(10) Early Mobile Browsers

• Early mobile browsers weren't really Web browsers at all
• Mobile devices didn't have much computing power
  • Rendering full web pages wasn't possible
  • Special markup languages instead of HTML
• Mobile networks were slow
  • Mobile providers proprietary protocols optimized for mobile networks
• Content providers had to develop separate mobile sites and invest in special "gateway" servers CNN.com adapted for mobile [http://www.google.com/gwt/n?q=cnn.com&site=search&hl=en&lr=&c2coff=1&safe=off&mrestrict=xhtml&ct=res&cd=1&rd=1&u=www.cnn.com/]

(11) WAP Browser

(12) i-mode Browser

(13) Mobile Web Browsers

• As mobile devices got more powerful, proprietary markup languages were abandoned for HTML
• As mobile networks got faster, proprietary protocols were abandoned for HTTP
• Easier for content providers to adapt their content
• Improved interaction design reduced need for adaption
• Now we truly have a mobile Web
  • Still worthwhile to design mobile versions of sites

(14) Safari on iPhone

(15) Opera Mini Browser

(16) Mobile Browser Market Share

Quantcast, 2009 Mobile Web Trends Report [http://www.quantcast.com/docs/display/info/Mobile+Report]

(18) Mobile Apps

• Using a modern mobile web browser, users can browser ordinary web pages
• However, it may be desirable to adapt content for a mobile device
• For example, scrolling and zooming can be annoying on a mobile device
• Sites that expect a lot of mobile use may design a mobile application for accessing their content
• Two possibilities:
  • A web application built using HTML + CSS + Javascript
  • A native application built using a platform-specific toolkit

(19) Mobile Web Apps

• A mobile web application [Anatomy of an Advanced Web Application] is built using standard web technologies
  • HTML, CSS, Javascript
• Screen layout and interaction optimized for mobile
• Example: Gmail [http://gmail.com]
• Advantages:
  • Will work on any modern mobile browser
  • Easily updated
• Disadvantages:
  • Can't access native functionality
  • Limited offline use
  • Hard to charge for web applications

(20) Native Mobile Apps

• A native application is built using a platform-specific software develop kit, e.g.:
  • iPhone SDK [http://developer.apple.com/iphone/]
  • Android SDK [http://developer.android.com/]
• Interface is not built using Web technologies
• But still accessing the Web via HTTP:
  • Web Service APIs [Anatomy of an Advanced Web Application; Web Service APIs (1)]
  • Syndication Formats [Content Syndication (Atom & RSS); Syndication Formats (1)]
• Advantages:
  • Can use the full functionality of the phone
    • Camera, GPS, compass, accelerometer, etc.
  • Easier offline use
  • Make money!
• Disadvantages:
  • Harder to develop
  • Have to target a specific platform
  • Users have to install updates