On 9/19/07, Andrew Gray <shimgray_at_gmail.com> wrote:
> Things like javascript
> can still mess up the browser, though - most catalogs don't have this
> sort of thing, thank goodness, but there's always a chance someone's
> being fancy with java ;-)
"Thank goodness", eh? :) It's thanks to JS that lots of hopeless web
pages at all *can* be viewed on mobile phones. Most mobile browsers
use JS directly to modify incoming HTTP to better deal with stuff.
This reminds me of a similar debate about "two-oh" technologies (and
I'm sorry for changing course a little here), and we need to be clear
about something ; there's two groups of web pages in this whole
fendangled 2.0 thing ;
1. Web pages that *rely* on JS is bad design. Web pages that are
unusable, regardless of JS or not, is bad design. Web pages that looks
boring or bad, is bad design. There's *lots* of these.
2. Web pages that don't rely on JS but use it for added functionality
is good design. Web pages that looks pretty are often good design. Web
pages that prioritise usability is good design. There's a slow
increase of these.
The former (1.) we obviously can do without, but the latter (2.) is
desperately missing from library systems. And I mean *desperately*.
Now, making 2. happen we need people who knows bucketloads about
cross-browser issues, JS (yes, all the lates tricks), CSS (and yes,
all the complicated cross-browser stuff, and including image
placements), usability, accessibility, HTTP / REST architecture
design, valid markup, XML and related technologies (and I mean using
XML for what it was designed to do as opposed to schema flaunting as
the library world is so famous for, I mean semantic data modeling, I
mean digging into xml:id, xlink:*, and integrated XPath/XQuery as part
of our technological future ways, etc.), application design
(higher-order designs), user-centered design (designing for librarians
is a path well-traversed and, even if functionally complete, sucks the
soul out of our end users), information architecture (designing
systems around information design instead of the normal other way
around). And that's just for some of the main developers. We also need
catalogers to pave the future path of meta data, librarians to extend
that data with specialist info, business and divisional people to
steer the *complete* ship away from coming ice-bergs, and leaders
across the board to *inspire* us to do so. *Inspire* us to be better.
*Inspire* us to make 2. relevant to the real world.
Anyway, sorry for the slight off-topic direction.
> The second class of mobile devices is people using a web interface on
> a lower-grade mobile phone with a data connection, which is a) more
> expensive; and b) substantially slower (think mid-1990s dialup). You
> really, really want a stripped-down service if you plan to have it
> accessible in this way, feeding plain text and links, and not much
> else.
I agree that WAP is dead, and that single band is dead. Carriers these
days make sure that both their networks are upgraded (dual/triple/quad
band, 3G, 2 1/2G, etc.) at the same time they keep mobiles that are
good for these networks cheap (ish). It won't take long for WAP to be
extinct (some say it already is). Already iPhone, Nokia, Sony, Samsung
and all the others have models coming out with dual/triplet/quad band,
3G, WiFo, loBand and such to make sure that any person under the age
of 30 will want whizzing web apps on their phones in less than 3 years
(my own estimate, of course :). Are we ready for 'em?
Alex
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Project Wrangler, SOA, Information Alchemist, UX, RESTafarian, Topic Maps
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Received on Thu Sep 20 2007 - 18:16:33 EDT