By John Puterbaugh

On the Web widgets have transformed the way people create and distribute applications and services. They have made it easier to create Web applications and have been instrumental in reinforcing a more distributed Web strategy -- one that isn't solely reliant upon driving traffic through individual portals.
Like the Web, mobile widget creation is a straightforward process that can be done by many designers and Web developers.

The creation of mobile widgets does not require the tedious process of mobile application design, development, porting and deployment.

But, in contrast to the Web, the distribution is anything but frictionless. There is fragmentation created by the many types of devices, network configurations and widget formats. And you also have competing widget engines based on entirely different technologies.

Widgets can be defined as self-contained, miniature applications that often provide a narrow range of functionality and are portals that can be installed and used across many distribution points.

Mobile widgets are often defined in contrast to desktop widgets (e.g., dashboard widgets from Apple) and Web widgets (e.g., Yahoo widgets). This distinction will rapidly become obsolete since there exists already the equivalent of desktop widgets in mobile (i.e., phone-top widgets) as well as mobile Web widgets.

Delivering mobile widgets
There are three primary vehicles on mobile devices for discovering and presenting rich, interactive content in general and widgets, in particular. They are browsers, players and on-device portals.
Browsers (e.g., mobile Internet browsers, WAP browsers) are used to navigate and view various types of content that is typically resident at remote locations and accessible via a network.

Players are used to playback and render media or instructions (e.g., serialized scripts such as Actionscript). In mobile, there are essentially two main types of players: media players and rich Internet application players (e.g. Adobe Flash and Microsoft Silverlight).

On-device portals (ODPs) are mobile applications that have been optimized for accessing and interacting with content and information without necessarily using the Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) or other markup languages (e.g., xHTML) and associated protocols (e.g., HTTP).

The two primary types of on-device portals are homescreen replacements and portal/portlet applications.

Looking ahead
It is ill-advised to simply view mobile widgets as a port of or a channel for Web widgets. The mobile user experience is unique.

When contrasted to the desktop or laptop experience (i) the user interaction model is fundamentally different on mobile (i.e., it is not driven by a keyboard and mouse); (ii) the consumer touch points are more tightly integrated (e.g., talking, texting, sending, receiving, listening, viewing) and; (iii) mobility itself an entirely different experience than merely being portable and always-on.

In short, when properly designed and deployed, mobile widgets provide mobile service extensibility (i.e., adding new content and functionality to existing services), easier and more rapid mobile content and service creation, better distribution and syndication and service personalization.

John Puterbaugh is founder/CEO of Nellymoser, a Boston-based mobile services firm. Reach him at .