From the web to the mobile web and vice versa

Let’s say you need to develop a service for both the web and the mobile web. This website will have for every web page a mobile version with the same content than on the normal web but formated to be readable on mobile device.

In my opinion you need to satisfy the following:

1. The lambda user should get automatically the version that serves the content adapted to the device (and network ?) he is using (ie. 1 URL for all devices with content negociation based on user-agent and any other information the server can get). Ex: www.mobapi.com
2. The user who needs the mobile version should be able to force the mobile rendering through a dedicated URL. For instance add “/mobile” at the end. This will allow browsers which does not identify themselves correctly to access the mobile content. This will also let normal browser access light content, I often do that in the train while surfing with my laptop connected to a GPRS/UMTS connection. Ex: www.mobapi.com/mobile
3. Even though it is less obvious the other way around might be useful as well. One user who is using a mobile device might want to force the web rendering. Browser on mobile are getting really powerful and capable of rendering big web page. Add “/www” at the end of the URL. Ex: www.mobapi.com/www
Same behavior can be true for language issue:
www.mobapi.com serves the language as set up in the HTTP header.
www.mobapi.com/fr forces the use of a language.

You end up with this kind of URL:
www.mobapi.com[/device_type][/language]
where:
device_type in [www|mobile|…]
language in [fr|en|de|it|…]

Suggestions:
1) On the web page you might want to advertise the existence of a mobile adapted version with some mobile discovery mechanism in the meta tags in the header.
1) In the footer of your pages, it might be a good idea to provide a link that will let you switch to the other versions (web->mobile, mobile->web).