“WAP addresses the shortcomings of other protocols”
“A new protocol family for mobile devices, Wireless Application
Protocol (WAP), is on the horizon, and analysts are predicting it
will become the standard for supporting smart cell phones, pagers,
wireless personal digital assistants, and mobile computers by 2001.
This month Rawn Shah investigates WAP and finds potential for
greatness.”
“Unlike most computers, which use protocols such as HTTP over
TCP over IP to access the Web, Wireless Application Protocol (WAP)
has its own protocols that operate in a format more natural for
wireless delivery. All WAP Internet connections still have to go
through a gateway that connects the two protocols, but the gateway
itself can add other services that optimize communications.”
“WAP is designed to handle higher latencies, unpredictable
service availability, unpredictable connection stability, and lower
bandwidth, all of which present problems for wireless
communication. In particular, instability, service availability,
and latency problems make it hard to maintain connection-oriented
services like TCP, which means most Internet applications that use
TCP as their delivery mechanism won’t work reliably on a wireless
network. Thus the need for WAP.”