Time To Update\\\\\\ Use The Standard

[selenite0]

I want a new HTML command (probably an extension of a/href) that creates a link that I can click on to make my smartphone dial the linked phone number.

This thought brought to you by my Android G1 and tonight's traffic jam on Saginaw Blvd.

UPDATE: Ah, gridlockjoe informs me there is an RFC for that. Now we just need to websites to use it.

Comments

[estokien.livejournal.com]

Probably more likely an extension of the object type, href is a little too tied into the main web functionality, while object is there for embedding other things to be interpreted by the browser. You'd want some upper level handling so that there was a confirmation before dialing a strange number. (Imagine if a banner ad dialed a 900 number!) Also, if an email program can recognize a typed URL in it, and make it into a link, there is no reason the browser on a phone couldn't recognize several standard phone formats and process them as links to the phone dialing resource.

[kd5mdk.livejournal.com]

In OS X, this feature is called Data Detectors. For example, my mail program can recognize phone numbers and add them to my address book with 1 click. I don't know how much that is used in iPhone OS.

[dbroussa.livejournal.com]

I have noticed that most smartphones (I have not used an Android) recognize what they think are phone numbers and allow them to be click dialed already. Sometimes they are wrong and let you dial an SSN for example, or an ID number, but it effectively works. I also know in Outlook that you can tag a number with +tel: and it will dial it using OCS (but this screws up the dialer in a smartphone).

[gridlockjoe.livejournal.com]

You mean as in RFC 3966?