarative Frameworks are the ones which have a pretty low learning curve and let you make use of all the mix-in tricks, tools, JavaScript libraries and all other things which you have already been making use of without any pain. Despite the fact that the results with these kinds of frameworks might not impress you to a great extent you can expect the end results to be the same as that of Programmatic Frameworks but with very minor differences. DHTMLX Touch
For a second time even if your are wedged working with the inherited server side coding such as ASP or JSP in that case Declarative Frameworks are the only solution which will not require you to bend backwards for fitting into a square peg wherever there is a round opening.
We have two frameworks to be discussed here i.e. DHTMLX Touch and jQuery Mobile and definitely the battle is going to be won by jQuery Mobile after the complete discussion.
Wondering what makes jQuery Mobile win the battle? Read On…
• It has a huge community support that was build directly from the very first alpha release • It has a very beautiful user interface that is easy to use. • It is backed by jQuery with a good number of widgets. • You can customize it easily for a broad range of devices.
• This functions just perfect on all desktops and you will not be able to beat the price of it.
Understanding the Differences
• Comparison in Terms of Platform Support & Marketing
Both jQuery Mobile and DHTMLX Touch promote themselves as HTML mobile frameworks in which jQuery Mobile defines itself to be a system that is meant for all the famous mobile devices whereas DHTMLX Touch defines itself to be a framework that allows the web developers to create powerful mobile applications that will function well on BlackBerry, Windows, iOS, Android and all other operating systems. DHTMLX Touch is usable on only Webkit browsers whereas jQuery Mobile will function on a huge number of available platforms however the jQuery Mobile framework does not seem to be optimized for particular platforms.
Winner: jQuery Mobile
• Comparison in terms of Visual Impression and User Interface
When it comes to look and feel you can notice that both DHTMLX Touch and jQuery Mobile are completely different frameworks in terms of UI. DHTMLX Touch is complete JavaScript driven whereas jQuery Mobile is HTML driven. Both the frameworks have a great UI feeling however DHTMLX Touch gives more of a native experience if you plan to create a hybrid mobile app. One sad thing here that you need to know is that both these frameworks are likely to result in miserable performance if you use a complex and large UI.
DHTMLX Touch
• It is extremely fast and fluid on all the mobile devices giving a much better feel than jQuery Mobile. • This framework is great for games because of its SVG Support. • As of now this framework has huge number of Widgets and UI Elements.
• This framework works on the Model View Controller philosophy.
jQuery Mobile
• This is not like DHTMLX Touch it functions more like a classic web user interface. • In this framework everything will be done through HTML where in the end result UI will be wrapped using different jQuery Mobile Styles. • You can easily extend the UI and morph it just by using some CSS. This gives you a privilege to create new widgets whilst allowing you to modify the existing ones.
• Unlike DHTMLX Touch you will have to worry about the architecture of the page and it can actually be a little problematic sometimes. Everything seems to be connected together in case of jQuery Mobile that is at times good and at times bad.
Winner: DHTMLX Touch
• Comparison in terms of Ease of Use and Availability
This comparison is altogether a different story. jQuery Mobile is markup driven framework and it is easy to use because of its dependency on jQuery till the time you prefer to use MVC architecture. DHTMLX Touch merely shines obviously for the reason that it comes at a cost of alien syntax in particularly it is alien for people who have distances themselves from the concept of vanilla JavaScript.
DHTMLX Touch • It completely makes use of JavaScript and can actually turn out to be confusing for the novel web developers. • This framework has a sharp learning curve but nevertheless the time spent on learning it is really worth it.
• It is next to impossible to find out bugs and fix them.
jQuery Mobile • With easy syntax this framework has won the heart of all the mobile web developers. • You can make use of any desired IDE so as to develop jQuery Mobile Apps.
• Unluckily it is an out of box MVC which can be fixed with the help of Knockout.js or Backbone.js.
Winner: jQuery Mobile
• Comparison in terms of Plugins and Tools
This is as well a significant subject that needs to be compared because the kind of plugins and tools supported make the life of web developers easy.
DHTMLX Touch
• This framework has support for themes and native app wrapper support.
• It is sad to say that the IDE is a paid application.
jQuery Mobile
- This makes use of Phone Gap as native app wrapper but at times behaves weirdly when both Phone Gap and jQuery Mobile are used weirdly.
- jQuery Mobile renders support for various themes but this is not considered as complete support for the reason that you cannot make changes to the CSS of some of the core elements.
- There are several third party plugins that are compatible with jQuery plugins and thus can be sued with ease.
- It is easy to extend jQuery Mobile when compared to DHTMLX Touch.
Winner: There seems to be a Tie in this case though you can slightly favor jQuery Mobile in this aspect.