W3C Issues Standards for Mobile Web Applications
August 12, 2008 // Published as a news service by IHS
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) issued standards for mobile web applications.
W3C Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0 specifies practices for delivering web content to mobile devices.
The recommendations refer to delivered content and not to the processes by which it is created, nor to the devices or user agents to which it is delivered.
It is directed at creators, maintainers and operators of web sites.
Readers of the standard are expected to be familiar with the creation of web sites and to have a general familiarity with the technologies involved such as web servers and Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Readers are not expected to have a background in mobile-specific technologies.
W3C XHTML Basic 1.1 includes the minimal set of modules required to be an eXtensible Hypertext Markup Language (XHTML) host language document type and it includes images, forms, basic tables and object support.
It is designed for web clients that do not support the full set of XHTML features; for example, web clients such as mobile phones, personal digital assistants, pagers and set-top boxes. The W3C mobileOK checker (beta), when used with the W3C validator, is designed to help developers test mobile-friendly web content.
W3C XHTML Basic is designed as a common base that may be extended. The goal of the standard is to serve as a common language supported by various kinds of user agents.
According to Juniper Research, "the global market for Mobile Web 2.0 will be worth $22.4 billion in 2013, up from $5.5 billion currently."
Keeping pace with this trend, the Mobile Web Best Practices (MWBP) Working Group published the first draft of the next generation of guidelines, W3C Mobile Web Application Best Practices, aimed at mobile web applications.
While the "original" best practices document focused on traditional web browsing, the new guidelines will focus on the use of web applications and widgets for user interaction opportunities on mobile devices.
For example, mobile content providers might use web applications together with geolocation information to provide users with richer location-based services and interfaces, said the W3C.
W3C is also developing resources to help authors understand how to create content that is both mobile-friendly and accessible to people with disabilities.
A draft of W3C Relationship between Mobile Web Best Practices (MWBP) and Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) is jointly published by the Mobile Web Best Practices Working Group and the Web Accessibility Initiative Education & Outreach Working Group (EOWG).
Source: World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).