The thing is though I’ve been doing both of these pretty much since 1986 and the concept really isn’t a new one at all.

Back then I was a huge fan of UK company Psion’s mobile computers, indeed I had a whole range of them. It started with the Organiser II, their second generation mobile device (though the first one that was genuinely useful) and moved on to the Series 3a, Series 3c and finally a Series 5.

Psion is the company that had already brought the world the first integrated office suite of Quill, Abacus, Archive and Easel for the ill-fated Sinclair QL business computer, just beating Apple’s Mac (though barely) and beating the equivalent on PC’s by a good year.

I thought I’d give you a quick tour of these devices (a trip down memory lane for some) and talk about why Psion’s handhelds were important and how they’re still influencing modern laptops and smartphones today.

Despite what some people might have you believe, the Palm Pilot was far from the first mobile computing device. By the time it launched in 1996, Psion had already been mass producing mobile computers for twelve years. The 1984 Organiser and the 1986 Organiser II, which many people still think of as the original model for the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy in the BBC Television adaptation of the classic Douglas Adams novels, was a fantastic little machine.

It had two removable storage ports you could plug additional memory into, these were later wiped by removing a label over the chip and exposing them to ultra violet light for 30 minutes (I’ll bet you’ve never formatted a disk quite that way before!)

All of the software you would expect for a mobile computer was already there including a diary, contacts app, clock, alarms, calculator and the device was fully programmable. In fact there was quite an extensive user base who wrote custom apps, not just for the Organisers, but also for the Series 3 and Series 5 computers that followed them.

Three years still before the Palm Pilot was launched, Psion had moved to a clamshell design with full qwerty keyboard and larger screen. Their Series 3 handheld was an instant success and they could be seen being used by yuppies everywhere (I wasn’t a yuppie). Their programing language had evolved and was now even more powerful and flexible.  A variant of Basic, it focused on database creation and query and the Series 3 soon became home to a wide range of third-party professional apps from medical and industrial information to education, science and more.

At this point Psion began to diverge into industrial handhelds, and they still operate in this market today. Before they finally abandoned the home handheld market though they launched the Series 5. This computer had an ingenuous folding clamshell design where the keyboard slipped outwards from the case to maximise the available space. This keyboard was completely revolutionary and, although Palm was clearly winning the handheld wars by this point, laptops for years to come would owe some of their design and ingenuity to the Series 5.

The Series 5 also sported a touch screen, the first Psion handheld to do so and, as it featured more power and yet more additions to it’s native programming language, saw just as many practical applications as its predecessor.

The operating system for the Series 5, EPOC, which was written from the ground up for this device, was later renamed Symbian and still exists to this day in Nokia smartphones. Psion entered a strategic alliance in 1998 with Nokia, Motorola and Ericsson to bring the mobile OS to a wider market. The project was inevitably doomed and eventually Nokia bought the OS outright for use on its mobile phones.

As if the company’s innovations weren’t good enough by this point, in 1999 they released a sub-notebook device called, you guessed it, the Netbook.  This pre-dated modern netbooks by almost a decade and while it wasn’t a huge success, was still popular in business sporting several additional models including the company’s first full-colour device and one running Windows CE.

I don’t own any Psion devices any more but I do remember them fondly. With my Organiser II was able to keep a diary and planner, organise all my contacts and carry them with me and more. The Series 3 and Series 5 allowed me more control over my life with mobile spreadsheets and word processing documents. I was able to do financial planning and more on the move. So when you use your smartphone or tablet today, think back to how it all began with one small British innovator.

Figures from IDC and published by Engadget show that the league table now stands as…

1. Nokia
2. Samsung
3. LG
4. Apple
5. RIM

…and given their recent and ongoing troubles, we can expect to see Nokia lose the top spot very soon.

According to IDC, Apple is now shipping 14.1 million handsets every quarter worldwide.  Further down the list, Sony Ericsson is apparently struggling but the company’s phones have lost their appeal in recent years.  It’s the first time Sony Ericsson has not been included in the list since 2004.

Full details of the top five companies with market share and manufacturing information can be found below, click on the image to view it full-size.

Apple have had their eye on overtaking RIM for some time, and this figure confirms a recent boast made by Apple supremo Steve Jobs.  Market leader Nokia still accounts for 32.4% of the market, though this has slipped from last year’s 36.5%

Google Voice has a ton of great features, and in a lot of ways fundamentally changes the way you’ll use your phone. A lot of things suddenly become easier with Google Voice – checking your voicemail, sending text messages, and more – and they’re all best dealt with through your computer.

But, as of now, Google Voice doesn’t inherently let you make calls from your computer. I mean, I’ve got a microphone and speakers on my computer, as well as a fast Internet connection – why shouldn’t I be able to make calls, ideally for free?

Well, as it turns out, I can – with a little legwork. Here’s how to set it up (I did this on a Mac, so PC directions might be slightly different – the same rules will apply, though).

Disclaimer: This is all assuming you’ve already got a Google Voice account. They’re sending out invites at lightning-speed, so if you don’t have one, go get on the list!

1. Download and Install Gizmo5 (create a free account, with no call credits – you won’t need them!).
2. Open Gizmo. In the “Home” tab of the application, click “Edit My Profile.”
3. In the tab that pops up, you’ll see, filled in, a number for “SIP number.” Copy that number (everything before the @ sign).
4. In Google Voice, click “Settings”, and then “Phones.”
5. Click “Add Another phone” and paste the SIP number from Gizmo (again, only what’s before the @ Sign) into the box.
6. Name the number “Gizmo” or whatever you want, and then Save it.

Now, to make calls:

1. Open Google Voice, and click “Call”
2. Enter the number you want to call
3. Make sure the Gizmo phone (whatever you called it) is selected as the “Phone to Ring”
4. Click “Connect”
5. You’ll get a pop-up from Gizmo, with your Google Voice number on the caller ID. Answer it!
6. Google Voice will automatically dial and connect the other person, and you’ll be chatting from your computer!

The whole process only takes about five minutes, and doesn’t cost a nickel. Because you’re using a SIP number, all the data is transmitted over your cable connection rather than your phone network. That means you’ll need fast Internet to really make this work, but also means it doesn’t cost a thing!

I’m not sure how long this will be around (I’m sure carriers won’t be fans), but for now it’s a fantastic solution for making calls directly from your computer.

That said, there has been much talk about when the Mojo SDK would be released. Well earlier this week, Palm decided to finally bring it to the table. Mind you the Mojo SDK is still in beta but from what I have heard, read and tested myself, it will be offering some major features so come this September when Palm begins accepting applications for the App Catalog, those who have taken the early plunge will be able to make a buck or two.

Being a Pre owner myself I have to say that it has its goods and bads. Same thing applies to the SDK. One of the major things that will make the SDK so great is the fact that it uses common programming language that most programmers have some familiarity with (unlike that of the iPhone which uses Project C).

HTML and JavaScript are pretty basic stuff and with a little practice and help from the API it shouldn’t be too hard for web programmers to get used to the Palm Pre programming enviorment. But as I said it has its drawbacks. My major contention with the SDK to date is the fact that it lacks direct access to the core CPU. Basically this means that we won’t be seeing NFS Most Wanted on the Pre for anytime soon. I’m not saying that it should be an open fair, but this is reminding me just like Apple when they infamously said that “web apps would do just fine.” Needless to say they soon changed their mind and since then they have crossed the 1.5 billion download mark.

It seems like the same thing is gearing up to happen with Palm. The Pre is a powerful device and carries equal processing power as the iPhone 3GS. As I’ve said to many people, the only thing that is holding the Pre back is webOS 1.0.4. Don’t get me wrong, I’m in love with webOS, but its only in its first generation and still needs time to mature. Hopefully when ver1.1 comes out we will see many of these performance issues fixed.

One thing that people should take note is that even with the few apps available for the App Catalog, has crossed the 1 million download mark. That is for only 30 apps. My only fair is that Palm is shooting itself in the foot and will ultimately have to rethink its decision about not allowing access to the CPU of the Pre.

Last thoughts: for those who are interested in jumping into the mobile phone app business, there is lots of space. What platform should you develop for? Well as it stands it all depends on what you are aiming for. iFart apps, vibration apps and the multitude of nonsensical games are the iPhone’s strength (don’t get me wrong, developers make money off these), lifestyle apps are the Android’s strength. Blackberry can take a little of everything but you will be greatly limited with graphically intense apps. As for WinMo, it all depends. You do have WinMo phone that beat the Pre and iPhone in specs and speed, but those are far and free, so productivity and lifestyle apps are the main strengths of this platform. As for the Palm Pre that is yet to be decided, but I can safely say that most games (except for the Sudoku and Connect 4) are a no, no.

If you want to focus on a specific programming language, Project C will be the hardest to learn but Apple has a big developer community for their iPhone. Palm has the easiest platform to develop for and in close second is Android. Blackberry and WinMo come in third.

So what are your thoughts? Drop a comment below.

1. Enabling bluetooth

The first thing you need to do is enable bluetooth on both devices. You should find bluetooth under connection settings on your phone, or some similar place. I use a Sony w880i, I have it under Settings, Connectivity, Bluetooth. Make sure to set your phone to visible, although this should be the default setting.

On your computer you should have a bluetooth icon in the tray. If you do, right click it, and select “show devices”. If you don’t see the icon there, go into your control panel and double click on “Bluetooth Devices”. This should take you to the same screen. If you don’t see bluetooth settings here, you might not have bluetooth capability, or you might need to install drivers.

2. Adding your device

On the Bluetooth Devices screen you might already see your phone, or you will need to click on “Add Wireless Devices” in the top menu. All devices which can be discovered should be listed after a few moments of searching, if you wait a few more moments, their names, brands, or types should also be visible.

Double click on the device you want to add, and you will be taken through a very simple procedure to add the device to your list. You will need to enter a code into a dialog on your computer, the code for it will be shown on the phone. Once done, your device will be listed on the Bluetooth Devices page.

3. Importing contacts

Double click on your newly listed device and you should see a screen similar to the one below. Select “Backup Contacts and Calendar Information from your Phone”. This will quickly copy all your contacts to the contacts folder in your user directory. You can now sync your contacts between your computer and phone. If supported you might be able to do the same with calendar items, emails and notes.

4. Using your computer as a phone

On the same page, you can see that at the top, you can enter a phone number and call the number. Doing this will work, but it will all be initiated only on the phone. Simply click connect next to the headset option “Use this computer as a headset or speakerphone for calls on your phone”. This will make your computer act like any other wireless headset, so any calls your receive or initiate can be conducted by just talking at your computer. I have a good speaker and a built in mic, so I don’t even have to stop working to talk to people.

The great thing is that you can also initiate a call by right clicking a contact, going to “actions” and clicking on “call this contact”. The call will be initiated from your phone, but since your laptop is your headset, there will be no need to touch your phone, or for it to be anywhere near you.

“It’s not a perfect, or even moderately good analogy, but I find myself thinking of Opera Mini as a tortoise to Safari Mobile’s hare. The latter is downright suave and spiffy and all that. Opera’s mobile browser, on the other hand, is moving steadily into relative ubiquity. Its rise seems deceptively understated, too.”

It’s easy to look at Opera in the browser market and see them struggling to compete with Mozilla Firefox, even though it has been responsible for so much innovation over the last decade.

You couldn’t help wondering, why wasn’t Opera doing more? What’s going on?

Well, it turns out Opera was one step in front, just as it always has been. This time though, they may be able to turn this into actual success.

Opera may have failed to make huge progress against Firefox, Internet Explorer and even Safari, but it has been making huge progress with what may end up being even more important – the mobile browser market.

Opera has huge influence in the mobile browsing industry, Glozowski gives some examples:

“The list of agreements Opera now holds with various mobile manufacturers and network operators is pretty extensive. I won’t treat you to the unabridged rundown, but suffice it to say that many, many millions (add another few manys in for good measure) of mobile phone users are being treated automatically to Opera Mini installs upon purchase of new devices. That, or the next gadget on their wishlist is sporting the software. Just this week the company announced a deal with O2 to increase its market share even further. It also has parties like Micromax, Swisscom, Debitel, Haier, and Ten by Orange in its repertoire. The number of mobile users that have downloaded the Mini browser by their own volition counts strong as well.”

That list should also include Sony, Nintendo with the Wii, Motorola, Samsung and UIQ. In fact estimates put Opera Mini usage at 50% of all mobile browsing, a near-Microsoft dominance of the market. It will face some competition from the Safari, but only on terms of features and performance as Opera is designed to run on almost every mobile phone available.

The irony of the whole situation is that Mozilla has effectively let the mobile browser market slip them by, although now they have stated their aim is to “redefine the mobile browsing experience” although their current progress at this point has involved trashing Opera:

“Q: Did Opera get a headstart in this area? They are on phones and the Nintendo Wii?
A: I’m not sure I care about the Wii as a platform. People were critical of us last year, saying Opera has sewn it all up. But they won the last market. They have three times as many people as us. You have Opera browsers on the phone, but who uses it?”

It will be interesting to see how this pans out, will Mozilla create a decent Opera competitor? What can it do about the impressive head start Opera has across the industry?

What’s interesting about all this is that now the iPhone has sparked significant interest in web browsing via mobile devices, the race is on for developers everywhere to tap into that growing market.

Skyfire is a new mobile browser I only just came across and claims to be the first and only browser to present the web on your phone exactly as it would be on your computer.

Yes, that includes all embedded content including all flash applications and media, Quicktime, Java and Ajax.

It’s a Windows Mobile browser, but will soon also be available for the Symbian mobile operating system as well.

Currently in private beta 1, you can submit a request to receive an invitation for beta 2, coming soon apparently. For now you can check out the video presenting the features of Skyfire, the example sites used seem pretty impressive… Youtube for example is exactly as you see on a computer and you can play all the videos like normal.

The only issue I would imagine would be speed, without a decent 3G connection I can see web navigation being pretty slow and frustrating, perhaps the iPhone optimised style webpages are a better way to go for a compromise between speed and functionality.

Apologies for the cynicism, I don’t hate the iPhone, or any Apple product. I think they’re great, but just not the brilliant works of art slash genius slash infallibility slash technology breakthroughs so often proclaimed. They are incredibly good for browsing the Internet and watching media on, but as far as using it as an mobile phone every day would drive me crazy.

One of the commenter’s over at ReadWriteWeb provided the following entertaining rant which got a few people going, however I do agree with a lot of what he said:

I’d like to voice an opinion that is likely to make me look like I’m an old dinosaur that is just bitterly jealous over Apple’s success.

Well in fact, I’m not. But I am still looking for words to describe how pathetic Bubbleland looks like from a higher perspective, buzzing crazily around Apple, their conference, and the new iPhone.

Just look at that : an army of bloggers "liveblogging" what ? An event primarily addressed to people who write programs working on products of a (still) relatively small company that until now addresses only the 10% of the richer people in the world with their fancy gadgets.

And writing about what ? A BIG event : the second release of a phone that until now lacked what 80% of the phones sold in Europe and Japan have had for the last 2-3 years – 3G connectivity. And guess what : it also does portable music playing and GPS. Woaaah ! Excellent ! Nobody else does that on the market, do they ?

Now, don’t tell me guys that the iPhone was a revolutionary phone : it wasn’t, except maybe for its stylish look. And this release is anything but exceptional. It basically is a "survival release". Adjust the competition or die. And also adjust the competition’s pricing or die.

People are talking about this as the latest genius move from Apple’s Steve Jobs. It’s not a genius move. It’s the only strategy to avoid the short-term failure of the product. Except to Apple groupies (which are numerous in Bubbleland’s crowd), this phone had been bought until now for its stylish look. And that wouldn’t have gone much further than it was.

However one of the responses to this was equally valid in many ways as well.

Obviously Ralph cares more about quantity than quality. He just treats functionality as laundry items from a checklist as if the mere presence of those items is enough. It’s more important to look at the substance of each functionality. What mobile browser compete with Safari? Play music? hold on let me pop in this SD card first. Nice! What cell phone has capacitor-sensor that automatically shuts its screen off to conserve power when the user holds it near his ear then turn right back on if it’s far away? There are tiny little details that adds up to the whole simple and elegant user experience.

Yea, I used to own cell phones that make and receive phone calls too. But they also beeps like crazy at 3am in the morning because someone just sent me a text message or when it’s about to run out of power.

May be it’s not so wise to just look at the army of bloggers flocking to cover the release of the iPhone. What about the hundreds of thousands of developers, or the eBay price that people in Europe and Asia are willing to pay for the iPhone, or the knockoff release of countless handset makers following the first iPhone.

It’s good to deflate all the hype surrounding the iPhone, but it’s jealous, arrogant, and ignorant to call this phone a "survival release".

I’m interested at what you all think of this? I know there will be a lot of Apple supporters out there, and just as many haters as well, let me know your opinion on this one.

A rule of thumb would be to always unplug the device safely if you want o minimize the chance for data corruption. The Microsoft solution for disconnecting USB devices is not optimal and is different (of course) depending on your operating systems. One of the most nerve wreaking messages is “It is now safe to remove this device” which can’t be turned off as far as I know.

If a process has locked files on the device the user will receive the message “This device cannot be safely stopped” without telling him (of course) which process is responsible for the locked files.

The software USB Disk Ejector is one solution to some of the difficulties that users face. It get rids of the message that the device can be safely removed and it can also close processes that are locking files on the device so that it can be removed.

One thing I like is that you get a gui and a command line version. The command line version for instance could be used to create a shortcut to eject a drive by name, letter, program running and partial name. The gui is helpful for users who prefer to work with graphical user interfaces. It displays a list of all connected USB devices and will automatically refresh the window if a new device is connected to the computer. A double-click removes the USB devices from the computer.

You should have Nokia PC suite installed for this to run, but that comes with your phone, or you can download it via the Nokia website. After you’ve installed it, head on over to Nokia Beta Labs (everyone seems to be coming out with beta labs lately) and download Nokia Text Messenger.

Following installation you will have two viewing options, you can either leave it in the sidebar, giving you a three message preview, or you can leave it floating around for a five message preview. I’ve always loved viewing messages on the PC, since it is a lot faster, especially when you reply. I takes me at least 2 minutes to write 150 characters, on my PC I shoot it out in about 10 secs.

Found via Sizlopedia

Everyone may access your profile page on Snapfoo and look at the recent images that you send in. Photos can not only be added by mobile phone but also by uploading them via email or with your computer. If you want to post something fast you might choose the mobile phone option, if you have more time at hand you better choose email or computer upload to save some money in case you are not running an unlimited data plan.

Both email accounts and cell phone numbers have to be added to Snapfoo before you can begin to use them. The creator of the picture can write a short description that will be added to the profile page and all other registered visitors can leave comments.

I think Snapfoo is a great idea, something unique that has not appeared yet on the Internet. The integration with popular web 2.0 communities makes it more attractive and it could very well become the next Twitter. It’s nothing for me though because I do not like to reveal my life to the public.

I have five Snapfoo invites. The first five to comment on this blog requesting an invite will get it.

The service itself is completely free and no advertisement will be send in any way to the cell phone number of the recipient. The system behind the service utilized the fact that many cell phone provider accept sms that are send by email which is exactly what Textmemos is doing.

New sms are processed every fifteen minutes and send out to the cell phone providers. All messages are send one hour in advance of the time detailed to avoid late delivery.

My cell phone provider is unfortunately not in the list but I have a friend who is using this service quite often. It works very well. This is nice if you forget birthdays often for instance or other important events.

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Textmemos
via MakeUseOf

The free application aids you by sending you text messages or emails when you reach a defined amount of minutes that are left in a month. All that needs to be done would be to download the Watch My Cell application and configure the application once to add the login details for your cell phone provider, the minutes that are free in your account and when you want to receive a notification.

Watch My Cell supports only a few major cell phone providers at the moment and all seem to be Us-based which makes the application at its current stage useless for users from other countries. Supported companies are Cingular / At&t, Sprint / Nextel, T-Mobile and Verizon. It is also possible to check the remaining minutes in your system tray by simply hovering over the icon of Watch my Cell.

Hey!Watch supports many devices and formats including devices such as iPods, Mobiles, PDAs, PSP, Wii, Zune and formats like Divx, DVD and SVCD. The videos that are transferred can be of any size but can’t exceed a playtime of ten minutes. A list of all videos that you have transferred to Hey!Watch is available under Raw Videos in your home directory. Clicking on Encode lets you choose a video and a format / device it should be encoded to. The approximate file size is displayed beneath the selected options.

The encoding takes place in a background process meaning you can simply turn off the computer or download more videos that you want to encode later. Encoded videos are hosted at the Hey!Watch website for 12 hours and get deleted afterwards. Downloads and encoding sessions are limited to one at a time for free users. A limit of 10 encoding sessions per month limits the free service even more.

The user receives an email every time a encoding session finishes. It is also possible to subscribe to an RSS Feed with the same information.

A paid account is available which is offered for $4.99 a month. This one raises the limit of encoding sessions to 100 per month and three can be done concurrently. I personally think that the service should raise the amount of encoding sessions because ten per month does not look that great at all. Even 100 for the paid service is not that great.

As of now Hey!Watch is a great service for a quick encoding session. I think that many users will register and use it for some days and leave it when the encoding cap is reached for the month. This will probably cost them many users in the long run.

I would not say that Skype made a big step forward, can’t see many other changes yet. Sure there are some new emoticons and stuff like that but this is not that important I think. In case you do not know Skype I decided to list the main features of it.

• Support of Windows, Mac and Linux
• Talk or chat with your buddies using Skype and a microphone (for voice chat)
• Video chat
• Cheap calls to (mobile) phones worldwide
• Send files using Skype
• Conference Calls

I’m using Skype mainly to see when my buddies come online. I know that instant messengers do the same but I never got used to one of those.

The code is * # 0 6 #

The fifteen-digit code is the unique serial number of your mobile phone. Write it down, it´s your IMEI Code. When someone steals your mobile you report the theft and your IMEI Code to your service provider. Most providers will ban that serial number making the phone useless.

via: snopes.com