Tag: Mobile Web

Community resources for the mobile

I wanted to recap a few valuable resources that developers can find on the web to help them start or improve their skills to produce sites for mobile devices.

My favourite, of course, is The Wireless FAQ, simply because of the time it took to bring it to a Wiki. I think it has done a big step ahead since that day and thanks to the wiki approach we have been able to add a number of resources about very important topics such as DRM, Video downloads, multimedia content delivery and more.

On the same track you might also want to check out the Techniques for the Best Practices, originally developed and maintained by the W3C. It’s another Wiki site and it’s about the Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0 that the group has produced. The Wiki was chosen because the group is looking for user contributions. If you are interested you should go, read, ask questions and add content, if you feel like willing to share with the W3C community.

A more specialized site, maintained by Barbara Ballard of little spring design inc, is Mobile User Interface Design Patterns. The title says it all, Barbara is a super-expert of User Interfaces for the mobile. She has already created a lot of valuable content and while it’s less technical from a certain point of view as compared to the other two sites, it actually provides great guidance about the general UI and presentation that you should use in your mobile site. Barbara’s Wiki is certainly something to read and put in practice in your mobile sites, maybe using some techniques suggested in the other 2 sites previously named.

The last site I wanted to remind to the community is mTLD‘s developers site. The site does not have a Wiki, but rather a forum, blogs and a few selected articles, all about the mobile. The site is relatively new and the administrators are working hard to provide more and more resources every day. It is obviously a different approach, the site aims to provide all the guidance and help to develop mobile sites, also linking to external resources, of course. It’s another great place to start from and to ask questions if there’s something you can’t do or is not clear. You can reach it at dev.mobi. The site can be visited both from your desktop computer or on the move.

Telefonica launches Opera browser

It must be clear to everyone that today I have more spare time. Meetings are done for today, all I need to do is go to eat and then I have a few hours free.

I took a chance to clear a bit of my backlog of things I wanted to post on the blog, then.

Via Marco Casario I found out the Telefónica Móviles has partenered with Opera to provide to their users a custom version of Opera and Opera Mini.
They are not the first ones and to me is another demonstration of the quality of the Opera browser and that a better user experience will lead more users on internet using their phone.

There’s a full Press release, of course: Telefónica selects Opera Mini and Opera Mobile to deliver the mobile Web.

More WURFL jobs

I have written in the past about a job posting in which WURFL was a reason of preference (you can read about it in WURFL means real money).

Now James Pearce, the new CTO of mTLD, has posted a message on the developers’ site blog. .mobi is seeking developers that know WURFL, that have experience with adaptation, mobile sites and have done something outstanding.

If you think you fit or are interested in working with .mobi, you should check out this post, Technical genius sought.

Opera Mini 3.0 – review

I did not even have the time to test Opera Mini 3.0 Beta that the full release is ready.
I have felt bad for complaining about the HTTP headers and not even give a shot to the full features. So here comes a little review.

Installation was smooth. I downloaded the MIDlet and installed. During the installation the client checked my internet connection and automatically picked the best one. It also generated keys for security.

Test #1: HTTP headers
I visited my test site at http://t.wurfl.com/ to grab some headers. I STRONGLY suggest the download from WAP, because as Mike Rowehl pointed out, the default browser’s user-agent will be store in an HTTP header.
These are the custom headers:

  • X-OperaMini-Features: advanced, download, camera, folding, inputhints
  • X-OperaMini-Phone-UA: SonyEricssonW810i/R4EA Browser/NetFront/3.3 Profile/MIDP-2.0 Configuration/CLDC-1.1
  • X-OperaMini-Phone: SonyEricsson # W810i

Test #2: Photo Blog
I wanted to upload a test image. Entered the Photo Blog link from the main page, took a picture of a nice flower… And discovered that the only supported blog is Opera’s! What a bad surprise. Reading from Opera Mini’s site: Now you can take images with your phone camera and upload them to any of your blogs, forums or e-mail blog right from Opera Mini.
Looking at the screenshots it’s clear they are uploading to Opera’s blogsite, but I thought that was just an example. I could not find any preference in the settings menu.
Reading on Opera Watch, they say you can post to myspace or other blogs. I am sorry I really could not find how to do it!

Test #3: my blog
The page looks very good. On top there’s a link to subscribe to the feed (read more to know about feeds support). All my articles are well readable and the ability to scroll up and down quickly with left and right joystick makes it very usable. Scrolling is smooth.
Images are rescaled and respect the proportions from the original layout. Just like on my desktop I can click on an image and zoom. Initially it fits the screen (little bit of vertical scrolling on big images, but that’s OK) and then I can zoom more to see the real image. I can also download the image.
All the right column of the blog is moved on the bottom of the articles. So I first need to scroll all the articles and then reach the right column. Not perfect, but probably the only possible solution on a small screen. Going through the “label cloud” and previous posts list is OK considering the high number of links. Again the ability to scroll up and down of one page is very helpful.

Test #3 bis: Tom Hume’s blog
Tom Hume‘s blog has a left column with links and images and then the articles on the right column. I wanted to see how Opera Mini would handle it.
The approach is very smart as I see Tom’s picture, a couple of other links and then all the articles. Links to Flikr and previous posts have been skipped totally. I don’t know if this is a feature or a bug, but works very well. I think it’s a feature! 😀

Test #4: slashdot
Slashdot works smoothly. I would add “as expected”. It provides a CSS for handhelds and the content is reduced to the minimum. There’s a form to login and then the articles.
I personally don’t like the layout, you can’t really understand that the title are not part of the article as they are rendered as normal links. A bit of background color would have made it much better on Opera Mini, but I guess the CSS is made to work on any mobile browser.
Reading an article means also loading all the comments. It gets very long. I think slashdot should have made it more efficient for a mobile device. Again, not Opera’s fault!

Test #5: searching with Google
Smooth and effective. Works like a charm.
I followed some random links and all worked nicely.

Test #6: Gmail
I went on http://www.gmail.com and logged in pretending to be a desktop computer. A big alert was on top of each page reminding me that standard HTML was being used. A link to move to the advanced AJAX version was available. Clicking would simply reload the same page.
The entire site was barely usable. Each page started with the left column of gmail, so mailboxes and labels. No contacts. Then the e-mails. It was crowded and mostly hard to read. I guess the mixture of the standard HTML interface and the small screen caused this. To read emails I had to scroll down about 3 pages.

Test #6 bis: Gmail mobile
When logging on the standard gmail I tagged the “remember me on this computer”. When accessing http://m.gmail.com I was logged in automatically.
The layout was much cleaner and simpler, of course. Navigating around was pretty easy and fast, of course.
Should be noted that I could not make the accesskeys work. Is this something that I need to discover in the online documentation?
Lists of links were all folded. Clicking on the + sign would open the list and I could pick the desired link. Quite nice feature. I am not convinced this is a usability advantage, but was nice to see it. Interesting. I will need more time using it to give a final judgment on this.

Text #7: RSS feeds
I tested my blog’s feed, of course. Clicking on the feed (always presented as the first link on top of the page) loads a page where you can see a first link that says “subscribe” and below the contents of the feed.
Subscribing brings you to the Feeds page. Feeds can be sorted alphabetically or by time.
In the Feeds page you see your subscriptions with a tiny icon, a title, and the number of unread news. Once you visit a feed all news are marked as read.

Overall results
The general user-experience is very good. I browsed a lot of sites and I could access all the information I needed very easily.
It is clear that some sites are more friendly and some others are harder to render.
No objects such as flash were rendered by the browser, but that’s OK too.
Browsing is fast and smooth and I really, really like the ability to scroll up and down quickly. Ebay is really ugly, but works. PlayDeep, an e-commerce site, works and I could place an order. Too bad that all the simple javascript in the page did not work at all. Every time a javascript event was supposed to happen I saw a big error message and the phone vibrated.
Sites that are providing a good CSS for handhelds clearly work better than other sites so thumbs up for the authors that took the time to draw a good stylesheet for small devices.
Memory does not seem to be an issue as it used to happen with old WAP browsers and sometimes still happens with some modern browsers.
Pop-up windows are managed OK. It is probably not clear to the user the difference between a normal link and a pop-up, but I also don’t see much advantage in notifying it as the browser only shows one page at a time.
I did not like that when picking something from a list (select element), the list is shown as a new page and when I pick the element the browser goes back to the web page. I would have liked the standard dropdown list like in all browsers. This is a feature that has also been present in the Openwave browsers for years. According to openwave this is a usability feature that helps the user pick the desired element more easily. I personally don’t like it and always feel strange when I click on a list and see an effect similar to opening a new page.

As an end-user I like the ability to automatically detect the best connection, but as a geek I would have liked to have a menu in the settings to change it and not a button to re-test. I want to be in control. 🙂
When loading pages a tag “Processing” appears at the bottom and then changes into “Loading” and shows the KB that are being downloaded. I know that “Processing” means that the Opera Mini-Proxy is downloading, analyzing and adapting the page, but it’s odd to see it on the client. It feels like the client is processing the page before having downloaded it. Just a small comment, this does NOT mean that the client is bad! Not at all!

Last thing is I would like to know what the “features” in the HTTP header are. I can guess that “camera” means I can take picutes and that download means I can download images. Is DRM supported? “inputhints” means that my phone supports T9 or does it mean that sites can use the format attribute? “advanced” means what?

How I did it
Tested with a Sony Ericsson W810i, running Opera Mini 3.0.
Mobile Operator is TIM, in Italy and using EDGE connectivity.
I will check my next bill to see how much this test costed me. Unfortunately the online service provided by TIM does not provide the detailed traffic.

Download from web: http://www.operamini.com/
Strongly suggested wireless download: http://mini.opera.com/

Want to see how it will look on your mobile? Look at the Opera Mini simulator.

Other Reviews:
Dan Appelquist: New Opera Mini Integrates Photo Blogging
Dominique Hazaël-Massieux: Off-line browsing on a mobile device
Helicoid’s mmm: Opera Mini 3
Mike Rowehl: Bloglines Mobile and Opera Mini 3

Volantis and Cingular

I just received the devCentral newsletter (sorry, no web version that I could find) from Cingular.

I read the annoucement of an agreement between the two companies that will allow authors to develop their sites using XDIME and Cingular will provide the gateway from Volantis to adapt the content to any mobile device. This is BIG news!

I am really looking forward to test the new WAP advantage (free subscription is required to read the news) solution by Cingular.

Opera Mini 3.0 Beta 2 is out

I meant to post this yesterday, but then Blogger had some problems and did not log me in. Now everything is ok, so here’s the post.

I read that Opera Mini 3.0 Beta 2 was out. I was just in the process of downloading and testing. I clicked on the ChangeLog page to discover the new features and fixes.

To my suprised I discovered that eventually Opera decided to re-introduce a parameter to recognize the device it’s running on. This was a hot topic on wmlprogramming as more than one developers and service providers did not know how to deliver contents to their users (don’t think only about ringtones, also consider images rescaled to best fit the screen, for example).
Users download and install Opera Mini because they want a better experience on WAP (and Mobile Web), developers work hard on their mobile sites to provide an optimized experience, but with the old Opera Mini this was not possible. This was certainly an issue.
From the service providers’ point of view it was a problem because they could not recognize the device as all were identified with the very same user-agent.
From the browser’s point of view it was a problem as Opera Mini should be able to manage the download, store it and manage the DRM if implemented. Not an easy issue.

I exchanged a few e-mails with my friends at Opera and they understood the problem. Talking is always good.

So Opera Mini 3.0 Beta 2 comes with a solution. Reading from the changelog:
# Added three new request headers, X-OperaMini-Phone, X-OperaMini-Phone-UA and X-OperaMini-Features

But wait… Let me think… Haven’t I seen this before? Something similar… Oh, YES! MS IEMobile! Now I remember! If you don’t, check out this other article I wrote before, new MS IEMobile user-agents.

I know Opera is for the open standards and is one of the most active companies in the W3C, but… this does not solve the problem for developers! Trying to read Opera’s mind in 3 points:

  • Opera is for open standards
  • Opera wants to be nice to developers
  • Opera wants sites to provide the same page to their browser as if it was a web browser and then the client will adapt

For these reasons they kept the user-agent unique for all devices, but added extra HTTP headers (respecting the standard, of course!). Nevertheless, this requires additional work from site developers aimed only at Opera Mini.

What are developers supposed to do? Install Opera Mini on EVERY device and check how the HTTP headers change to discover which device it is?

There MUST be a better solution.
A unified solution among all browser developers should be taken. I would suggest a solution around WURFL, of course, but if this is not possible, well, then even UAProf would be better.

3 introduces X-Series

I just received an e-mail to view the webcast about the new X-Series from 3.

Just 2 minutes later I read from Tom Hume that 3 might be going out of business in UK.

I don’t know if 3 will really be sold and if Vodafone will buy it, but I can tell you I’m really looking forward to see X-Series. In two words, it’s a flat free subscription to access internet services.
According to the site you will have your standard subscription, whatever you picked and you will add X-Series on top of it. You will be able to call with Skype, chat with Gtalk, Y!M and MSN, watch TV with Sling and browse the internet.
This is all VERY interesting. I wonder what the flat free is and if the internet will REALLY be open.
There are only 2 supported devices. 2 high-end devices from Nokia and SonyEricsson. Why is the device required? I am a bit scared that this is another big marketing announcement and then, when you read the details written in the back of the contract you discover that it’s a flat fee to chat over MSN and not for the whole internet.
I also wonder about Sling. How is it going to work in the other countries? What are Mr. Murdoch and SKY going to say about this?

Anyway, if I’m wrong and it’s open internet…. Count me in!

The service will be launched in UK next month and in the other countries in EU where 3 is present early next year.

On a similar trend, Vodafone Italia has launched “Vodafone Infinity Fastweb” (news item in Italian here) that lets you close your fixed line subscription, receive calls to your old number on your mobile, pay a lower rate when at home (even if you effectively receive the call on your mobile) and use a real aDSL connection for internet (and Skype, why not?).

TIM and Wind in Italy both have mobile and fixed lines, what are they doing?

mobile web, make your own standards

Two days ago I posted about MS IEMobile and commented about the features they promote that are not based on any standard, but only on their own ideas and technologies.

Thanks to Jérôme, I found a link on Six Apart that promotes an alternative way to advertize mobile versions of sites. Specifically of blogs (as that’s their very own business).

If you read the article down to the bottom of the page, you will discover that actually this “technology” was already agreed to become a standard!
So 5 guys get together, agree on something and HEY, that’s a standard!

I didn’t think it would be so easy to make a standard. I wonder what the W3C (I know they don’t make standards but recommendations, but what’s the difference?), IETF, ETSI and other organizations are here to do. 🙂

RSS feeds a-go-go

RSS feeds have been available for quite a while now.
As an old timer Opera user, I have always believed that setting a number (5-7) of homepages would bring me to the sites I visit most often. Then I would browse from there.

Lately RSS feeds are more and more common so I eventually decided to give it a try. I downloaded NetNewsWire (for Mac, of course!) and this was the beginning of the end. The software (unfortunately) includes a HIGH number of feeds. Of course I subscribed to a bunch of them PLUS all the pages I regularly visit. Now I have about 100 news to read every day and if I don’t read them regularly they GROW UP!
Now I’m addicted.

I have to say it’s pretty cool. Some sites offer the full news through the RSS, some other will give you a short description and then you may read the full news on their site. Both solution are cool to me.

It looks like many people likes this new way of staying informed… And probably I’m one of the last geeks to discover this “new technology”.
Anyway, going back to the wireless business, a couple of people already started to port this “new technology” to the people on the move.
Here are the links:
pixs.jp
www.ifeedyou.com

In my previous post I talked about Marcus. He’s the author of pics.jp.
Jérôme Chevillat is the author of Ifeedyou and uses wurfl for the multimarkup rendering.

Both services let you read the news title and the short descriptions, the problem arises when you need to read the full article. Maybe while you’re on the move you don’t need to read the entire article. Too lengthy texts might not be so comfortable to read on a normal device like my V3.