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WAP Glossary

3G

3G (third generation)mobile telephony gives you high-speed access (up to 2mb/s). This may enable live pictures, camera etc. on your phone. Preceding 3G is analogue (1G). Then came GSM (2G). Currently GSM is now tested with GPRS(a "light version" of 3G.)

AMPS (Advanced Mobile Phone System)

A standard for analogue mobile systems. Used in North America, Latin America, Australia and parts of Russia and Asia.

ASP (Active Server Pages)

Serverside scripting technology to make interactive web pages. Based on VBScript.

Bandwidth

Measures the data-carrying capacity of a communications channel. Usually measured in bits per second(bps).

Base station

The central radio transmitter/receiver that maintains communications with a mobile telephone. Most countries require several hundred base stations, in order to give approximated full coverage for mobile subscribers.

bps

Bits per second

B (Byte)

1 byte = 8 bits. A byte is the smallest directly addressable memory unit in modern computers.

CDMA (Code Division Multiple Access)

A technology for digital transmission of radio signals between, for example, a mobile telephone and a base station. The system uses the same frequency to allow multiple conversations. Each conversation is cut into snippets and then remodulated in reassembled in the other end.

DTD

Document Type Definition. A DTD defines the names and contents of all elements that are permissible in a certain document. A DTD is used to specify XML document structure.

Dual band

Dual band mobile phones can work on networks operating different frequency bands. Often urban areas operate on 1800, while suburbs use the 900-band. This is especially useful if you travel abroad. Some phones are able to switch between GSM 900,1800,1900 (tri-band) allowing you full coverage in Europe, America and Asia.

GHz

Gigaherz - A frequency measurement. One hertz equals one cycle per second. GHz = One Billion hertz.

GPRS (General Packet Radio Service)

A packet-linked technology that may enable high-speed (up to 115 kilobit per second) access to wireless Internet in a GSM network. GPRS is IP-based, and may allow users to be online 24 hours.

GSM (Global System for Mobile Communications)

The world’s most widely used mobile system. Used on the 900 MHz and 1800 MHz frequencies in Europe, Asia and Australia, and the MHz 1900 frequency in America.

HDML

Handheld Markup Language. Invented by phone.com, predecessor to WML.

HSCSD

(High Speed Circuit Switched Data). A circuit-linked technology for higher transmission speed by combining several GSM channels at the same time. This may allow speeds up to 58 bps, far faster than original GSM (9.6bps). For upload HSCSD is limited to half the speed. This technology is the predecessor of GPRS, which may deliver up to 115kbs.v

Hz

Hertz - radio frequency measurement (one hertz = one cycle per second).

Kbps (Kilobits per second)

A speed measurement for the transmitting of data (see BPS).

MB (Megabyte)

1 MB = 1024 kilobytes (KB)

PAN

Personal Area Networks. A personal network between your devices, for example between your computer and your mobile phone. Bluetooth is one related standard, enabling this.

PDA

Personal Digital Assistent. Usually a hand-held device, such as the Palm Pilot.

Portal

A gateway or Internet access point for individual Web users.

Roaming

Means that your mobile phone automatically sets up communication procedures with different radio base stations when you are on the move. International roaming means that you can use networks other than your own when travelling abroad. Some phones allow for example switching between 900/1800 in Europe to 1900 in US.

Router

A data switch that handles connections between different networks. A router identifies the addresses on data passing through the switch, determines which route the transmission should take and collects data in "packets" which are sent to their destinations.

SET

SET (Secure Electronic Transaction) is a system for ensuring the security of financial transactions over the Internet. SET, may authenticate both user and merchant in order to approve the transaction.

SGML

Standardised Generalised Markup Language. The mother of all markup languages. XML is "SGML light". HTML is a loose application of SGML.

SMS (Short Message Service)

A service for sending messages of up to 160 characters to mobile phones that use Global System for Mobile (GSM) communication. GSM and SMS services are primarily available in Europe.

SSL (Secure Sockets Layer)

Protocol for managing the security of message transmissions in a network. The idea is that the programming for keeping your messages confidential ought to be contained in a program layer between an application (such as your Web browser) and the Internet’s TCP/IP layers. The current rate of SSL cryptation is 128.

UA

User Agent. Software that interprets WML, WMLScript, WTAI and other forms of code. Explorer, Netscape and Opera, are examples of UA´s)

UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System)

The name for the third generation mobile telephone standard in Europe. Also described as 3G.

VOIP (Voice Over Internet Protocol)

Describes the process of transmitting voice via data IP packages.

W3C

World Wide Web Consortium. www.w3.org.

WAE

Wireless Application Environment. WAE specifies an environment that allows operators and service providers to build applications and services that can reach a wide variety of different platforms. WAE is part of the Wireless Application Protocol.

WAP

The Wireless Application Protocol is a family of protocols allowing mobile devices to access wireless services.

WAP Forum

WAP Forum, an organization of several big internet and telecom companies, develops the WAP protocol. www.wapforum.org

WAP Gateway

A WAP gateway is a two-way software. Its main function is to offload the WAP mobile device from a lot of computational layers.

WAP Server

A WAP server is a web server. The computer programmers use WML instead of HTML.

WCDMA (Wideband Code Division Multiple Access)

A technology for wideband digital radio communications of Internet, multimedia, video and others - described as 3G.

WDP

Wireless Datagram Protocol

WML

WML (Wireless Markup Language) is a stripped down version of HTML, more a 'DOS-like' version of HTML. Read more.

WML Card

A WML card must exist inside a WML deck containing one or more cards.

WML Deck

A collection of WML cards.

WMLScript

Scripting language for WAP devices. Based on JavaScript, but less powerful. Read more.

WSP

Wireless Session Protocol. Provides the upper-level application layer of WAP with a consistent interface for two session services, a connection-mode service that operates above a transaction layer protocol, and a connectionless service that operates above a secure or non-secure datagram transport service.

WTLS

Wireless Transport Layer Security. The "equivalent" to SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) widely used in the HTML world - although not identical in functionality.

WTP

Wireless Transaction Protocol

XML

Extensible Markup Language. W3C´s standard for Internet Markup Languages. WML is one of these languages.

WML (Wireless Markup Language)

WML (Wireless Markup Language) is a stripped down version of HTML, more a 'DOS-like' version of HTML. The Wireless Markup Language is WAP’s analogy to HTML used on the WWW. WML is based on the Extensible Markup Language (XML).

WML uses a deck/card metaphor to specify a service. A card is typically a unit of interaction with the user, that is, either presentation of information or request for information from the user.

A collection of cards is called a deck, which usually constitutes a service. This approach ensures that a suitable amount of information is displayed to the user simultaneously since inter-page navigation can be avoided to the fullest possible extent.

WMLScript

WMLScript is based on ECMAScript, the same scripting language that JavaScript is based on. It can be used for enhancing services written in WML in the way that it to some extent adds intelligence to the services, for example procedural logic, loops, conditional expressions, and computational functions.

WMLScript can be used for e.g. validation of user input. Since WML does not provide any mechanisms for achieving this, a round-trip to the server would be needed in order to determine if user input is valid or not if scripting was not available. Access to local functions in a wireless device is another area where WMLScript is used; for example access to telephony related functions. WMLScript does also support WMLScript Libraries. These libraries contain functions that extend the basic WMLScript functionality. This provides a means for future expansion of functions without having to change the core of WMLScript. Just as with WML, WMLScript can be binary encoded by the WAP Gateway/Proxy in order to minimise the amount of data sent over the air.