WAP paves the way for m-commerce
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Because it works in already existing networks, WAP needs little modification in Web content and is easily available. Already, there are numerous companies providing e-commerce services through WAP around the world, and with the huge mobile telephone subscriber base, the potential for m-commerce is tremendous.
In the past half decade, the Internet has revolutionized the practice and procedure of trade, giving birth to the new world of e-commerce. Now people can buy or sell goods and services practically 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, if they have access to the Web. Vendors have been able to tap into markets that were impossible to reach due to remote geographic location. This "anywhere, anytime" technology has fueled the new economy. The mobile telephone is the obvious choice for m-commerce.
Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola, and NTT DoCoMo-as well as giants in banking, retail, and travel-are developing their mobile e-sites, including Amazon and Schwab. And these sites are all using WAP, which works with all major wireless networks-Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA), Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM), Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA), and Cellular Digital Packet Data (CDPD)-via circuit switched, packet, or short messaging service. The wireless networks can be built into any operating system, including Windows CE, Palm OS, Epoc, or JavaOS.
The Japanese mobile operator DoCoMo is the leader, with the first-mover advantage in bringing mobile Internet services to market by attracting 10 million subscribers to its I-mode service in less than one year. The Palm VII personal digital assistant (PDA) from Palm Computing can deliver wireless e-mail and information access service in the United States and the U.K. Most current mobile Internet services are based on the WAP standard. Microsoft, which came a bit late to the game, gave its grudging approval recently by redoing its cellular telephone browser for WAP.
In the business-to-business (B2B) environment, m-commerce can facilitate real-time mobile access to online exchanges, virtual communities, and auctions. Mobile workers such as sales reps, truck drivers, and service personnel will be able to use the mobile Internet. Medical doctors will be able to use their handheld PDAs to pull up patient information, information on available drugs and online ordering/scheduling of prescriptions, clinical tests, and other procedures. Unified messaging services will allow mobile workers to use a single device for all their communications and interactions; and ubiquitous computing will use online connections to communicate exception reports, performance problems, and errors to service personnel.
Most IT executives are still on the fence, whereas a few early adopters have settled on proprietary technologies. One example is a women's accessory company, Nine West, which has a non-WAP client/server solution for its field reps and buyers deployed into older Nokia 9000 cellular telephones. Developed by the Finnish company Celesta, it creates smart forms using Short Message Service (SMS) rather than going through an ISP. This solution has reportedly been profitable for Nine West because it alerts headquarters in real time, rather than through weekly batch files, when a store carrying its line needs to be restocked.
Although WAP has drawn a tremendous amount of attention in the business and technology sector, its huge popularity has also drawn criticism that leads one to think that WAP will not develop into a major force impacting business and life. According to David Rensin, CTO at handheld infrastructure developer Aether Systems in Owings Mills, MD, "WAP is dead."
Chief among his complaints is the necessity for rewriting the Web sites in WML for every device a WAP-enabled Web site is sent to. WML is used as a technique to get content from an HTML Web site using WAP onto small-screen devices. "You have to rewrite the same Web site for a four-line cell phone display and again for an eight-line display," says Rensin. "The problem [with WAP] is content. Redoing a Web page for multiple sites on different devices is a nightmare."
Handheld devices are more limited than desktop computers in several important ways. Their screens are small, able to display only a few lines of text, and they are often monochrome instead of color. Their input capabilities are limited to a few buttons or numbers, and entering data takes extra time. They have less processing power and memory to work with, their wireless network connections have less bandwidth, and they are slower than those of computers hard-wired to fast LANs.
Web applications are traditionally designed based on the assumption that visitors will have a desktop computer with a large screen and a mouse. A smart telephone can't display a large color graphic and doesn't have point-and-click navigation capabilities. As some analysts say, these limitations will hinder WAP as the choice for tomorrow's technology.
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