Ultra-portable terminals

[Bob Rasmussen]

Hi all,

I trust you're not all sweltering excessively.

I thought I'd share some experiences with a new handheld device, for your
general edification. Take a look at Sony's new UX device, at

http://www.learningcenter.sony.us/Notebooks/UXMicroPC/Research/UXMicroPCOverview

This is a tiny gadget that runs Windows XP Pro, on a 4.5" diagonal screen.
The resolution is 1024x600, which means the pixels are really tiny. You
can read other descriptions online about the unit in general.

We've had requests from time to time for a version of Anzio on Windows CE,
Windows Mobile, or Palm, but the development hassles were always
significant. Also, I had questions about whether the screen would be
readable. So I was interested when I saw the Sony.

I bought one yesterday, and set about getting acquainted, and especially
testing Anzio on it. Anzio actually runs fine on it, if your eyes (or
bifocals) are good enough. There's plenty of pixels - we used to run on
640x480! But as I said, they're small. But very crisp.

The popup screen reveals a keyboard, which is tedious but at least it's
there!

There is support for Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and Cingular cell-modem. I was
using it with Wi-Fi, and it could make for a good in-warehouse unit. With
a USB barcode reader, you could take inventory. With cellmodem, a remote
sales rep could be online frequently. Or you could connect to the Linux
servers and run "vi".

I thought of a few things I could do to Anzio to make it work better, but
all in all it did just fine.

I plan to have my unit with me at SCO Forum, so you can try it there. By
the way, Anzio will be available on the house PCs, in case you need to SSH
home.

More off-topic, you could use this unit as a camera, a video-conferencing
station, a music player, a music recorder, a photo viewer, and a video
viewer. And to play Solitaire.

Let me know what you think.

Regards,
....Bob Rasmussen,   President,   Rasmussen Software, Inc.

personal e-mail: ras at anzio.com
 company e-mail: rsi at anzio.com
          voice: (US) 503-624-0360 (9:00-6:00 Pacific Time)
            fax: (US) 503-624-0760
            web: http://www.anzio.com