Some of the coolest sites on the Internet are designed to deliver a different version to the iPhone, than to Nokia phones, or to someone using a Blackberry (you could create a different version for each model), and that’s just the beginning.
Even if you don’t have time for all that, I recommend creating at least one special version of your web site that is mobile-optimized, or at least mobile friendly.
Then you just set up an ‘auto-detect’ script on your web server and deliver one version to computer users, and the other to cell phones.
That doesn’t mean you have to completely recreate everything on your web site for mobile, but put the most important information — like you’re phone number and a map to your office or restaurant — where people can find it when, say, they want to call you from the mobile phone they’re using to try to find you on the way there…
As you plan for a mobile site, consider how your visitors are likely to use your site when they are mobile, not just the limitations of the screen. If you get a lot of traffic to your pet store or accounting firm, make sure people can find you easily when they’re mobile.
I am dedicated to helping you find practical ways to redesign web sites for mobile phones that work today
If you have the time, budget, and a complex interactive web site, the more you can optimize it for the differences among the limitations of a feature phone, the new opportunities of a touchscreen, and the easy access of smart phones, the better.
If you want to be able to show off your photos or other creative work, create a mobile-optimized slide show or add video (YouTube is one of the best places to post video that works on mobile).
If you use lots of CSS, background images, AJAX drop-down menus, or other interactive features, you’ll probably need to strip those down to a simpler design for mobile.
And make sure to test any site you design for mobile on as many devices as possible…
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“if you visit a Flash site on an iPhone or Blackberry or any POPULAR phone, you’ll only see a broken icon.”
Nokia has sold over 100 million Symbian based handsets that support Flash. A recent branch on the Symbian tree is Maemo which has even better support for Flash. Symbian’s forthcoming sequal to Maemo, and Intel’s sequal to Moblin, is MeeGo which is also expected to have Flash support.
It looks like Adobe’s mobile efforts aren’t just a Flash in the pan, they are real and will continue to expand. Of course, while Apple, RIM and Google take the lions share of the media’s attention, Flash integration will continue to appear a dim hope instead of the bright reality it is.
I point this out so that your readers are aware that the challenges to Flash on other mobile platforms have been more political than technical.