mobiForge (nee dev.mobi) announced its DeviceAtlas mobile-device database some time ago, aiming to create the most comprehensive file of mobile device specs to help web developers craft mobile sites. The latest version of DeviceAtlas has a new feature, Data Explorer, that aggregates the device data in the system and provides an interface to explore and analyze it.
For example, you can look at the screen widths of devices in the database and find which are the most common, or find the number of devices that support a certain audio codec or particular J2ME JSR. Check out the link above for more details and a video that goes into some more depth about the capabilities.
This info’s free, too — all you need is to register a free developer account with DeviceAtlas. This is a great starting place to inform your mobile and mobile web development, helping you to navigate the fragmentation of devices and specs. It can also be combined with other sources of free data, like AdMob’s monthly metrics reports to get a good idea of the capabilities of devices people are using to surf the mobile web. Then, of course, once you’re up and running, you use some analytics on your site to sharpen your focus even more.
Fragmentation remains a hugely annoying problem for mobile developers, but it’s great to see more and more free data and services emerging to help mitigate the problem, even if it’s just a little bit.
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[...] DeviceAtlas Data Explorer [...]
“There is a world of information that we can’t immediately see in the streets we walk and drive in, and in the buildings in which we work, play and live. The great potential of the mobile web – whether it is delivered by smart phone, automobile navigation system, or other device – is to reveal this hidden world to us, by adding geospatial and timing data to the user experience. In this way, the mobile web is poised to become the delivery mechanism for a new generation of location-aware applications. ”
The world as the interface – location data and the mobile web, Jonathan Follett in receiver magazine, Autumn 2008
http://www.receiver.vodafone.com/the-world-as-the-interface
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