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CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCING THE MOBILE WEB
One fi nal point is arguably more important than all of these, and it ’ s one that sows the seeds for
you to be able to really explore the possibility of the mobile web: The mobile phone is so much more
than simply a piece of hardware upon which a lonely browser runs. Today ’ s mobile devices are truly
the Swiss Army knives of modern society: a phone, an address book, a calendar, a camera, a music
player, a compass, a messaging terminal, a game console, and now a web client.
Even if it simply results in ensuring that your business website has a click - to - call link with your
telephone number (so the user can dial you straight from the page), keeping this fact in mind is an
important step in crafting the shape of this new medium. Using geolocation; allowing social media
interactions with users ’ friends and contacts; uploading photos directly from a camera; building
web applications that respond to phone orientation, temperature, light levels — the list of ways in
which a mobile device could be a more capable web client than a desktop one is almost endless.
It ’ s true that this is still an area of much standardization work (privacy and security are important
considerations, of course). But what is truly exciting about the potential of the mobile web is that
you have barely glimpsed at the possibilities gained by aligning web - based services with the diverse
capabilities of these amazing little devices.
MOBILE WEB CONSIDERATIONS
What makes a good mobile website? This is an impossible question to answer, because design and
taste are always highly subjective matters. But certain considerations are worth bearing in mind
from the start, and these considerations will undoubtedly help you create positive user experiences
for your mobile users. You will explore these in more detail throughout this book, but let ’ s
summarize them here.
Recognizing Mobile Users
It should go without saying that the most important aspect to developing a mobile website is to
ensure that it is available and easy to reach! This sounds straightforward, of course, but it can
actually become relatively involved: It ’ s a fair assumption that existing site owners are very careful
to promote and use their current website URL consistently. If you want to create a separate site for
your mobile users, should it be a different URL? Should it appear on the same URL? If so, how does
the server or CMS know whether to present one type of site or another? How can you cater to user
choice and potentially let them switch back and forth between your desktop and mobile sites? How
can you publicize the (attractive) fact that the mobile site exists at all? And ensure that it is correctly
listed in search engines and directories?
There are glib answers to all these questions, but each has a level of subtly to it, and no matter which
technique you use for hosting, selecting, and publicizing your mobile presence, it is inevitable that
you will have to distinguish between mobile users and desktop users. In reality, this means detecting
between mobile and desktop browsers and then providing different sites or templates accordingly.
Users fi nd content in the strangest ways, and it remains the site owner ’ s responsibility to ensure that
the right type of experience is given to each type of user. You look at a number of techniques for
doing this, both in the general sense, but also for specifi c content management systems.
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