Mobile Web Widgets: Enabler of Enterprise Mobility Work

Increasingly, many smartphones (i.e., Apple iPhone, Google Android, PalmPre, Blackberry Storm and Bold, and Nokia S60) today are equipped with standards-based Web browsers that facilitate access to and interaction with the Web. In some cases, like Nokia S60 series, the smartphones add a web application runtime environment that runs widgets. Like the desktop widgets, Web-based mobile widgets are lightweight mobile applications developed with standards-based Web technologies, such as HTML, CSS, JavaScript, and AJAX. They serve as front ends to Web 2.0 services or Internet content. Newer versions of the S60 web runtime will also have access to platform resources and capabilities that enable more personal and context-aware widgets. Platform service access and mobile work context provide two key differentiators of mobile Web widgets from their desktop counterparts. As such, the mashups enabled by mobile Web widgets have the potential to empower large numbers of smartphones with capabilities and services that are hitherto limited by heterogeneity of device operating systems