This may be a looooong thread

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teleguy
Enthusiast

Apr 28, 2005, 11:05 AM

Post #1 of 9 (2442 views)

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I've been wanting to do this for a while but where to start?

There are lots of internet websites that are specifically formatted to fit on your phone (small screen, much less memory than PC).

These WAP sites (Wireless Application Protocol) are extremely useful, having been pared down to fit the phone (few graphics,few or no ads), but usually poorly publicized -- even by the site owners for some reason.

So I wanted to talk about some of them. I'll probably add one to the thread just about every day. And be sure to chime in telling us about your favorite WAP sites as well, since I can't do it without help.

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Soooo, since baseball season is getting in full swing now that it's (uh, late) April , how 'bout a baseball site?

Major League Baseball's site is http://mobile.mlb.com

A very simple site. NOTHING fancy here. Just today's scores and by clicking on the score, a limited box score (Runs Hits Errors, plus Winning and Losing Pitchers and their records) can be displayed.

Perfect for the casual fan who just wants to see how Mighty Casey and the Locals came out today. Probably a bit disappointing for the dedicated sports fanATIC who will be looking for more, more, more....

Check it out. What do you think?

Your turn. What are some your favorite WAP sites?

teleguy
Enthusiast

Apr 29, 2005, 5:05 PM

Post #2 of 9 (2425 views)

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All kinds of things can be found online thru the PC and the same is becoming true online thru the phone.

A medical oriented WAP site for the phone is Pocket Doctor.

Just type in your phone's browser http://wap.pocketdoctor.co.uk

This site has some really neat features including a Symptoms Analyser divided by sections of the body (Got pain in the abdomen? Trouble breathing? Earache?). It will give you Common Causes, Possible Causes and Rare Causes of your complaint.

Also a Pocket First Aid section with A-Z emergency situations, a medical encyclopedia called Health E Ref,
and a unique section called Doctor Q -- Questions to Ask your Doctor in various situations.

This site is written by several different doctors, not just one guy's opinion and is well organized, as you might expect. But I was also very happy to see that the pages seemed to load very quickly compared to some other sites, especially since the Pocket Doctor site has loads of info on it.

This site is well worth bookmarking to your Favorites list and checking frequently.

Try it out. What do you think about it?

teleguy
Enthusiast

Apr 30, 2005, 12:25 PM

Post #3 of 9 (2424 views)

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Lots of well known names are putting WAP sites at the fingertips of cell users. One of these is Edmunds.com , a provider of info for car shopping, specifically "blue book" type pricing info.

The Edmunds2Go site is found on your phone's browser at http://wap.edmunds.com

This site has some excellent utility and a few glitches too. For instance, when hunting a price on a used car, I was able to navigate from Used Cars>Buick>2002>LeSabre>4Dr Limited Sedan>Base Prices easily and without the added step of hitting OK each time. When you made a choice it automatically advanced. So far so good.

But then it asked for my ZIP Code and after entering it, I had to fumble to find how to advance to the final screen to get the Price. It was located in a Menu with the right soft button, with no screen prompt or info to direct me to it.(This I found to be the case in any instance where I had to fill in a number rather than selecting from a list of choices.)

When I did find the price , however, I was rewarded by seeing 3 pricing quotes: Trade In value, Private Sale value, and Dealer sale value.

Also included is New Car info and a Loan Calculator, which worked well.

Dealer Locator was a true info source, but only pulled Dealers by one specific make (you cannot choose "GM dealers" you must choose "Pontiac" or "Chevrolet").
And only one at a time. You must hit NEXT to get one more, and so on. However they are arranged from closest to furthest for convenience.

Two less helpful sections were:

--Insurance section was basically a commercial and an offer to connect you with a Geico or Progressive rep by phone.

--Financing section was same thing for E-Loan rep.

Back to the positive side again, webpages loaded quickly from this site and are logically arranged. All in all, I can see Edmunds2Go making a Saturday of car shopping quite a bit easier, even though it's not perfect. I would definitely make the most of it.

Check it out. What else would you like to see on this site to make it more useful to cell users?

teleguy
Enthusiast

May 2, 2005, 11:24 AM

Post #4 of 9 (2402 views)

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Ever been sitting in a boring meeting or in the breakroom at work thinking, "Boy I ought to go into business on the web and make a fortune so I can ditch this stupid job!" ??

Well, http://wap.checkdomain.com is there for just such inspired moments.

This simple site will tell you whether Baseballcards.com is available for you to start your dream web site (it's not available), or whether TvSoapsTalk.com is available for you to start a red hot forum and sell advertising till you can retire in Cancun (it is available).

That's it. The site is not there to sell you the domain or help you get started. It's beauty is in it's simplicity and it's entertainment value when the fish aren't biting at 4AM and you wonder whether MyBrotherBobCantFish.com is still out there waiting to become the Red Green Show of the internet.

teleguy
Enthusiast

May 3, 2005, 8:11 PM

Post #5 of 9 (2387 views)

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Lots of name brand companies are getting WAP sites out there, with mixed results.

In the flowers and gifts business is the FTD network at http://www.ftdwireless.com

Most WAP sites benefit from having little or no graphics or photos because they load faster. But a little bit of graphic presence is not necessarily a bad thing.

This is especially true if you are selling something visually oriented -- like flowers!

On the plus side, this site is easy to navigate and well organized. It asks for first of all the Occasion for which you are order flowers or a gift such as Birthday, Get Well, Sympathy, Love & Romance, Thank You.

Then it gives you a few choices : Dozen Roses, Teddy Bear basket, Gift Bouquet, etc

Then it gives you a short description and , yay! , a price is revealed BEFORE asking if you want to connect to an FTD rep to place an order.

This is all good. The only 2 things missing are a picture. (Not too much to ask) , and the ability to finish the order online by inputting a credit card and giving delivery info.

For a quick order, from someone who knows what they want, it is a handy site for sure. I'm just asking for a few pics, c'mon please?

I guess on a 1-10 scale I would give this a 7, which isn't bad. But there's that room for improvement.

Check it out. See what you think. Even big companies can learn a little!

Neko
Supreme Overlord

May 4, 2005, 4:12 AM

Post #6 of 9 (2377 views)

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Excellent resources Teleguy. I like the checkdomain.com service. That could be real handy.

Good work!

teleguy
Enthusiast

May 8, 2005, 11:21 AM

Post #7 of 9 (2321 views)

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Ok, what could be more boring than the weather, right? And every portal from Yahoo and AOL down to Joe's Internet has weather, right?

Well true. However, if you want detail and info you won't find anywhere else, you have to go to the source where all of the weathermen get their info.

NOAA's website for weather on your cell phone is http://mobile.srh.noaa.gov/port/port.html

The site seems well put together. Pages load fast and there are few layers to click thru to get what you are looking for.

The main page gives you access to :

Local weather by zip code lookup
Watches , Warnings and Advisories by State lookup
Regional Radars
Satellite Images
Convective Outlooks
Tropical Weather
Tides
and more.

Several areas offer weather Discussion which is a running dialogue or messageboard and commentary , with posting by multiple forecasters. This gives a "behind the scenes" flavor to the otherwise dry discussions of weather facts.

On the downside, of course the satellite images and radars somewhat overwhelm the small screen of your phone and you have to know the area you are looking at to make sense of them.

Also, info tends to be in run-together sentences or Tables of Information without a grid -- example:

station max / min / 24 - hr / snow / snow
: name temp/ temp / precip / fall / depth
:................................................................
:
:
mci : kansas city intl : 82 / 62 / t / 0. 0 / 0
stj : st joseph : 83 / 64 / t / 0. 0 / 0
mkc : kansas city dwtn : 81 / 64 / 0. 00 / /
ojc : johnson co exec : 79 / 58 / 0. 01 / /

gives us from left to right :

Station Name
Max Temp
Min Temp
24 Hr Precip
Snow Fall
Snow Depth

for each of the areas of KC Airport , St Joseph, Downtown KC and Johnson County.

On the plus, where else will you get:

Tides information
Surf Forecast
Air Pollution Standard Index
River and Lake Stages
Earthquake Reports
Maritime forecast
High Seas forecast for half of the globe?

And with Tropical Storm watching due to inaugurate a new season June 1 --- Up to the minute Hurricane and Tropical Storm info without waiting for it to filter down to the TV or radio.

All in all, a pretty cool site if you are interested in weather. (But probably no one really is because you never hear them talk about it!)

Check this site out, and tell us what you think.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Also let us know if you have trouble accessing any of these sites being discussed from your phones browser or navigating to the areas you need. Be sure to mention what brand and model phone you are using, and your carrier.

teleguy
Enthusiast

May 10, 2005, 11:07 AM

Post #8 of 9 (2296 views)

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Take off. Well if you are going to, some WAP sites might be helpful.

Northwest Airlines has a site optimized for your phone's browser at http://wireless.nwa.com/palmlive

American Airlines at http://aa.flightlookup.com

Continental Airlines at http://pda.continental.com/pocketpc

All three of these sites allow you from your phone to check on Flight Status (on time or late) and Flight Schedule/Timetable that is searchable by flight # or Departure and Arrival city.

This is where American Airlines' site is done. That's it.

Both Continental and Northwest also allow you to view your Reservation. (Northwest will allow you to change it as well.)

The Continental site allows you to access your OnePass account, view weather info for it's hub operations in Houston, Newark and Cleveland, as well as Average Airport Delays.

Northwest's site adds yet additional info: Search Fares and Availability, check your account for World Perks mileage total, Cyber Savers low price deals, Airport Gate maps of Detroit , Minneapolis / St Paul and Memphis (very basic stick figure type maps, but as least you might find your way around the terminal in a pinch), Contact phone #s, and a Help page. You can also sign up for an email Notification on Flight and Gate Status.

Handy sites indeed. All seemed to be quick loading and not too many layers to click thru to find needed info, 3 clicks or less in most cases.

American's site, for all it's sparseness, at least recognized abbreviations (KC for Kansas City, DFW for Dallas) where Continental's did not. Northwest's site was a bit odd in that it REQUIRED an abbreviation when searching for Fares, but supplied the abbreviations needed. (However they were in another section, necessitating a backtrack, not very helpful in this instance.)

Northwest's site also had helpful descriptions of it's links BEFORE you clicked them and seemed both the most complete as well as the friendliest (mostly).

Altogether , if you are going to fly, a resouce like this could prove extremely valuable and I would be interested to hear your experience with these or others that you find. Other airlines may have these as well, however I do not know of them at present. How 'bout you? Can you add to the list?

teleguy
Enthusiast

May 20, 2005, 11:28 AM

Post #9 of 9 (2194 views)

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North into Canada, lots of WAP sites await the adventurous cell user.

Air Canada can be found at http://mobile.aircanada.ca

The info on Flight status searchable by Flight # only is a little bit limiting. What if you only know the Arrival and Departure city? Then you can obtain a Flight # by going to the Timetable feature. But it would be easier to make the Status feature a little friendlier.

The Timetable gives info on not only Flight #, Arrival and Departure times, but also how many stops and where, total travel time, plus what type of aircraft you will be on (very cool for aeronautical buffs).

The Flight Notification service letting you know about delays on a particular flight is set up the same way. You must know the Flight #, so the Timetable becomes indispensable.

You can also access your Aeroplan account, get helpful contact numbers including Individual or Group Reservations, Baggage, Aeroplan, and Convention services. There is also a Help section with step by step for each section.

Also this site parlez Francais. (OK now you know I don't.) This however is very cool and not to be overlooked. But it might be easy to do so since the French option is all the way down at the bottom of the page and you must scroll to the end to find it. Not very strategic, but at least it's there.
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Winnipeg has http://www.olapeople.com to provide Airport info, Weather, Restaurants, Movies, Business guide, Classifieds, Links and more.

Select categories and the site saves you a click by going immediately to your choice. Good move.

The Restaurant section in particular is well stocked with choices from more than 10 ethnic restaurant types including Portugese, East Indian, Ukranian and more.

The Airport info is searchable by Flight # similar to the Air Canada site.

Classifieds offer an insiders look at the city including Jobs, Buy and Sell, Personals, Rent and Business.

All in all an interesting mix.