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Editor's Corner
Mobile Web revisited
It looks like I hit a nerve with my column on mobile web standards. I don't think I can succinctly summarize all the comments I've received via email and on FierceDeveloper.com, but suffice to say that building mobile websites is a tough business and lots of very smart people disagree about the right approach.
I admit that I may have painted the Web standards debate with a broad brush, but that's because I don't think its worthwhile to argue the minutia of, say, whether or not mobile Web sites should use tables for layout. That's something that each author must decide for himself or herself. And, really, that's the point I was trying to make. There is no One True Way for delivering content over the Web and no universal standard to fall back on. The best advice I can give to developers is to read all the specification documents, read all the best practices, and test obsessively in as many different browsers as possible.
The idea of a device-independent "One Web" is an excellent, worthy goal, but in some ways I do believe it is Utopian (and GAP author Luca Passani and I aren't the only ones who think so). Generating 100% standards-compliant XHTML without browser adaptation is tough on the desktop and really tough when you factor in mobile browsers. As Jason Delport recently wrote, "the only sane choice for small development houses like ours is to follow what each group are saying, contribute wherever possible but ultimately stay loyal only to the end user... My more important concern should be that the code actually works, today, and in as many browsers as possible." Nobody wants a "content soup" solution, but if that's what works best today, it's certainly a valid option. - Eli
Useful mobile Web Developer resources:
- Guidelines and how-tos: W3C, Opera, dotMobi (pdf), GAP
- Document verification tools: ready.mobi, TAW mobileOK
- Misc. resources: Opera Mini in-browser simulator, WURFL
Comments
Posted by Paul Walsh | March 20, 2007 - 7:50pm
I think you should address the commentators on your original post before writing a new post.
Posted by Luca Passani | March 21, 2007 - 4:42am
Paul, I can't believe my eyes. You are given a chance to explain the world why One-Web is way more than just an excellent goal, and all you have to say is complaining that the editor did not comment on the 372 posts in the other thread?
OK, I'll get the ball rolling by explaining why one-web is *not* an excellent goal, but just a distraction for developers. Assuming you are not a hobbist or someone working for a non-profit organization, you'll need to create succesful mobile sites and services. In order to be succesful, users need to flock to your service, do it multiple times and spend a lot of time on it (that's fun time, not time while they get frustrated waiting for a page to finally appear).
In order to achieve this, you need to optimize for mobile. Consumers don't care if the service they are using is one-web-approved or not, anymore than you care if your TV remote control has parts manufactured in dublin or not.
So, one-web sucks. Can someone from BPWG be brave and tell us why one-web does not suck?
Luca
Posted by Paul Walsh | March 21, 2007 - 7:56am
I didn't realise the entire world was reading this ;)
Posted by Sean Owen | March 21, 2007 - 8:03pm
I share Eli's general concerns about "one web" -- lofty idea, maybe not practical at times.
But the issue here is not "one web" in general, but rather, what does it mean for mobile?
According to MWI's Best Practice "THEMATIC_CONSISTENCY", it means "if you're making a mobile site, and you have a web site, make sure they're not offering significantly different stuff." Regardless of what you think of "one web" in general, this modest proposal is hard to argue with.
I am not clear why Luca continues to mix these up! :)
Posted by Luca Passani | March 22, 2007 - 3:32am
> I am not clear why Luca continues to mix
> these up! :)
well, here is how THEMATIC COSISTENCY is described (first sentence):
http://www.w3.org/TR/mobile-bp/#tc
" This is a realization of the One Web (see 3.1 One Web) principle, whereby content should be accessible on a range of devices irrespective of differences in presentation capabilities and access mechanism."
If reading the BP document means "mixing things up", then I am guilty as charged.
> Regardless of what you think of "one web"
> in general, this modest proposal is hard
> to argue with.
Not really. In fact, I think I can argue with it pretty easily :)
THEMATIC CONSISTENCY is a pendolum. As far as developers go, it goes from being harmless (it can be totally ignored with no consequences) to being a real pain (it impacts an organization's business model pretty heavily) depending on how one interprets it.
If someone builds a web and a mobile site which are thematically inconsistent with one another for some interpretation of the TC practice, I am sure that this is the consequence of a company's business model, and not distraction (oops, I should have done a page that serves news, while my mobile site serves ringtones. Thank you, W3C!).
Of course, one possible interpretation (and I acknowledge it is not your interpretation, Sean) is that a site is declared by someone as non BP-compliant because a web browser cannot access it, because only some devices on some networks can access it, or because this or that device simply is not supported. This is where THEMATIC CONSISTENCY can turn up to be a real pain.
For the record, I asked insistently that this BP is dropped within BPWG, but there are obviously other interests involved which have nothing to do with actual industry needs.
Luca
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