Mobile Distillery, which specializes in software solutions for mobile application production and testing services, has announced the launch of Alembic, a web-based  device knowledge database and device characteristic search engine. The company says that Alembic offers the most comprehensive and widely tested insight into the behaviours and capabilities of the vast majority of mobile devices available on the market. The service will be previewed at CTIA Wireless 2008 in San Francisco from 10-12 September on the Mobile Distillery booth, No.129, in the Developer Pavilion on Level 1.
For developers, marketing and product managers, the sheer detail and accuracy of Alembic allows them to clearly understand their market potential and base their prototypes on tested data, Mobile Distillery says. It is now possible to identify which makes and models of mobile handsets their application could potentially work on before they write a single line of code, reducing the investment and production risks incurred for the development of mobile applications.
Based on a seven-year research and development effort and in-depth handset knowledge, Alembic includes the detailed characteristics, performances and behaviours of more than 1,000 Java handsets which are used by consumers and businesses today. More than 30 new devices are being added to Alembic every month on a worldwide basis, as new devices come to market.
Alembics query interface is designed to simplify searches based on multiple handset criteria. Its core data is the result of rigorous, industrial testing, with handsets tested for more than 1,000 individual characteristics, behaviours and performance benchmarks. These are then checked and verified by Mobile Distillerys dedicated integration teams. Developers simply select the different capabilities and features they plan to include in their applications such as Bluetooth, 3D graphics or GPS, and within a few seconds, Alembic generates a unique list of every device that is capable of supporting that particular feature set.
Developers can also work directly with Mobile Distillery to integrate their own specific device criteria. These new parameters are then included in Mobile Distillerys software and testing processes for future use.
A key feature of Alembic is that it is directly integrated into Mobile Distillerys automatic porting suite, Celsius. This allows developers, from a single interface, to search devices compatible with their application in one click for compilation. With Alembic, developers also know which device is supported by DeviceAnywheres testing solution, which provides developers with real-time interaction with handsets directly from their computer, enhancing the mobile application production workflow from prototyping to development through testing and backfilling.
For many companies, the cost of dealing with the hundreds of devices and thousands of configurations often means that their mobile applications never make it off the drawing board, says Mobile Distillery Co-Founder and CEO, Eric Lemarchal. With Alembic, for the first time, companies can base their development decision on accurate, verified information; this is like giving developers a personalized crystal ball to understand their market.
Alembic will be available in Q4, 2008. The stand-alone version of Alembic is available at 1,500 (1,200) on a monthly basis including ongoing updates relating to new devices, characteristics, behaviours and performances). For companies using the Celsius development and porting solution, key components of Alembic are already included within Celsius at no extra cost: a full Alembic license is available for an additional 500 on a monthly basis.