Wireless Application Protocol

WAP stands for Wireless Application Protocol. It is a protocol designed for micro-
browsers and it enables the access of internet in the mobile devices. It uses the mark-
up language WML (Wireless Markup Language and not HTML), WML is defined as XML
1.0 application. It enables creating web applications for mobile devices. In 1998, WAP
Forum was founded by Ericson, Motorola, Nokia and Unwired Planet whose aim was
to standardize the various wireless technologies via protocols.
WAP protocol was resulted by the joint efforts of the various members of WAP Forum.
In 2002, WAP forum was merged with various other forums of the industry resulting
in the formation of Open Mobile Alliance (OMA).

The dictionary definition of these terms are as follows −

• Wireless − Lacking or not requiring a wire or wires pertaining to radio
transmission.
• Application − A computer program or piece of computer software that is
designed to do a specific task.
• Protocol − A set of technical rules about how information should be
transmitted and received using computers.
WAP is the set of rules governing the transmission and reception of data by computer
applications on or via wireless devices like mobile phones. WAP allows wireless devices to
view specifically designed pages from the Internet using only plain text and very simple black-
and-white pictures.
WAP is a standardized technology for cross-platform, distributed computing very similar to
the Internet's combination of Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) and Hypertext Transfer
Protocol (HTTP), except that it is optimized for:
• low-display capability
• low-memory
• low-bandwidth devices, such as personal digital assistants (PDAs), wireless
phones, and pagers.
WAP is designed to scale across a broad range of wireless networks like GSM, IS-95, IS-136,
and PDC.

Who is behind WAP?

The Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) is a result of joint efforts taken by companies
teaming up in an industry group called WAP Forum (www.wapforum.org).
On June 26, 1997, Ericsson, Motorola, Nokia, and Unwired Planet took the initiative to start a
rapid creation of a standard for making advanced services within the wireless domain a
reality. In December 1997, WAP Forum was formally created and after the release of the WAP
1.0 specifications in April 1998, WAP Forum membership was opened to all.
The WAP Forum now has over 500 members and represents over 95 percent of the global
handset market. Companies such as Nokia, Motorola and Ericsson are all members of the
forum.
The objective of the forum is to create a license-free standard that brings information and
telephony services to wireless devices.

Why is WAP Important?

Until the first WAP devices emerged, the Internet was a Internet and a mobile phone was a
mobile phone. You could surf the Net, do serious research, or be entertained on the Internet
using your computer, but this was limited to your computer.
Now with the appearance of WAP, the scene is that we have the massive information,
communication, and data resources of the Internet becoming more easily available to anyone
with a mobile phone or communications device.
WAP being open and secure, is well suited for many different applications including, but not
limited to stock market information, weather forecasts, enterprise data, and games.
Despite the common misconception, developing WAP applications requires only a few
modifications to existing web applications. The current set of web application development
tools will easily support WAP development, and in the future more development tools will be
announced.

WAP Microbrowser
To browse a standard internet site you need a web browser. Similar way to browse a WAP
enables website, you would need a micro browser. A Micro Browser is a small piece of
software that makes minimal demands on hardware, memory and CPU. It can display
information written in a restricted mark-up language called WML. Although, tiny in memory
footprint it supports many features and is even scriptable.
Today, all the WAP enabled mobile phones or PDAs are equipped with these micro browsers
so that you can take full advantage of WAP technology.

WAP - Key Features

A programming model similar to the Internet's
Though WAP is a new technology, but it reuse the concepts found on the Internet. This reuse
enables a quick introduction of WAP-based services, since both service developers and
manufacturers are familiar with these concepts today.

Wireless Markup Language (WML)

You must be using HTML language to develop your web-based application. Same way, WML
is a markup language used for authoring WAP services, fulfilling the same purpose as HTML
does on the Web. In contrast to HTML, WML is designed to fit small handheld devices.

WMLScript
Once again, you must be using Java Script or VB script to enhance the functionality of your
web applications. Same way, WMLScript can be used to enhance the functionality of a service,
just as Java script can be utilized in HTML. It makes it possible to add procedural logic and
computational functions to WAPbased services.

Wireless Telephony Application Interface (WTAI)

The WTAI is an application framework for telephony services. WTAI user agents are able to
make calls and edit the phone book by calling special WMLScript functions or by accessing
special URLs. If one writes WML decks containing names of people and their phone numbers,
you may add them to your phone book or call them right away just by clicking the appropriate
hyperlink on the screen.

Optimized protocol stack

The protocols used in WAP are based on well-known Internet protocols, such
as HTTP and Transmission Control Protocol (TCP), but they have been optimized to address
the constraints of a wireless environment, such as low bandwidth and high latency.

WAP - The Model

The Internet Model
The Internet model makes it possible for a client to reach services on a large number of origin
servers, each addressed by a unique Uniform Resource Locator (URL).
The content stored on the servers is of various formats, but HTML is the predominant. HTML
provides the content developer with a means to describe the appearance of a service in a flat
document structure. If more advanced features like procedural logic are needed, then
scripting languages such as JavaScript or VB Script may be utilised.
The figure below shows how a WWW client request a resource stored on a web server. On
the Internet standard communication protocols, like HTTP and Transmission Control
Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) are used.

The content available at the web server may be static or dynamic. Static content is produced
once and not changed or updated very often; for example, a company presentation. Dynamic
content is needed when the information provided by the service changes more often; for
example, timetables, news, stock quotes, and account information. Technologies such as
Active Server Pages (ASP), Common Gateway Interface (CGI), and Servlets allow content to be
generated dynamically.

The WAP Model

The figure below shows the WAP programming model. Note, the similarities with the Internet
model. Without the WAP Gateway/Proxy, the two models would have been practically
identical.
WAP Gateway/Proxy is the entity that connects the wireless domain with the Internet. You
should make a note that the request that is sent from the wireless client to the WAP
Gateway/Proxy uses the Wireless Session Protocol (WSP). In its essence, WSP is a binary
version of HTTP.
A markup language − the Wireless Markup Language (WML) has been adapted to develop
optimized WAP applications. In order to save valuable bandwidth in the wireless network,
WML can be encoded into a compact binary format. Encoding WML is one of the tasks
performed by the WAP Gateway/Proxy.

How WAP Model Works?

When it comes to actual use, WAP works as follows −
• The user selects an option on their mobile device that has a URL with Wireless Markup
language (WML) content assigned to it.
• The phone sends the URL request via the phone network to a WAP gateway using the
binary encoded WAP protocol.
 • The gateway translates this WAP request into a conventional HTTP request for the
specified URL and sends it on to the Internet.
• The appropriate Web server picks up the HTTP request.
• The server processes the request just as it would any other request. If the URL refers to
a static WML file, the server delivers it. If a CGI script is requested, it is processed and
the content returned as usual.
• The Web server adds the HTTP header to the WML content and returns it to the
gateway.
• The WAP gateway compiles the WML into binary form.
• The gateway then sends the WML response back to the phone.
• The phone receives the WML via the WAP protocol.
• The micro-browser processes the WML and displays the content on the screen.

WAP - Architecture
WAP is designed in a layered fashion, so that it can be extensible, flexible, and scalable. As a
result, the WAP protocol stack is divided into five layers −

Layers of WAP Protocol

Application Layer
Wireless Application Environment (WAE). This layer is of most interest to content developers
because it contains among other things, device specifications, and the content development
programming languages, WML, and WMLScript.

Session Layer
Wireless Session Protocol (WSP). Unlike HTTP, WSP has been designed by the WAP Forum to
provide fast connection suspension and reconnection.

Transaction Layer
Wireless Transaction Protocol (WTP). The WTP runs on top of a datagram service, such as
User Datagram Protocol (UDP) and is part of the standard suite of TCP/IP protocols used to
provide a simplified protocol suitable for low bandwidth wireless stations.
Security Layer
Wireless Transport Layer Security (WTLS). WTLS incorporates security features that are based
upon the established Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol standard. It includes data
integrity checks, privacy, service denial, and authentication services.

Transport Layer
Wireless Datagram Protocol (WDP). The WDP allows WAP to be bearer-independent by
adapting the transport layer of the underlying bearer. The WDP presents a consistent data
format to the higher layers of the WAP protocol stack, thereby offering the advantage of
bearer independence to application developers.
Each of these layers provides a well-defined interface to the layer above it. This means that
the internal workings of any layer are transparent or invisible to the layers above it. The
layered architecture allows other applications and services to utilise the features provided by
the WAP-stack as well. This makes it possible to use the WAP-stack for services and
applications that currently are not specified by WAP.
The WAP protocol architecture is shown below alongside a typical Internet Protocol stack.

Note that the mobile network bearers in the lower part of the figure above are not part of
the WAP protocol stack.

WAP - Environment
Wireless Application Environment (WAE), the uppermost layer in the WAP stack, provides an
environment that enables a wide range of applications to be used on the wireless devices. We
have earlier discussed about the WAP WAE programming model. In this chapter, we will focus
on the various components of WAE.
Components of WAE
Addressing Model
A syntax suitable for naming resources stored on servers. WAP use the same addressing
model as the one used on the Internet that is Uniform Resource Locators (URL).

Wireless Markup Language (WML)

A lightweight markup language designed to meet the constraints of a wireless environment
with low bandwidth and small handheld devices. The Wireless Markup Language is WAP's
analogy to HTML used on the WWW. WML is based on the Extensible Markup Language
(XML).

WMLScript
A lightweight scripting language. WMLScript is based on ECMAScript, the same scripting
language that JavaScript is based on. It can be used for enhancing services written in WML in
the way that it to some extent adds intelligence to the services; for example, procedural logic,
loops, conditional expressions, and computational functions.

Wireless Telephony Application (WTA, WTAI)

A framework and programming interface for telephony services. The Wireless Telephony
Application (WTA) environment provides a means to create telephony services using WAP.

Hardware and Software Requirement

At minimum developing WAP applications requires a web server and a WAP simulator. Using
simulator software while developing a WAP application is convenient as all the required
software can be installed on the development PC.
Although, software simulators are good in their own right, no WAP application should go into
production without testing it with actual hardware. The following list gives a quick overview
of the necessary hardware and software to test and develop WAP applications −
• A web server with connection to the Internet
• A WML to develop WAP application
• A WAP simulator to test WAP application
• A WAP gateway
• A WAP phone for final testing.
Microsoft IIS or Apache on Windows or Linux can be used as the web server and Nokia WAP
Toolkit version 2.0 as the WinWAP simulator.

Configure Web Server for WAP

In the WAP architecture, the web server communicates with the WAP gateway, accepting
HTTP requests and returning WML code to the gateway. The HTTP protocol mandates that
each reply must include something called a Multi-Purpose Internet Mail Extensions (MIME)
type.
In normal web applications, this MIME type is set to text/html, designating normal HTML
code. Images on the other hand could be specified as image/gif or image/jpeg for instance.
With this content type specification, the web browser knows the data type that the web
server returns.
In WAP applications a new set of MIME types must be used, as shown in the following table
−

File type MIME type

WML (.wml) text/vnd.wap.wml

WMLScript (.wmls) text/vmd.wap.wmlscript

WBMP (.wbmp) image/vnd.wap.wbmp

In dynamic applications, the MIME type must be set on the fly, whereas in static WAP
applications, the web server must be configured appropriately.

WAP - WML Syntax

The topmost layer in the WAP architecture is made up of WAE (Wireless Application
Environment), which consists of WML and WML scripting language.
WML scripting language is used to design applications that are sent over wireless devices such
as mobile phones. This language takes care of the small screen and the low bandwidth of
transmission. WML is an application of XML, which is defined in a document-type definition.
WML pages are called decks. They are constructed as a set of cards, related to each other
with links. When a WML page is accessed from a mobile phone, all the cards in the page are
downloaded from the WAP server to mobile phone showing the content.
WML commands and syntaxes are used to show content and to navigate between the cards.
Developers can use these commands to declare variables, format text, and show images on
the mobile phone.

WAP Program Structure

A WML program is typically divided into two parts − the document prolog and the body.
Consider the following code −

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE wml PUBLIC "-//WAPFORUM//DTD WML 1.2//EN"
"http://www.wapforum.org/DTD/wml12.dtd">
<wml>
<card>
 ...
</card>
...more cards...
</wml>

The first line of this text says that this is an XML document and the version is 1.0. The second
line selects the document type and gives the URL of the document type definition (DTD). This
DTD gives the full XML definition of WML. The DTD referenced is defined in WAP 1.1, but this
header changes with the versions of the WML. The header must be copied exactly so that the
tool kits automatically generate this prolog.
The body is enclosed within a <wml>...</wml> tag pair as shown above. The body of a WML
document can consist of one or more of the following −
• Deck
• Card
• Content to be shown
• Navigation instructions

WML Commands
The commands used in WML are summarized as follows −

Formatting
Command Description

<p> Paragraph

<b> Bold

<big> Large

<em> Emphasized

<I> Italicized

<small> Small

<strong> Strongly Emphasized

<u> Underlined

<br> Line Break

Inserting Images
<img src="image-path/image - name" alt="Picture not available" />
Using Tables
Command Description

<table> Definition of a table

<tr> Defining a row

<td> Defining a column

<Thead> Table header

Variables
Declared as −

<setvar name="x" value="xyz"/>

Used as −

$ identifier or
$ (identifier) or
$ (Identifier; conversion)
Forms
Command Description

<select> Define single or multiple list

<input> Input from user

<option> Defines an option in a selectable list

<fieldset> Defines a set of input fields

<optgroup> Defines an option group in a selectable list

Task Elements
Command Description

<go> Represents the action of switching to a new card

<noop> Says that nothing should be done

<prev> Represents the action of going back to the previous card

<refresh> Refreshes some specified card variables.

Events
The various events are as follows −

Command Description

<do> Defines a do event handler

<onevent> Defines an onevent event handler

<postfield> Defines a postfield event handler

<ontimer> Defines an ontimer event handler

<onenterforward> Defines an onenterforward handler

<onenterbackward> Defines an onenterbackward handler

<onpick> Defines an onpick event handler

Sample WML Program

Keep the following WML code into info.wml on your server. If your server is WAP enabled
then you can access this page using any WAP device.

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<!DOCTYPE wml PUBLIC "-//WAPFORUM//DTD WML 1.2//EN"
"http://www.wapforum.org/DTD/wml12.dtd">
<!-- WML prolog.declaration of file type and version>

<wml>
<!-- Declaration of the WML deck>
<card id="info" newcontext="true">
<!-- declaration of a card in deck>
<p align="center"><b>Information Center</b></p>
<!--paragraph declaration to display heading>
<p>
<!--paragraph declaration to display links>
<a href="Movie.wml">1. Movies info.</a>
<a href="Weather.wml">2. Weather Info.</a>
<!--declaration of links for weather and movies>
</p>
</card>
<!-- card end>
</wml>
<!-- program end>
 WAP - WML Script
WMLScript (Wireless Markup Language Script) is the client-side scripting language of WML
(Wireless Markup Language). A scripting language is similar to a programming language, but
is of lighter weight. With WMLScript, the wireless device can do some of the processing and
computation. This reduces the number of requests and responses to/from the server.

WML Script Components

WML Script is very similar to Java Script. WML Script components have almost similar
meaning as they have in Java Script. The WML Script program components are summarized
here.

WML Script Operators

WML Script supports following type of operators.
• Arithmetic Operators
• Comparison Operators
• Logical (or Relational) Operators
• Assignment Operators
• Conditional (or ternary) Operators

WML Script Control Statements

Control statements are used for controlling the sequence and iterations in a program.

Statement Description

if-else Conditional branching

for Making self-incremented fixed iteration loop

while Making variable iteration loop

break Terminates a loop

continue Quit the current iteration of a loop

WML Script Functions

The user-defined functions are declared in a separate file having the extension .wmls.
Functions are declared as follows −

function name (parameters) {

 control statements;
return var;
}

The functions used are stored in a separate file with the extension .wmls. The functions are
called as the filename followed by a hash, followed by the function name −

maths.wmls#squar()

WML Scripts Standard Libraries

The are six standard libraries totally. Here is an overview of them −
• Lang − The Lang library provides functions related to the WMLScript language core.
Example Function − abs(),abort(), characterSet(),float(), isFloat(), isInt(), max(), isMax(),
min(), minInt(), maxInt(), parseFloat(), parseInt(), random(), seed()
• Float − The Float library contains functions that help us perform floating-point
arithmetic operations.
Example Function − sqrt(), round(), pow(), ceil(), floor(), int(), maxFloat(), minFloat()
• String − The String library provides a number of functions that help us manipulate
strings.
Example Function − length(), charAt(), find(), replace(), trim(), compare(), format(),
isEmpty(), squeeze(), toString(), elementAt(), elements(), insertAt(), removeAt(),
replaceAt()
• URL − The URL library contains functions that help us manipulate URLs.
Example Function − getPath(), getReferer(), getHost(), getBase(), escapeString(),
isValid(), loadString(), resolve(), unescapeString(), getFragment()
• WMLBrowser − The WMLBrowser library provides a group of functions to control the
WML browser or to get information from it.
Example Function − go(), prev(), next(), getCurrentCard(), refresh(), getVar(), setVar()
• Dialogs − The Dialogs library Contains the user interface functions.
Example Function − prompt(), confirm(), alert()

WML Scripts Comments

There are two types of comments in WMLScript −
• Single-line comment − To add a single-line comment, begin a line of text with the //
characters.
• Multi-line comment − To add a multi-line comment, enclose the text within /* and */.
These rules are the same in WMLScript, JavaScript, Java, and C++. The WMLScript engine will
ignore all comments. The following WMLScript example demonstrates the use of comments
−

// This is a single-line comment.

/* This is a multi-line comment. */

/* A multi-line comment can be placed on a single line. */

WML Script Case Sensitivity

The WMLScript language is case-sensitive. For example, a WMLScript function with the name
WMLScript Function is different from wmlscript function. So, be careful of the capitalization
when defining or referring to a function or a variable in WMLScript.

Whitespaces in WMLScript
Except in string literals, WMLScript ignores extra whitespaces like spaces, tabs, and newlines.

WML Script Statement Termination by Semicolons

A semicolon is required to end a statement in WMLScript. This is the same as C++ and Java.
Note that JavaScript does not have such requirement but WML Script makes it mandatory.

WAP - Core Services

A vast majority of WAP services are available in the market. You may contact to some WAP
lover to have a big list of all the available services and then you can start accessing those
services from your WAP enabled mobile phone.
However, some examples of useful mobile services are in the following fields −

Banking
• Accessing account statements.
• Paying bills.
• Transferring money between accounts.
Finance
• Retrieving stock and share prices.
• Buying and selling stocks and shares.
• Looking up interest rates.
• Looking up currency exchange rates.
Shopping
• Buying everyday commodities.
• Browsing and buying books.
• Buying CDs.
Ticketing
• Booking or buying airline tickets.
• Buying concert tickets.
• Booking theatre tickets.
Entertainment
• Retrieving restaurant details.
• Looking up clubs.
 • Finding out what is playing in what cinemas.
• Playing solitaire games.
• Playing interactive games.
Weather
• Retrieving local weather forecasts.
• Looking up weather at other locations.
E- Messaging
• Voice mail.
• Unified Messaging.
• Enhanced support of legacy SMS services.
Live WAP Examples
Following are some of the examples of WAP applications −
• 123Jump (http://www.123jump.com) A selection of stock data and news, all
via WAP.
• 1477.com (http://1477.com) WAP/Web development services.
• 2PL World-Wide Hotel Guide (http://wap.2pl.com) A worldwide hotel guide
accessible in multiple languages via a WAP-enabled device.
• AEGEE-Eindhoven (http://wappy.to/aegee/) A Europe-wide students
association, whose goal is to allow all students to integrate and learn about
each others cultures.
• Ajaxo (http://www.ajaxo.com) A WAP service for Wireless Stock Trading from
any WAP-enabled device.
• Aktiesidan (http://mmm.aktiesidan.com/servlets/aktiesidan/) A Swedish
stock-market monitoring service, all WAP-enabled.
• Amazon.com Bookshop (http://www.amazon.com/phone/) Amazon.com
has launched this WAP portal (HDML-based) for browsing books.
• Traffic Maps (http://www.webraska.com/) A French service that monitors
and shows the latest in traffic news via maps.
WAP - Key Benefits
Subscribers
It is crucial that the subscribers benefit from using WAP based services. The key benefits can
be summarized as −
• Portability
• Easy to use
• Access to a wide variety of services on a competitive market
• The possibility of having personalised services
• Fast, convenient, and efficient access to services
• To fulfil as many customers needs as possible, WAP devices will be available in
various form factors, e.g. pagers, handheld PCs, and phones
Operators
Many of the advantages mentioned under "Service Providers" are be applicable to operators
as well. The operator's benefits may include −
• Address new market segments of mobile users by enabling a wider range of
mobile VAS.
• Deploy telephony services that in contrast to traditional telephony services are
easy to create, update, and personalise
• Use the flexibility of WAP as a tool to differentiate from competitors
• Attractive interface to services will increase usage
• Increased revenues per user due to higher network utilisation
• Convenient service creation and maintenance including short time-to-market
• Replace expensive customer care centres with WAP based services (E-care)
• WAP services are designed to be independent of the network, implying that an
operator who runs different types of networks only have to develop its services
ones
• An open standard means that equipment will be provided by many
manufacturers
Service Providers
WAP opens new possibilities for service and content providers since they not necessarily have
to come to an agreement with a specific operator about providing services to their customers.
For example, the gains are −
• Create a service once, make it accessible on a broad range of wireless networks
• Address new market segments by launching innovative mobile VAS. Keep old
customers by adapting existing Internet services to WAP
• Keep old customers by adapting existing Internet services to WAP
• Convenient service creation and maintenance
• Creating a WAP service is no harder than creating an Internet service today
since WML and WMLScript are based on well-known Internet technology
• Use standard tools like ASP or CGI to generate content dynamically
• Utilise existing investments in databases, etc that are the basis of existing
Internet services
Manufacturers
Mobile devices supporting WAP will be available in many different form factors, e.g., cellular
phones, pagers, and handheld PCs. Hardware manufacturers will also need to supply
operators with equipment such as WAP Gateway/Proxys and WTA servers. Manufacturers
benefit in the following ways −
• WAP scales across a broad range of mobile networks, meaning that WAP
implementations can be used in devices supporting different types of
networks.
• The expected wide adoption of WAP implies that economies of scales can be
achieved, meaning that the huge mass-market can be addressed
 • The fact that WAP is designed to consume minimal amount of memory, and
that the use of proxy technology relieves the CPU, means that inexpensive
components can be used in the handsets
• Reuse the deep knowledge about wireless network infrastructure to develop
advanced servers that seamlessly integrates mobile VAS with telephony
• Seize the opportunity to introduce new innovative products
Tools Providers
Today, we have a number of tools available for creating applications for the web. Content
developers have become accustomed to the convenience that provides. Tools providers will
be able to −
• Reuse and modify existing products to support WAP or even integrate WAP support in
existing tools.
• Address a new customer base in the wireless community.

WAP - Modern Devices

A WAP device is a combination of hardware and software capable of running a WAP-
compliant microbrowser, such as a WAP-enabled mobile phone or a PDA.
A PC can also be used as a WAP device, if you download a WAP phone emulator from one of
the developer sites. The emulator allows you to use a virtual phone on your desktop. Some
major suppliers such as Ericsson, Nokia, and Openwave, have developer sites where you can
download software development kits (SDKs) containing WAP emulators.
A WAP phone can run any WAP application in the same way that a Web browser can run any
HTML application. Once you have a WAP phone, you can access the Internet simply by
entering URLs and following the links that appear.
These devices provide easy and secure access to the internet content and other services such
as banking, leisure, and unified messaging. Furthermore, access is not restricted only to the
Internet, but it can also deal with intranet information in the same way as internet content
because both are based upon HTML.