Just wondering if there is a point where html5 is enough and titanium is not needed?

I can't imagine anyone would go to Titanium first without having spent alot of time thinking on this. Here are the thoughts that landed me with Titanium over Sencha Touch.

What is in the vendors incentive in common HTML5 support for all phone features? I'd say 'not much'. How long will it be before market demand for standards override the vendors self-interest? I say at least 2 years. Can I avoid the lowest common denominator issue with HTML5? I lived through Windows OS vs. OS/2 when I tried to use wxWindows; we're all still living with IE; etc. History says that vendors have every reason to make a farce of standard support whilst interpreting them in different ways and adding unique features to their own platforms.

Say that I want my mobile app to record video today with HTML5. Will that work across multiple mobile platforms with a single code base? (It could -- I am pulling out an example that I have not researched out of thin air.) Let's say 'no' for arguments sake. With Titanium I can code in native modules to fill that gap. In fact I need to do that for streaming video support, which is in Android, but not yet in the Titanium layer over Android.

Or lets say that I want my code base to use some interesting Android Intent features, and do something else on the iPhone and Blackberry, while keeping most of my code the same. The odds of HTML5 supporting Android Intents seem pretty unfavorable to me. I can do that in custom code in Titanium, and keep a single code base for the rest of my app. The Titanium approach wins there as well. (Actually, if I recall recent source code commits correctly they are adding Intent support to Titanium now).

How about if I want to use the development skills I gain during mobile platfor development elsewhere? As you point out, HTML5 may have some issues running as a desktop app. But not only am I leveraging my Javascript skills across mobile, web site development, and the desktop, but JavaScript is a major contender to be the 'next big language' thanks to efforts such as Rhino. It is popping up in development environments and scriptable applications more and more. So I am leaving open the possibility that I am improving a skill set that has transferability to many problem domains. That's not anything to lightly dismiss. There are so many technologies out there that you have to pick which ones you learn very carefully to ensure they provide as large as possible a future marketplace for you to play in.

The only real concern I see is if Apple starts changing their TOS again to stop Titanium apps from being approved for their App Store. Other than that the Titanium approach seems to give the most options. I expect some of these arguments to lose power as the state of the technology changes, but they should hold true long enough to make Titanium an investment worth making today.

Now if you are only going to choose one mobile platform, the iPhone is the no-brainer option. It does not matter what you develop with then.

John S.

I been using phoneGap

It HTML 5 with a small native layer to provide stuff the HTML does not support.