The technology that will fuel a boom in mobile computing is now a
reality. Murdoch MacTaggart reports
The desire for IT on the move has been with us since the early
days of personal computing, but it is only now that it looks set to
become ubiquitous among the general population and business
world.
The first handheld computing device was the Psion Organiser,
launched in 1984, well over a decade before the Palm Pilot, which
now holds over 70% of the PDA (personal digital assistant) market
worldwide.
There are currently three main groups of PDA: Palm which offers
a simple product with limited functionality, Psion which is still a
strong seller in the UK, and Pocket PC which is based on a
feature-rich operating system from Microsoft.
Like Microsoft, Palm has licensed its operating system to third
parties, and Handspring, a start-up owned by the original Palm
development team, has taken advantage of this. Handspring's Visor
range has attracted users by offering expandability options, albeit
through plug-in cards of proprietary format. Handspring's success
has prompted Palm to respond, and its latest range of products will
be capable of supporting a range of snap-on devices, such as a
modem or a digital camera.
Like the original Palm Pilot, Microsoft's Windows CE operating
system was also launched in 1996, but hardware - which is
manufactured by third parties - was not available until 1998. User
interest was also lacking despite the Windows look and feel of the
system.
The most recent release, WinCE 3.0, is more impressive than
earlier versions and Microsoft has relaunched its concept under the
Pocket PC banner. As the name implies, the hardware is a PC in
miniature and supports multimedia functions alongside the usual
range of office applications. Pocket PCs are available from
manufacturers such as Hewlett-Packard, Compaq and Casio.
The similarity to the PC is carried down to the software level,
with a range of cut-down versions of familiar Microsoft
applications including Outlook, Excel, Word and Internet Explorer.
In addition, support for heavyweight corporate systems is being
supplied for SAP's R3 and Siebel's CRM (customer relationship
management) suite.
Psion, the third major PDA player, also produces powerful
computing devices and recently released a completely rewritten
version of its Epoc modular operating system with the Psion 5
handheld. The Epoc system is managed by the Symbian alliance, which
includes Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola and Matshushita (Panasonic)
alongside Psion. The alliance is well placed to benefit from the
projected growth in mobile Wap phone sales but the market has been
slow to take off.
Using a mobile device for Internet connectivity is tedious and
difficult but this is likely to change rapidly when third
generation (3G) systems with their promise of up to 2mbps
connectivity appear in volume.
At present there are about 150 million fixed Internet
connections, very few of them outside North America, Western Europe
or South-East Asia. Mobile phone deployment is forecast to approach
one billion by 2003 or 2004, which should coincide with widespread
deployment of very fast, "always on" wireless services, which will
enable realistic mobile Internet connectivity.
At about the same time, other technological developments will
render sterile the ongoing debate about mobile phones taking on PDA
characteristics - as with the Nokia Communicator - or whether more
powerful PDAs, such as the Pocket PC, will offer telephone
connectivity.
In future, convergence will be the watchword. Voice commands, a
printed fabric or folding keyboard could be used to enter data, and
information may be viewed on a virtual screen projected into the
eye or, perhaps, be displayed on a flexible, slim, foldable A5
booklet.
A wristwatch could support a Wap telephone connection. A
smartcard in a shirt pocket could hold huge volumes of data and
communicate with devices by radio to authenticate the user or
transfer electronic money to vending machines.
The material is all there. As Wap suppliers are finding to their
cost, the real question is - will the users wear it?
Mobile computing:the state of the art
- Lernout & Hauspie recently showed a voice-controlled
PC
- Wronz EuraLab has developed Softswitch, a wearable material
that can act as a keypad
- Charmed Technology, an MIT spin-off, holds fashion shows where
catwalk models use jewellery to send or receive e-mails and perform
other computing tasks
- Last year, IBM demonstrated a "wearable computer" with a
virtual screen projected into the user's field of vision
- Last week, IBM showed a Linux-based wristwatch display that
communicates wirelessly with PCs or phones
- Storage initiatives are developing systems to store hundreds of
gigabytes in a square centimetre
- Bluetooth, due to appear later this year, uses a radio
frequency over a 10m range to allow localised cable-free
connectivity