Monday Morning Punch

Published in: Silverkris (abridged version)
Publish on: August 2008

As someone who travels on a regular basis, I often need information related to weather, flight status, and currency conversions. While I can obtain most of this information online, I'd rather have it sitting on something that is always with me: My phone. I also need to edit or view the odd document or two, and for short documents, I'd rather use my phone instead of whipping out my laptop.

Work

Thankfully, most phones now offer extended productivity features for the mobile professional. I like the Nokia E71 (http://www.nokia.com) and HTC Tytn II (http://www.htc.com) for their built-in business features. These handsets have one touch keys for direct access to wireless e-mail, contacts, and appointments. Both phones have built-in keyboards for easier writing of e-mail and editing of documents with the QuickOffice or Microsoft Office Mobile. Road warriors will certainly appreciate the integrated GPS feature on both phones when they’re running to a meeting or simply looking for a restaurant in an unfamiliar place.

Watch

But it’s not all work on the road.

Watch movies or make your own DVD-quality video on Nokia’s N96. Optimized for video and TV, this phone looks like a personal entertainment system that stores up to 40 hours of video and just happens to let you make calls and send SMS on the side. I not only like its large 2.8-inch screen, but also its kickstand at the back that lets you watch your movies hands-free.

Or watch the phone itself. The new HTC Touch Diamond’s 3D interface will keep you entertained for hours. Use your fingers to flip through its features such as contacts, email, Internet, music player, weather, and so on. Text messages and photos float and twist on the screen like pages of a Rolodex. Slide your finger up the display to see the animated weather of various countries. And if the phone rings while you’re in a meeting, flip it over to silence it.

Plan and convert

To get centralised, real-time travel information at your fingertip, you’ll need to install additional applications.

Worldmate (http://www.mobimate.com/) gives you for free world clocks, global weather forecasts, currency, clothing size and measurement converters, and tip and tax calculators for virtually any country. For a fee, you’ll also get real-time access to flight schedules for over 1,000 airlines, and real-time flight status for over 75 airlines.
SPB Traveler (http://www.spbsoftwarehouse.com) is similar to Worldmate, except that none of the services are free. You can try before you buy though, so you know what you’re paying for. For US$29.95, you also get a phrase book where you’ll find a lot of useful everyday conversation phrases, links to local information on the cities you are traveling too as well as local customs, and even dialing codes to make phone calls.

Stay in touch

So you aren't ready to give up your trusted mobile phone line, but you still want to make free calls over the Internet? Give Skype (http://www.skype.com) a try. Calls to fellow Skype users are free. You pay a small fee for calls to regular phones. There's even an Instant Messaging option, should you prefer typing to talking, and a conference-call function that lets you converse with up to four other people at once.

Like Skype, Gizmo (http:// www.gizmoproject.com/) is a phone service with free service between fellow users. Resembling a well-evolved VoIP client, Gizmo’s interface is clean and clear. It contains any other Gizmo users in your contact list, and can even scan your Microsoft Outlook address book and find any current Gizmo users. You can also send SMS or chat with friends on Gizmo5, MSN, AIM, Yahoo! and Jabber.

For the road warrior who deals with groups of people at one time, the Nokia Team Suite helps organize and facilitate conference calls, and initiate push-to-talk sessions with selected team members through a built-in speakerphone. You can easily create different groups, and as easily populate the groups with members from your address book. Team Suite will then let you choose one, several or all members of your group to interact with them by conference calls, push-to-talk sessions, sending email or other text messages.

Play

Get high on speed car racing on your phone: Check out Astraware (http://www.astraware.com/) for an endless array of action games like GTS Racing Challenge, popular strategy games like Sudoku, and many more.

Or Go full swing with 3D Nine Hole Golf from OmniGSoft (http://www.omnigsoft.com/). Unique real-time 3D graphics make this golf game stand out. Easy control and challenging elements provide great action for the golf addict and the mobile gamer alike.

Get clued-in

Being offline in the air makes you wonder what you missed. Most phones already have software for you to view Podcasts and receive RSS feeds. A Podcast is like a broadcast of media, usually audio, that nearly anyone can create. You download Podcasts – for example, a CNN Radio news update – and play it back at a later date. These are great for traveling when you might not have the ability to listen to live broadcasts, like in an airplane.

They are also fairly easy to create and share, so even the average user can tell a story to capture your attention and share it with the world. RSS gives you text headlines without video or audio, so it will be faster to download. It typically contains either a summary of content from an associated web site. Iif you have Internet access, you can drilldown to get the full content.

You can also get instant access to personalized information through Widsets. With Widsets (http://www.widsets.com/), you can get your favorite web content straight to your mobile phone - news, blogs, email, pictures, play games, and so on. You also can share your preferred content with other users or publish it on the web.

Except for the Nokia Team Suite, all the applications listed above run on mobile phones that run either the S60 or Microsoft Windows Mobile operating system. Combine these applications with your phones’ built-in capabilities and you probably won't leave your house without your mobile phone. And why would you? It's the perfect travel companion.