New project, general questions:

[Ben van Jaarsveld]

Hi guys... SO I have been developing only for a short while now and ran into many problems...
I want to create a mobile application and I have some general questions please.. please answer my questions to help me with my research and making the right decisions:

What I would like to accomplish:

I would like to create an application( for user 1) that does the following:
1)store information likes, name, surname, tel number etc in a database
2) take other information and create pdf documents.
3) store photos(only a couple, about 6)

I would like to create a second application (for user 2) that does this:
1) store location at curtain times
2) and give access to the created documents from user 1

I only would like the UI on the phone(gathering the information) then store and do all the processing on the server.
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Problems:
I was using android studio and developed in Java, I used Firebase database and storage. The applications was too big: 100MB +. The application updated to many times to Firebase and the costs would be astronomical.
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Questions:

1) What IDE would be best to accomplish what I need. I know Android Studio and am busy playing around with Eclipse, but what would you recommend?

2) What language would be best to use for what I need? I studied Java but have done some work (very basic) in HTML, CSS and C#.

3) would it be possible to code in Java and send to a server and process in another language? What would be the best?

4) What would be the best database, storage and servers to use?


Thanks a lot for the help...

[Stephan van Hulst]

Ben van Jaarsveld wrote:1) What IDE would be best to accomplish what I need. I know Android Studio and am busy playing around with Eclipse, but what would you recommend?

Whatever you are most comfortable with.

2) What language would be best to use for what I need? I studied Java but have done some work (very basic) in HTML, CSS and C#.

If you want to make an app with native controls, I recommend Java or Kotlin. If you want to make an application that runs in the browser, HTML, CSS and JavaScript are the ticket, although I recommend using a language that transpiles to JavaScript, such as ES6, rather than using JavaScript directly.

3) would it be possible to code in Java and send to a server and process in another language? What would be the best?

Yes it's possible. For instance, you can write the client in Java and the server in ASP.NET MVC. Use whatever you're most comfortable with.

4) What would be the best database, storage and servers to use?

Again, whatever you are most comfortable with. But for local development and testing you shouldn't use a paid service but instead set up your own database. You can easily do this with a package like SQLite. Host a more advanced DBMS or user a paid service when you go live.

[Tim Moores]

Oh boy, that's a bunch of questions that each on its own can lead to lengthy discussions. Let me pick out a few in no particular order.

The applications was too big: 100MB +.

Not sure what's going on, but since the functionality that's part of the app is so little, the app should be quite small. Well under 10MB, I'd say, and possibly much less.

What IDE would be best to accomplish what I need. I know Android Studio and am busy playing around with Eclipse, but what would you recommend?

Both are OK - go with what you already know. Android Studio is sort of the default choice, as it gets updated much faster to work with new Android versions and capabilities.

What language would be best to use for what I need? I studied Java but have done some work (very basic) in HTML, CSS and C#.

Java (or Kotlin) is the language of choice for Android. HTML/CSS/JavaScript is an option if you know JavaScript well, but it's an approach most often used for cross-platform apps (these days that basically means Android and iOS). If you only want to build for Android, it doesn't add much (and comes with its own set of limitations). ReactNative is interesting in this space. If you don't mind programming in Dart, check out Flutter. Both of these work cross-platform.

would it be possible to code in Java and send to a server and process in another language? What would be the best?

The server is independent from the client, so you can use whatever you want there. What might be "best" depends on so many things we don't know that we can't make recommendation. Since you already know Java, a Java web app accessed via a REST interface from the app would be one option.

What would be the best database, storage and servers to use?

Same again - we know nothing about your existing setup, knowledge, budget etc. so that we can't make a recommendation. From what little you said it certainly sounds as if the common open source DBs like MYSQL or PostgreSQL would be up to the job.