MWABP: Comment from EXI working group

Dear participants of the Mobile Web Best Practices working group,

The review period for the Mobile Web Application Best Practices Proposed Recommendation is over. We received one comment sent on behalf of the EXI working group, available at:
  http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-bpwg-comments/2010OctDec/0000.html

We mention EXI as a possible alternative format in 3.4.1.2:
  http://www.w3.org/TR/2010/PR-mwabp-20101021/#bp-conserve-compress
  "alternative compression formats (such as EXI [EXI]) may also provide benefit."

EXI was precisely designed to alleviate some of the usual de-compression costs (e.g. the fact that "very small files generally do not benefit from compression", and the impact on the processor and battery) that are listed in the paragraph that follows. In short, the paragraph seems to suggest that the same costs apply to EXI.

I think that's an oversight which can be fixed with a minor editorial change, namely by moving the sentence mentioned above to the end of the section, slightly reworded to:

"When available, alternative compression formats (such as EXI [EXI]) that do not share some of the above impediments, may provide benefit."

This change would not delay the publication  of the Mobile Web Application Best Practices document as a W3C Recommendation.

Resolution of this last comment should be discussed in a final BPWG call, probably next Tuesday (heads-up email to follow).

Any other views? Do you agree with the proposed change?

Francois.

Received on Thursday, 25 November 2010 10:54:09 UTC