Cafe con Leche News Sunday, January 8, 2006

XML News from Sunday, January 8, 2006

The W3C Mobile Web Initiative Best Practices Working Group has published a note on Scope of Mobile Web Best Practices and the second public working draft of Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0. According to the abstract of Scope of Mobile Web Best Practices:

Web access from mobile devices suffers from problems that make the Web unattractive for most mobile users. W3C's Mobile Web Initiative (MWI ) proposes to address these issues through a concerted effort of key players in the mobile value chain, including authoring tool vendors, content providers, handset manufacturers, browser vendors and mobile operators.

To help frame the development of "best practices" for the mobile Web this document - created by the members of the Mobile Web Initiative Best Practices Working Group ( BPWG) as an elaboration of its charter - identifies the nature of problems to be solved, outlines the scope of work to be undertaken and specifies the assumptions regarding the target audience and the anticipated deliverables.

Most of the actual practices suggested make sense, though I take issue with a couple. They are as follows:

[CONTEXT] Take all reasonable steps to find out about the device/browser (client) capabilities, adaptation and other transformation that takes place for any instance of an access to a resource. (Informative)

[CAPABILITIES] Exploit device capabilities. Do not take a least common denominator approach. (Informative)

[DEFICIENCIES] Take reasonable steps to work around deficient implementations. (Informative)

[TESTING] Carry out testing on actual devices as well as emulators. (Informative)

[URIS] Keep the URIs of site entry points short. (informative)

[NAVBAR] Provide minimal navigation at the top of the page. (Informative)

[BALANCE] Design the service with a broadly balanced navigation tree where numbers of links on pages is balanced against depth of navigation. (Informative)

[THEMATIC_CONSISTENCY] Ensure that links provide a thematically coherent experience when accessed from a device other than the one on which they were captured. (Informative)

[NAVIGATION] Use navigation mechanisms in a consistent manner. (Informative)

[ACCESS_KEYS] Assign access keys to links in navigational menus and frequently accessed functionality. (Normative)

[LINK_TARGET_ID] Clearly identify the target of each link. Use clear, concise, descriptive link text to help users decide whether to follow a link. Identify the implications of following a link if the target is notably large and the user might not anticipate this from the context. (Normative)

[LINK_TARGET_FORMAT] Note the target file's format unless you know the device supports it. (Normative)

[IMAGE_MAPS] Do not use image maps unless you know the target client supports them and has sufficient screen area and an appropriate means of selection, such as a stylus or navigation keys. When using image maps under these circumstances, use client side image maps unless the regions required cannot be described with an available geometric shape. (Normative)

[SERVER_SIDE_IMAGE_MAPS] Do not use a server side image map unless you know that the client provides a means of selection within the image map. (Normative)

[POP_UPS] Do not cause pop-ups or other windows to appear and do not change the current window without informing the user. (Normative)

[AUTO_REFRESH] Do not create periodically auto-refreshing pages, unless you have informed the user and provided a means of stopping it. (Normative)

[REDIRECTION] Do not use markup to redirect pages automatically. Instead, configure the server to perform redirects by means of HTTP 3xx codes. (Normative)

[SUITABLE] Ensure that content is suitable for use in a mobile context. (Informative)

[CLARITY] Use the clearest and simplest language appropriate for a site's content. (Informative)

[LIMITED] Limit content to what the user has requested. (Informative)

[PAGE_SIZE_USABLE] Divide pages into usable but limited size portions. (Normative)

[PAGE_SIZE_LIMIT] Ensure that the overall size of page is appropriate to bandwidth, the memory limitations of the device and other device and delivery channel characteristics if they can be determined. (Normative)

[SCROLLING] Limit scrolling to one direction, unless secondary scrolling cannot be avoided. (Normative)

[SCROLLING_LIMIT] Limit secondary scrolling to objects that require it, where it cannot be avoided. (Normative)

[CENTRAL_MEANING] Ensure that material that is central to the meaning of the page precedes material that is not. (Normative)

[GRAPHICS_FOR_SPACING] Do not use graphics for spacing. (Normative)

[LARGE_GRAPHICS] Do not use large graphics. (Normative)

[USE_OF_COLOR] Ensure that information conveyed with color is also available without color. (Normative)

[COLOR_CONTRAST] Ensure that foreground and background color combinations provide sufficient contrast. (Normative)

[BACKGROUND_IMAGE_SUPPORT] Do not use background images unless you know the device supports them. (Normative)

[BACKGROUND_IMAGE_READABILITY] When using background images make sure that content remains readable on the device. (Normative)

[PAGE_TITLE] Provide a short but descriptive page title. (Normative)

[NO_FRAMES] Do not use frames. (Normative)

[STRUCTURE] Ensure that perceivable structures within the content can be programmatically determined. (informative)

[TABLES_SUPPORT] Do not use tables unless the client is known to support them. Do not use multi-layer tables. (Normative)

[TABLES_LAYOUT] Do not use tables for layout. (Normative)

[TABLES_ALTERNATIVES] Where possible, use an alternative to tabular presentation. (Informative)

[NON-TEXT_ALTERNATIVES] Provide textual alternatives for non-text elements. (Normative)

[OBJECTS_OR_SCRIPT] Do not embed objects or script in pages unless you know the device supports them. (Normative)

[IMAGES_SPECIFY_SIZE] Always specify the size of images in markup. (Normative)

[IMAGES_RESIZING] Resize images at the server. (Normative)

[VALID_MARKUP] Create documents that validate to published formal grammars. (Normative)

[MEASURES] Do not use pixel measures and do not use absolute units in markup language attribute values and style sheet property values. (Normative)

[STYLE_SHEETS_USE] Use style sheets to control layout and presentation, unless the device is known not to support them. (Normative)

[STYLE_SHEETS_SUPPORT] Organize documents so that they may be read without style sheets. (Normative)

[STYLE_SHEETS_SIZE] Keep style sheets as small as possible. (Normative)

[MINIMIZE] Use terse efficient markup. (Normative)

[CONTENT_FORMAT_SUPPORT] Send content in a format that is known to be supported by the device. (Normative)

[CONTENT_FORMAT_PREFERRED] Where possible send content in a client's preferred format. (Normative)

[CHARACTER_ENCODING_SUPPORT] Ensure that content is encoded using a character encoding that is known to be supported by the target device. (Normative)

[CHARACTER_ENCODING_USE] Indicate in the response the character encoding being used. (Normative)

[ERROR_MESSAGES] Provide informative error messages, and a means of navigating away from an error message back to useful information. (Normative)

[COOKIES] Do not use cookies unless you know the device supports them. (Normative)

[CACHING] Attach caching information to the content. (Normative)

[MINIMIZE_KEYSTROKES] Keep the number of keystrokes to a minimum. (Informative)

[AVOID_FREE_TEXT] Avoid free text entry where possible. (Normative)

[PROVIDE_DEFAULTS] Provide pre-selected default values where possible. (Normative)

[DEFAULT_INPUT_MODE] Specify a default text entry mode, language and/or input format, if the target device is known to support it. (Normative)

[TAB_ORDER] Create a logical tab order through links, form controls and objects. (Normative)

[CONTROL_LABELLING] Label all controls appropriately. Explicitly associate labels with controls where the device supports this. Position labels relative to controls appropriately. (Normative)