Web application development for mobile devices.

1. NETC 2010 – Auburn

2. Motorola DynaTAC 8000x
 LED display
 30 min. talk time
Only $3995.00
May 29, 2010 NC State University

3. Motorola DynaTAC 8000x
 LED display
 30 min. talk time
Only $3995.00 $8723.67
May 29, 2010 NC State University

4.  4.2B mobile devices vs. 1.3B PCs
 ~840M MD internet enabled
 2009 the NA web share rose 110%,
148% globally
 Forecast is 1.7B mobile web users
by 2013
The main or only access for many
Statistics from Vint Cerf, WWW 2010 and Quantcast.
May 29, 2010 NC State University

5. Many reasons contribute to the increase in use of
mobile devices on the Internet.
 Faster, better connectivity
 Better data plans
 Devices with larger, color displays
 Touch screens
 Better browsers (Webkit, Mozilla, Opera)
 Software designed specifically for MDs
May 29, 2010 NC State University

6.  Small, variable screen size and resolution
 Input is awkward
 Selection of items is often difficult
 Networks, even 3G, are slow and may cost
 Flash is white space
 Looking for a small amount of information
May 29, 2010 NC State University

7.  Use CSS for layout, not tables.
 Put important information near the top.
 Use images sparingly and make sure they are
optimized.
 Less is more.
 Use links like breadcrumbs to navigate your
site.
May 29, 2010 NC State University

8.  Meet the user need quickly
 Input is awkward, make it easy
 Show only essential information
 Breadcrumb trails vs. navigation
 Mobile friendly page layout
 Single column (Google, Yahoo, FB, Twitter)
 Clearly distinguish selected items
 Large icons for buttons
 Consistent layout
Acknowledgements: Abid Warsi, webcredible.co.uk (Oct. 2007), et al
May 29, 2010 NC State University

9. With smarter, better, mobile browsers is there a
reason to develop mobile sites?
Increase usability for the mobile user.
Mobile users were successful 64% of the time on
mobile sites compared to a 53% success rate for
standard websites (Jakob Nielsen, 2009).
May 29, 2010 NC State University

10. With smarter, better, mobile browsers is there a
reason to develop mobile sites?
Take advantage of specific capabilities of MDs, for
example:
- telephone
- navigation / location based services
- camera
May 29, 2010 NC State University

11. With smarter, better, mobile browsers is there a
reason to develop mobile sites?
A lot of the world only has access to the web via a
mobile device. Is your target audience or is a
new audience within this group?
May 29, 2010 NC State University

12. With smarter, better, mobile browsers is there a
reason to develop mobile sites?
Is location-sensitivity important to you? Are you
able to provide content or services that users
need “in the field?”
May 29, 2010 NC State University

13.  Make your current site mobile friendly
 Provide different functionality for MDs vs. PCs
 Create a site specific to MDs
May 29, 2010 NC State University

14.  Don’t reinvent the wheel
 Libraries to detect if and what type MD
 View source
 Initial testing in Safari, final testing on device
or http://www.opera.com/mobile/demo/
May 29, 2010 NC State University

15.  Principles of design for a mobile site are quite a
bit different than for a traditional web site.
 Simplify - Some sites can be made mobile
friendly with logical, semantic markup, a
different style sheet, and fluid design.
 You might decide you need to design a mobile
site to utilize a specific functionality of the
device.
May 29, 2010 NC State University

16.  With the explosion in usage of touch screen
phones and the iPad it becomes increasingly
harder to decide how to display content.
 The mobile market is growing rapidly, so if
possible, offer a choice.
May 29, 2010 NC State University

17.  MobiForge.com (ready.mobi – validator)
 Tips on Designing and Developing Mobile
Web http://journal.code4lib.org/articles/2055
 MIT Code:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/
mitmobileweb/
 Opera mini emulator:
http://www.opera.com/mobile/demo/
May 29, 2010 NC State University

18. http://m.ces.ncsu.edu
May 29, 2010 NC State University