carlos123

I am tentatively adding mobile website building to the list of services I can offer and am finding some interesting resources as I look to train myself on how to do this that I thought I would share with you all for what it is worth.

I came across this graph that shows in the US alone, over the period of 2010 - 2011, the Android browser had a 34% share of the market, compared to the other top 3, iPhone (27%) and Blackberry (17.3%).

Source: http://gs.statcounter.com/#mobile_br...012-201112-bar

I wasn't aware that Android had made such big market gains compared to the iPhone. If you are developing mobile websites do you mainly focus on Android and iPhone as the two top phones to make your site presentable on?

Carlos

Quentin

Yep Carlos that is pretty well the same today also.

Quentin

WillR

Carlos,

I try and follow as many of the official mobile web guidelines as possible so my sites will work across as many different devices as possible. Having said that it is almost impossible to physically test your phone on a large number of different mobile platforms so the three I ALWAYS make sure I test on are the Android, iPhone, and Blackberry.

I bought a cheap Android phone on eBay, I use my iPod Touch 4 for the iPhone Testing, and my main everyday phone is a Blackberry. This way I cover MOST bases.

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carlos123

Excellent input Will. Thanks very much.

That's what I wanted to know. I will focus on making sure any mobile sites I create look good on an Android, iPhone, and Blackberry then.

Carlos

egilchrist

Good stuff. I read this on LinkedIn as well.

WillR's take on using 3 different phones is interesting. I've always used the simulators. I also have a few friends with Blackberrys and iPhones that I'll check from time to time. Does anyone else use several different phones to check their mobile site designs?

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Jay Moreno

@egilchrist i have mentioned our mobile testbed a few times... if your serious about mobile web developement you have to test on real handsets... simulators and emulators whilst helpful really dont give you a 100% accurate picture of how they work or function although some like mobilizer will get you very close...

For the ultimate experience for iphone or Ipad emulation you will need xCode. But you will also need a Mac and a developer license. Thats what we use alongside their real counterparts.

MobiOne Studio ($100) for windows doesn't do a bad a job either and the lite version of Electricplum.com which is free is certainly worth having in your arsenal of testing tools...

I give MobiOne a +1 for simulating the iphone desktop but a -1 for displaying 3gp but not displaying video from youtube??? Go figure!!!

For the absolute closest experience to the Android devices you will need to install the Android SDK which for most will be beyond their technical ability... we don't currently use this as we use actual android handsets for testing instead.

We have used perfectomobile.com for online testing since they use a testbed of "real devices" - however it got expensive and we invested in our own testbed. But take advantage of their free trial... your first mobile sale should give you the funds to invest in purchasing your own little test bed of real mobile devices!

Currently we use:

For testing on smartphones
iPhone 3gs - For backwards compatibility - (this could easily be replaced with an iTouch 3)
iTouch 4 - For retina display testing
Samsung Captivate (is my day to day phone) - Uses Android 2.2 for backwards compatibility

For testing feature/non smart phones
Blackberry 8500 - For non webkit backwards compatibility

For testing absolute dumb phones!
Samsung T245G Flip Phone - For old school style testing

For testing tablets
ipad v1

The reason we don't always use the absolute latest Mobile operating systems is that its usually the case some features that work on the new versions won't necessarily work on the older counterparts and its unlikely that things that do work on an older OS wont work on the new OS. Hope that logic makes sense! lol

If it helps...

The Samsung flip phone was only $20 and non contract with Tracfone, we just top it up when we need access to the net. Most people wont have a need for this though - however we want to go the whole hog with our products and want them to work on the widest and broadest range of mobile devices... this is simply going the extra mile over and above whats really necessary... Why do we pain ourselves with this? I guess because we can and are purist when it comes to mobile...

The Blackberry we got used for $65 but you can get new ones from wallmart for around $90 - we have it on no contract and just use Wifi.

You can get android handsets non contract for around $100 just be sure to check they are WiFi compatible

iTouch are going to cost you $100+ and are obviously using Wifi to connect to the internet...

Hope that helps,

Jay