Nexus One is not currently supported by the Mobile Device Browser File, which leads to the Nexus One being identified as a non mobile device.
I know the user agent, and the capabilities are pretty similar to other Android terminals. With this information, how do I patch the MDBF to have the N1 be recognized as a mobile device?
Regarding Mobile Device Browser File:
Quote: "Due to the organizational restructuring of the team that developed and supported the Mobile Device Browser file, we will no longer have the resources to support and update this CodePlex project. The team will be providing two more releases – one on the 27th July 2010 and the final release on the 24th August 2010."
not sure if it is helpful to you but you can check for Nexus in the user agent field returned by the browser.
Related
I'm starting some research on skype programming. Is there one technologie for skype plugins or are there multiple frameworks or apis?
I'd like to make a plugin where user from my database can communicate with each other (video, audio, chat) over skype without seeing each others' real skype id's - is it possible? (I guess yes, I tried skycandy a couple years ago and it was actually the same)
any hints for realization?
primary platform would be windows, but maybe android/ios as well (are mobile versions plugin enabled?)
Is skype a good choice for the requirements or is there a better solution for a small project without budget?
Skype offers an API for its Desktop clients, Desktop API and an SDK for you build your own client.
The Desktop API is in maintenance mode and doesn't support newer features in the client and has a number of known bugs.
SkypeKit is fully supported but doesn't currently support Multi Part Video, at the time of writing.
Neither of these technologies can be used on mobile devices, in the case of SkypeKit its specifically prohibited in the licence terms, and you may never obscure the sending or receiving parties Skype name as this is prohibited.
For additional info please see http://developer.Skype.com
Allen Smith
Community Manager
Skype Developer
I have no up to date mobile phone personally, and we don't have any in our team to allow us to test mobile versions of our ASP.Net websites.
We have now been asked to provide a mobile version of our website (which is a fairly busy site) but I have no means to check the mobile pages.
Any suggestions? Are there emulators or would it better to have the real thing?
It's always better to have the real thing, but if that's not an option, I have used a plugin for FireFox called "User Agent Switcher"
Another route you could go is to get the Android SDK and load up an emulator. It runs a full version of android, so you could open the browser from there (You could also change screen size/device type) - a little more heavy than the first solution, but potentially another route worth exploring.
You can use simulators/emulators - Android, iPhone etc.
Well Apple provide an iOS emulator, which you can download in the developers section of Apple's own website.
Outside of that, the only other testing environment I'm aware of is Ripple, which is a plugin for Chrome, designed to emulate a range of mobile devices. You can find that at: http://ripple.tinyhippos.com/.
As others have answered there is a lot of different tools to do the testing and that is all fine to a certain extent, for daily testing by developers and testers.
But with 15 years of testing behind me I would never let the site go untested with a few different real devices if the site is an important service - usually this can be done with "staff" phones at no cost if the cost is the problem. I would more or less say; can your company live with publishing a site out there and there might be a risk it won't work on some mobile platforms?
DeviceAnywhere is the tool that we have used a lot. It provides you access to numerous mobile devices using which you can test both apps and websites. They have placed several physical devices which you can see and operate remotely.
It is always better to test on real devices instead of emulators. During development phase, emulators are helpful but for final delivery it is best to test on real phones. Mobile web browsers may or may not support HTML,CSS,JS completely and their individual implementation could be different.
Market has added device compatibility check.Now we can check if an app will work on specific device, for exaple HTC mobile phone, Samsung Galaxy, etc.
What about developer's side: How can we build apps for specific devices only or restrict app for tablets only? How to do restriction in XML and code? It's probably some attribute in Manifest file.
Thanks
Here "Specifying Your Application's System API Requirements" ?
It seems that Market checks this out by itself.
I am creating mobile application in asp.net webform targeting IPhone, Android and blackberry. I am using JQuery-Mobile for the same.
Below is my first page I have developed with jquery-mobile.
I don't have iphone, android and blackberry. So my questions are:
Best Simulator I can use on windows XP/ Windows Server 2008 for Iphone, Andriod and Blackberry
Also, when I am running the application on the browser it is looking wierd. I mean textbox size, buttons. Is this the way it looks on normal webpage or it's my faulty design?
As I am developing application in asp.net, do I need to install latest browser which support HTML5 and CSS3 because below browser is IE7.
An old IE is not the best choice to test the capabilities of a HTML5+javascript framework...
For daily basis it's quite ok to use Firefox or any WebKit based browser (chrome, safari ...)
Emulators are very helpful, but to be sure your product works well you will probably need to give it a try on an actual device. I have already seen some reports of problems that show up only when working with the real device.
A team that I do some JQM stuff for has bought a cheap old ipod touch for testing. It's the most demanding apple product you can get. It has the oldest browser, causes most problems and is the slowest. Best choice! :)
Emulator for Android
Simulators for Blackberry
I'm sure Apple has one too - but I think you need to register as a iOS developer before you can get your hands on it. I believe using third-party iOS emulators is against Apple's policy.
I am working on a commercial web application that has a separate mobile browser version intended for the more capable devices (BlackBerry, iPhone, Android, etc). I don't want to do simple User Agent contains style logic and was looking at the various detection libraries. It seems like WURFL and Mobile Device Browser File are my best options.
The Mobile Device Browser File (MDBF) project at CodePlex exposes information through the Request.Browser property. Also, it has a Microsoft Public License (Ms-PL). Mobile Browser Detection in ASP.NET mentions "data for MDBF comes from WURFL" and Mix: Mobile Web Sites with ASP.NET MVC and the Mobile Browser Definition File confirms MBDF is "created from a database from many sources, including the popular WURFL mobile device capabilities database."
51degrees has a .NET Mobile API that uses the WURFL data files and also populates Request.Browser. It is licensed under the Mozilla Public License Version 1.1. and claims:
With the .NET Mobile API installed and
WURFL providing mobile device data,
these calls will return extremely
accurate data when compared to the
standard browser information provided
by Microsoft
Since the official WURLF .NET API is distributed with a GPL License, so it is a non-starter for my project.
WURFL ASP.NET Implementations compares ASP.NET implementations of WURFL, but this is over a year old (2009-01-16 - Article submitted) and doesn't mention the 51degrees API or MDBF.
Can I get any feedback on which library to use.
How often are these data files updated?
Is it better to use feature detection that user agent parsing?
Is an online service (e.g. Handset Detection) easier that update data files?
Any other useful input.
Regarding Mobile Device Browser File:
Quote: "Due to the organizational restructuring of the team that developed and supported the Mobile Device Browser file, we will no longer have the resources to support and update this CodePlex project. The team will be providing two more releases – one on the 27th July 2010 and the final release on the 24th August 2010."
So that I am not just the bearer of bad news...
We are planning on using:
Mobile Device Detection and Redirection
by 51 Degrees
Which has a really good example of:
How to Add the .NET Mobile API to an
Existing Web Site
Hope this helps.
The MDBF was updated fairly recently. If what you need is basic information it's probably better as it integrates nicely with your .NET framework.
Marg.Wurfl is definitely a good choice and integrates with .NET framework as well.
Both have an approach that is good for the old .NET style, not the MVC. In MVC you will have to do your own legwork.
You might also want to consider DeviceAtlas that has an API for .NET and has very good performance in .NET.
Specifically to your questions, WURFL is updated almost once a month, while AFAIK there are no planned updates for MDBF, they will release an update if and when they feel like it (yes, not very exciting).
You might use Javascript to detect features in modern browsers such as iPhone, Android and recent Nokias, but for all the rest, the User-Agent string is still the only real option, so I'd say it depends on your target market. You might want to create a super-simple version that works for all and an advanced version where you do feature detection.
I don't like the idea of online services, if you plan to have a high volume site. Once-a-month updates are OK, with commercial products like DeviceAtlas or Mobile Phone Wizards you can get more frequent updates.
DISCLAIMER: I used to work for dotMobi that created DeviceAtlas
The WURFL official .NET API has been released recently by ScientiaMobile--the WURFL people's newco. You can access it here: http://www.scientiamobile.com/site/page/view/downloads. However, it is subject to the AGPL license, which basically means you need to buy a commercial license to use the API in a commercial app, including a Web site. Raw data remains free.
A whitepaper showing how to integrate it with ASP.NET is: http://wurfl.sourceforge.net/dotNet.
I think WURFL has more capabilities and more active community, and it has more frecuently release than mdbf. But i have to say that microsoft is doing good work. You could look Marg.Wurfl, too.
And remember you can use GPL software in SaaS.
You can look Marg.Wurfl too,
As Dino mentioned, the WURFL API is distributed under AGPL, but also available under commercial licensing terms (this is called dual licensing, or also offering a GPL exception in FSF's parlance).
The wurfl.xml file is not longer considered raw data, though. Because of the creative work of keeping the data organized and groups, ScientiaMobile claims the copyright on the wurfl.xml file starting with version 2.2 and distributes it under certain conditions (notably, that the wurfl.xml file can only be used in connection with one of the standard APIs):
http://wurfl.sourceforge.net/licence.php
Acquiring a commercial license also delivers certain extra rights on the wurfl.xml file itself.