The WiFi Opportunity
Most of the projects I work on tend to take advantage of newer phone features so as to be first to market with a particular solution.
This year, many more phones will be shipping with WiFi which presents some new challenges and opportunities.
Expect new tariffs from Network Operators which include use of WiFi Hotspots. This, in turn, will provide a faster, cheaper and more reliable network connections which will help drive new mobile applications.
When most people think of WiFi and phones, they think of Voice over IP (VoIP). However, VoIP currently isn’t reliable over GPRS and 3G due to high latency (round trip times). VoIP will become more and more possible as the mobile networks improve via HSDPA and latency decreases.
Instead of VoIP, in the short term, mobile email, news and other information services are likely to become much more popular as people start to use WiFi as well as 3G on their phones. WiFi provides some interesting possibilities for mobile developers. Here are some random thoughts to provoke new ideas…
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Consider applications that wait until a WiFi connection is available before uploading data.
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There’s probably a need for auto-connecting applications.
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Think push as well as pull.
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Think about the possibilities of applications downloading large amounts of data (databases) overnight.
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WiFi might even be used to provide rudimentary presence (location based) information.
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Think of using WiFi to by-pass or supplement current uses of SMS and MMS.
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Think about cooperating WiFi networks to relay information.
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As an example, in a retail environment, applications might include customer ordering and payment.