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What Do You Use WAP For?

Posted by Cliff on from the for-those-of-you-still-using-it dept.

FePe asks: "I have a Siemens M55 with WAP support, and I have experimented a little with it. I can search on Google, upload my own pages in WML (try this on your mobile phone, which isn't a WML page, but it works anyway), and also browse other small regular HTML pages. It seems to me that nearly nobody uses WAP these days, at least that's what my impression is, so I was wondering if Slashdot readers use WAP, if you use it at all?"

2 of 49 comments (clear)

  1. Expensive by BigZaphod · · Score: 4, Informative

    It costs me per kilobyte to use anything that accesses the web on my phone. So I don't. They can give me unlimited night and weekends to anywhere in the country, but if I try to access Google they try to take both my arms and one of my legs.

    This might explain why few people use WAP.... Use it once and after you get the bill you are no longer able to push the buttons on your phone...

    --
    Hexy - a strategy game for iPhone/iPod Touch
  2. Confusion about what WAP is by yelvington · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There seems to be some confusion about what WAP is (including in some modded-up postings).

    WAP is a family of protocols, documented here.

    WML is an obsolescent markup code that is part of the WAP family. It has been "replaced" by XHTML Mobile Profile in the sense that phone manufacturers recommend XHTML-MP as the forward path. It has not been replaced in many phones that are still in the active user base.

    Many people suggest that current Web standards (XHTML + CSS) mean there is no need for specialized support of handheld devices. This opinion generally is held by people who (a) do not actually use phone-based wireless browsers and (b) have not read the XHTML-MP standard and have not yet discovered that it might be nice to, for example, click and dial a phone number.