Wireless Technologies Explained. Bluetooth and WAP.

WAP

WAP allows service providers to separate the content and only send to the mobile handset the information the user needs. The possibilities of WAP are enormous. Basically, anything you can do on the Internet can now be accessed via your WAP cell phone.

WAP users wireless mark-up language (WML) – a browsing language similar to HTML that has been especially designed for devices with small displays. Based on the eXtensible Markup Language (XML), the WML language can be considered as a text-mainly, scaled down version of HTML – displayed without the complexities of handling fonts, tables, applets or client-side Javascript/VBScript. It provides navigational support, data input, hyperlinks, text and image presentation as well as forms. All the user needs is a WAP compliant, GSM phone.

The global symbol for mobile services is WWW:MMM. The symbol guarantees that the service or product is compliant with the Wireless Application Protocol. WAP is a license-free standard that enables users to access and browse the Internet from any WAP-enabled mobile device including cellular phone handsets and personal digital assistants (PDAs).

WAP users will not browse from web site to web site as they do now on the Internet. The technology is designed to take information from sites, reformat it and transmit it over the more limited bandwidth available on mobile networks.

A WAP server accesses origin www-servers and corporate information systems, adapting the content into a format for wireless communication. Where the Internet provides the information, GSM provides the messaging or the delivery mechanism.

WAP was initiated by the WAP forum, a non-profit industry association, developed to supply industry knowledge and monitor world standards for wireless information and telephony services on digital mobile phones and other wireless terminals. There are currently over 300 members.

Co-founded by Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola and Unwired Planet, the WAP forum organization represents over 90% of the global handset market and boasts carriers to more than 100 million subscribers, leading infrastructure providers, software developers and other organizations providing solutions for the mobile industry.

Cellular phone makers are now focusing on the development of open, generic software products and platforms based on the WAP standard in order to develop basic WAP-technology products, mobile solutions for corporations and end-user applications in selected segments.

Bluetooth

Bluetooth wireless technology allows for low-cost, short range radio links between mobile PCs, mobile phones and other portable devices. This means users will be able to connect a wider range of computing and telecommunications devices without cables.

Bluetooth is the code name for the radio chip developed by Ericsson, IBM, Nokia, Intel and Toshiba. Bluetooth-enabled devices contain a microchip transceiver that transmits and receives in a previously unused frequency band of 2.45 GHZ that is available globally. Its small size allows easy integration into a variety of devices with negligible power consumption at low cost.

Data updated on one device is transferred to all other devices automatically and seamlessly – no wires, no docking stations, no fuss. Bluetooth will also enable automatic synchronization of a desktop and mobile PC, PDA and a mobile phone. So, as soon as a user enters an office, the address list and calendar in the notebook could automatically be updated to agree with the one on the desktop, and vice versa.