MOBILE COMPUTER
Abstract: There is a tremendous amount of interest in developing mobile
enterprise computing applications, driven by recent advancements in mobile
technologies and standards, as well as an increasing mobile workforce
population. However, many enterprises are uncertain of the various options
they may have due to the emerging nature of mobile computing technologies.
Additionally, they are concerned about the integration of mobile technologies
with existing IT infrastructure and applications. In this paper, we propose a
methodology to help enterprises develop business strategies and architectures
for mobile computing. A generic mobile technical infrastructure is presented
to assist enterprises in evaluating and implementing mobile applications.
Software standards that may have major impacts on mobile technical
architectures and application development are discussed.
Finally, the
implications of the proposed methodology for mobile computing for
practitioners and researchers are discussed in the conclusion.
Keywords: Mobile computing; web services; mobile technical architecture;
business strategies, standards.
Biographical note: Minder Chen received a B.S. in Electrical Engineering
from National Taiwan University in 1977, an M.B.A. from National Chiao
Tung University in 1983, and a Ph.D. in MIS from the University of Arizona
in 1988. He is an Associate Professor of MIS and Decision Science in the
School of Management at George Mason University. His primary research
interests include Web services, electronic commerce, mobile computing,
knowledge management, business process reengineering, computer-aided
software engineering, and GDSS. He has published papers in Journal of
Management Information Systems, Database, Journal of Organizational
Computing, Expert Systems with Applications, IEEE Transactions on
Knowledge and Data Engineering, Journal of Small Group Research, Journal
of Computer Information Systems, International Journal of Human-Computer
Studies,IEEE Software, andIEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and
Cybernetics.
1
Emerging trends of mobile computing
The twenty-first century workforce is becoming increasingly mobile. A recent
IDC study predicted the number of mobile workers in the U.S. will rise from 92
million in 2001 to 105 million in 2006 while the non-mobile workforce will decline
by 2 million to 53.8 million by 2006 [Error! Reference source not found., Error!
Reference source not found.]. Therefore, two-thirds of U.S. employees will be
mobile workers by 2006. Mobile workers are defined in this study as workers who
spend more than 20% of their time away from theirs desks attending meetings,
traveling, or telecommuting from home.
Some players in the mobile computing market focus on consumer oriented
contents and service, such as ring-tones, MP3 music, and MMS [Error! Reference
source not found.].However, according to studies from IT research firms, 40% of
companies will use wireless technology for business applications by 2003, up from
just 5% in 1999 [Error! Reference source not found.].According to this trend, more
than 50% of companies have or will have wireless connectivity to corporate systems
by 2005. The aggressive deployment of mobile computing is in part driven by recent
advancements in mobile computing technologies and high payback for effective
application of mobile technologies.
Some studies show that the productivity of
mobile workers may be improved by 30% when proper mobile technologies are
deployed [10].
The abundance of emerging mobile technologies and standards as well as
expanding opportunities to capitalize on them has created a lot of confusion among
business managers and IT architects. We have developed a methodology to help
organizations plan and build enterprise-wide mobile computing applications. The
methodology proposed in this paper is an attempt to provide a comprehensive
strategic framework to identify business opportunities for mobile business and
commerce, as well as a roadmap and action plans to develop and deploy mobile
applications.
This methodology is intended to help firms to realize the potential
benefits of mobile technologiesmore easily. Section 2 of this paper presents the life-
cycle phases of the methodology. Section 3 discusses how to analyze the mobility of
business processes. Section 4 is a detailed discussion of the development of a mobile
computing architecture and emerging mobile technologies. Section 5 presents several
important software standards that are important to mobile architectures and
application development. This paper is concluded with a discussion of how this
proposed methodology may be improved and validated, as well as a call for further
research to advance our understanding of the development and deployment of mobile
computing in enterprises.
2
A methodology for building mobile computing applications
The enterprise-wide mobile computing is the use of mobile devices, wireless
networks and Internet connections to access enterprise data and applications. The
lack of methodologies to help organizations in their mobile computing initiatives may
have hindered the deployment of enterprise-wide mobile applications.
literature
regarding
systems
development,
business
process
Based on the
reengineering
methodologies [3, 4], information systems planning methods [Error! Reference source
not found.,
Error! Reference source not found.], and mobile computing [11, 13], a
methodology for building enterprise-wide mobile computing applications was
developed. The proposed methodology shown in Figure 1 is depicted in IDEF0
diagramming notation [Error! Reference source not found.]. In IDEF0, a process is
represented as a rectangular box and itsrelationships to inputs, controls, outputs, and
mechanism (ICOMs) can be interpreted as:
Business priority
Current business
processes & applications
Business
mobilization
strategies
Business
objectives &
strategies
I1
Analyze the
Mobility of
Business
Processes
Design constraints
3
Funtional mobile
applications
Develop
EnterpriseWide Mobile
Strategies
1
Mobile processes &
mobile applications
Selected
mobile
projects
IT budget
Mobile
technology
trends
Technology
strategy &
requirements
Existing
information
systems
architecture
Mobile Analysis
Team
Develop an
EnterpriseWide Mobile
Technical
Architecture
Depoyed mobile
Deploy
applications
Mobile
Applications
Build
Mobile
Application
Mobile
computing
architecture
5
4
Development
tools
Deployment
platforms
2
Mobile
Architect
Team
Mobile
Development
Team
Mobile
Deployment
Team
Mobile Strategy
Team
Entrprise Mobilization Teams
Figure 1
A Methodology for Building Enterprise-Wide Mobile Applications
"Inputs are transformed by the process into outputs according to controls, using
mechanisms."
The boxes in Figure 1 represent five phases of the life cycle for
building enterprise-wide mobile computing applications.
The arrows coming in
contact with the box from the left are the inputs to a life cycle phase; arrows coming
out from the right ride of a box are outputs (i.e., deliverables); controls are shown as
arrows coming in contact with the top side of a box representing constraints and
guidelines governing the conduct of a phase. Mechanisms are arrows coming in
contact with the bottom of a box representing systems, organizations, or individuals
that perform activities in a life-cycle phase.
The methodology should be treated as a suggestionand a general guideline.
Companies can plan and develop mobile applications by conducting activities in
O1
various phases in the life cycle iteratively and concurrently to allow quick prototyping
and feedbacks. The five major phases for building mobile computing applications are
described as follows:
1. Develop enterprise-wide mobile strategies: Companies engage in mobile
computing initiatives because they want to take advantage of emerging mobile
computing technologies as well as supporting an increasingly mobilized
workforce to gain competitive advantages in the marketplace and to better serve
their customers. A mobile strategy team should consist of top level management
(e.g., chief executive officer, chief information officer, chief technology officer,
and business-line managers).
The process of creating enterprise-wide mobile
strategies should be based on existing business strategies and objectives, as well
as high-level understanding of mobile technology's trends and impacts. Details of
this phase are further discussed in Section 3.
2. Analyze the mobility of business processes.
Until recently, enterprise
communication and computing support was limited to desktop computing tools
that glue employees to their desks. Mobile technologies enable organizations to
redesign their business processes such that their sale forces and field services
representatives can perform critical activities at customer sites. In this phase, the
mobile analysis team will develop business process maps and identify promising
mobile projects that may bring in more revenues and result in better customer
service. Section 4 elaborates the activities involved and approaches in analyzing
process mobility.
3. Develop an enterprise-wide mobile technical architecture. A comprehensive
mobile technical architecture will be developed in this phase based on mobile
business strategies, mobility analysis of business process map, as well as mobile
application portfolios developed in the previous two phases.
The technical
architecture will allow companies to invest wisely in mobile technologies based
on current IT infrastructure and mobile standards so that the development and
deployment costs for mobile applications may be reduced.
Section 5 explains
important components of a mobile technical architecture. The roles of standards
that are important for the development of a mobile technical architecture are
discussed in Section 6.
4. Build mobile applications. The most obvious constraints in building applications
for mobile devices are smaller screen sizes, less efficient data entry methods, and
limited local CPU power. Keyboards and mice are normally not available for
small mobile devices. Developers may need to learn new development tools and
observe these constraints in building mobile applications [Error! Reference source
not found.].
The first step in mobile application design to reduce user input
requirements by providing point and click interfaces as well as delivering only the
most critical contents to mobile users. A step further is to take advantage of
special features in mobile devices such as Soft-Key, telephone dialing, and voice
capabilities of cell phones. An example of a design method for the building of
mobile applications has been proposed by Beaulieu[2].
5. Deploy mobile applications. Proper user training and support are required in the
deployment phase. Change management strategies should be applied along with
mobile application deployment to ensure effective behavioral changesof people
who are involved in these mobilizedprocesses. Performance measures of the
mobile business processes and workforce should be implemented to provide
justification for the investment in mobile computing and to receive feedback for
improving mobile enabled business processes continuously.
The first three phases in this methodology are important for enterprise-wide mobile
computing effort in the methodology. The last two phases are more project-specific.
In this paper, we focus on the enterprise-wide aspect of mobile computing and will
discuss the only first three phases in detail.
3
Develop enterprise-wide mobile computing strategies
Mobile computing allows the right information to be available to the right
person to perform critical business processes wherever and whenever.
The mobile
strategy team should extend e-business and e-commerce business models to identify
strategic areas where mobile computing applications may have the highest payback
opportunities. From a business perspective, companies need to focus on supporting
their employees, customers, and trading partners involved in their core business
processes. These strategic areas include:
1. Business to employee (B2E): B2E applications can be classified into two
categories:
a. Horizontal mobile applications are professional productivity tools,
often been referred to as Personal Information Management (PIM),
including email, instant message, calendar, and Internet access. Email
is probably one of the most important mobile horizontal applications.
Some researchers believed that email is "a proxy for a business
process" [Error! Reference source not found.]. It is often used in
the context of information workflows related to enterprise business
applications.
b. Vertical mobile applications directly support core business processes
by providing mobile access to enterprise applications such as sale force
automation, field worker automation, inventory control, warehouse
management, and logistics.
2. Business to consumers (B2C): B2C mobile applications are often referred to
as mobile commerce (m-commerce).
M-commerce is an extension of e-
commerce. Mobile applications in B2C that are unique and promising in the
m-commerce space include [15]:
a. Wireless data delivery service is a critical element of mobile
commerce. Popular services are weather and sports reports, traffic
conditions, financial news, stock portfolio tracking, stock quotes, and
telephone directory assistance.
b. M-commerce transactions often require immediate actions for people
on the run. For example, typical m-commerce transactions include
buying tickets, purchasing goods from vending machines via wireless
devices, and trading stocks.
c. M-commerce marketing functions may alert users of shops and special
sales based on their locations.
Businesses should be aware of difficulties facing m-ecommerce in this
planning stage [Error! Reference source not found., Error! Reference
source not found.]. M-commerce applications should be designed so that less
steps and data entry efforts are required to go through a transaction. Planners
should be briefed on emerging mobile technologies trends and understand
their implications to their businesses.
For example, using location-based
services to advertise sales to customers at the proximity of your stores is a
unique and innovative mobile application.
Innovation in B2C mobile
applications can be found in some vertical industries such as health industry
and retail industry[5, Error! Reference source not found.].
3. Business to business (B2B): Few mobile and wireless B2B applications have
been developed. Building mobile web sites for B2B exchanges such that
mobile devices can submit bids and receive alerts of new bids seems to be a
promising application in this area [Error! Reference source not found.].
In general, M-commerce tends to be more successful in Japan and Europe but
is very slow to catch on in the United States [8].
The driving force for the
deployment of mobile and wireless devices in the United State will be enterprise-wide
mobile applications.
A new vision of a mobile enterprise should emerge from this phase to guide
the formulation of mobile strategies and goals. The mobile strategy team needs to
communicate this vision and a business case for action to all stakeholders to ensure an
organizational commitment to mobile computing. The team should also evaluate the
issues involved in introducing mobile applications from technical, organizational, and
cultural perspectives to plan the implementation of mobile computing initiative
accordingly.
The next phase after mobile strategies have been developed is to have
a more in-depth analysis of the mobility of core business and applications as
discussed in the next session.
4
Analyze the mobility of business processes
The challenge of mobile computing strategies and implementation is to
identify and select opportunities for deployment that will provide the most payback.
Based on the general mobile strategies developed in the first phase, the mobile
analysis team needs to develop a business process model in order to identify business
activitiesin which increasing the mobility of these activities can improve business
performance and gain competitive advantages [11].
Using a value chain model to
guide the development of the process map is a good starting point in this phase [14].
The analysis team should educate the business managers involved in this
analysis phase about the capability of mobile computing technologies and challenge
their current business practices and procedures constantly. The mobility analysis
team needs to create a process map of core business processes first. Based on the
process map, the team can identify activities in these processes in which remote
access to data and applications may improve these processes.
The facilitator could
asks the analysis team members the following triggering questions to help them
analyze the process model:

What is the mobility of employees who are in involved in this process?

What are themajor activities of the process?

Where are these activities performedcurrently?

What information and applications are required while performing these
activities?

Can employees perform some activities while working onsite with
customers?
Several heuristics developed in business reengineering have been adapted to
determine how to increase the mobility of an enterprise [4].

Bring mobility to office-bound activities. Enabling mobile access to
information allows corporations move office tasks into the field where their
customers are. Mobile access to information (such as service records and
product pricing) will empower employees in the customer-facing processes
to make more informed decisions to serve customers better. Information
generated while away from offices can be captured at the place where
events occur.

Extend mobile access to customers and trading partner. The processes in
the process map should be an extended e-process map that contains links to
customers and trading partners. By extending business processes such that
mobile customers can access data relevant to cross-organizational business
processes, an enterprise is forging a stronger tie to their customers.

Create new and innovative mobile applications. New applications, such as
mobile web sites, downloadable offline data sets and applications, locationbased services, and mobile commerce, are new areas that an enterprise
should exploit to extend their reach to employees, customers, and trading
partners. New or reengineered business processes and applications should
be designed to embrace these new services.

Extend current enterprise-wide applications. Mobile computing offers a
new channel for communication and data access to improve operational
efficiency and increase added value to customers [13]. Enhancing current
client-server based enterprise resource planning (ERP), customer
relationship management (CRM), and supply chain management (SCM)
enterprise-wide application packages with mobile technologies is a natural
logical step forward towards operational efficiency [Error! Reference source
not found.].
At the end of this phase, the mobile analysis team needs to evaluate and
prioritize mobile projects or applications to be implemented by considering two major
factors. The first factor is the impacts and the benefits of these mobile projects. The
second factor is the difficult in implementing these mobile projects. A more detailed
cost-benefit analysis may be required to select appropriate projects for
implementation. Ideally, one should select projects that have a high impact but are
easy to implement. Mobile projects that have the following characteristicsshould be
given high priority:
1. Projects that target broken business processes. These broken processes are caused
by the lack of mobile access to data or by the complicated data synchronization
procedures involved between mobile devices and back-office systems.
2. Projects that deal with customer-facing processes. These processes have high
added-value and involve front-line workers including sale force automation, field
worker automation, and mobile CRM.
3. Projects that involve time-sensitive processes. The cycle-time of these business
processes can be reduced by capturing data in computer readable format at the
point of creation. Hence, companies can eliminate duplicated data entry from
different applications.
4. Projects which are easy to implement. The development team should choose
some quick and effective mobile projects at the beginning of the mobile initiative
to secure continuous support from top management and ensure buy-ins from
stakeholders.
The analysis team should involve functional area managers, mobile workforce,
and trading partners to brainstorm new ideas and learn to challenge basic assumptions
of why certain activities in processes need to be done in the office.
Creative
applications of mobile technologies are often coupled with the conceptual
breakthroughs of business practices.
New processes and applications may be
developed to create more added-value for the mobile enterprise.
5
Develop a mobile computing technical architecture
Gartner, an IT research firm, predicted that "more than 50 percent of mobile
applications deployed at the start of 2002 will be obsolete by the end of 2002 [Error!
Reference source not found.]." Many applications get outdated quickly due to the
complexity of the various mobile technologies involved.
The best practice in
managing these constantly evolving and competing technologies is to define and
develop a standard-based mobile computing technical architecture. A sound mobile
technical architecture is an extension and enhancement of existing IT infrastructure
components to facilitate the integration between mobile applications and existing IT
applications. A comprehensive mobile architecture can also enhance efficiency in
developing and deploying new mobile applications [13].
We have developed a generic mobile computing architecture, depicted in
Figure 2, based on recommendations from IT vendors and researchers [3, 9, 11, Error!
Reference source not found., Error! Reference source not found.]. Standards that
are critical for defining an enterprise-wide mobile computing architecture are
addressed in Section 6.
Figure 2
5.1
A Mobile Computing Technical Architecture
Mobile clients
Mobile clients consist of mobile devices, mobile operating systems (OS), and
client-side mobile application software. Mobile devices include cell phones and lowend PDAs that have Web access, as well as high-end PDAs and notebook computers
that have wireless network connections. There are many mobile operating systems
for PDAs (e.g., Pilot Research's Palm OS and Microsoft's Pocket PC). Additional
programming frameworks (i.e., virtual machines) such as J2ME and .NET Compact
Framework, specifically designed to run on mobile devices, may be required to
deploy some offline applications. For consumer oriented cell phones, Symbian OS is
a popular mobile OS for phone-based devices supporting 2.5G and 3G networks and
Multimedia Message Service (MMS) [Error! Reference source not found.].All
mobile devices are expected to have a wireless Internet connection, Web browsing
capability, and some degree of local process capability.
Horizontal mobile applications include personal information management
(PIM), messaging services such as email, short message services, and multimedia
message services [Error! Reference source not found.]. Vertical mobile enterprise
applications can be custom-built or are extensions of ERP, CRM, and SCM packages
for mobile workforce.
Enterprise applications are the main driver of mobile
computing growth in the United States. High-end PDAs and notebook computers
have better input mechanisms, large screen size, and more local processing power;
therefore, they are better positioned to support online mobile enterprise applications
that require bothonline and disconnected offline processing.
A comparison of
mobile Web clients and Mobile rich clients is listed in Table 1.
5.2
Wireless networks
Wireless deployments have been accelerated more recently, including a rush
to serve data over cellular networks (2.5G-3G) and wireless LAN (Wi-Fi). In the near
future, applications can expect always-on connectivity from anywhere.
IDC
estimates that 85 million notebook PCs will be sold in 2005. Most of them are
expected to contain Wi-Fi.
There are three types of wireless networks that
compliment each other to serve different needs.
Features
Devices
Operating System
Mobile Web Clients
Smart-phone, Cellular phone,
PDA
Symbian, Palm OS
Online/Offline
Online only
User interface
Web browser interface rendering
markup web pages encoded in
WML, cHTML, XHTML, etc.
Smaller
Stylus and virtual keyboard
Screen size
Input
Locations of
business Logic and
data
Reside on the server side
Client-side
installation and
configuration
No
Table 1
Mobile Rich Clients
PDA, Notebook
Pocket PC, Palm OS; Programming
frameworks: J2ME and .NET Compact
Framework
Online or offline
High end offline applications may require
the installation of J2ME or .NET compact
Framework.
More flexible user interface
Web browsers rendering HTML web pages
Larger
Keyboard and mouse
Offline applications: Reside on the client
side
Online applications: reside on the serverside
Yes
A Comparison of Mobile Web Clients and Mobile Rich Clients
1. Personal Area Networks (PANs) are short-range to link an individual user's
computing and communication devices, such as PDA, notebook, cell phone, and
printer. The primary technologies are infrared (IrDA) and Bluetooth [16].
It is
touted as cable-less technology that enables data synchronization, peer-to-peer ad
hoc file exchanges, and printing without using cables to connect these devices
[12].
Earlier efforts to implement Bluetooth encountered adoption barriers
including security and compatibility issues.
2. Wireless Local Area Networks (WLANs) may become a major driver for
wireless networking of mobile devices. The dominant standard for WLAN is
IEEE 802.11b, also referred to as Wi-Fi (Wireless Fidelity) supports a data rate of
12 Mbps. The data transmission rate is a little better than the 10 Mbps data rateof
10-BaseT Ethernet, but less than 100-BaseT Fast Ethernet's 100 Mbps. For most
enterprise applications, the speed is appropriate.For example, "the paradigm shift
to notebook computers as the default platform" was completed at Intel by the end
of 2002 [10].
There are increasingly more hotspots in public places, hotel,
conference rooms that are equipped with base stations to support wireless LAN
connectionsthat provide access to the Internet.
3. Wireless Wide Area Networks (WWANs) are provided mostly by wireless
network carriers. There are several generations of technologies and standards
available in the marketplace.
The first generation of cellular wireless (1G) was
based on analog technologydesigned to carry voice. The second-generation (2G)
technology converts voice to digital data for transmission over the air and then
back to voice. Most 2G systems provide 9.6–14.4-Kbps circuit-switched data
service.
2.5G refers to technology that is added to a 2G network to provide packetswitching data service. In practice, 2.5G is synonymous with the GPRS
technology that has been added to GSM networks.
The third-generation (3G)
systems have been designed for both voice and data. By International
Telecommunications Union'sdefinition, 3G systems must provide a packetswitching data service from 144-Kbps to 2Mbps. The availability of 3G WWAN
is slower than expected.
Wireless gateways are required to connect the wireless
carrier's networks to the Internet in order to support Internet-based applications.
The build up of wireless LANs is not only occurring inside corporate
campuses, but also at publicly accessible hotspots such hotels, airports, college
campuses, and conference centers. People can logon to these public WLANs to
access the Internet. For example, Starbucks started to offer T-Mobile Hotspot's Wi-Fi
service at 1200 locations on August 21, 2002 [1, Error! Reference source not
found.]. The usage of wireless LANs in public places are encroaching on the domain
of 3G network [Error! Reference source not found.].
5.3
Data synchronization
Data synchronization servers are necessary when client mobile devices such as
PDAs and notebooks are capable of handling data offline.
Mobile devices using
software such as Microsoft Outlook and Lotus Notes often need to have access to
"personal information" including address book, to-do lists, e-mail, and a calendar.
Business data that need to be stored offline on mobile device such as customer
orders and product data may require the use of mobile versions of database
management systems, such as SyBase SQL Anywhere, Microsoft SQL Server CE,
Oracle Lite, etc. Mobile database software packages have a much smaller memory
footprint. For example, SQL Server CE delivers its functionality in approximately
one megabyte [Error! Reference source not found.]. A synchronization server may
be needed to handle the data synchronization between the mobile databases and
centralized database servers.
Data synchronization services simplify data exchange
between mobile devices and back-office systems.
New database programming models have also emerged to support offline and
disconnected data management and batched database updates.
For example,
ADO.NET in the .NET Framework allows programmers retrieve data from database
servers or XML data sources into datasets (i.e., in-memory databases). Data that
needs to be accessed by disconnected mobile devices can be stored offline as XML
files or in mobile databases. Changes made to data locally can be sent to the server
based on an optimistic concurrency control mechanism when the mobile devices are
connected to the network.
5.4
Mobile application servers
Mobile application servers provide a broad range of functions, sometimes
under different product labels. Major functions in a typical mobile application server
include: content adaptation, notification, and security.
1. Content Adaptation or Transcoding Services.Various markup languages are
used by different mobile devices. Building contents in formats specific for each
mobile device is very costly and impractical.
There are server-based solutions
that dynamically translate Web contents and applications into multiple markup
languages and optimize them for delivery to mobile devices. IBM's WebSphere
Transcoding Publisher [7] and Oracle 9i Wireless are examples of such products.
Microsoft takes a different approach by providing a programming tool, Mobile
Information Toolkit, to support the development of mobile Web applications in
one code base. Contents can be generated dynamically in various formats for
more than one hundred devices.
2. Notification services. In an increasingly mobile environment, people want access
to the information they need regardless of where they are. Notification services
can provide data subscription and delivery mechanisms. Applications that use
notification services can provide their customers and employees with the
information they need when they need it to empower them to make timely and
informed decisions [6,Error! Reference source not found.].
The user is
required to subscribe to the service by specifying triggering events when the
notification should be generated and sent to the user. Delivery preferences can be
specified in advanced. Notifications are sent to users' mobile devices as SMS or
to their e-mail accounts. Notification service is an essential component of the
mobile infrastructure and is a unique feature in some innovative mobile
applications.
3. Security. Securing information from unauthorized access is a major problem for
any network – wire-line or wireless.
In a mobile enterprise, anytime and
anywhere access to mission-critical data by mobile workers is necessary for them
to perform effectively in the field. Such a trend is a major security challenge for
the mobile infrastructure because wireless communications rely on public airways.
For sensitive business data, proper measures,such as secure end-to-end encryption,
are required to protect the privacy and ensure the integrity of the data. There are
multiple facets of security in mobile computing including: network security,
system security, information security, and physical security.
Security
mechanisms of existing IT infrastructuresprovide the basic foundation for mobile
security management. Security technologies may be embedded in mobile devices
and also integrated in various layers of mobile architecture.
Important security
technologies include firewalls, authentication servers, biometrics, cryptography,
and Virtual Private Network (VPN) [Error! Reference source not found.].
6.
Standards for mobile computing: Markup languages and Web
services
Many standards have been developed to provide interoperability among
various mobile devices and software components. A mobile computing architecture
should be defined and developed according to standards to ensure the flexibility and
expandability of the mobile architecture. In this section, we focus our discussion on
software standards for mobile computing.
6.1
XML and markup languages
XML definition language is a meta-language to define new markup languages.
Currently, there are two "standards" used as XML definition languages: XML 1.0
W3C Recommendation and XML Schema. The structure of a document is defined by
XML DTD or XSD files. The content is captured in actual XML documents. There
are two approaches to handle the display aspect of XML documents: XSL and XML
parsers.
XSL (eXtensible Stylesheet Language) 1.0 is a W3C Recommendation
[Error! Reference source not found.] that specifies how one can convert an XML
document to another document format. XML parsers are program libraries that can
be used by a programming language to process XML data.
There are several web page specification markup languages such as WML and
cHTML. Wireless Markup Language (WML) 1.0 used in WAP-enabled phones is a
XML-compliant document format. cHTML used in DoCoMo's iMode is a subset of
HTML for small information appliances. WAP 2.0 has adopted XHTML which is a
reformulation of HTML 4 as an XML 1.0 application.
iMode may migrate to
XHTML in the near future [Error! Reference source not found.]. When a mobile
device requests a web page implemented by a server-side scripting program such as
ASP and JSP, the program can detect the requesting browser type by examining the
HTTP_USER_AGENT CGI variable [Error! Reference source not found.]. The
program can then dynamically apply an appropriate XSL template file to transform an
XML document to a format (e.g., WML, cHTML, XHTML, and HTML) that is
appropriate for the requesting mobile device.
6.2
SynchML
As mobile computing devices continue to proliferate, userswill demand
ubiquitous and consistent access to up-to-date information and applications. IT
organizations will need standards to ensure consistency and a common data protection
protocol formobile device access to the corporate server.SyncML is the leading openindustry standard for universal synchronization of PIMdataleveraging XML standards
[Error! Reference source not found., Error! Reference source not found.].
SyncML is sponsored by leadingmobile and wireless organizations and
vendors such as Ericsson, IBM, Motorola, Nokia, and OpenWave, etc. It is astandard
for implementing two-way synchronizing mechanism for all devices and applications
over anynetwork.
Some vendors have remained non-committal.
For example,
Microsoft has developed its own ActiveSync synchronization software for its Pocket
PCs for applications such as Microsoft Outlook.
6.3
Web services
Web services provide a standard-based approach to implementing distributed
components.
Web services offer data and business logic services over standard
protocols such as HTTP, XML, and SOAP over the Internet. Gartner, an IT research
firm, defines Web services as "loosely coupled software components delivered over
Internet-standard technologies" [Error! Reference source not found.].
"Loosely
coupled" implies that the Web services are impendent of any programming languages,
platforms, and object models. Using the ubiquitous and low-cost Internet, Web
services can easily provide software functions over the internal networks and the
public Internet for mobile computing applications [Error! Reference source not
found.]
Mobile computing devices that are capable of consuming Web services can
use distributed components implemented as Web services to get access to legacy data
and applications [Error! Reference source not found.]. This approach will enrich
the functionality of mobile applications as well as increase the reusability of
distributed software components. As a result, maintenance of business logic that is
shared by both mobile and non-mobile applications will be easier.
7
Conclusions
With mobile computing and wireless networking, people can conduct
businesses at any time without been constrained by the availability of physical
networking connections or specific computing platforms. With information delivered
to employees at their fingertips while away from their offices, employees can increase
their responsiveness and productivity. The proposed methodology in this paper is an
attempt to identify some guidelines and formulate a life-cycle approach to assisting
enterprises in planning and developing enterprise-wide mobile strategiesand
applications.
The methodology may also help researchers identify areas where further
research may be called for. For example, in our literature research, we found that
there is a lack of research on mobile workforces. More rigorous and large scale
studies on mobile applications usage patterns are very much in need. Field studies of
how companies plan and deploy their mobile strategies in conjunction with
measurements of the resulting business performance improvement can help the
further development of the proposed methodology.
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