When to prefer Phonegap/Cordova API over Sencha Touch?

Question

I've read a lot about Sencha/Phonegap combination, but I still don't understand why would someone use Phonegap API call and not Sencha's, in which cases and what are the best practices?

Answer 1

You have two choices in terms of packaging your app. Sencha, or Phonegap/Cordova. To make your choice simple, Phonegap build or Cordova is the correct way to go as updates to OSes are responded to quicker, you won't have issues with iOS7 approval, and you have waaaaaaaay more plugins at your disposal. I will go so far as to say there is zero good reason for anyone to prefer sencha packaging over cordova now that cordova integration exists within Sencha's command line tool. Use this tutorial: http://docs.sencha.com/touch/2.3.0/#!/guide/cordova

Regardless of which one you choose, you can use Sencha's API to access the device's native features as this will auto-detect how you packaged the app. Or you can just call the plugins directly as described in the cordova docs.