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Networking in the Palm of Your Hand: Page 4 of 6

Mobile computing will grow beyond PDAs in the next few years. Intel's X-Scale architecture promises to increase the speed of mobile devices. Already we are seeing PDAs and other devices like cellular phones converge into all-in-one mobile devices (see buyer's guide, "It's a PDA! It's a Phone! It's a Data-Enable Cell Phone"). Microsoft's tablet PC may offer even more versatility for mobile devices as it blurs the line between PDAs and laptops. Only time will tell how much the role of mobile devices in the enterprise will increase.

Sean Ginevan is a research associate with the Center for Emerging Network Technologies at Syracuse University. He has conducted research in convergent multimedia and electronic books, and has spoken at Dickinson College and the National Archives College Park on oral history and the Web. Send your comments on this article to him at [email protected].

Selecting a mobile enterprise platform is a difficult process. The two main camps -- Palm and Microsoft -- have strengths and weaknesses and differing philosophies in regards to enterprise applications. Palm relies on its wealth of third-party developer support, while Microsoft uses its own products to fill customer needs. Following are questions to ask when selecting a mobile-device platform:

1. What is my company's back-end infrastructure?

2. How does this platform integrate with the existing infrastructure?