WAP Tchnology, a short brief

What is WAP?

Wireless Application Protocol, is an open protocol that coordinates the communication between mobile devices and a WAP gateway, which is a server installed in the mobile phone network; the gateway receives requests from WAP mobile devices, routes it to the concerned HTTP server which process the request and makes a response, either directly (as in simple HTTP server), or after processing it and collecting data from various sources,(as in Dynamic pages, ASP,JSP,PHP,..., using databases, etc...). the WAP gateway receives the response and coverts it to a format that can be accepted and viewed using the WAP device, for example, the HTML pages are converted into WML deck of cards which can be easily viewed on the small mobile device display, and the various picture formats are converted into a single bit (Black/White) graphical format, WAP Bitmap (WMB). WAP can provide various mobile services, ranging from basic user information services, news services, web access, to mobile banking and other interactve applications.

English: This figure shows a WAP Push Process and ...

Nokia 7110 Closed

Nokia 7110

In spite of the fact that WAP standards are highly supported by industry leaders, and the overwhelming reception WAP had, it is still difficult to say that WAP will be the only standard for wireless access applications, because WAP devices are not widely available, and it is not easy to access new services, not to mention the cost of using these services. Moreover the WAP industry is facing problems in integrating WAP with the existing mobile infrastructure which is not optimized for WAP, and the huge competitive environment that exists in the market combined with the fact that WAP standards are not complete yet. All these facts and the availability of protocols to supplant WAP, will not help WAP to be the industry leader of the future.

WAP protocols

WAP is a bundle of protocols...