RE: Mobile phone capabilities list?

> You may not be aware of situations where laptops and PDAs use 
> wireless data but we are aware of plenty of developers 
> who worry about such things.

I am sure there are cases in vertical applications, but hardly in horizontal
applications for the wireless market. Connection speeds are typically an
implicit parameter of the application.
For vertical applications that may require this knowledge, the problem can
typically be solved with a tiny page that looks like:

Choose connection speed:
1 (GSM) 9.6 kbps
2 (GPRS)less than 30 kbps
3 High (ISDN, ADSL, LAN)
4 Not sure, please test

> You mention WAP markups. WAP is not restricted to WML as you 
>are probably aware but includes XHTML profile support.

I am perfectly aware of that. In fact I also invented a very popular
solution to the problem:

http://wurfl.sourceforge.net/java/tutorial.php

>. Laptops and PDAs also use such
>profiles and developers may wish to provide content targetted at these
>markup languages and devices and  device capabilities knowledge is
>important to have optimal matching of content to device.

exactly. Have you checked out WURFL? we have addressed and solved all of
this. 

>To me HTTP headers giving an indication of device capabilities, e.g.
>providing device type, URLs to appropriate profiles such as UAPROF etc. is
>a much more reliable way to achieve device capability 

It's not! this model has been failing egregiously along the way.
I lost track of how many developers have been complaining of how bad UAProf
is, yet I have *bever* heard a developer praise UAProf. Even one of the main
UAProf supporters criticizes UAProf and CC/PP's shortcomings:

http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/marbut/someQuestionsOnCCPP.htm

face reality, guys. Device profiling is too important to be left in the
hands of device manufacturers.

Luca
 

-----Original Message-----
From: Alastair Angwin [mailto:alastair_angwin@uk.ibm.com] 
Sent: 27 July 2005 10:56
To: Luca Passani
Cc: public-ddwg@w3.org; www-mobile@w3.org; www-mobile-request@w3.org
Subject: RE: Mobile phone capabilities list?





Luca
You may not be aware of situations where laptops and PDAs use wireless data
but we are aware of plenty of developers who worry about such things.
You mention WAP markups. WAP is not restricted to WML as you are probably
aware but includes XHTML profile support. Laptops and PDAs also use such
profiles and developers may wish to provide content targetted at these
markup languages and devices and  device capabilities knowledge is
important to have optimal matching of content to device.
Whether WURFL supports this case or not is separable issue.
To me HTTP headers giving an indication of device capabilities, e.g.
providing device type, URLs to appropriate profiles such as UAPROF etc. is
a much more reliable way to achieve device capability indication than the
IMEI which appears to only be useful in restricted cases, e.g. user agents
integrated with the device containing the IMEI and domains where the IMEI
is available


Alastair J Angwin,
Mail To :  IBM UK Laboratories,  Hursley Park, Winchester, Hampshire, SO21
2JN, UK
Tel: +44-(0)1962-816817 ... Fax: +44-(0)1962-819777 ...Mobile:
+44-(0)7703-128131
Email: Lotus Notes :  Alastair Angwin/UK/IBM  or ANGWIN@IBMGB
Internet :           alastair_angwin@uk.ibm.com
                                        angwin@uk.ibm.com
             External IEA : GBIBMX59@IBMMAIL


 

                      "Luca Passani"

                      <luca.passani@ope        To:
<public-ddwg@w3.org>, <www-mobile@w3.org>                                   
                      nwave.com>               cc:

                      Sent by:                 Subject:  RE: Mobile phone
capabilities list?                                         
                      www-mobile-reques

                      t@w3.org

 

 

                      27/07/2005 09:07

 









>As has been said ... the IMEI can be used to know about the radio device
>being used. But that does not assure knowledge of the client capabilities
>e.g. laptop / PDA with GPRS card.
>There is much more than is needed to be known.

Really? where does this requirement come from?

I have talked with hundreds of developers from very varied backgrounds
over the past few years, yet I can't recall a scenario where wireless
developers were going mad trying to identify if it was a laptop over a GPRS
connections they were trying to send an MMS too.

On the other hand, WURFL only covers WAP, markups, WAP Push, MMS, J2ME,
EMS, ringtones, usability, wallpapers and streaming. You may be aware of
other reasonably common scenarios outside of the domain of those
technologies.
In that case, I would really be curious to hear about them.

Also, I think there is a misunderstanding here. Some may find it useful to
use IMEI as a key to figure out device capabilities. This would be an extra
feature. Nobody ever said that this should be the only way. In most cases,
HTTP headers are much better for that purpose. IMEI is useful under a few
conditions:
- you have access to the IMEI code for the device of the subscriber you
want
to serve.
- you don't have an HTTP request coming from the device


Luca

Received on Wednesday, 27 July 2005 10:32:01 UTC