Chapter 28. The System.Web.Mobile Namespace

Version 1.1 of the .NET Framework incorporates support for mobile devices that have a wide range of abilitities, including Pocket PCs, PDAs, and Internet-enabled cellphones. Some devices expect Wireless Markup Language (WML), while others support compact HTML (cHTML) or ordinary HTML content. Fortunately, ASP.NET embraces this diversity with intelligent mobile controls that can render the correct output based on information supplied by the client browser.

The System.Web.Mobile namespace includes the core functionality required for mobile web applications, including classes that process errors, perform forms authententication, and retrieve the capabilities of the client device. Several of these classes are used internally by ASP.NET, while others (namely the MobileCapabilities and MobileFormsAuthentication classes) are accessed directly in your code. Figure 28-1 shows the types in this namespace

The System.Web.Mobile namespace includes two key classes for the mobile ASP.NET developer. The MobileFormsAuthentication class allows you to retrieve fine-grained information about the requirements and abilities of a client device. The MobileFormsAuthentication class provides shared helper methods that allow you to use forms authentication with devices that don't support cookies by embedding encrypted authentication information into the URL.

Figure 28-1. The System.Web.Mobile namespace