> So, my somewhat ignorant question is: why would these WBXML folks go to
> the trouble of defining yet another compression scheme for wireless XML?
The same reason SOAP was invented, I'd imagine - because in order to
justify charging your customers an arm and a leg for a solution, you
have to convince them that you're doing something new and valuable,
even when you aren't.
> Aren't the usual compression techniques available in wireless
> toolkits/operating systems? Can XML-specific compression schemes be
> implemented in significantly less space than gzip (or LZW, or some other
> widely deployed scheme)? Finally, I thought the WAP Forum had learned its
> lesson about diverging from standard practice (de facto or otherwise) on
> the internet, since the wireless infrastructure will not lag TOO far
> behind the rest of the internet, but it takes quite a bit of time to
> deploy enough WAP technology to make it worthwhile for enough people to
> support it to be worthwhile ....
>
> Can anyone help sort this out for me?
As Tim said, WAP doesn't matter any more. WAP 2 specifies (last time I
checked) that TCP + HTTP + XHTML-Basic is a conformant stack. Not that
we needed them to tell us that, but it's nice to see them acknowledge
their own demise. 8-)
MB
--
Mark Baker, Chief Science Officer, Planetfred, Inc.
Ottawa, Ontario, CANADA.
http://www.markbaker.ca http://www.planetfred.com
