Posted by Alex Young
Thu, 07 Feb 2008
If you’ve created an XHTML Mobile Profile-based site, you might have wondered how well it works on a BlackBerry. Fortunately, RIM provide a BlackBerry simulator, so you don’t even need to own one to test your sites. They also provide an environment that allows you to simulate their web and email services, which ultimately means you can test your sites locally during development (rather than after deployment to a public server.) This environment is called the Mobile Data System, or BlackBerry MDS.
To set up a workable environment:
- Download the MDS environment and a simulator from here
- You’ll have to register for BlackBerry’s developer downloads
- Once you’ve installed both files, run MDS and then the simulator
- Using the simulator is slightly awkward: treat your mouse’s wheel like the BlackBerry trackball, pressing the wheel in to select items, or use the arrow keys and return. Press F9 instead of clicking the trackball’s button with the mouse
- You should now be able to connect to web sites in BlackBerry’s browser
There’s a few caveats, however:
- The MDS and the BlackBerry simulators require Windows, which makes life slightly awkward if you’re a Mac or Linux-based developer
- The MDS seems to raise Java exceptions when I connect to websites that use HTTP auth
- To avoid having to switch between the mouse and keyboard for input, keep a close eye on the bottom of the simulator window to see what keyboard shortcuts can be used for the BlackBerry’s buttons
On to web development. RIM provide a PDF that lists BlackBerry support for WML, WAP CSS and XHTML MP: Wireless Handheld Browser Content Developer Guide
A lot is covered in this guide, but you really need to get your sites in the simulator to get a feel for overall support.
BlackBerry’s browser presents a few difficulties when creating XHTML MP sites:
- Table, stylesheet and background images must be turned on in the browser’s options by the user
- Since the browser only supports WAP CSS, you can’t use such esoteric CSS properties as margin and display, rendering most sites slightly messy
- -wap-accesskey and accesskeys in general are ignored
The limitations of the BlackBerry browser are such that you might be left wondering if there’s a conspiracy at RIM to push developers off web services into developing applications that run on their OS, but you can still make workable XHTML MP sites if you’re not too worried branding or anything else that’s typically style-sheet dependent.
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Posted by Alex Young
Mon, 03 Dec 2007
Adobe’s Mobile and Devices Developer Center contains resources for Flash Lite and Device Central, and also features articles about the wider world of mobile development. If you purchased CS3 recently and wondered what use Device Central was, or want to get started with Flash Lite, this is probably a good place to start. Nokia also have Flash lite resources.
Device Central contains profiles for popular mobile devices, allowing you to check support for Flash, bitmap, video and web content. The “web” tab in particular is useful for mobile developers because it gives information on HTML, WML and XHTML version support.
Some popular devices are absent, for example iPhone, but Adobe publish device profile updates occasionally (which you have to register to download).
I’ve actually used Device Central to preview logos and other images used on my XHTML MP pages. Previewing logos straight from Illustrator on smaller screens (especially clamshell Nokias) helped me make some tough decisions, so it’s worth giving Device Central a go if you own CS3 and haven’t tried it yet.
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Posted by Alex Young
Wed, 28 Nov 2007
Drawing on Cameron Moll’s experiences developing for mobile devices, Mobile Web Design aims to unite mobile web design with web standards. It features facts, statistics and practical advice, and even includes sections on testing and promoting your mobile site.
Split across 9 chapters (just over 100 pages), Mobile Web Design is a concise guide to all the major issues facing developers and designers today. Statistics are included covering the penetration and growth of mobile devices, presumably targeted at anyone trying to sell the idea of mobile web development to their boss or clients. It also contains discussions of cultural topics beyond practical advice. I was particularly intrigued by the section on the concept of mobile itself:
Mobile, the user; not mobile, the device. Mobile is more than just being wireless.
Moll is very clear about the limitations of the mobile web, covering carrier issues and standards, and explains the unique opportunities presented by this technology. Getting developers to think along the right lines is discussed particularly well in the “PC nearsightedness” section, and these arguments are related to current issues including the iPhone and even the term “cell phone” itself.
In the chapter “Four Methods, Revisited”, Moll expands on his series of articles entitled Mobile Web Design: The Series. The four approaches discussed are: do nothing, reduce images and styling, use handheld style sheets and create mobile-optimised content. Each approach is illustrated with real world examples along with the advantages and disadvantages.
Our web applications (at Helicoid) use the fourth approach, where we create separate sites for mobile devices. We’ve learned the hard way about the issues and best practices relating to this. We’d have saved a lot of time had we been able to read Mobile Web Design beforehand, and our experiences closely follow Moll’s advice.
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Posted by Alex Young
Fri, 06 Jul 2007
Have you ever noticed how mobile services seem to follow an inverted Moore’s Law?
Moore’s Law states that the number of transistors in an integrated circuit doubles ever 18 months. Using this as a measurement you can predict the technological improvement in microchips.
Mobile services, however, got it right as soon as GSM landed. Making calls was easy, the clarity was good enough. Don’t feel like calling someone? Send an SMS instead!
Ever since then, mobile operators have been trying to recreate the incredible profitability of SMS and calls. The last few years have seen a lot of talk about micropayments, yet SMS was already there in the 90s. And more importantly, people wanted to pay for it.
Perhaps as a way to drive next generation services to a larger number of customers, Nokia, Siemens and Thomson recently announced plans to co-operate on “home 3G” through the consolidation of femtocell technology.
Access points integrating conventional wireless and residential 3G have already been announced. Yet as far as I’m aware, the fundamental practicalities have not been divulged: if I have a femtocell, will my phone automatically use it when I’m at home? Does that mean my calls will be routed through my broadband? Will this be a service provided by my mobile operator? Will it be cheap?
Meanwhile, mobile operators seem to see this as another way to deliver digital content instead of enhanced quality of service. “Home 3G” is cited as another way to sell music, TV and films. This could be a market of diminishing returns in the UK, irrespective of what statistics show about Japanese mobile music sales.
Such technology coupled with recent technological improvements in handsets makes me wonder about the future of the mobile web. The movement away from WML to XHTML MP was welcome, but slow. Meanwhile, devices like iPhone already have desktop-quality browsers.
Hopefully all we’ve learned creating mobile-friendly sites will continue to be built upon by taking the unique nature of mobile devices into account during the design process. Either that or customers will have to sit there zooming and scrolling with their touch screens, give up, and use their laptop instead.
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Posted by Alex Young
Thu, 03 May 2007
This will be of definite interest to people in the UK: Orange are going to be offering flat rate data plans. This could coincide nicely with the recent rapid growth of mobile social sites, since GPRS/3G (or even SMS) end up being restrictively expensive for regular use. Perhaps we’ll see a UK-based Twitter based on mobile web technology instead of SMS!
Meanwhile, I’ve been reading Johann Burkard’s mobile web posts. He’s been posting useful tips for mobile web developers over the last month.
If you’re writing about the mobile web, let us know so we can learn from you and share your links with our readers.
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