MOBILE COMPUTING: AN INTRODUCTION

A mobile computing device is effectively any computer not constrained in its location to a desktop or data centre. In recent years the variety of mobile computing devices available has rapidly increased. In doing so, it has also turned from theory to reality a trend for ubiquitous computing, whereby computers are all around us in the world, enabling access to digital content anytime, any place and anywhere.

MOBILE COMPUTING CATEGORIES

Mobile computers may be roughly be divided into four different categories. Firstly, many mobile computers are laptops -- or basically portable versions of desktop PCs, based around the same type of hardware, and capable of running the same software applications. Secondly, the fastest growing category of mobile computer are ultramobiles. Also increasingly known as netbooks, these are considerably smaller than most laptops, usually capable of running the same or similar software as a desktop PC, though increasingly based on dedicated forms of hardware. Thirdly, an increasing number of mobile computers -- such as pocket computers, smart phones and media players -- do not share any lineage with desktop PCs, and instead are based on specific technologies designed from scratch for mobile use. Finally, the last category of mobile computers are embedded devices. These are often not even recognised as computers by the majority of people (for example because they do not feature a traditional form of keyboard or display), even though they do contain a processor that manipulates stored digital data in the same manner as any other form of computer.

Just to keep us all on our toes, Intel has introduced the term mobile Internet device or MID into the mobile computing arena to describe devices that "will allow [us] to connect, entertain, stay informed, and be productive wherever [we] go". Within the above categorization, MIDs could be either ultramobile or pocket computing devices, with the lack of real definition meaning that use of the term "mobile Internet device" is already on the wane.

A full discussion of every kind of device that could be considered a mobile computer is not just beyond the scope of this website, but would arguably serve little purpose. What follows is therefore a summary -- including specific, key product examples as appropriate -- of the four broad categories of mobile computing as identified above. Other good sources of information on mobile computing include Mobile Computer Mag, and suppliers of mobile devices including Smart Devices Direct and Clove Technology. Indeed, a quick surf around the these last two websites should provide you with a very good idea of the vast range of mainstream mobile computing devices now available.

LAPTOPS

Whilst the term "mobile computer" is now sometimes only used to refer to a very small and even pocketable device, a laptop (or notebook) computer is still probably what most people picture when they think of a computer that is not rooted to a desk. In technology terms, laptops are basically desktop computers repackaged for portability. This means that they will almost always have either an Intel or AMD microprocessor (as found in desktop PCs and detailed on the hardware page), and will run a desktop operating system and applications (most obviously Windows with applications such as Microsoft Office).

Pretty much everything discussed on this site under hardware and software applies for laptop as well as desktop computing. Laptop processor speeds tend to be a little lower (to conserve battery life) and memory and hard disk capacities smaller (the latter because notebook computers use 2.5" or smaller hard disks, compared to the 3.5" units found in most desktops).

Not that many years ago, when deciding between a desktop and a laptop PC there was a significant performance trade-off be weighed. Today, however, a typical laptop can be considered a direct replacement for a typical desktop PC. Laptop computers do cost more and can have keyboards and mouse-replacing touchpads that some people find difficult to use. However, except for activities such as intensive video editing and 3D rendering, there is nothing that now holds most laptops back. In particular, the widespread use of WiFi wireless networking now makes a laptop the computer of choice for many.

Laptop computers come in a range of sizes. At one end of the spectrum are machines with very large displays (19"+) that are more "transportable" than portable. At the other come far small devices with screens around 12" or less in diagonal, and which blur into our next mobile computing category of ultramobiles.

ULTRAMOBILES

Ultramobiles or "UMPCs" inevitably start to make comprises in terms of their inclusion of "standard" desktop technology. Most obviously they have fairly small screens (most commonly about 7" or 9" in diagonal) and either smaller keyboards, or indeed no keyboard at all. Ultramobiles with a keyboard are now also increasingly being referred to as netbooks due to the way in which they are often used as highly portable Internet access devices.

Some ultramobiles dispense with a physically spinning hard disk in favour of solid state storage. This is arguably a very good idea indeed, as even the best 2.5" or smaller hard disks are not very good as surviving the knocks and jolts inevitably experienced by any form of mobile computer during its working day.

Today, more than any other area of mobile computing, for most consumers and businesses the ultramobile market is the one to watch. Samsung started to get things moving a few years back with its Q1 range. These run Windows on a device with a 7" widescreen about the size of a VHS video tape. Most Q1 models are touchscreen input only (ie they do not have a physical keyboard), with some models featuring a physical hard disk, and others solid state storage. Other ultramobiles are a little larger than the Q1 range -- such as the HTC Advantage and a range of models from Vye Computers -- and include a small if perfectly usable keyboard.

With built-in WiFi wireless networking and screens big enough to view web content and office applications with few (if some) compromises, ultramobiles are significant because they offer enough computing power and functionality to make the Internet truly portable around the home and around the office. Until late 2007 the one thing against them was their price -- which for the above models was significantly more than a typical desktop or laptop computer. However, in November 2007 all this changed with the launch of the Asus Eee PC.

In its first year (celebrated by this online birthday party) the Eee PC -- now a brand in its own right -- has grown into a family of cult ultramobile computers priced in the UK from around £170 for the lowest specification model with a 7" display, up to about £370 for the highest-specification models with a 10" display. All Eee PC ultramobiles have a reasonable-sized (if not fantastic) keyboard, with all but some of the most recent models using a solid state disk that makes them very robust.

Eee PCs come installed with either the Linux operating system and applications (including the Microsoft Office compatible OpenOffice, and the Firebox web browser), or increasingly Windows XP and Microsoft Works. Over 300,000 of the original 7" display Eee PCs were sold in the last two months of 2007 (making them the most popular Christmas gift in America), with Asus expecting to meet its sales prediction of selling five million Eee PCs in 2008 and double that in 2009.

With the Eee PC having taken the world by storm (and having even forced Microsoft to extend the life of Windows XP to run on them!), other manufacturers have been quick to follow suit in launching low-cost ultramobiles. Notable competitors to the Eee include the Acer Aspire One, the HP MiniNote and the MSI Wind. All are very good value devices, although the Eee PC has achieved by far the greatest cult status, with a host of dedicated websites including the excellent EeeUser.com

Ultramobiles like the Eee PC and its competitors represent perhaps the first serious attempts to design hardware-and-software mobile computing packages down to viable-cost mass-user requirement. Asus initially targeted the Eee PC for children and education. However, less than a year after launch it is a very mainstream mobile computing family. The Eee PC et al are also like to play an important part in sparking even more interest in the use of software as a service (SaaS) web-based applications such as Google Docs (and to which there is a direct link on all Linux Eee PC models).

For more information (and to see an Eee PC 901 and an Acer Aspire One in action) you may want to watch my Explaining Ultramobile Computing video. There is also a wealth of information on ultramobiles on the UMPC Portal website.

POCKET COMPUTING DEVICES

Some ultramobile computers may fit into a very large coat pocket. However, their provision of close-to-desktop application functionality will always constrain their portability, not least due to their screen size. In many situations, however, traditional desktop functionality is not what is required. This leads us to a consideration of pocket computing devices designed from the ground up for mobility.

Around 1999, Microsoft actually launched a technology platform called "Pocket PC" for small organizer-sized devices or PDAs (personal digital assistants) running what is now called the WindowsMobile operating system and applications. However, developments in the mobile phone market kind of overtook PocketPC, with people more keen to carry one integrated digital device, rather than a separate mobile phone and pocket computer. Such integrated devices are now most commonly called smartphones (again a Microsoft standard), although in practice an increasing number of mobile phones are effectively pocket mobile computing devices, incorporating as they do applications for personal information management, playing music and video files, playing games, and at least some form of web access, in addition to voice call functionality.

Apart from their physically small size (and hence small screens and usually the lack of a physical QWERTY keyboard), the main thing that distinguishes a pocket computing device from a laptop or ultramobile computer is that it is not based on desktop hardware or software technology. Whilst some pocket computers run WindowsMobile with "pocket versions" of office applications like Word and Excel, they do not and cannot run desktop versions of windows or standard desktop applications. The hardware inside a pocket computing device is also very different, and is not based around an a standard desktop/laptop Intel or AMD microprocessor. Pocket mobile computers also always use solid state storage, rather than having a spinning hard disk.

A wide range of devices could potentially be described as "pocket computers". These include not just stand-alone PocketPCs, smartphones and the Apple iPhone, but also mobile digital audio and/or video players (including Ipods and the wide range of media players and "Internet tablets" available most notably from Archos and Creative). Digital cameras could also be meaningfully included under a "pocket computing" banner. However, perhaps one of the most interesting recent innovations to include here is Amazon's Kindle.

Kindle is a reader for electronic books (e-books) that uses a new form of electronic paper technology to provide a sharp, high resolution display that reads "like real paper". E-books are delivered to Kindle wirelessly, with over 90,000 titles currently available. The Reader eBook has also recently been launched by Sony in conjunction with Waterstones bookshops. This also has an "e-ink" display, as well as a storage capacity of 160 books.

Both the Kindle and the Reader eBook are significant more because of their innovative screen technology and infrastructural model for content delivery, as opposed to the specific devices themselves. Indeed, as with the Eee PC, they are both pocket computing devices that have become possible due to the development, convergence and common availability of a range of technologies -- and in particular high-speed wireless networking and new forms of computer display. Both devices therefore provide an indication of the kinds of connected mobile and pocket device that could become very common in our homes, offices and out-in-the-field by early next decade.

EMBEDDED & AMBIENT COMPUTING

Laptops, ultramobiles, and to perhaps a lesser degree even smartphones, media players and e-book readers, are all devices that most people would recognise as a mobile computer if they saw one. However, today computer processing power and wireless connectivity is increasingly also being integrated into devices that would in no reasonable context be recognisable as a computer. This leads us into the area of "ambient" mobile computing.

Whereas laptops, ultramobiles and their like enable people to compute ubiquitously -- ie anytime and anywhere -- what they also do is to demand and/or require a user's full attention. In contrast, ambient computing operates at the limits of our senses by utilising our pre-attentive processing abilities. Ambient computing is hence far less demanding and interruptive of other human activities. Or as AmbientDevices.com so nicely explain, ambient computing devices "elegantly embed digital information into the objects and environments that surround us". The explanations of ambient computing philosophy and science on the AmbientDevices.com website are also so effective that there is no point in me attempting an alternative coverage here.

Ambient technology can be built into a wide range of devices, not all of which have to be mobile. However, the concept is very nicely demonstrated by considering the Ambient Umbrella. This hangs next to your front door like any other umbrella, but also includes a handle that glows with a range of light patterns to warn of possible rain or snow, and hence the necessity to take it with you. Data is fed to the device wirelessly via a forecasting website, meaning that the device can be ignored completely by the user until it catches their attention when a storm may be brewing. Other devices from AmbientDevices.com include a frosted glass orb that can glow different colours to display real time data relating to anything from stock market trends to local traffic congestion, to electricity usage, to the pollen count.

MOBILE COMPUTING: CONCLUSIONS?

When planning this website, one of the most difficult challenges was deciding the categories into which the information would be organized. Of all these categories "mobile computing" remains the one with which I am least happy. In part this is because I toyed for a long time with the idea of instead including a category for ubiquitous computing -- to cover both mobile computing devices, and also "fixed" devices like Internet consoles, surface computers and even screen fridges that are increasingly making digital data access possible anytime and anywhere. The other issue I faced with the label "mobile computing" is that it is an area of such constant change that deciding what to include in each subcategory is nigh-on impossible. And not least this is because the terminology is in such a constant state of flux.

Any definition of just what constitutes a "mobile computer" inevitably remains both relative and subjective. For example, back in 1981 one of the very first portable computers was the Osborne 1. This weighed 11.8Kg, was larger than most modern desktop PCs, and only ran on mains power without an optional battery pack. At the other end of the scale, the recently released Artigo Pico-ITX PC measures just 150mm x 110mm x 40mm, weigh only 520 grams, and yet is probably best categorised as very small desktop computer.

Mobile computing is probably an area best defined at any one point in time by those devices that are challenging paradigms and setting new consumer and business agendas. Right now this includes products like the Eee PC, Amazon's Kindle, and some of the latest mobile phone and media player devices, including Apple's iPhone. Offerings such as the Ambient Umbrella may also make us think about what is possible, if not themselves being products that will ever go mass market.

Ultimately, whilst mobile computing is still barely out of its infancy, it is fairly certain to represent a large part of the future of computing development. Not least this is because desktop computers are now a relatively mature platform offering little scope for high-return market development for companies in the computing industry. The rising green computing agenda will also mean that desktop computers are replaced far less regularly, in turn making new mobile computing market opportunities even more attractive. Mobile computing also offers the potential for what Apple once called "computing for the rest of us" -- or in other words, computing for those people who do not spend their working day at a desk, and/or those who do not want to spend their leisure time slaved to a desktop PC.

Mobile computing can also perhaps even be considered as more "natural" than those location-dependent forms that have gone before. As seekers, consumers, processors, hoarders and communicators of information, every human being is already a form of mobile computer. Increasingly smart devices that can travel with us to help in such seeking, consuming, processing, hoarding and communicating will hence perhaps inevitably be very widely adopted as soon as they become technically and economically mass-viable. Indeed, one only has to look at the uptake of mobile phones to consider the potential.

The science fiction of the last decade contained a great many robots to walk beside us in servitude. However, we are perhaps far more likely to want to seek assistance from a small device that we can carry with us or find lying around the home or office than from a lumbering mechanical clone.