We know that it is a very good practice to use Virtual Hosts on your local machine to develop websites locally. Using paths like http://localhost/site1 are not only bad looking, it gives problems when you reference files, images, ... relative to your domain. It also helps you get better organised.

There are some steps to undertake in your systems hosts file and in your apache server in order to get these virtual hosts running. Just google or Bing for a tutorial.

As maintainter of the Drupal Mobile Tools module I often get the question how device detection works when caching is enabled (e.g. with Boost).

Several solutions are emerging. Two of them worth looking at:

- http://www.projectronin.com/blog/?p=10
- http://www.idelfuschini.it/en/apache-mobile-filter-v2x.html

Both are doing device detection in apache.

Mashable has written a simple and short write up on creating a mobile website:

http://mashable.com/2010/07/13/mobile-web-optimization/

It is short, but contains some links to good resources on developing mobile website.

Drupal users who have followed my blog will probably already know about OSMOBI, the online service to make your Drupal, Joomla! and Wordpress site Mobile. OSMOBI has been the brainchild of Siruna, a Belgian startup focussing on creating solutions to make mobile websites. Examples of mobile websites that are still running on Siruna technology are http://m.stubru.be and http://m.uitinvlaanderen.be. Examples of OSMOBI sites are not existing anymore since the service stopped at the end of June.

The Siruna technology, including OSMOBI focussed on mobilizing your existing Drupal sites and by the end of april 2010 more then 1200 Joomla! and Drupal sites used the free OSMOBI service to create their mobile website.

To get a feel on how OSMOBI worked, have a look at the screencasts that are still online:
http://www.youtube.com/user/SirunaOsmobi

Although the huge adoption of OSMOBI and the increasing need for Mobile websites, the service did not survive due to insufficient funding... This left more then 1000 developers stranded without any mobile sollution. So the natural question I have got was "what's next?".

One of my most recent freelance projects has been the integration of SoundCloud with Drupal, and yesterday I created the first stable release of this module. The SoundCloud connect module helps module developers to easily connect with SoundCloud using OAUTH, and get access to secure SoundCloud data and services. This includes private audio files, account data, uploading songs to the users accounts, etc ...

SoundCloud in a nutshell

SoundCloud is a service that simplifies the process of receiving audio files, sending audio files and distributing your audio.

Music lovers can use this service to receive tracks from others without having to worry about file sizes, file formats, download times, etc ... And at the same time you can easily upload your songs and publish them where you want using the SoundCloud widgets. As an example:

Decks Fxs and Martini - Acid Jazz / Trip Hop / Hip Hop Mix - Joey Muniz BUMP by TheBedroomRockers

This week I launched a Foursquare module for Drupal.

The launch of this module fits in a local experiment that lists several NYC based bars. This effort resulted in http://www.buybacknyc.com.

Further, this twitter quote directed to me raises some serious issues that must be addressed thoroughly in the Drupal community ;)

Great map of people who got stuck during Drupalcon SFO in Europe...

We are currently hard to launch the new release of OSMOBI. One of the upcoming features will be the option to allow for Youtube videos to be shown on your mobile website.... (and more to come, see our latest newsletter for a preview of our new features for April)

Since we are testing now our new YouTube mobilizer, I'll put up one of the screencasts I have recently made. Stay tuned for some life results and demonstrations!

UiTinVlaanderen (dutch for 'Going out in flanders') is the biggest cultural events site in Belgium and it is powered by Drupal.

Amplexor, an IT services company specialized in content management systems, has now created a mobile version of the site optimized for all mobile devices.

The mobile site allows you to quickly navigate through all the events in your neighborhood and the mobile website augments the experience by taking your GPS coordinates into account.

The website provides an easy way to browse through all the events across Flanders, view event and location information.

Together with the recently launched mobile Drupal site of http://www.stubru.be, this is again an example of how Siruna powers Drupal in order to leverage a mobile audience.

The site can be accessed with your mobile device by surfing to http://www.uitinvlaanderen.be

If you want to experiment with creating a mobile Drupal site, surely check out OSMOBI

....with the release of m.stubru.be the mobile site of the nr.1 public broadcast radio station "Studio Brussel".

Studio Brussel, the nr. 1 radio station of the Belgian public broadcaster VRT has released last week it's mobile website using Siruna technology.