Browsing the Web with a small mobile phone may sound absurd at first. The increasing importance of the Internet means, however, that a person should be able to access Web services even when not sitting in front of a computer. Since there are approximately three times more mobile phones than computers in the world, a mobile phone may provide the only way to access the Web for many people.
Technically, it has been possible to access the Internet on a mobile phone for several years already, but the mobile browsing experience has often been cumbersome for ordinary people. Understanding the user needs in different use contexts is the key to improving the user experience and thereby popularizing device independent access to Internet.
In her dissertation research, Virpi Roto has interviewed users of mobile browsers in several countries, and identified characteristics that help improve the mobile browsing user experience if taken into consideration. In addition to user and use context, all the system components should be taken into account: device, browser, network infrastructure, and web site. A partial outcome of the research is a visualization method called Minimap, which has gathered publicity as the first practical way to view Web pages on a mobile phone. The method has been used in Nokia S60 phones since 2006.
Source: Nokia Research Center
86 pages worth of sweet sweet research. I skimmed this document and will give it a fair once over after finals are finished this semester. If you’re into research as much as I am, you definitely want to check this out.
One more thing: To the people behind NRC, please please please enable an RSS feed so I can keep track of the latest projects you guys are working on!
Thanks for sharing your work Virpi