It's been a hectic few days - amidst the motorbike rides, the gardening, my re-discovery of Labview (which allows us to control motors and pumps on one side of the world fro the other) and starting my first social networking program (developing on facebook) I should be swamped for things to talk about!
Strange then, that the first thing that comes to mind is the recent launch of iPhone by Apple in the US. Given all of the hype, it was always bound to be popular and it's raised a few questions relevant to web development: Is it going to increase the number of people using mobile devices to access the internet and use all of the powerful online apps that are available today?
Because of the way we develop websites (and we are far from alone in this approach), by ensuring the websites are 'standards compliant', the move to mobile devices, such as the new Apple iPhone, your regular Nokia and PDAs (for exmaple), isn't a great leap. So it isn't be a case of redeveloping websites upon a mass-shift to higher mobile internet usage. In fact Vodafone's inclusive mobile internet is probably a bigger step in encouraging people to use the net on the move. The reason iPhone won't do this, as yet anyway, is that it won't support the 3G (fast mobile) network.
iPhone will e a success, despite it's price, simply because it is another style icon produced by the design machine that is Apple. The mobile phone internet will grow in usage anyway - and the sites we build are ready for it when it happens!
Labels: mobile internet, mobile web development, pHone, standards compliant web design, web design, web development