Re: ACTION-575 Techniques for Guidlines Document

Wow Jo, nice list :)

I think there is a lot to talk about here, so I have just picked a
couple and commented on them.

On 10/10/07, Jo Rabin <jrabin@mtld.mobi> wrote:
> 4. Add the real user agent as part of the massaged user agent string

This one I am not crazy about just because User Agent strings are a
mess already.  Trying to stuff more in there is probably not a good
idea.

> 5. Tasting of content with original header

Assuming I understand what you are suggesting, I generally like this
one.  In fact this is what I think is probably the best idea.  We
could issue a request that looks as much like what the original device
would have made as possible, then inspect the returned content.  If it
looks like non-mobile content, we can have our way with it, otherwise,
we'll pass it along.

Now if the server returns content akin to "go away, you're not using
LatestBrowser X on CoolestPlatform Y", we'd have to fire off a second
request with a spoofed User Agent.  We could record this fact
somewhere to reduce the round trips required for subsequent requests
(of course, this recorded value would have to be expired at some point
so as to allow a site to modify their behaviour).

> 7. Embed original HTTP headers as part of a multipart mime encoded
> elaboration of the request as a message/http part

Seems like a fairly large change that will break a lot of existing
mobile stuff.  It would be a complete solution though, for anyone who
cared enough to use the information.

> 22. Taste the content
> Look see if the headers indicate XHTML-MP, taste content looking for
> DOCTYPE

So I like this, as I said above, but more involved that just looking
at the DOCTYPE.  For a given request, we presumably have a pretty good
idea about what the device can actually handle, so we can transform
content in the response that we know it doesn't support, and pass the
rest through.  This way, a nicely done mobile site will be unmodified.

> 23. Look  for LINK elements

Worth noting that although this method has shortcomings, it is
somewhat widely deployed.

Aaron

Received on Sunday, 14 October 2007 19:56:48 UTC