W3C Issues Mobile Web Best Practices as Candidate Recommendation
Industry Leaders Encourage Developers to test Guidelines for "One Web" of Content
http://www.w3.org/ -- 27 June 2006 -- Today, W3C reached an important milestone toward its mission of making it as easy to use the Web on a mobile device as on a desktop computer. W3C has published Mobile Web Best Practices a Candidate Recommendation, an indication of broad consensus on the technical content of the document.
W3C now invites implementation experience from the community. Industry leaders are declaring their support for the guidelines, which explain how to develop Web sites that work on mobile devices. "There are many devices, but one Web," said Daniel Appelquist, chair of the Mobile Web Best Practices Working Group. "Practical guidelines on how to create content once that can be delivered to the plethora of devices saves developers and organizations time and money, and has the added benefit of not breaking the Web. "
W3C Distills Principles and Techniques for Efficient Delivery of Web Content
"Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0" condenses the experience of many mobile Web stakeholders into practical advice on creating content that will work well on mobile devices. Authors and other content producers can find instructions on how to create content that makes browsing convenient on mobile devices and avoids known pitfalls, such as pop-ups and page-scrolling.
Guidelines Checker and Techniques Wiki Available to Mobile Web Developers
W3C invites the designers of Web sites and content management systems to read the guidelines, make implementations, and test their results with the alpha version of a guidelines checker
In order to build a strong community of mobile Web developers, W3C has also launched a wiki to collect observations and suggestions on techniques and implementation experience of Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0.
Mobile Web Best Practices Enjoys Broad Industry and Consumer Support
"Mobile Web Best Practices 1.0" was developed by a Working Group that included representatives from 30 organizations: Afilias Limited, America Online, Inc. (AOL), ANEC European Association for the Co-ordination of Consumer Representation in Standardisation, Argo Interactive Ltd, AT&T, Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI), elmundo.es, Ericsson, France Telecom, Fundación CTIC (Centro Tecnológico para el Desarrollo en Asturias de las Tecnologías de la Información y la Comunicación), Fundación ONCE, Go Daddy.com, Google, Inc., Indus Net Technologies, International Webmasters Association / HTML Writers Guild (IWA-HWG), Internet Content Rating Association, Microsoft Corporation, dotMobi (mTLD Top Level Domain, Ltd.), Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, Openwave Systems Inc., Opera Software, Segala, Sevenval AG, T-Online International AG, The Boeing Company, TIM Italia SpA, University of Helsinki, Vodafone and Volantis Systems Ltd.
This work is part of the W3C Mobile Web Initiative, which is supported by nineteen MWI Sponsors, including key players in the mobile production chain: Afilias, Argogroup, Bango.net, dotMobi, Drutt Corporation, Ericsson, France Telecom, HP, Jataayu Software, MobileAware, Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, Opera Software, TIM Italia, RuleSpace, Segala, Sevenval, Vodafone, and Volantis.
About the World Wide Web Consortium [W3C]
The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an international consortium where Member organizations, a full-time staff, and the public work together to develop Web standards. W3C primarily pursues its mission through the creation of Web standards and guidelines designed to ensure long-term growth for the Web. Over 400 organizations are Members of the Consortium. W3C is jointly run by the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (MIT CSAIL) in the USA, the European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics (ERCIM) headquartered in France and Keio University in Japan, and has additional Offices worldwide. For more information see http://www.w3.org/
- Contact Americas, Australia --
- Janet Daly, <janet@w3.org>, +1.617.253.5884 or +1.617.253.2613
- Contact Europe, Africa and the Middle East --
- Marie-Claire Forgue, <mcf@w3.org>, +33.492.38.75.94
- Contact Asia --
- Yasuyuki Hirakawa <chibao@w3.org>, +81.466.49.1170
Testimonials for Mobile Web Best Practices
AOL | dotMobi | France Telecom | ICRA | Microsoft Corporation | Nokia Corporation | Opera Software | Segala | T-Online | Vodafone | Volantis
AOL
AOL is very pleased that the W3C has released these Mobile Web Best Practices Guidelines as a Candidate Recommendation. These guidelines are an important first step in improving the user experience of the Web from mobile devices. As a major provider of content and services on the Web, AOL intends to use these guidelines in our diverse portfolio of Web properties and services. We are looking forward to extending more of our Web content to mobile devices, and welcome W3C's timely initiatives in the mobile arena.
-- Barry Appelman Senior Vice-President and Chief Mobile and Web Strategist, AOLdotMobi
dotMobi is proud to support the W3C. We have been a long-standing supporter and contributor to W3C's Mobile Web initiative, and have even formalized this open and standards-based approach into our developer guides. We are thrilled to see that these guidelines are available to all developers and content providers. We believe W3C and their efforts bring closer a future where everyone can easily access and use the internet with only a mobile phone.
-- Neil Edwards, CEO, dotMobi, (mTLD, Top Level Domain, Ltd.) - the ICANN-appointed registry for the .mobi domainFrance Telecom
As an Integrated Operator that aims to provide consistent user experience across multiple networks and terminal devices, the France Telecom Group welcomes the release of the W3C Candidate Recommendation for Mobile Web Best Practices. As these guidelines facilitate the process of developing and delivering content that would be more accessible from mobile and other portable devices, they represent an important step towards creating new service opportunities and enabling more users to take advantage of the Web.
-- Christian Jacquenet, Director of Standardization – France TelecomICRA
ICRA has always been a champion of Best Practice on the Web,particularly with respect to the protection of minors. The developmentof the these Best Practices is clearly a step forward on what, forchildren, is the most essential gadget in the world – their mobilephone. ICRA is proud to have contributed to this effort andcongratulates W3C on today’s publication. It will prove highly useful aswe continue to develop our work for mobile.
-- Phil Archer, CTO, ICRAicrosoft Corp.
Microsoft Corp. is pleased to see the Mobile Web Best Practices become a W3C Candidate Recommendation. Committed to working with the industry to ensure the highest standards of mobile web software and services, Microsoft will continue its support of Mobile Web Best Practices by implementing the W3C Recommendation within its mobile services, and through joint ventures such as the Mobile Top Level Domain (".mobi").
-- Aron Holzman, Program Manager, Microsoft Corp.Nokia
Nokia believes the use of the Web via mobile browsers will be the next big step towards making information and content available globally to everybody, including billions of people for whom their mobile phone will be their first and only means of Internet access. To achieve this it is important to provide the Web community with the right set of tools to make it easier to deliver information and content in mobile-friendly way. Mobile Web Best Practices Candidate Recommendation is an important step towards this goal. Nokia congratulates W3C for this achievement.
-- Timo Ali-Vehmas, Vice President, Standardization and Industry Relations, Nokia CorporationOpera Software
Opera Software welcomes the publication of Best Practices for the Mobile Web as a Candidate Recommendation. The guidance it provides to authors will nicely complement the work of browser makers like Opera in bringing the full Web to anyone anywhere on any device. With the development of browsers like Opera mini making the mobile Web more accessible to more people than ever before, this publication is indeed timely.
While the best mobile browsers can provide a great internet experience for any content, it is more efficient and more effective when content has been designed to take account of basic design requirements, and these guidelines will help authors to ensure that their content works as well as possible on the entire internet. We look forward both to our own work implementing the Best Practices in our Web content, and to a large range of authors using them to improve the entire Web.
Segala
As an authority and global provider for Web accessibility and other Trustmarks, enabling and bringing trust to the Web through content labelling is our primary goal. Segala is proud to have participated in the creation of the Mobile Web Best Practices within the W3C's Mobile Web Initiative (MWI), and believes thattogether with the associated mobileOK Trustmark it will provide a key enabler in allowing mobile users to access the Web with confidence and in a trustworthy manner. Segala will launch a mobileOK certification programme once details of that portion of the MWI programme have been finalised.
-- Paul Walsh, CEO, SegalaT-Online
T-Online, the ISP of Deutsche Telekom AG, T-Com, is pleased to be part of the Mobile Web Best Practices Working Group and the Mobile Web Initiative.As one of the leading Internet Service Providers on the European Internet market, T-Online sees a growing need to harness the web's full potential by making it truly mobile. The Mobile Web Best Practices make it easier to answer our customers demand for a greater ability to access the same information both from desktop computers and web capable mobile devices with equal comfort. The Mobile Web Best Practices represent a major step forward in the continuing development of the World Wide Web.
-- Bernd Beimdick, AC Representative, Deutsche Telekom AG, T-ComVodafone
Vodafone is pleased to have participated in the development of the Mobile Web Best Practices. We have seen this development through to Candidate Recommendation stage with our chairmanship of the Mobile Web Best Practices working group and our sponsorship of the W3C Mobile Web Initiative. Vodafone believes these best practices will play an important role in the growth of the Mobile Web in concert with other standards and industry activity, such as the Mobile Top Level Domain.
-- Daniel Appelquist, Senior Technology Strategist, Vodafone GroupVolantis
Volantis applauds the initiatives by the W3C to document and standardise best practices in content mobilisation. Volantis is a leading advocate driving the industry to reduce the complexities for integrating the Internet & mobile communications in order to maximise the content quality experience for any device.
-- Rhys Lewis, Chief Scientist at Volantis and Chair of the W3C Device Independence Working Group