The internet is growing and people are continuously demanding greater speeds and accessibility making mobile devices more common. For some, being able to check email or update a personal status while waiting in queue or riding on the bus is an extremely effective use of time. With these advances, web designers have been forced to learn and adapt their websites and web applications to allow their users to access the content across all mediums.

When we start talking about the mobile web, a lot of different details start coming up: browsers, protocols, languages. As of today, I think it’s safe to say that most of the phones available have some form of html browser. Although they may still have a WAP browser, it is a dying breed.

Wireless Access Protocol (WAP) uses a very basic xml-based language, which integrates html and javascript elements and with no specific styling. Although it is simple to learn, it is nearly useless due to the fact that WAP 2.0 has been out for a while now and uses a completely different language: HTML MP (Mobile Profile). This encourages the mobile phone market to support full HTML browsers, which many of the larger suppliers already do.

Some key points to remember when designing for mobile devices are:

• The screen sizes are small and vary from device to device; providing that liquid layouts and relevant font sizes are usually best.
• Clean mark-up loads faster than messy mark-up, so code accordingly.
• Loading pages via AJAX can save bandwith, but remember to provide a reasonable way for users to trackback.
• Images should be used sparingly and should be converted to an appropriate size.

These tips should help to save on bandwidth costs for both yourself and the user, plus reduce the loading time, which on a mobile can seem forever. Mobile websites and web applications have huge potential and it is our job to make them reach their full potential.