HTML, XHTML, and CSS Bible, Fourth Edition

Chapter 22. Creating Mobile Web Pages

IN THIS CHAPTER

• Understanding the evolution of Web mobility

• XHTML basic 1.1

• Mobile web development tools

As I've repeatedly pointed out, the Web and its technologies have grown up. Starting as a simple, text-only medium, the Web is now capable of delivering almost any kind of media. The underlying technologies, HTML and HTTP, have also evolved to better support this growth.

One inevitable side-effect of a popular delivery technology is the rapid adoption by other media devices. Today it isn't just Web browsers on PCs that access Web content and use Web-related technologies — devices such as mobile phones, mall kiosks, and even ATMs utilize the technology. However, many of these devices have limited resources and cannot make full use of HTML or display the same rich content that a dedicated PC browser can. As a result, if you intend to deliver content via one of these resource-constrained devices, you must limit the scope of your code appropriately.

This chapter covers XHTML Basic, a specification designed for smaller devices. It also covers some ancillary technologies that help deploy content to these devices.

Understanding the Evolution of Web Mobility

If you choose to develop Web content for mobile devices, it is important for you to understand the evolution of those devices and their relationship to the Web. This history is important because the mobile landscape is very different from that of the normal Web. The capabilities of mobile devices tend ...