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Issue 2012 March > Sitebuilders

Joomla and Smartphones

Written by Hagen Graf | Thursday, 01 March 2012 00:00 | Published in 2012 March
In February 2010 Google adopted a new strategy that the company's focus is now more on smartphones than on desktops. Eric Schmidt summed this up with a new motto: "Mobile First". Google developers started to create versions of new services for smartphones before creating ones to run on PCs. At that time the global smartphone penetration reached a average of 15% (2009). Two years later, we talk about a global smartphone penetration of 30% (2011). Only in 2011, nearly 500 millions smartphones were shipped.
Top smartphone facts and figures in 2011 Top smartphone facts and figures in 2011 http://www.visionmobile.com/blog/2012/02/infographic-100-million-club-top-smartphone-facts-and-figures-in-2011/

At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona this week, Google announced:

“There will be an Android in every pocket”

I found no official definition of a smartphone in comparison to other phones (feature phones) but I see three differences

  1. smartphones are always "on-line"
  2. smartphones have a browser to surf the web
  3. smartphones allow applications to have a deep integration with the phone's OS and hardware

The mobile market for feature phones was/is focused on selling ringtones, games and other content brought by the industry to the customer (B2C). The mobile markets (app stores) for smartphones provide the logistic for developers, authors and artists to offer their apps (Digital Distribution Platform). 

Mobile Content Management System

An important principle of a content management system (CMS) like Joomla! is the separation of content from presentation. To become a mobile content management system (MCMS) it should have  additional features e.g.:

Multi channel content delivery (machine-readable web )

It should be possible to publish XML and an application take this XML and delivers it to mobile devices.

It should be also possible that the mobile application queries the MCMS directly. The MCMS responds with XML that is rendered and displayed by the mobile device. The evolution of this feature went from service-oriented architecture (SOAP, XML-RPC) to resource-oriented architecture (REST).

Specialized templating system (human-readable web)

The templating system is used to deliver the content to the mobile device. Mobile CMS templates must be adapted to a very wide range of target devices with different capacities and limitations.

There are two approaches to adapting templates:

  • multi-client: the multi-client approach makes it possible to see all versions of a site at the same domain (e.g. example.com), and templates are presented based on the device client used for viewing.
  • multi-site: the multi-site approach displays the mobile site on a targeted sub-domain (mobile.example.com)

Location based content delivery

This feature is important because it did not exist before inside a CMS. Depending on where you are, a MCMS can be used for e.g.

  • recommending events in a city
  • requesting the nearest business or service, such as a restaurant
  • receiving alerts, such as notification of a sale on gas or warning of a traffic jam
  • location-based mobile advertising

What is possible in Joomla?

A web content management system (WCMS) like Joomla is affected by this development and will be transformed to a mobile content management system (MCMS) in the future. It needs to be capable to store and deliver content to mobile devices in various ways.

I had a look in the Joomla Extension Directory and asked people via twitter how Joomla fits today in the mobile world.

I want to mention that the examples are not chosen because they are the best or the easiest solution. I just want to give examples. I used a few of them, but not all and I am very interested in your experiences on these topics, so please comment on this article!

Multi Channel content delivery (machine-readable web )

Since the very beginning, Joomla offers the Syndication Feeds module to create xml feeds from content. These feeds can be used by many, many apps e.g. FlipBoard or Google Currents.

Concerning more sophisticated solutions I found the following possibilities for displaying a Joomla site on mobile devices:

Weever apps

You have to install a plugin in your Joomla site, configure and enable it for mobile visitors. The visitor has to access your Joomla site by using a browser on his mobile device and can then add the "app" to his homescreen. It is not necessary and not possible to add the "app" into an "app store". To make it nice and easy for the visitor, you can e.g. use QR Codes.
Weezer App
http://weeverapps.com/home

iJoomer

iJoomer offers an interesting approach. If you need an app, you have to install a component in your Joomla site. Than you can order "your app" by describing your requirements and pay for building it. When ready, iJoomer submits your app to the AppStore and the Android Marketplace. Now you can advertise your app to your clients.
There are free apps available for a connection to JoomSocial. It is possible to use it for mobile commerce together with VirtueMart.
Cart
http://www.ijoomer.com/

General management

Another kind of apps are for the general management of your Joomla site. You can write articles, upload photos and more.

joooid
Joooid is an Android client for Joomla: it has been created to publish articles with text, images, galleries and geolocated maps, you can also save drafts for later publishing.

http://www.joooid.com/

JAM! Joomla Admin Mobile!
Another app like this is jAdmin mobile. You can create new articles, set titles and categories, upload images- all without leaving the app.
Joomla! Admin Mobile

http://www.covertapps.com/jam

Specialized templating system (human-readable web)

The templating solutions consists of a template systems which means a mobile template on one hand and a Joomla extension on the other hand. These systems are very powerful and include mobile templates. The mobile templates can be divided by "clean" and "responsive" templates. The clean templates are designed to work additionally to the site template. The responsive templates are usable for a device including the desktop browser.

Separate templates systems

MobileJoomla
Mobile Joomla is a Joomla component and a mobile theme. The component has to be configured inside your Joomla site and afterwards the mobile theme will be displayed to your mobile visitors. You can configure which subdomains shall use which themes and templates in MobileJoomla!
Mobile Joomla
http://www.mobilejoomla.com 

Other examples with the same functionalities are

Mobile templates

Most of the template clubs offer their templates either with a mobile version or in general as a responsive template like joomlashine.

Responsive Site Templates

Responsive Admin Templates

Clean Admin Templates

Conclusion

It is interesting to see how many different approaches have been chosen to make Joomla an MCMS.
Again, it is not my intention to hightlight the named projects here. I am researching that topic because I am starting to write a book about it :)
For this reason, I want to encourage you again to comment on this article about your experiences, solutions, use cases and examples.

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Tagged under Sitebuilders
Hagen Graf

Hagen Graf

consultant, author, trainer, solution finder, web architect, themer, developer, open source specialist, visionary, orator, the good old webmaster

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Comments (12)

  • avatar
    • 1
    • 0
    Thomas
    2012-03-02 07:44:22

    enter your message here...
    The project visitas in SourceForge als ha templates (and some components)thar are used in a mobile implementation as a tourist guide. It is implemented at http:// www.digitalumea.se

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
    • 2
    • 0
    Paul Orwig
    2012-03-03 03:15:36

    Thanks Hagen for writing article! You did a great job of highlighting many different ways that people are using Joomla to give mobile users a better experience. I hope that Joomla will become a leader among FOSS CMS for offering great support to mobile users. Here are some questions I have:

    1. In general, if a website uses a well developed mobile-friendly Joomla template is used, should content from most non-core components and modules also display well on mobile devices? If not, is there a known list of common issues and ways to overcome the problems? Does Joomla need to establish some "mobile first" standards that should be in the core and also by extension developers?

    2. What changes to improve Joomla's mobile first support do you think should go in the Joomla core, and what innovations do you think would better take place from extension and template developers?

    Personally, I would love to see a series of in-depth JCM articles about different mobile first issues and what Joomla should do to become a MCMS leader. Thank you for all of your contributions to the Joomla community, here on the JCM as well as in other ways!

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
    • 0
    • 0
    TB
    2012-03-06 01:20:11

    Joomla devs seem to be VERY late in adapting their CMS for the mobile web. Joomla ought to have had mobile capabilities built in over 2 years ago. I know...they are volunteers. I understand. But, the leaders at Joomla could have made mobile a priority a long time ago.

    Casual site builders, like me, are handicapped by Joomla's lack of native support for the mobile web.

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
    • 1
    • 0
    Johannes Hock
    2012-03-06 20:35:39

    Hello Hagen,

    thanks for your interesting text about those many different and usefull ways to make joomla sites responsive and adaptive to mobile devices.

    As you wrote, that you are interested in our experiences with responsive or mobile solutions, i will tell you a little about my joomskeleton project, which is still work in progress - ie problems left to solve - but you can have a look at it on www.joomskeleton.adhocgrafx.de - please use another browser than ie first :).

    The template works with css media queries. It is based on a 960px grid system and offers different grid sizes responding to the actual devices.

    With the friendly help and inspiration of Angie Radtke, i implemented the beez tabs and beez hide modules.

    Another idea, i am working on meanwhile, is to provide different grid css files depending on screen sizes via a small 1kb java script. One advantage is to load smaller css file sizes and the possibility, to make different variations of module positions, depending on screen sizes in the index.php.

    That's what i'm on, for the moment.
    Please tell me, what you are thinking about it.

    Johannes Hock / www.adhocgrafx.de

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
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    Huyen NT
    2012-03-07 07:47:55

    Thanks Hagen for your article. I am going to try joooid and Minima.

    I hope that the Joomla core supports mobile soon. And it comes with simple configuration settings.

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
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    VJ Templates
    2012-03-08 01:05:22

    We have created a template that can auto-detect all mobile devices. Whenever a mobile device is detected, the mobile version of our template will be automatically displayed.

    If you add the web site as a homescreen, your company icon will be displayed just like a native app.

    http://www.vjtemplates.com/virtuemart-2/jewelry/62-virtuemart-2-red-ruby

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
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    Tuan Bui
    2012-03-09 15:17:52

    Great articles about mobile approaches and Joomla CMS :D!

    A few days ago "the new Ipad" has been released, interestingly to see Joomla optimized website on a new iPad device with Retina display.

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
    • 0
    • 0
    Jean-Yves
    2012-03-19 13:00:00

    Thank You so much for this article...as a businessman, not a programmer, it's nice to know that Joomla keeps up with the world that surrounds it!

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
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    • 0
    Ugur.-
    2012-03-22 11:58:24

    Hey, great article Hagen! And thanks for helping to boost awareness and mentioning Mobile Joomla! as well. We've been mobilizing Joomla! since 2008 and happy to see it's finally picking up and Joomla! is one of those leading the move!

    BTW, check Elegance Mobile Joomla! Template we just released. Our fans seem to love it, you probably also would.

    cheers,

    Ugur.-

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
    • 0
    • 0
    Rain
    2012-03-22 12:05:50

    The number of smartphone users is growing fast and we have to make mobile optimised websites . Everything for the users!

    ReplyQuote
  • avatar
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    • 0
    Daniel Peraza
    2012-03-22 17:49:48

    I think that the next big requirement for releases to come will be to provide built-in facilities for mobile developers to build their Apps o top of the Joomla CMS & Joomla Platform.

    And I think this is going to be as important as once did the ACL & custom permissions for 1.6.

    ReplyQuote
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