PhoneJS along with ChartJS are DevExpress’ efforts in providing single page web applications for mobile platforms (think Tablets and Phones). Together they are combined into DevExtreme combo. In practice they are pure javascript libraries without ties to any server side platform – which is good, are built with KnockoutJS, jQuery in mind, etc (really plenty of nice features, check hyperlinks). And they can be packed into “native” applications for various platforms using PhoneGap. Added bonus is an emulator (again in javascript) that let’s your preview applications. Everything you need to run projects based on DevExtreme is a web server. Any web server on any OS since they are client side stuff.
I recently poked around this technologies and I soon felt that one, rather important feature (well, to me at least) was missing. Typescript definition files were missing. Until now that is. They are coming with v13.2 and you can already preview them in beta. Plus, there is a template that let’s you start your project with Typescript code instead of Javascript. While this doesn’t seem a big deal, well, it is. Typescript is a huge boost for javascript development, more so when it comes to bigger projects. Hence it is a big deal to be able to use all of Typescript goodies with DevExtreme goodies. And now I can.
Other improvements are coming as well (improved theming, improved and new widgets, localization…). While I can’t call myself experienced in DevExtreme it will be definitely my first choice for new projects.