The advent of diverse web application platforms, wireless networks and browsers added complexity to the mobile web environments in contrast to typical web environments. As a result, many performance issues such as slow loading, deferred tap events and jagged page transitions have come into the picture. Though experts are putting efforts to deliver a more native experience to the end user, still there are some roadblocks hindering them.

Factors such as limited screen size, packet latencies, battery life etc., have encouraged users to expect speedy performance from mobile web solutions. Sluggish loading can highly affect your conversion rates and hence search engine rankings. Moreover, more users are usually impatient and occasionally accept delays which make them leave the website due to loading issues. As the mobile traffic is increasing drastically, it is quite important to optimize the mobile web to avoid potential business loss.

Though there are numerous mobile web application frameworks available in the market, there are certain complexities involved. So, in this article I am sharing some useful tips to optimize mobile web solutions using HTML5. Read on.

Hardware acceleration

Usually, detailed 3D modeling as well as CAD diagrams are handled by GPU. However, here we want our primitive drawings, for example, backgrounds, div’s, images and text with shadows to animate and appear smoothly with GPU. One bad news is that majority of the developers are using third-party frameworks to dish out the animation process ignoring the semantics, however the question here is “do we really need to mask these core CSS3 features?”. Well, let me give you a clear picture of it.

1. Memory allocation and computational burden

If you constantly composite each element in the DOM to accelerate hardware, it becomes difficult for the next person who works on the same.

2. Power Consumption

It is very obvious that when battery kicks in synchronous with hardware. While working on mobile web solutions, developers are left with no choice than considering many device constraints while writing code. It is a very common practice as the browser developers tend to enable access to more device hardware.

3. Conflicts

Most of us have personally faced the issue of unusual behavior of browser while applying acceleration to some parts of web page which is accelerated already. Hence it is very important to know the importance of overlapping acceleration.

In order to improve the user interaction more smooth and native, it is important to make the browser convenient and flexible to you. Preferably, we want the CPU to start the initial animation and consequently take care of composing all the layers during the process of animation. The popular things like translate3d(), scale3d() and translate(), serve the same purpose- providing own layer to the animated elements and enabling the device to render all the elements together smoothly.

Hardware Consideration

A number of device-specific factors must be taken into account while developing web solutions for mobile. The elements including battery consumption, memory allocation and so on can bring about many challenges; and if not fixed appropriately they can ruin the overall performance of your mobile application. Not clear about this? Let me explain.

For example, take the case of battery consumption. We all know that hardware is always linked with battery, so it is very important to take this factor into consideration while developing an application. The main reason is that the browsers we are using now get a high level of access to the device hardware when compared to earlier browsers. Hence it can disturb the performance of the web.

To generate trouble-free, consistent user experience it is important to enable the CPU of mobile device to configure the first stage of animation and later on allow the GPU to proliferate different layers while executing an animation procedure.

Network type detection, handling, and profiling

With the ability to buffer the web application, it is essential to giver proper connection detection features to the app in order make it smarter. This is the most critical stage where the development completely depends on the connection speed and online or offline modes.

Let’s take a common scenario for instance. While using a mobile web from a high-speed train, there might be some issues with the network at different moments and various geographies may support dissimilar transmission speeds. For example 3G is not available in some areas of the city. However, remote areas support unique 2G technologies.

Verdict

The HTML5 mobile applications are becoming more popular now and it is just the beginning- lot more is yet to come. Now, we have discussed the simple tricks and tips to build a mobile web solution using only HTML5 and its compatible technologies. In my view, it is important for the programmers to work on the bottlenecks and solve them from the core.

If you have anything else to say, please share your opinion in the comments section. Your opinion matters, unless it is a Spam.