True, an HTML page on a tiny screen will look a mess, but for most pages the important information is contained solely in text.For several years developers have talked about launching WAP-type phones. The line has always been that while proper WML pages would look great, the phones would be able to display ordinary HTML pages in a bastardised format. The problem is that while, for most of the time, WAP phone users will want to stick with the suggested WML pages highlighted for them by the phone operators, every so often they will want, or need, to access an HTML page and garner a vital piece of information.For example, perhaps the Arsenal page has details of kick-off times, and you are planning to meet someone before an away game. Just as HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) is a collection of tags that describe how a page should be displayed on a computer screen, so WML tells a mobile device how a page should appear on a tiny phone or personal organiser screen. The phones will have the number to dial programmed in, and it will take a brave soul to search through the functions of the phone to change this.The problem for Web libertarians is that neither Orange nor Vodafone is preparing to install that third vital piece of software that converts today’s Web pages into a format that can be read on a mobile phone.WAP gateways are designed to read new Web pages written in a special language called WML, or Wireless Markup Language.

Second, the Internet service-provider needs a special gateway that serves up information in WAP format; and third, that gateway computer needs to run special software that will convert standard Web pages into WAP messages for your phone.In the short term at least, most users will get their WAP service from their telephone supplier, which will become their default ISP. What’s more, inconsistencies in phone design will mean a headache for would-be content-designers.
Orange says it will launch a WAP service next month and Vodafone will launch on 1 November. But neither company looks likely to introduce the facilities that are needed to let ordinary WAP phone users browse the Web.To do that on the tiny screen of a mobile phone you need three things First, the phone has to have a WAP browser built into it. Scratch below the surface and you find that “the Internet on a mobile” is not really that at all.

Two of the UK’s major mobile-phone operators announced plans to launch information services using the so-called Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) and the organising committee of the standard – the WAP Forum – met in London to discuss the next version of the standard. Motorola has said that all its mobile phones will include a WAP browser by the end of next year, and other manufacturers are not far behind This means a major revolution is about to start

There is bad news, however. The ability to access the Internet via your mobile phone came a few steps closer last week. Instead of text, we could use graphics in our menus, but text is much easier to edit.Jason Cranford Teague is a senior information architect at iXL and the author of `DHTML for the World Wide Web’, available from book stores around the UK. If you have questions, you can find an archive of this column at Webbed Environments ( http:// www. webbedenvironments ) or e-mail him at jason webbedenvironemts. Each link in that menu is used to show or hide one of the sub-menus which are contained in the tags below.You can change the names and links in these menus to suit your needs.

Most importantly, however, the subMenu class tells the sub-menus where to appear on the screen (30 pixels from the top and 8 pixels from the left).The HTMLThe final step is to set up the menus.News |ReviewsThis WeekLast WeekArchiveBooksSoftwareHardwareThis code is placed in the of the document The first tag holds the menu bar. This sets up two classes called menu and subMenu, These classes set the font face and size of the text in our menu bar and sub-menus as well as setting a border around the menus. In addition, this function has to remember the last sub-menu that was selected, so that if it is selected again, the sub-menu is turned off instead of on again.var isLayers = 0; var isAll = 0; var isDHTML = 0;var dom = null; var oldDom = null;if (document.layers) {isLayers = 1; isDHTML = 1;}if (document.all) {isAll = 1; isDHTML = 1;}docObj = (isLayers) ? `document’ : `document.all’;styleObj = (isLayers) ? `’ : `.style’;function popMenu(currElem) { if (oldDom) { oldDom.visibility = “hidden”; }dom = eval(docObj + `.’ + currElem + styleObj);if (oldDom != dom) {state = dom.visibility;if (state == “visible” || state == “show”){dom.visibility = “hidden”}else { dom.visibility = “visible” } }if (oldDom != dom) { oldDom = dom; }else { oldDom = null; } }The above script is placed into the of the document. I went to New York in February last year, and it was basically the craze out there – everybody had the DVD player and all the videos were coming out on DVD before VHS It wasn’t even out here at that time Certain shops had it, but it wasn’t really on the market. So when I bought it in June last year there were only two or three films out on DVD

But I knew that it was going to take off. I found certain shops that actually had DVD films, and I could order them from America. By the time it came out properly I had 20-odd films on DVD already.
I would by lying if I said there was that much of a difference.

Except, put it this way: if you are watching a film on videotape, the tape can easily get worn down, and you will see that effect on the screen. But with DVD it will keep its perfect quality for ever – unless you scratch it, but then that’s the same with everything.The number-one thing you will notice about DVD is how clear the visuals are. And the sound quality is much better; more like stereo sound. It does pay to get a surround-sound system or something like that to enhance sound on your television, because obviously a normal TV can only do so much. I have got surround-sound on a Philips WideScreen TV.Then there are the different angles. You can also watch selected extra scenes from films, get little biographies of the characters, and it’ll show the trailer It’s interactive.