Lingua Data

We look at a Web site on a browser and see text, graphics and links to other pages, but from the developers' perspective, it's a totally different world. They can visualize the same page in HTML, the universal language of the Web. Text is surrounded by formatting “tags” in brackets, identifying style attributes such as typeface, point size, color, margins and tables. Instead of images and links, HTML code gives the exact source of where they can be found on server pages. Pop-up windows and other interactive elements may appear as lines of JavaScript. At the top of the page are “metatags” that define the document type.

All of the information associated with a Web page can't be squeezed onto a wireless phone's small display. That's the main reason why members of the WAP Forum (www.wapforum.org) standardized WML. WML (and its predecessor hand-held device markup language developed by Openwave Systems) was designed by the industry for wireless use only. Because of a handset's reduced resolution and low memory capacity, WML offered a “bare bones” version of Web pages.

Maybe it was a bit too bare: Content lacked appeal and didn't look anything like the Web. In addition, developers considered it a pain and an expense to reconfigure their Web pages into a WML format. Two problems resulted: The amount of available WML content was limited, and subscribers weren't impressed with what they saw.

Different standards brought a gap between wireless and the Web that was wider than expected, said Anders Wästerlid, Ericsson (www.ericsson.com) director of systems, solutions and strategic business development for consumer products.

What to do? Change the language to become more like HTML. Version 2.0 of WAP (called WAP 2.0) will put WML on the back burner and instead use the basic form of extensible HTML. XHTML is practically the same as version 4.0 of HTML but based on XML rules. Coincidentally, wired Web developers also are planning to migrate to XML rules within an XHTML environment. The rules give developers more flexibility in designing what their Web pages will look like, depending on where they will be displayed.

“XHTML will improve the WAP experience,” said Becky Diercks, Cahners In-Stat Group (www.instat.com) director of wireless research. “We'll have one standard rather than several.”

All developers know HTML, so they can write wireless Web sites much easier. That settles the issue of limited content. The basic format strips out the unnecessary codes from XHTML but lets subsets of these elements be placed in “modules” for scripting, graphics and other applications. Different modules can be used with different wireless devices, but the content remains exactly the same. By using cascading style sheets, developers can customize how their pages are displayed on the Web or the phone. That takes care of the problem of unattractive sites.

This leads the way to the long-trumpeted convergence of the Internet and wireless, putting everyone on the same Web page.

“It makes more sense for a world to have interoper-ability between wireless and wireline,” said Rocky Daehler, Motorola (www.motorola.com) Personal Communications Sector director of strategy. “XHTML is a solution that can address both.”

However, XHTML comes with no-nonsense XML rules, which require precise document-type definitions at the top of the page, as well as additional tags.

“XML applies a set of rules that everyone follows to render content more consistently,” said Paul Chapple, Nokia (www.nokia.com) manager of U.S. business development. There may be a learning curve at first, but he insists that the WML experience proved that developers will learn new tricks.

XML also tells the HTML community to clean up its act. Many Web pages have become weighty with unnecessary code strewn about and tags stashed in the wrong place.

“This may be a wake-up call for sloppy Web developers,” said Ron Mandel, Openwave manager of developer services (www.openwave.com).

At first, XHTML might be hard to learn, and it doesn't realize a developer's dream of “write once, run anywhere.” XHTML content must be formatted for wireless devices, but it won't take as much effort as WML or HDML. Mandel said developers still need to think about how their content will be presented on a tiny screen.

So, the question is not whether developers will adopt XML rules for their Web sites but how many will — and when. Scott Goldman, former WAP Forum CEO, is convinced it'll happen quickly.

“Once they develop in XML-based languages, they'll never go back to HTML,” he said.

Brave New Wireless Web

The mastermind behind XHTML Basic is the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C; www.w3c.org). The standard was devised to give developers creative ways of expressing their ideas and to adapt their sites for alternate platforms (such as phones, PDAs, televisions, pagers and car-navigation systems). Masayasu Ishikawa, W3C HTML activity lead and one of the editors of the XHTML Basic specification, believes developers will run with XHTML just because it's easier than learning different languages.

“Even if they would have to prepare different versions to accommodate limitation of screen size and so on, they can still use the same format (XHTML) — no need to use different formats, and they can concentrate on actual content,” Ishikawa said.

Although WML is the de facto markup language for wireless Internet phones in most of the world, carriers in other countries currently use different formats.

“It's a pity,” Ishikawa said, “as most content formats in use are actually quite similar, and they don't really have to differ.”

But fortunately, each of Japan's carriers eventually will migrate to XHTML Basic, perhaps at the same time as WAP.

When AT&T Wireless Services (www.attws.com) and NTT DoCoMo launch i-mode in the United States next year, handset browsers will use XHTML Basic, not cHTML.

“We are proponents of the move to WAP-NG (WAP 2.0) and XHTML,” said Tom Trinneer, AT&T Wireless vice president of portal development.

“Ninety-nine percent of the cHTML content is in Japanese,” Goldman added. “That won't help AT&T much, especially compared to the 8 million-plus pages of WML content still readable on WAP 2.0 phones.”

The WAP Forum dictates that new browsers offer backward compatibility with WML pages.

Last March, Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola and dozens of other manufacturers and carriers announced their support for the standard. Trinneer said that within six months to a year after WAP 2.0 is ratified by WAP Forum members, handsets should begin appearing on store shelves.

Not too many XHTML pages will be written by them, but at least the browser will be ready for them and still will be able to display WML pages.

“We'll be seeing the plumbing (of XHTML) before we see the stuff coming through the plumbing,” Trinneer said. Legacy HTML sites will be around for years.

To read XHTML Basic and WML pages, existing WAP proxy gateways will receive an upgrade in software; devices will need browsers that can view both WML and XHTML Basic. But given these extra steps, will XHTML Basic microbrowsers get off the ground? Most manufacturers are certain of it.

“It will probably take some time and some money, but the driving force behind this is strong,” Ericsson's Wästerlid said. “It's the logical thing to do.”

Combined with high-speed data access over GPRS and cdma2000 1X networks, XHTML Basic sites may boost carriers' sagging wireless-Internet revenue streams. More content will be available, and it will look more pleasing.

Of course, a new markup language alone isn't the panacea for the wireless Internet's ills.

“It doesn't make a difference what the language is,” said Barney Dewey, an analyst with Andrew Seybold's Outlook (www.outlook4mobility.com). “The real issue is whether North America and Europe can deliver a business model to deliver information to wireless devices.”

Although nearly everyone thinks walking the road to convergence via XHTML is the right direction, that path won't necessarily lead a wireless-data revolution.

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Rikki Lee (rikkilee@wirelesslee.com) is an editorial consultant and freelance writer based in Highlands Ranch, CO.