SREE VISVESVARAYA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY AND SCIENCE

SVITS QUEST-2007

SMARTPHONES AND PDAs

HIMA BINDU.B SRUTHI.R

04571a0514 04571A0546

C.S.E C.S.E

himabindu_svits@yahoo.com svits_sruthi07@yahoo.com
Abstract:
A smartphone or sphone is any
electronic handheld device that
integrates the functionality of a mobile
phone, personal digital assistant (PDA)
or other information appliance. This is
often achieved by adding telephone
functions to an existing PDA (PDA
Phone) or putting "smart" capabilities,
such as PDA functions, into a mobile
phone. A key feature of a smartphone is
that additional native applications can be
installed on the device. The applications
can be developed by the manufacturer of
the handheld device, by the operator or
by any other third-party software
developer. "Smart" functionality
includes any additional interface
including a miniature QWERTY
keyboard, a touch screen, or even just
secure access to company mail.
Definition and history
It is increasingly difficult to define
exactly what qualifies as a
"smartphone". Nearly all new mobile
phones have some rudimentary PDA
functionality such as phonebooks,
calendars, and task lists. Furthermore,
BREW and Java ME devices allow for
the installation of additional applications
but are still not considered smartphones.
There are many BREW devices with
PDA functionality, the ability to run
third-party applications in native code
and sporting displays as large as
240x320 pixels; yet they are not
considered "smartphones". The elusive
definition seems loosely tied to the
particular operating systems listed
below. A non "smart" mobile phone may
be referred to as a Feature Phone, a
Dumb Phone, etc..
Fundamentally, these seem to be the
common traits: Smartphones are voice-
centric devices (voice is the primary
function, data is secondary) that offer
PDA-like capabilities, whereas PDAs or
Personal Communicators (such as most
BlackBerries) may offer voice
capabilities, but they are data-centric.
Smartphones are generally capable of
one-handed operation, while PDAs
generally require use of both hands. But
it can be argued that this definition based
on the device's "focus" may fail, as
devices integrate more features .
Smartphone features tend to include
Internet access, e-mail access,
scheduling software, built-in camera,
contact management, GPS navigation
software and occasionally the ability to
read business documents in a variety of
formats such as PDF and Microsoft
Office. In the CTIA conference held in
Atlanta, Georgia in March 2004,
incorporation of television into the
smartphone was among the topics
discussed.
The first smartphone was called Simon
designed by IBM in 1992 and shown as
a concept product that year at
COMDEX, the communications industry
trade show held in Las Vegas, Nevada. It
was released to the public in 1993 and
sold by BellSouth. Besides a mobile
phone, it also contained a calendar,
address book, world clock, calculator,
note pad, e-mail, and games. It had no
physical buttons to dial with. Instead
customers used a touch-screen to select
phone numbers with a finger or create
facsimiles and memos with an optional
stylus. Text was entered with a unique
on-screen "predictive" keyboard.
As of 2004 smartphones were an
increasingly large part of the mobile
telephone market. According to the
analysts, Canalys, smartphone shipments
increased more than 50 percent from the
second quarter of 2005 to the second
quarter of 2006 with nearly nineteen
million devices shipped in the latter
period [2]. It is expected that in a few
years most phones sold (except for
disposable phones) will be considered
"smart". Smartphone is usually used as a
term contrasting "regular phones".
Various terms exist for non smart
phones, including Feature phone.
Operating systems used in
Smartphones:
The most common operating systems
(OS) used by smartphones are Symbian,
Linux, Windows Mobile (Which is an
extension of Windows CE designed for
pocket PC, and developed by Microsoft),
and Palm OS (developed by Access (fka
PalmSource)).
In 2005 Microsoft released the new
version of its operating system Windows
Mobile 5.0.
On January 9, 2007 Apple announced
the iPhone based on OS X to be released
in June 2007.
Dual-OS handsets such as the FIC
Neo1973 may run OpenMoko (or
Windows Mobile).
What are PDAs:
Personal digital assistants (PDAs) are
handheld computers that were originally
designed as personal organizers, but
became much more versatile over the
years. PDAs are also known as pocket
computers or palmtop computers. PDAs
have many uses: calculation, use as a
clock and calendar, playing computer
games, accessing the Internet, sending
and receiving E-mails, video recording,
typewriting and word processing, use as
an address book, making and writing on
spreadsheets, use as a radio or stereo,
and Global Positioning System. Newer
PDAs also have both color screens and
audio capabilities, enabling them to be
used as mobile phones (smartphones),
web browsers, or portable media players.
Many PDAs can access the Internet,
intranets or extranets via Wi-Fi, or
Wireless Wide-Area Networks
(WWANs). One of the most significant
PDA characteristic is the presence of a
touch screen.

Typical Features of PDA:
A typical PDA has a touch screen for
data entry, a memory card slot for data
storage and IrDA port for connectivity.
Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are often integrated
in newer PDAs.
Touch screen
Many original PDAs, such as the Palm
Pilot, featured touch screens for user
interaction, having only a few buttons
usually reserved for shortcuts to often
used programs. Touch screen PDAs,
including Windows Pocket PC devices,
usually have a detachable stylus that can
be used on the touch screen. Interaction
is then done by tapping the screen to
activate buttons or menu choices, and
dragging the stylus to, for example,
highlight t
Text input is usually done in one of two
ways:
• Using a virtual keyboard, where
a keyboard is shown on the touch
screen. Input is done by tapping
the letters.
• Using letter or word recognition,
where letters or words are written
on the touch screen, and then
"translated" to letters in the
currently activated text field.
Despite rigorous research and
development projects, this data
input method still requires much
patience from the user since it
tends to be rather inaccurate.
PDAs for business use, have full
keyboards and scroll wheels or thumb
wheels to facilitate data entry and
navigation, in addition to supporting
touch-screen input. There are also full-
size foldable keyboards available that
plug directly, or use wireless technology
to interface with the PDA and allow for
normal typing and also has additional
functionality as push based email and
applications
Memory Cards
Almost all PDAs have some form of
memory card slot. A standard on modern
PDAs is the SD (Secure Digital) slot.
Although originally designed for
memory, in recent years the invention of
the SDIO standard has allowed such
things as Wi-Fi cards and Webcams to
be used in the same slot. Compact Flash
slots are used in many PDAs to provide
extra expandability. For example, one
slot is used for memory and the other for
Wi-Fi. Some PDAs also have a USB
port, mainly for USB flash drives.
Connectivity
Many PDAs have an IrDA (Infrared)
port for connectivity. This allows
communication between two PDAs, a
PDA and any device with an IrDA port,
or between a PDA and a computer with
an IrDA adapter. Most modern PDAs
also have Bluetooth wireless
connectivity, which is used by many
mobile phones, headsets and GPS
devices.
Synchronization
An important function of PDAs is
synchronizing data with a PC. This
allows up to date contact information
stored on software such as Microsoft
Outlook or ACT! to update the database
on the PDA. The data synchronized
ensures that the PDA has an accurate list
of contacts, appointments and e-mail,
allowing users to access the same
information on the PDA as the host
computer.
The synchronizing also prevents the loss
of information stored on the device in
case it is lost, stolen, or destroyed.
Another advantage is that data input is
usually a lot quicker on a PC, since text
input via a touch screen is still not quite
optimal. Transferring data to a PDA via
the computer is therefore a lot quicker
than having to manually input all data on
the handheld device.
Most PDAs come with the ability to
synchronize to a PC. This is done
through synchronization software
provided with the handheld, such as
HotSync Manager, which comes with
Palm OS handhelds, or Microsoft
ActiveSync, which comes with
Windows Mobile handhelds.
These programs allow the PDA to be
synchronized with a Personal
information manager. This personal
information manager may be an outside
program or a proprietary program. For
example, the BlackBerry PDA comes
with the Desktop Manager program
which can synchronize to both Microsoft
Outlook and ACT!. Other PDAs come
only with their own proprietary software.
For example, some early Palm OS PDAs
came only with Palm Desktop while
later Palms such as the Treo 650 has the
built-in ability to sync to Palm Desktop
and/or Microsoft Outlook. Third-party
synchronization software is also
available for many PDAs from
companies like Intellisync and
CompanionLink. This software
synchronizes these handhelds to other
personal information managers which
are not supported by the PDA
manufacturers, such as GoldMine and
Lotus Notes.
Major Manufacturers of
Smartphones:
• High Tech Computer
Corporation (Is the Largest
Manufacturer in the World of
Windows Mobile Smartphones
and Pocket PC Phone Editions
that take on different names with
different retailers in the USA, but
are HTC branded in other
countries around the world)
• HP - Hewlett-Packard Company
• Samsung Electronics
• RIM - Research in Motion
Limited
• Kyocera Corporation
• Mio_Technology
• Group Sense PDA
• Palm Inc
• Eten - Eten corp
• Apple_Inc - Apple Inc