W3C Initiatives - for .Mobi Website Development

W3C had developed several number of web technologies that unequivocally take into account the specifications of mobile devices. Try the following in your .Mobi Website development, and let me know your experiences.

• CSS Mobile, a profile of the cascading style sheet language that matches the need of mobile Web authors


• SVG Tiny, a profile of the Web’s scalable vector graphics format well-suited to the capabilities of mobile devices


• XHTML For Mobile, which defines a subset of XHTML for mobile

The latest generations of mobile internet browsers are capable of using more advanced Web technologies, including features from HTML5, CSS 2.1 and 3, a number of rich JavaScript APIs, opening the way for Web-based mobile applications (including widgets).

I am working on the technical document now for some sample models, which can help the beginners to get started with .Mobi development quickly.

Quick Tips .Mobi Web Development

.Mobi is the extension for Mobile websites – websites that can be browsed in Mobile Phone Internet browser.  Just like .com, .net and .info, the .modi extension is also becoming popular based on the popularity of smart phones in market. Numerous corporate companies and news media agencies are having their Mobile website to present news and content directly into the hands of end user. Many social media websites – including facebook and twitter posts are also getting presented in this way through various mobile websites.

.Mobi websites are opening a new world of opportunities for web site designers, developers and testers. I see many small and medium size companies are also participating in these developments powerfully now days. Recently I presented a demo about .Mobi development and its standards to a client. I would like to share some points here for our friends.

Number #1: Visualize the .Mobi website based on a straightforward template, which is suitable for almost all the mobile browsers. Try to see visit the existing mobile websites and build a standards document. It will be helpful for your designers and developers, and also for estimations.

Number #2: Plan the .Mobi website with limited content. Don’t fill it with everything from your Internet website. Plan for the images, media content [videos, audio etc], and RSS feeds in design time itself. Use images with less DPI, and size reduced audio video content. Don’t use animated GIF kind of media in professional websites.

Number #3: Create a personalized CSS Template, and tailored theme for your website. It should be impressive, at the same time, it should be lite to get downloaded quickly in mobile device.

Number #4: Less usage of Javascript and Flash will be good, but these things are helping a lot in presentation and interactivity. Try using Javascript libraries and Flashlite swf files wherever you feel required, and test its performance in real time mobile devices. Don’t rely on Emulators. Emulators will not help you to find and fix real time issues.

Number #5: Use the CMS based Frameworks, if you are familiar with such architectures. I used Wordpress, and I see many are using Joomla too. The development time can be optimized, and many standards related things will be taken care by these frameworks automatically. There are Templates for Mobile Devices available for Free, and you can customize them for your requirements.

WordPress and .Mobi Development

Wordpress is a well known name in cross platform open source blog publishing application market. It uses PHP and MYSQL – and it can be used as Content Management System also.  It has many features including plug-in architecture and custom templates – best for beginners to advance level users.

Wordpress is providing Mobile template and functional extensions for .mobi development.  Wordpress Mobile Edition is a Plug-in that shows an interface designed for a mobile device, when visitors come to your side on mobile devices. Mobile Browsers are automatically detected using WURFL, the list of mobile browsers can be customized on the settings page.

The Installation is very simple – just like all other Wordpress Plug-ins

• Drop the wp-mobile.php file in your wp-content/plugins directory


• Drop the carrington-mobile-(version #) directory in your wp-content/themes directory


• Click the 'Activate' link for WordPress Mobile Edition on your Plugins page (in the WordPress admin interface)

Mobile template themes can be created, and customized for your business requirements. You can also add other plug-ins such as RSS feeds, Micro Blog Panel etc. You can create and edit pages to customize the PHP/XHTML content – add your Facebook Badges, LinkedIN profile connecters etc.

Visit my Mobile blog – http://m.gvmuthu.com – I created it using Wordpress – just as a beginner. Share your comments and suggestions – let me see, how best I can improve it.

What are the customer needs?

How do you meet the customer’s expectation? How to understand the needs of a customer clearly before producing project definition to them? Well, this is an important activity in any mobile application development project, but it is easy if you follow these simple steps.

• Understand your customer and business


• Understand the customer’s environment – technical & business beliefs


• Demonstrate your awareness of the customer’s technical and business needs


• Ensure Customer and End-user needs are aligned – see from different views


• Expose and hidden expectations – technical mostly

Sustainable Innovations

Early this week, I got an opportunity to attend a workshop on Sustainable Innovation – presented by Dr. Kumar S. Nochur (Ph.D, MIT’s Sloan School of Management, USA), President, Vidya Technologies Inc., - a Boston area management consulting firm. It was organized by Amrita School of Business, Coimbatore.

The workshop provided an excellent insight on Innovations and how to build a process for innovations. Basically from an Idea to Success. Kumar presented some very valuable business philosophies on Innovations and its process, stakeholders through various real-time examples including his experiences with 3M and other companies. Yes, it finally went into – ROI – How to increase your return of innovations…

I personally learned some real interesting business model system around innovations in industry, which includes handling stakeholders – investors, intermediates, influencers, customers/end users, and competitors. He also discussed about need and priority analysis, proactive and skillful management if key stakeholders, values and risks in innovations, positive relationships, what stops innovations in industries etc.

Kumar gave couple of workshop exercises – based on the personalized idea to success on everyone’s mind – which is a personalized innovation for their life. I wrote about enterprise mobile solutions – even though it is not an innovation – but an idea which can change the way of management in many industries.

I have to thank Vasudevan Uppili [CEO, Haritham Technologies] for this interesting opportunity. Now I am working on 5 critical roles kumar suggested in his workshop – for innovation success. I think I can fit into the role of creative thinker and champion to make it success.

Good things are happening… Happy to work on these kind of projects…:)

Facebook Desktop Chat

Ever tried to Connect Facebook Chat with your Desktop Chat Client - here is the easy way..

I am using Pidgin 2.6.2 as my Desktop Chat client - where I configured multiple Yahoo Accounts, MSN Accounts and Gtalk Accounts. Now, Let me show you how I configured Facebook Chat ..

Start your instant message program and locate the menu where you can add a new account (usually in preferences or settings).

Create a new account by entering the following info:

Protocol: XMPP or Jabber

Username: [your username]

Domain: chat.facebook.com

Jabber ID: [username]@chat.facebook.com

Password: <your Facebook password>

Enter the following server info, as requested:

Port: 5222

Server: chat.facebook.com

Use SSL/TLS: no

Allow plaintext authentication: no

Facebook + SKYPE = Facebook Video Call

Facebook comes with Video Call - Facebook + Skype.

Just click the call button at the top of your friend's profile or chat window — no need to launch new software.

You can also leave a Video Message. :-)

Milestone schedule – a view to success

The milestone is a flag or signal, at some clearly defined point in the project. The milestone flag indicates, that something special should have happened, or it is about to happen. The milestone is a point of control, placing target points in the project plan for certain events, to be signed off as completed.

Try to build a Milestone chart using these points and let’s discuss how it improved your planning.

• Completion of a Key Task – Example: Functional Analysis based on business requirements


• Completion of project deliverables – Example: First cut working demo, Database Design


• Stage for generation of benefits – Example: Reports


• Completion of third party significant event – Example: acceptance tests


• Completion of third party activity – Example: Delivery of equipment / Mobile


• Financial Audit Point


• Project Audit Point


• Quality Audit Point


• Significant decision point


• Completion of project stage to release further funding

Your Social Network?

web surveys

How to do self-appraisal using Google Forms

Self appraisal is nothing but an evaluation of employee himself – It gives the fundamental feedback / views and points regarding his performance in given period of time at work. It analyses the strengths, weaknesses, accomplishments, problems faced, training and development needs for every member in team. The self appraisal document is normally a simple excel sheet.

Google Forms is an excellent alternative for static Excel sheets – mainly for this kind of processes. You can create a Form and share it with multiple members without any duplicate efforts.

We used Google forms in a small size organization – for 150 members. It gave us interesting results effort wise. We finished the self appraisal process in 2 days using this. We used the following sections for self rating (1 to 5) simply and added a notes section at the end of it for comments.

• Satisfaction in current responsibilities held by the employee


• Clarity in Goals for the next appraisal period


• Accomplishments score


• Training need for his current role


• Support from his Manager for challenges in Work


• Leadership skills Score


• Inter-personal and communication skills

Steps to create Google Forms

1. Click on ‘Form’ in ‘Create New’ Menu – from the home page of Google Docs.


2. You can edit the title, add description, add Question Titles, Question Types (basically answer type –               Text, paragraph, multiple choice, check boxes, scale, grid etc)


3. You can even select themes for colorful forms.


4. After all your create Form processes – you can publish it in email to your team


5. You can see responses in Summery or Spread sheet mode

Try it, and give me your feedbacks. If you need any help in doing it first time – just ping me.

How to satisfy your customer?

Recognize that customer expectations directly relate to customer satisfaction. Ensure that you are following these simple instructions.

• Serve them with professional competence


• Behave in a cooperative and friendly manner


• Understand the customer business and technical environment


• Understand the difficulties and constraints your customer face in real time business


• Always avoid springing negative surprises


• Always provide positive results, not excuse for poor performance

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