The Daily Reporter | Contractors Handbook | Compute, Calculate, Convert

Have you noticed a proliferation of ads for personal digital assistants - PDAs - recently? Maybe you have a friend or colleague who totes a Blackberry or feverishly taps at the screen of a Palm Pilot, Visor, Jornada, Ipaq or CLIE. Annoying yes, but if you're a busy contractor or project manager, these devices are ready made for you.

At first glance, you might think PDAs are nothing more than high-tech daybooks or electronic Rolodexes. But those products don't even begin to approach the computing power of a PDA. Need some convincing? Fire up a Palm IIIe and HP Jornada and you can:

Install free engineering calculators, time and billing software, project management tools and powerful reference, mapping and conversion data.
Download free handheld versions of news sources such as The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Sporting News, Packers.com and, of course, The Daily Reporter.
Transfer all of your e-mail from your computer to your handheld.
Draft memos and spreadsheets for quick import into Microsoft Word or Excel.
Keep track of all expenses across multiple categories and bank accounts.

Many of these functions come preinstalled on most machines, while others require Internet browsers to download the program to your computer. Downloads are extremely manageable, even with a dial-up connection because the programs must be small enough to run within the device's memory, which ranges in size from 2MB to 32MB. After that simple step, all you have to do is use the software included with your unit to transfer the downloaded program from your computer to your unit.

Wireless connectivity has, so far, been the greatest advance in handheld technology. The Palm VII, Handspring Visor Deluxe, Jornada 720, RIM Blackberry and Sony's CLIE -to name but a few - all boast wireless capability. With a few taps on the screen, you can retrieve your e-mail, surf the Internet and instant message in real time.

Of all the wireless devices on the market, Palm leads the pack. But, it's not just the sale of Palm handhelds that has made it the market leader. The secret to the company's success is its Palm operating system licensing.

Clear away all the techno-speak and most computer purchases turn on two factors: price and power. PDAs are no different, and you should expect to spend anywhere from $149 to $500, depending on the model you choose. The higher end of the spectrum is where you'll find color displays, Internet capability and larger memory packages.

If you're just looking to read your e-mail offline and download a few handy programs, your best value is the Handspring Visor Deluxe ($169). It allows you to store 6,000 addresses; 5 years of appointments (about 3,000); 1,500 to-do items; 1,500 memos and 200 e-mail messages. You can also download and install AvantGo's handheld news browser to retrieve news content.

What separates the Visor Deluxe from its nearest competitor, the Palm m100 ($129), is that it can scale to meet your needs via its Springboard™ expansion slot. This neat little tray on the back of the unit allows you to pop in more memory, run larger software packages or add a modem. You will find this feature only on Handspring's Visor products.

When you boil it all down, computers are great in the office, but to be truly useful they need to move with you from place to place. That benefit shouldn't hinge on whether you can afford or know how to use a laptop computer. That's what PDAs are all about - mobility, cost efficiency and usability.

Pat Mckenna is Director of Internet Services for the Daily Reporter and can be reached
at 414-276-0273, Ext. 117, or by email.