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The Mobile Site Root: Responsive HTML After WML

The Cumulus /m root is a responsive HTML mobile site: successor to WML decks, distinct from WAP endpoints and from a dedicated /m/forecast tab.

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/m is the mobile site root on a Cumulus host: the HTML entry for a small screen. It is not a WAP deck, not a second-generation XHTML-MP endpoint, and not the forecast tab that lived at /m/forecast. Those URLs kept older markup contracts alive. /m is the successor idea—ordinary HTML, later with a viewport and fluid layout, showing station observations a phone can read without downloading the desktop chrome.

This article explains that root. It does not restore a live mobile skin, does not emulate a feature phone, and does not reprint a historical forecast as current weather. Serving rules for WML belong on /wap.php. Markup-generation split belongs on /wap2.php. Forecast-versus-observation labeling on a handheld view belongs on /m/forecast.

Historical context

Station operators added mobile URLs in layers as handsets changed.

WAP 1 wanted Wireless Markup Language. A dedicated script such as /wap.php emitted a deck. Payload was tiny. Layout was cards, not columns.

WAP 2 / XHTML-MP wanted a second bookmark. /wap2.php existed so gateways that had cached WML did not suddenly receive a different media type.

Smartphone browsers could render HTML and CSS. Operators then published /m or /mobile as a third public root: the same observations, fewer images, stacked text, a viewport meta tag. Some CMS packages used /m as a directory; others used a rewritten path. Incoming links copied whichever string first worked on a phone.

The historical TNET Cumulus host followed that pattern. /m is the HTML mobile root. TNET does not rehost the old stylesheet or a device detector. The useful residue is the product definition: a small-screen HTML site that succeeded WML without deleting WML.

What the mobile root is for

The root answers: “show me this station on a phone, now, as HTML.” Completeness is the same as on any honest observation page: identity, scalars with units, packet time, and a stale rule. The compact info card is the identity source. /m should link it or repeat the four fields in miniature. It should not invent a shorter station name that disagrees with /info.

Observed now. Outdoor temperature, wind, pressure, rain today—each with unit and the logger clock. Derived indices (dewpoint, wind chill, heat index) labeled as derived.

Not the forecast tab. A one-line NWS phrase on the root is optional and dangerous. If present, it must be a clearly titled forecast with source and valid time, or it must be a link to /m/forecast. The root’s headline number must remain the sensor.

Not a webcam theatre. A single still with interval and time is acceptable. Autoplay and multi-camera carousels belong off the root. Bandwidth on a constrained radio link was the original reason /m existed.

Not desktop chrome with display:none. A mobile root that loads the full gauge CSS and hides three columns is a desktop page with a lie in the URL. The successor to WML is a reduced document, not a hidden desktop.

Responsive HTML as successor, not as synonym

Responsive layout (fluid grids, media queries, viewport width=device-width) arrived after WML. It solved a real problem: one HTML family could serve a 320-pixel phone and a later large phone without a fourth filename. It did not make /wap.php obsolete on day one, because deployed WML clients and gateways still requested WML. Successor means: new clients get HTML at /m; old clients keep their bookmarks.

Rules that carry over from the WML era:

  • Units and time are not optional chrome. They are how a four-line screen stays a measurement. The completeness contract on /wap.php still applies.
  • Representations of the same station must not disagree on scalars. If /m shows °F and /wap.php shows °C, you have two stations in one costume.
  • Fail visible. If the Cumulus include is missing, /m should say so with text, not with a blank hero panel.

Rules that are new in the HTML era:

  • Set a viewport so the layout width matches the device. A 980-pixel table scaled down recreates the problem WML never had.
  • Do not disable user scaling. A visitor who enlarges type is reading a number.
  • Contrast must survive cheap panels. Temperature is primary text (WCAG 2.2, last checked 13 August 2026).
  • Document order must read as label, value, unit, time if CSS fails.

XHTML-MP versus WML is the markup-generation story. /m is the product that eventually replaced both for smartphone users: HTML the phone already knew.

URL hygiene for a mobile family

Keep the family distinct in public:

| Path | Product | |---|---| | /m | HTML mobile root (this page) | | /m/forecast | Forecast view, labeled as forecast | | /m&action=login | Session/auth article for mobile CMS (not a form) | | /wap.php | WML serving endpoint (historical) | | /wap2.php | XHTML-MP / early smartphone CSS (historical) |

Do not 301 /m onto /wap.php “because both are mobile.” Do not 301 /m/forecast onto /m “because the root could include a forecast.” Those collapses are how evidence families mix.

If a directory /m/ exists, the root should be the index of that directory, not a redirect loop through the desktop template. Query-string skins (?mobile=1 on every URL) are a different architecture; they are not this bookmark.

Practical checklist

  • /m is HTML observation-first; forecast is a link or a labeled block, not the H1 number.
  • Identity matches /info.
  • Units and packet time are in text.
  • Viewport is set; user scaling remains.
  • WAP bookmarks still have /wap.php and /wap2.php if those were public.
  • No live login form, no autoplay webcam, no desktop CSS payload.
  • Stale files are labeled stale.

Modern relevance

Most “mobile weather” today is a responsive desktop site or a native app. The /m pattern still matters for operators who publish a station on a metered link, a Pi, or a host that should not ship megabytes of JavaScript gauges to a phone. A small HTML root is still the honest successor to WML: same scalars, cheaper document.

It is also still easy to get wrong. A root that opens on a forecast icon, a radar loop, and a cookie wall has abandoned the reason the path existed. TNET does not operate /m as a live app. The path remains a definition of the mobile HTML product on this host.

TNET research bridge

A mobile root is a compact observation record. How TNET distinguishes observed, modelled, and derived information is how the service works. Freshness and units of source files are data sources, quality controls, and methodology.

The weather-station hub groups instrument and publishing pages. The Cumulus hub lists the historical software family, including WAP project notes.

Sources