Mobile devices like BlackBerry and Pocket PC are becoming more and more popular. People are moving out of the office so they can become more productive.
As this trend continues, it becomes even more popular for the webmaster or business to have a website that is mobile friendly.
Better to retain those web users and maybe even get a few new ones in the process. Websites designed specifically for mobile devices do just that.
Why can’t mobile devices use the same website as PCs and Macs?
Well the main reason is that the pages are too big. Most websites are designed to be viewed with a resolution of 1024×768 or at least 800×600. Well, the BlackBerry 8730e has a resolution of 320×240. It is the equivalent of looking at a map through a pinhole.
Well, what do you need to do? We need to lower the resolution of the web page. Since we cannot expect 90% of your PC users to see a small website on their screen, we need to create a duplicate site.
There are some solutions, but the best in my opinion is to do it by hand. First, consider why someone would view your website from a mobile device. There are a few main reasons: 1.Searching for email address 2.Searching for phone number 3.Searching for location 4.They want to know more about your company
it’s okay. I’m getting ahead of myself here. That is why we must create a second website for mobile users. Most people go for the mobile.yourwebsite.com approach. I think creating a subdomain is probably the best and fastest way to deal with the situation.
Creating a subdomain for mobile devices on the Apache web server
If you are running your site on apache web server, you most likely have cpanel and in cpanel there is an icon / text to create subdomain. If this is the case, go there and follow those instructions. Then it will create a folder on your site like this. http://www.yoursite.com/mobile/ and when users access mobile.yoursite.com, the contents of the mobile folder will be displayed.
Create subdomain for mobile devices on the IIS server
Creating a subdomain on the IIS server is a bit more complicated than on Apache. First you must create a folder in the inetpub called mobile. Then you need to add a new website by right-clicking on My Computer and then on Manage and then on Services and then on IIS and then on Websites. Create a new website and name it Mobile Site, then make sure the Home Directory tab correctly displays the contents of the mobile folder. Then go to control panel and select network devices and right click on your network connection and go to properties. Then click on the advanced button and make sure the tab is under IP Settings. Add an IP address (a new one that is not the same as your other site’s) and then save all of that.
Now you need to NAT the incoming request for mail.yoursite.com to that internal IP address. I may have skipped a step or two, but I think I have all of that covered. If you have questions, just Google “Subdomain Configuration IIS Tutorial”
Now let’s go back to what we mentioned earlier, making some pages specifically for mobile device browsers. You need to create at least 4 different pages.
* Email directory
* Telephone directory
* Rental
* Upon
If your organization is not that big, you can probably zip the email / phone directory into a contact page.
These pages should be minimal. Minimal text, minimal tables, minimal images, etc. Also, NO FRAMES, NO JAVASCRIPT and NO FLASH as most mobile device browsers cannot read any of them.
Assuming everything hasn’t gone smoothly, you should have a mobile-friendly website that can be viewed by any user anywhere. Make sure to post a link on your homepage that links to the mobile page and deliver it to your customers as well.
