Mobile portals
Next-generation portals are accessible through more than desktop browsers when you use IBM WebSphere Everyplace Access. WebSphere Portal supports mobile devices by generating pages in any markup language. Three markup languages are currently supported:
HTML Desktop computers and some personal digital assistants WML WAP devices, which are typically mobile phones cHTML Mobile devices in the NTT DoCoMo iMode network. Support for other markup languages is available. Users can customize a unique home page for each device, selecting content and applications that are most useful on the device.
When the home page is requested, the page is produced by detecting the type of device that is making the request and then by assembling the portlets, each of which renders its contents in the appropriate markup language.
When a user customizes the home page for a device, the portlet selection list shows only the portlets that can produce markup that is appropriate for that device. Thus, the list of available portlets for each device depends on what the portlets can actually do.
Some portlets might be available for all supported devices, while others might be available only for a single device. The user interface design of each portlet also varies from device to device, so that the user's experience can be optimized on each device. Thus, the user's home page and each of the portlets might appear very different on a mobile phone from how they appear in a desktop browser.
Supporting new devices: content transformation
Using Transcoding Technology imbedded within this version of WebSphere Portal, portlets that normally produce HTML content can be made to automatically render WML and cHTML as well. By defining the transcoding PortletFilter on a portlet, the portlet HTML output can be converted to WML or cHTML, depending on the device that is making the request. See the Transcoding Technology section for more details.
Portlets that do not natively support the device markup can be transformed using Transcoding Publisher technology. This means that a portlet can easily and automatically support mobile devices, even if the portlet developer who created it did not explicitly support that device.
Supporting new devices: clients and markups
The WebSphere Portal page aggregation subsystem supports several markup languages and recognizes certain browsers and mobile device user agent signatures, all out of the box. The framework is easy to extend to support additional markups or new devices. To support new browsers and devices, add new markup and clients using the corresponding administration portlets.
WebSphere is a trademark of the IBM Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.
IBM is a trademark of the IBM Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.