Mobile Computing Technologies: an Overview - Mobile Devices

The market is currently flooded with mobile devices such as notebooks, PDAs, and mobile phones designed to allow you to take your work with you wherever you go.  These devices are often Internet-enabled, allowing you to keep up with email, participate in video conferences, or simply continue working on that spreadsheet you started in the office.

In the case of notebook computers, you actually bring your computer with you.  These durable, lightweight systems are built for mobility.  Designed to be taken on-the-go, these computers feature a small profile designed to fit inside a briefcase or suitcase.  This allows you to take your own computer—along with any specialized software—with you wherever you go.  Of course, this adds one more thing to carry and the additional hardware isn’t what I would consider cost-effective.  On top of that, there’s a constant need to keep the work on your mobile computer synchronized with your work on your office or home PC.  (This, of course, assumes that you are not using your mobile machine as a complete desktop replacement).

PDAs, mobile phones, and a flurry of other hand-held devices offer some computing abilities in an extremely small footprint.  In some cases this is limited to checking email or browsing the Internet; however, some devices offer the ability to run Microsoft Office and other common software.  The abilities of these devices vary highly, but you can be sure of one thing:  you will definitely pay for each added convenience.  Hand-held devices are typically very expensive considering their inherent limitations.  However, this shouldn’t rule them out as a viable mobile solution.  Many specialized devices serve other necessary functions as well.

A final genre of hardware-based mobility uses a shell PC to create a user experience.  This genre uses a basic system, such as a blade PC.  These systems do not have localized software, and in many cases don’t even offer local storage.  Instead, they offer software from a centralized server.  This allows you to bring your computer with you while maintaining both limited hardware overhead and a centralized software package.  Some examples of this are blade PCs, kiosks, ATMs, and POS-based (Point Of Sale) cash registers.

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