Firefox for mobile

The first mobile phone version of the popular web browser Firefox is "days away" from launch, the head of the project has told the BBC.
The browser, codenamed Fennec, will initially be available for Nokia's N900 phone, followed by other handsets.
It is currently going through final testing and could be released before the end of the year, said Jay Sullivan at Mozilla, the group behind Firefox.
The open-source browser will be able to synchronise with the desktop version.
Software will mean that any web pages open in a user's desktop browser will automatically open in the mobile version.
"At the end of the working day you can walk away from your computer and keep on going on your phone," Mr Sullivan told the BBC.
"It encrypts all of the information and sends it back through the cloud between your desktop and mobile."
He said that providing there were no "show stoppers", the software could be available to download "within the year".
(Source: Telnic forum)

Original article / BBC:
Link:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8425906.stm

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Articles about Mobile Phone Usage

http://www.netbanker.com/mobile_banking/

Horoscope.mobi / Aquarius

Your dreams can lead you and your friends into the future, so don't hold back. Even if it seems as if you are being unrealistic, your imagination holds the keys to what's ahead. Instead of being restrained by practical considerations, share your visions as they appear to you. You can always modify them later on to bring them down to earth and make them real. Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Don't get confused: Only get the names!

If you would compare what the registry of the dot tel domain has done for its domain and community within the first year, and what other registries have done in their first year since the launch of their domain extension, than you might be able to conclude and see, that this is simply outstanding and extraordinary. And no other registry and community has made so much effort before, to develope and market its domain within the first year since launch.

I guess that marketing of a mobile domain, has to be done in a similar way a for example as it was done for the iPhone.

.Tel should look upon dot mobi (.mobi), as its brother, because, as far as I know, it is the only other mobile domain that exists. If you will, it is also early days for dot mobi. Wheras dot mobi offers nothing else, than its domain extension „.mobi“ (but which might be very fine, too), the dot tel domain does not only offer its domain extension „.tel“, but also a practical and useful interface, where you not need to have a website, or any hosting, which means, also, that you save money on webspace and the cost for hosting.

We got to learn from our "brother" (.mobi), about the good and the bad, about the pros and cons.
Despite all the negaive talk and the naysayers: Dot mobi is still there, alive, has a demand for it, and gets sometimes some very nice prices at auctions.

Furthermore: Same as with .tel, there are a lot of people who don't get, what .mobi is about, and why a registry had lauched it, and why it has a lot of companies that are backening it financially.
For many things, .mobi won't be able to be of much use, but in some other situations, it is the perfect solution.

Neither .mobi, nor .tel is probably the „one size fits all solution“. But it might fit, for you, or for him, or her. Just tell them about it, and why it might fit and suit them.

Personally, it think, you either have a love affaire with a name or/and extension, or you don't:
Some names with „.com“, or with „.mobi“ just look darn good. I am not sure, about if a name looks better, if it has „.tel“ instead of a country extension, etc., but it sure will feel darn good.

So that is where .tel will have to be good at: At providing a great feeling and experience.

As we all know: „.com“ stand for „commerce“, and „.mobi“ stands for „mobile device, or mobil phone“. But „.tel“?...: Can you go to your telephone, and use „.tel“? However, „.tel“ means „telecommunications“. But if there would be a person having no clue about the meaning of „.com“ he could think as well, that „.com“ meant „telecommunications“. Why not? Or should it be more like „.comm“ for „communications“? - Commerce, as well as communications start both with "com", and "com" could therefore also stand for (tele)communications, if it had not been promoted for the cause of (e-)commerce.

Anyway: „.tel“ might confuse some people with its extension, because they might not be able to figure out, for what „.tel“ is supposed to stand for.

It might be easier for them, if they get a chance to look at a .tel page.

You could even go so far, and say: Well, if you wan't to put it right, according to common sense, than „.mobi“ should look like the dot tel domain. Because „mobi“ stands for mobile and telecommunication.

Imagine, if „.tel“ had only its extension to offer, like „.mobi“...: People would have to develope a mobile version of their website, and change their „.com“ extension for a „.tel“ extension.
This might have even worked better than with the extension „.mobi“ (if .mobi was .tel, and .tel was .mobi).
- If the extension ".mobi" hadn't been already taken by a other registry, would of possibly Telnic chosen that extension for its interface, that was designed mainly for mobile purpose? Would that of made more sense, having the mobile and electronic business card named "company.mobi", instead of "company.tel"?

However, I think it is just important, that users know, for what „.mobi“ and „.tel“ stand for, and how they can be used in the most efficient way. So that it will then be up to them, to decide, if they could benefit from such a extension/domain, or not.

As we concluded: „.com“ or „.tel“ could quasi stand for anything (communications or telefon, etc.).
The strength of the „.mobi“ name might just be, that people are most likely to easily figure out, that the domain name with such a extension is for mobile devices. Maybe even soon, for smartbooks (smaller mini laptops, that are smaller than netbooks).

Why is „.tel“ not better named ".tele", or „.teleco“, or „.telecom“ (dot tele, or dot teleco, or dot telecom)? - Would there be less confusion? Is „.tel“ confusing?
„.Tel“ probably will mean nothing to the user, until he gets his hands on .tel, and realizes, how awsome this „.tel“ is.

With the registries themselfs, it is also a case fo "first com, first serve" (served by ICANN), because the extension ".com", as well as ".mobi" would of been perfect for the electronic business card that Telnic had launched a year ago. However, as soon as a extension is properly branded and marketed, it will work, no matter, if the extension makes sense, or not, for its cause and usage (see the dot com domain, after a period of twenty five years). Because ".com" could mean this, or that, or also that. Who thinks, every time he uses a ".com" that it means "commerce"? - The only thing they know, is that they can do business with that domain, and that it is not a non-profit website, like you can find under a domain name with the extension ".info", ".museum", etc.
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So, what is the message?:
We got to get people to know, for what the domain name extension ".tel" stands for, and they might want to take a look at it. Otherwhise they might say: "Why bother and do "try and error", and possible waste some time? After all: Isn't it ".mobi", that is for mobile phones? Is there something else, as well?" - Tell the world...
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But seriously, folks: The DotMobi registry and Telnic better make some sort of a deal..., becaus the one registry has the name, and the other one has great functions and features, and will have the looks (very soon).

It is not the first time, that two important companies have merged together, to be more successful, in hard economic times, and in a market with a lot of competition, etc. - All those mobile phone users, and the potential ones to come: We don't want to confuse them, but we want to give them something, that they can use, and that is easy to get and to use.

Merry Christmas!

Simple Tips About How To Develop A Mobile Version Of Your Site

Making a site mobile-friendly has nothing to do with whether it’s available at a .mobi address, and simply buying a .mobi domain won’t solve site owners’ problems

Emulators:
The thoughest task on mobile world is to deal with a lot of various devices which is exactly what an emulator does NOT do!

If there’s anything flakier and more inconsistent than the browsers in mobile handsets, it’s the emulators of those browsers. So slapping an emulator on a web page, then acting as if it not rendering a site correctly is proof somebody needs to buy a .mobi domain a little off base in concept. In reality, it’s actually even worse, since the .mobi emulator doesn’t call up the proper content on some sites that automatically serve correctly formatted content to mobile devices. This, of course, behooves .mobi by making the supposed problem it’s trying to solve appear more glaring — creating a view of the mobile internet that isn’t accurate, but better suits its marketing.

But try this:
Here are some simple tips about how to develop a mobile version of your site such as: choosing an URL address for your mobile site version, using a redirect script for mobile devices, designing a mobile-friendly layout using CSS and HTML and (if you are a WordPress user) using a free WordPress plugin to develop your mobile site quikly.

Choose an URL address for the mobile version of your site
First step is choosing an URL address for the mobile version of your site. You have some options, for example, you can create a folder (mobile) in the root of your site so your mobile version will be publishet at this URL: http://www.yoursite.com/mobile.
...or if you can add custom sub domains to your domain, you can use an url like thishttp://m.yoursite.com or http://mobile.yoursite.com which links to the folder mobile which will contain all files of your mobile site version.

Redirect script for mobile devices
The second step is creating a redirect script for mobile devices. It's not necessary, but it's useful to redirect automatically all traffic coming from mobile devices to the mobile version of your site. For more info about this topic take a look at the following links:

Redirect a mobile/PDA to a "lite homepage":
http://www.webmasterworld.com/forum45/260.htm

Redirecting visitors who visit a standard webpage to a mobile version:
http://studiohyperset.wordpress.com/2006/10/06/detecting-and-automatically-redirecting-website-visitors-who-visit-a-standard-webpage-website-on-mobile-handheld-wireless-pda-or-cel-cell-phone-devices-browsers-to-a-mobile-version-of-the-webpage-or-w/

...and in particular if you are a PHP, ASP programmer take a look here:

Device detection using PHP:
http://mobiforge.com/developing/story/lightweight-device-detection-php

Device detection using ASP:
http://mobiforge.com/developing/story/lightweight-device-detection-asp

If you know other interesting links, please add a comment :)


Simple page structure mobile-friendly
What is the better layout style for your mobile site version? I suggest you to use a typical one-column layout which is very popular for this kind of sites and make them more usable and readable for mobile users. YouTube, Facebook, Twitter , for example, use this layout one-column for their mobile versions:

http://img1.mobify.me/?url=http%3A%2F%2Flh5.ggpht.com%2Fantonio.lupetti%2FSIT2XpI2-RI%2FAAAAAAAABzA%2FPz4r0IzZWvI%2Fdevices3.png&h=195&w=234&max_h=234&max_w=234

Using this layout is a good practice but not a rule. In fact, if you surf the web using a mobile version of Internet Explorer, on Windows Mobile based devices, you can choose some layout options which the browser uses to "arrange" the content of the page to the device screen width (independently from the original page layout):

- Default, narrows content width to reduce horizontal scrolls
- One Column, forces all content to fit in a single column
- Desktop makes no change to the content (the site looks exactly how if you used a desktop version of IE)

But in general, the result can be bad if your site layout is too complex. To avoid this problem, you can think to spend a little bit of your time to design an optimized mobile version of your site using a more device-friendly one-coloumn layout how I illustrated in the following sections.



A proposal for your mobile site
If you have a blog, your mobile devices-friendly layout for your site can be something like this:

http://img5.mobify.me/?url=http%3A%2F%2Flh5.ggpht.com%2Fantonio.lupetti%2FSITe30ZRxFI%2FAAAAAAAAByw%2FTolR91VOFKM%2Fdevices1.png&h=250&w=234&max_h=234&max_w=234

...with the following elements: header, body and footer. Header contains the site logo, body contains your post (or a summary) and footer contains other info about your site.

HTML and CSS basic code
You can use Dreamweaver or your preferred editor to develop the code. HTML code is very simple and can be something like this:

http://woork.mobify.me/2008/07/tips-to-design-your-site-for-mobile.html


...and CSS code could be something like:



/* -- Reset default style -- */
body, h1, p{border:0; margin:0; padding:0;}
body{font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size:12px;}

/* ------------ */
/* HEADER */
#header{
padding:6px;
background:#444444;
}
/* PAGE BODY */
#page-body{padding:10px;}
h1{font-size:14px; font-weight:bold;}
h1 a:link, a:visited{color:#0033CC;}
.tag{font-size:12px; margin-bottom:20px;}
.tag a:link, .tag a:visited{color:#999999;}

/* FOOTER */
#footer{
padding:6px;
border-top:solid 1px #DEDEDE;
color:#999999;
font-size:11px;
}
#footer a:link, #footer a:visited{
color:#666666;
}



The result is something like this:

http://img2.mobify.me/?url=http%3A%2F%2Flh5.ggpht.com%2Fantonio.lupetti%2FSIUJLvqdwmI%2FAAAAAAAABzU%2FMNqn1t1ddxU%2Fmobile4.png&h=214&w=234&max_h=234&max_w=234

...naturally this is only a very basic proposal which you have to modify adding images, your logo, changing colors, font-family and add some lines of PHP, Coldfusion, ASP or other code to display dinamically all your post. For example with some lines of CSS code you can obtain a result like this:

http://img1.mobify.me/?url=http%3A%2F%2Flh6.ggpht.com%2Fantonio.lupetti%2FSIY9VvA15QI%2FAAAAAAAABzk%2FTxXNfy4XQ2o%2Fmobile7.png%3Fimgmax%3D512&h=249&w=234&max_h=234&max_w=234

You can also add a search field in the header of the page to help your readers to find quickly what they are looking for in your site. I also suggest to be simple and don't add useless element such as social network buttons (such as delicious tagometer or digg) or other widgets which use javascript. This is only a mobile version of your site and it have to be simple, usable and readable. Nothing else!

Issue with fonts using devices with Windows Mobile
If you use a mobile device with Windows Mobile, you don't have installed by default fonts like Arial, Verdana, Georgia... So to display correctly a web page you have to copy into your device some of the most used fonts in web design. Click on Explorer and copy from your PC (or also from your MAC) these fonts into the folder Windows > Fonts in your mobile device:

- Arial
- Verdana
- Georgia
- Trebouchet MS
- Times New Roman

WordPress Mobile Plugin
If you are a WordPress user, and you want develop your mobile site quickly, you can download WordPress Mobile Plugin, a free to download plug-in developed to make your blog mobile friendly.

Download Wordpress Mobile Plugin:
http://wordpressmobile.mobi/download.zip

It'all! For other suggests or to add interesting links about this topic please add a comment :)

Original source:
http://woork.mobify.me/2008/07/tips-to-design-your-site-for-mobile.html

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