Highlight: a system for creating and deploying mobile web applications

Abstract

We present a new server-side architecture that enables rapid prototyping and deployment of mobile web applications created from existing web sites. Key to this architecture is a remote control metaphor in which the mobile device controls a fully functional browser that is embedded within a proxy server. Content is clipped from the proxy browser, transformed if necessary, and then sent to the mobile device as a typical web page. Users' interactions with that content on the mobile device control the next steps of the proxy browser. We have found this approach to work well for creating mobile sites from a variety of existing sites, including those that use dynamic HTML and AJAX technologies. We have conducted a small user study to evaluate our model and API with experienced web programmers.