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WebLogic Server Frequently Asked Questions


FAQs: Wireless-Related Questions

Q. What is a wireless (mobile) device?

A. A wireless device in this context is a device that has connectivity to the Internet without being physically plugged into a network with a wire. The most common examples of these are the Internet-enabled cell phone such as a WAP Phone or i-Mode phone, personal digital assistant (PDA) such as Palm VII, Pocket PC such as Wireless iPaq, and pager such as RIM Blackberry.

Q. Can WebLogic Server support wireless devices?

A. Yes. For information on wireless support, see Using WAP with WebLogic Server. Wireless examples, if installed, are located in the /samples/examples directory of your WebLogicServer installation and are available from the Start menu.



For more information see Wireless, Internet and Email.

Q. What is WAP and what is i-Mode?

A. WAP and i-Mode are the two major over-the-air (OTA) protocols for wireless Internet communication with cell phones and some other devices. WAP stands for Wireless Application Protocol and is found predominantly in Europe and North America. i-Mode is the protocol used in Japan by NTT DoCoMo. A new protocol called WAP-NG (WAP Next Generation) is being considered as a replacement for both of these protocols.

Both WAP and i-Mode are comprised of both the OTA protocol and a markup language understood by their microbrowsers. The WAP markup language is WML (Wireless Markup Language) and cHTML (Compact HTML) is the markup language specified by i-Mode. WML and cHTML may be superseded by XHTML (Basic) in the future.

Note that other wireless carriers and devices use protocols and markup languages other than WAP and i-Mode. For example, the Palm VII uses web clipping over a proprietary protocol.

For more information about WAP, see


A. Yes. WAP and i-Mode were designed to hide the network details from the application developer. They will both work equally well on any underlying network. Therefore, as carriers upgrade their networks, applications written for either WAP or i-Mode will continue to work without any need for modifications. As the networks are upgraded to higher speeds, the performance of wireless applications written in either WML or cHTML should improve as well.


A. None. As described in the previous answer, neither WAP nor i-Mode is dependent on the underlying network. However, a developer may consider enriching an application with streaming media or other content that requires greater bandwidth.


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