[General Topics] Menneisyys:
1.1.3.	Files

Third, when you right-click a link to a file you'd like to save (without, for example, directly passing it to an application that knows how to handle it - for example, a MP3 file to Windows Media Player, a PDF file to Adobe Acrobat Reader etc), you can save it in the desktop Internet Explorer by choosing "Save Target As..." in the context menu. Note that with some (mostly binary) contents, you can safely (left) click the link for the same effect on the desktop to be presented the same download dialog box.

On the Pocket PC, particularly with the built-in Pocket Internet Explorer (PIE) (it's called Internet Explorer Mobile (IEM) starting with WM5; this is why I'm referring to it under both names. Also see this article on this and similar name changes if interested), the situation may be different due to the core, in this case, not at all welcome differences between the desktop and Pocket PC versions.

1.1.4.	Getting a link of a page or resource

Finally, when you want to, say, e-mail a friend the address (URL) of a Web page or a resource you've found, you can easily do this in the "traditional" way: left-click the link and, then Copy the new URL address to the clipboard (so that, from there, you can easily Paste it to the mail) by highlighting the contents of the address bar of the browser and, then, choosing Copy (or pressing Ctrl-C on the keyboard).

There is, however, a much more elegant and simple solution: instead of left-clicking (following) the link leading to the given resource / page, right-click it and select Copy Shortcut in the context menu. This will not only save you time (you don't need to wait for the page to load - if you don't cancel it in between), but also will work with all kinds of resources, unlike the former, which can not be used if, for example, the accessed contents aren't on a new page but dynamically offered or the content will be passed straight to, say, Windows Media Player.

This functionality may prove useful in other situations too; for example, when you need to use external tools (for example, EZDownload or WinMobile Download Accelerator, which will be discussed later, in Chapter 2) on your Pocket PC requiring the address of a downloadable file on the Web.

So, you'd like to see how you can do these four activities on the Pocket PC? The next sections discuss this.

1.2.	Desktop Windows, Pocket PC and resource saving / link address copying to the clipboard

The following chart shows what Pocket PC (and, for that matter, desktop Windows) Web browsers support these kinds of functionalities and how you can access them. As with all my comparison charts, I've tried to make this chart as user-friendly as possible; this is why I've even included screenshots showing how the given functionality can be accessed in different desktop and Pocket PC browsers. (Click the provided links to see them.)

I've also added some version change information in here (as with the other charts); for example, with NetFront and "Copy link address to clipboard?", "new in 3.3" means this functionality was introduced in (the latest) version 3.3 and, therefore, doesn't exist in the previous, 3.2 version. These remarks will be highly useful if you plan to stick with the older version because of the upgrade fee and would like to know what isn't available in it.

Note that the chart doesn't contain PIE plug-ins, only top-level, stand-alone browsers; plug-ins will be discussed in the following section.

As with all the charts, plus (+) means existing feature while minus (-) means the lack of it. OS stands for Operating System (WM2003SE, WM5 etc).

THE CHART IS HERE - CLICK THE LINK!

As can clearly be seen, all the three major desktop Windows browsers support all these (in the desktop word, basic) functionalities. Not so with Pocket PC browsers, not even with desktop ports: for example, the current (8.6) version of Opera Mobile (which is a "dumbed-down" port of the excellent, highly, particularly for (W)UXGA users, recommended desktop Opera browser) doesn't support any kind of explicit resource saving or link copying and the same stands for the free Firefox / Mozilla clone Minimo. Thunderhawk is in the same league and, because of the very simple engine, it's highly unlikely it'll ever support this functionality.

NetFront supports everything; unfortunately, it's only able to save Web pages into MHT files (and not to simple HTML files), which means non-MHT-capable Web browsers (all the other Pocket PC web browsers) will be unable to read the pages it saves, unlike with HTML. (However, there are certain "hacks" that may help circumvent this problem - for example, saving a linked Web page as a file if you have some link pointing towards it or searching for the given Web page in the NetFront file cache.)

Finally, the built-in PIE/IEM is pretty incapable too; it's as late as in WM5 that it has received image saving capabilities. In previous operating systems, you don't have any way of saving images (unless you manually browse the file cache and look for the given resource - more on this later in the section devoted to this question). In this respect, the PIE plug-ins discussed in the next section help a lot: they implement most, or, with the more advanced ones, all the missing functionalities.

(A quick note: with Opera Mini, the free, Midlet-based Web browser running on a wide variety of devices (not just Pocket PC's but also your Java-capable smartphones or even dumb phones), image / link downloading doesn't work in IBM J9 5.7.2 (I've tested this on both WM2003SE and WM5). It, however, is working great in the latest, 6.1 version (tested on WM5). Therefore, you must upgrade J9 to the latter version if you want to access this functionality. Please see this tutorial for more info on version 6.1, the installation etc. Note that you won't have any kind of problems with the other, widely-known Pocket PC Midlet environment, the Intent Midlet Manager, which comes with most Pocket PC Phone Edition devices / ROM versions and, if you don't find it on your particular mobile operator ROM - as is the case with some US operators - is also accessible here as a download. Please read my generic Midlet article on its usage.)

1.3.	PIE plug-ins and resource saving / link address copying to the clipboard

If you stick with PIE (and don't use another browser), you can still have additional capabilities with the help of the well-known PIE plug-ins, of which there are, fortunately, several, two of them being even free (ftxPBrowser and the free version of Webby). In the following chart, I list them all and also show (click the links in the chart for the demo screenshot) how the given functionality can be accessed. (Click the links in the first column to read the reviews / comparisons of the most current versions of all these plug-ins.)

THE CHART IS HERE - CLICK THE LINK!

Remarks:

As far as the current (D72) build of MultiIE 4 is concerned, it no longer has image saving capabilities (unlike the previous, 3.x series), which is certainly bad news. This means if you still have a pre-WM5 device, you need to either wait for a new version of the 4.x MultiIE series for this omission to be fixed or need to stick to the old, 3.x series. Unfortunately, MultiIE (along with Spb Pocket Plus) has never had the "Save Target As..." functionality either.

Webby (current version: 2.6) doesn't have explicit current web page/image saving capabilities either. Image saving is only possible under WM5, where PIE itself has image saving features (see the related screenshot in the comparison chart). Under previous OS’es, you can’t save images out of Webby.

Also note that its (existing) link target saving and link-to-clipboard copying features must be accessed in a radically different way than with the other browsers or plug-ins because it has no custom context menus and, therefore, everything must be done via traditional, "global", non-local / non-context menus.

Spb Pocket Plus, while having the other functionalities, painfully lacks the "Save Target As..." functionality, which all the other PIE plug-ins (except for MultiIE) have.

Also note that, as is mentioned ("only via Save Target As") several times in the chart, you can save HTML Web pages if the given browser / plug-in doesn't support Web saving, but it has the "Save Target As..." functionality. Then, you can still save a copy of the Web page - without images or anything related, of course. This, however, won't really help with for example (non-linked) images. This means you can't save images in any way under the MultiIE 4 + pre-WM5 PIE combination or in Webby. You should, however, not give up - there are ways of finding these resources with some additional tweaking (cache hunting), which I explain in the following section.