Rating: 
Summary: Solid, but not spectacular introduction to WAP
Review: In the computer trade journals that I read, a common topic over the last year or so has been the progress (often lack) of Wireless Application Protocol (WAP). The common phrase always seems to be "poised to take off." However, despite the problems with bandwidth, valuable applications and security it does appear that it is the next area of rapid expansion of the Internet. The English speaking North American market is leveling off in the advent of new web users and while the market for the rest of the world continues to expand, it seems likely that will do so at a slow rate for the near future. Therefore, it is a good idea to learn at least the basics of what WAP can and cannot do.
When I received a request from a corporate client to offer a short course in Wireless Markup Language (WML), I looked around for a book with an adequate coverage of the basics of WAP. I chose this book because it was filled with basic examples that demonstrated the fundamental topics and moved on to some more advanced topics that were reasonable uses for WAP. This was of course necessary, as some of the hyped potential uses for WAP are pie in the airwaves. I cannot conceive of any circumstances where a large number of people are going to want their cell phones to constantly broadcast their geophysical position so that they can receive coupons from merchants in the area.
In working through the projects in preparation for the courses, my reaction was one of the best possible. My thinking through the exercises led to additional thoughts and ideas for teaching projects for the course. This is a solid introductory book in the basics of WAP, WML and WMLScript and I recommended it to the students.
Rating: 
Summary: Technically a good resource
Review: My review of this book is a little mixed. I think that technically the book is quite good. I have always been extremely pleased with Ben Forta's writing and clear approach to the subject matter. There were two things I did not like about the book. First, I purchased this book when it first hit the shelves and it was expensive, for a technical book. Second, I found numerous typos, incorrect references to figures, and other text errors. I am a stickler for these things and it is distracting to me when I find simple errors in a book. Overall, I really do think that the technical aspects of the book are good and it is a great resource that I use frequently. If minor typos and the such bother you, check to see if there is new edition, otherwise, this is a great resource for learning WAP and WML.PS: Be forewarned, my reviews are not checked for spelling or grammar...I don't have an editor fix them for me. SORRY!
Rating: 
Summary: Disappointing but might be good for beginners considering...
Review: there are a lot of style guidelines that I did not agree with. Some were based on a misunderstanding of the cellular phone keyboard. They state at one point that the only way to enter numbers on a Neopoint phone is (the book uses the example the digit 5) takes four key inputs. Simply not true. If you put the phone into NUM mode the keyboard acts like a normal phone and punches up digits instead of cycling through characters. In fact many cellular phones provide rapid input technology Tegic9 in different languages. So I thought that many of the stylistic guidelines on user input were not very real world. I was looking for something on feeding HTML and WML from the same dynamic page. The book does devote some time on this. The solution... to write separate pages and even separate SQL statements!? This would be a maintenance nightmare (as I know from experience). And they devoted only about 1 page of text on the possibility of using XML to solve this problem but refer the reader to other sources stating that the subject is better read there (so why buy this book?). Overall I think the book might be useful to a beginner because it does tie together disparate sources (though they are freely available over the web or on usenet) like the WML guides and the book does explain some rudimentary concepts in more detail than the Phone.com documentation. But for the advanced programmer this book skips important new technologies and their implementations.
Rating: 
Summary: The best book to learn WML and WMLscript
Review: This book from Ben Forta is a real guide for beginners as well as a reference book for advanced users. I bought this book and Professional WAP from wrox both of them helped me to come out in flying colours in my bachelor degree thesis.
Rating:
Summary: An Excellent Choice
Review: This book is by far the best!!!The author explains all the important details of WML and WMLScripting. This book is easy to read. Great for the experienced developer. A great reference. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants learn WML andWMLScripting. Knowledge of JavaScript will help the reader termondously. Knowledge of HTML and XML will also help. The authors assume the reader has knowledge of HTML, XML, and JavaScript. A great investment!!!
Rating:
Summary: An Excellent Choice
Review: This book is by far the best!!!The author explains all the important details of WML and WMLScripting. This book is easy to read. Great for the experienced developer. A great reference. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants learn WML andWMLScripting. Knowledge of JavaScript will help the reader termondously. Knowledge of HTML and XML will also help. The authors assume the reader has knowledge of HTML, XML, and JavaScript. A great investment!!!
Rating:
Summary: If you know some HTML already, this book is the one to get.
Review: WAP is so similar to HTML that I found that this book, PLUS my knowledge of HTML coding, helped launch my abilities to develop in this language quickly and easily. I liked that the syntax is clearly explained and presented and there's LOTS of example code - which is the main thing I look for when getting a book like this. There's a great section for advanced web programmers which shows you how to integrate WML with ASP/JSP/ColdFusion. It's probably a good idea to learn some HTML before you dive into WAP, but this book did have some good asides to explain things for pure beginners, as well.
Rating:
Summary: If you know some HTML already, this book is the one to get.
Review: WAP is so similar to HTML that I found that this book, PLUS my knowledge of HTML coding, helped launch my abilities to develop in this language quickly and easily. I liked that the syntax is clearly explained and presented and there's LOTS of example code - which is the main thing I look for when getting a book like this. There's a great section for advanced web programmers which shows you how to integrate WML with ASP/JSP/ColdFusion. It's probably a good idea to learn some HTML before you dive into WAP, but this book did have some good asides to explain things for pure beginners, as well.
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