Questions from future content creator

[moCa-2]

Hello,

I'm Moca and before anything I apologize if this is not the sort of question to post here and/or my ignorance on the topic.

I am a web designer starting to read on developing content for devices and came across your great document on DI.

It would be great if you could expand on ideas for testing... even if we followed a structure when creating content, nothing really guarantees it will look or function the same across devices until you test it. Testing only on targeted devices or ones you can afford to me defeats the purpose of trying to create content that can be accessed across any device if you can never test it... it seems like an impossible challenge.

In the document, you mentioned many different media types but did not include Flash content as one. I am very curious to know the group's position in relation to Flash Lite content.

Thanks a lot,
Moca

[Rotan Hanrahan]

Hello Moca,

 

Very briefly, testing is the only guarantee. If you have good device knowledge (i.e. tests of generic cases have been conducted and results recorded) then you may be able to reduce some of the testing by adhering to the device knowledge you have. The bad news is that to be sure of the highest quality on the widest range of devices, you will probably need a good adaptation solution that has all this device knowledge built-in.

 

The DIWG has produced several documents related to DI, but you do not identify which one you refer to as "great". Nevertheless, on behalf of the group, thank you.

 

You can try to limit the content to features that are known to pose fewer problems. The W3C MWI Best Practices group has much to say on the matter of producing content that will work on a broad range. Of course, imposing such limitations may reduce the perceived quality of the presentations, especially for end-users who expect exciting colourful interaction.

 

The media types covered in W3C documents tend to favour those that are associated with recommended W3C technologies. Proprietary technologies are acknowledge but are not the focus of discussions or examples. Media type that are not supported by the majority of browsers except via proprietary plug-ins (free or otherwise) tend to be omitted from our documentation.

 

I cannot speak on behalf of the group with respect to an opinion on a particular proprietary technology, but I believe that we understand that such technolgies have a role to play, especially in niche domains. However, where possible, technolgies that have the widest "out-of-the-box" support should be favoured.

 

There are a number of vendors of specialised solutions to multi-device Web content, some of whom are represented in DIWG. I suggest you survey the documentation that they offer on-line to educate yourself on what is possible and practical. If you are looking for low-cost solutions (without the "wow" factor of the professionals) then the open source community has a few simple solutions to offer.

 

---Rotan Hanrahan (DI, and chair of DD)

 

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From: www-di-request@... [mailto:www-di-request@...] On Behalf Of Moca
Sent: 18 July 2006 09:07
To: www-di@...
Subject: Questions from future content creator

Hello,

I'm Moca and before anything I apologize if this is not the sort of question to post here and/or my ignorance on the topic.

I am a web designer starting to read on developing content for devices and came across your great document on DI.

It would be great if you could expand on ideas for testing... even if we followed a structure when creating content, nothing really guarantees it will look or function the same across devices until you test it. Testing only on targeted devices or ones you can afford to me defeats the purpose of trying to create content that can be accessed across any device if you can never test it... it seems like an impossible challenge.

In the document, you mentioned many different media types but did not include Flash content as one. I am very curious to know the group's position in relation to Flash Lite content.

Thanks a lot,
Moca