Also crucial to making net access viable from mobile wireless devices is WAP, the Wireless Application Protocol. WAP is an open, global specification that empowers mobile users with wireless devices to easily access and interact with information and services instantly. It works with most wireless networks - including CDMA, Global System for Mobile Communications, Time Division Multiple Access and Mobitex - and is intended to cover a wide range of wireless devices, including mobile phones, pagers, two-way radios, smartphones and PDAs.

In detail

Technology
WAP embraces and extends the previously conceived and developed wireless data protocols. Phone.com created a version of the standard HTML designed specifically for effective and cost-effective information transfer across mobile networks. Wireless terminals incorporated a HDML (Handheld Device Markup Language) micro-broswer, and Phone.com's Handheld Device Transport Protocol (HDTP) then linked the terminal to the Internet or intranet where the information being requested resided . This technology was incorporated into WAP - and renamed using WAP-related acronyms

The WAP Device
The key utility on WAP devices will be the microbrowser, which will allow access to any WAP-supporting Web site. Content providers are expected to support WAP enthusiastically since, for a minimum of effort, the technology will provide them access to a huge untapped market of mobile customers. Consequently, there should be no lack of such sites. Indeed, WAP's WML (wireless markup language) uses the XML standard that is already widely used by current Web sites.

WML is designed to optimise Internet text data for delivery over limited-bandwidth wireless networks and onto small device screens. It is specifically devised to support one-hand navigation without a keyboard. WAP is scalable from two-line text displays up through graphic screens found on items such as smart phones and communicators. It also supports WMLScript. This is similar to JavaScript, but is designed to make minimal demands on system resources such as memory and CPU power. It is unlikely that WML will provide support for features such as colour, audio and video for a number years.

The process will operate as follows. Someone with a WAP-compliant phone uses the in-built microbrowser to make a request in WML. This request is passed to a WAP Gateway that then retrieves the information from an Internet server either in standard HTML format or preferably directly prepared for wireless terminals using WML. If the content being retrieved is in HTML format, a filter in the WAP Gateway may try to translate it into WML. The requested information is then sent from the WAP Gateway to the WAP client, using whatever mobile network bearer service is available and most appropriate.

Nokia and Ericsson have written their own microbrowsers; more than 20 other vendors license the UP.Browser developed by Phone.com (formerly Unwired Planet). Much of the impetus in this area has been European, with Symbian?s EPOC OS expected to run smart-phones.

The WAP Forum
The WAP Forum is the industry association responsible for driving the standard. Members represent over 90% of the global handset market, carriers with more than 100 million subscribers, leading infrastructure providers, software developers and other organisations providing solutions to the wireless industry. Major players include AT"T, Hewlett-Packard, IBM, Intel and Symbian and Microsoft.

Nokia was the first to market with a mobile phone featuring a WAP 1.1 microbrowser - released by the WAP Forum in June 1999 - with rival wireless phone manufacturers Ericsson, Motorola, and Qualcomm all plan to release WAP-enabled phones by mid-2000. WAP v1.1 has the same functionality as WAP v1.0 and has incorporated refinements and clarifications to better enable compliance and interoperability testing. It also includes modifications to ensure alignment with the World Wide Web Consortium's (W3C) upcoming XHTML specification.

Content providers will need to re-author their material into WML in order for a WAP microbrowser to use it. At the time of the Nokia 7110e's launch, typical WAP sites worked by presenting visitors with a series of text-based questions and options. Whilst somewhat limited, it is a mode of operation that works perfectly satisfactorily for the delivery of news, stock quotes, sports results and entertainment listings - along with directory, transport, ticketing and banking enquiries.




WAP - Wireless Application Protocol