Mobile learning is all the rage.  Everybody wants to talk about it.  Every LMS says they rock it.  But how many companies have mastered it so far?  Not many.  Why?

Devices:  Which ones are your learners using?  Does your company provide them?  Do you need to support a range of devices and versions?   It matters.  Because HTML5 isn’t a single unified standard.  A current Mobile Safari browser on an iOS device delivers a different experience than your two-year-old Android users will get.   

Animation:  Remember that cool animated simulation you made last year for that major course?  Well, chances are it won’t fly in all mobile browsers—and maybe very few.  So you may need to take a small step back on the media and interactivity side to meet that lowest mobile denominator.  If done right, that’s not a crisis.  

How about those new authoring environments?  Yes, careful planning can get you a good way down the mLearning road and create decent content, but it’s still about compromise, small file sizes and limited functionality.

The best tip is to just start testing and trying alternates to build your experience.  Like everything else, you’ll make the best progress not necessarily by reading the manual, but by making every mistake there is to be made.  Or you can work with a team that's been down that road already.

Our approach is to do a careful analysis of each client's goals and current environment.  Then we design multi-tiered deployment and testing plans using the tech they have today so it'll work in the real world.
 

Life is full of surprises.  Whether or not your mLearning works should not be one of them.

Image credit: DScape Interactive