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Encyclopedia of Database Systems pp 1751–1755Cite as

Mobile Interfaces

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Synonyms

Handhelds interfaces; Navigation system interfaces

Definition

Mobile interfaces are interfaces specifically designed for little portable electronic devices (handhelds), like cellular phones, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and pagers. Mobile interfaces provide means to execute complex activities on highly constrained devices, characterized by small screens, low computing power, and limited input/output (I/O) capabilities. While this term is mainly used to refer to interfaces for classical Web applications, like email and Web browsing it should be intended in a broader sense, encompassing all Web and non-Web applications that run on little mobile equipments (e.g., GPS navigation systems).

Historical Background

Mobile interfaces came up with the proliferation of cellular phones through the 1980s. At that time, the notion of mobile interface was very primitive and the offered services were very simple: handling lists of contacts, usually limited to <name, phone-number> pairs,...

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Recommended Reading

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Rome, Roma, Italy

    Giuseppe Santucci

Authors
  1. Giuseppe Santucci
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. College of Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology, 266 Ferst Drive, 30332-0765, Atlanta, GA, USA

    LING LIU (Professor) (Professor)

  2. Database Research Group David R. Cheriton School of Computer Science, University of Waterloo, 200 University Avenue West, N2L 3G1, Waterloo, ON, Canada

    M. TAMER ÖZSU (Professor and Director, University Research Chair) (Professor and Director, University Research Chair)

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© 2009 Springer Science+Business Media, LLC

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Santucci, G. (2009). Mobile Interfaces. In: LIU, L., ÖZSU, M.T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Database Systems. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-39940-9_219

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