Intranet Access In The Palm Of Your Hand

Excitement swelled recently over Palm Computing's claims about developing a "wireless" Palm unit that would help keep corporate mobile users connected to the Internet, e-mail and the company intranet.

"How cool!" was the cry from those eager to get their hands on one. But could the Palm unit deliver everything promised, and be practical and affordable at the same time? The answers are "not really," "maybe" and "not yet." But one of its less-touted features may make the Palm VII useful in the corporate world.

Palm Computing Inc.'s Palm VII looks similar to its older siblings, the PalmPilot and Palm III. It has the same size LCD screen, and you use the same buttons to access the Address Book, Date Book, Memo Pad and To Do List applications. The Palm VII also has 2 MB of RAM, supports IR beaming of data and synchs with a desktop PIM app through a cradle that comes with the unit.

But the similarities end there. For one, the Palm VII is a quarter-inch taller than its predecessors. The company crams a two-way radio into that space. Also, once you have opened an account on Palm.Net from the Palm unit itself, just flip up the built-in antenna that serves as a secondary off/on switch, and you're connected to Palm's network through Bell South Wireless Data. That makes the Palm VII able to be connected in 260 major U.S. cities right out of the box.

Coverage in the Washington, D.C. area, where we tested the unit, has been solid. That includes inside a shielded television station where we frequently used the unit. While the wireless network provides coverage, it does not offer speed. Typical data transfer rates run at 8 Kbps.

Palm Computing has developed several tricks to counter the lack of speed. The Palm VII does not really surf the Web in the traditional sense. Instead, it uses a technology Palm calls "Web clipping." This allows the unit to grab small snippets of specific information from specially designed Web sites, much as you would clip a couple of key paragraphs from a newspaper. Palm Computing also caches some of these Web sites on a proxy server to keep the content close to the Palm VIIs.

That content fills in the blanks of templates, called Palm Query Applications (PQA), that come preloaded on the Palm VII device itself. Here is how it works: You first tap on the "ESPN" PQA icon. The ESPN logo and a template listing different sports pops up instantly because they are already "in" the Palm. Next, tap on the "Auto Racing" listing, and a racing graphic, plus categories of available information, quickly appear.

But it is not until you tap on "NASCAR Standings" do you actually connect to ESPN's Web site through the Palm Computing server and pull down the current standings--957 bytes of information. You can tap the Title box at the top of the screen and find out how much information was received, and how much space that information took up on your Palm VII. More on why that's important when we discuss the cost associated with using the unit.

The Palm VII comes preloaded with numerous PQAs, including ones from sites like MapQuest.com, ABCNews.com, Travelocity.com, Weather.com, WSJ.com and E-Trade.com. More services are available for download at Palm.Net. These services make the Palm VII a bit like a pocket concierge. You can receive information on travel routes, entertainment guides, hotels and restaurants, movie tickets, ATM locations and dozens of other services right at your fingertips.

Conveniently, you can even trade stocks online, say, from the back of a cab. Transactions are protected by Certicom Corp.'s Elliptic Curve Cryptography. This means the Palm could very well be an indispensable way for taking care of personal business while on the run; however, Palm Computing is still waiting for developers to come up with more business-related applications.

Here's where we see potential for this handheld. The Palm VII will work with Intranets; users just set up a Secure Sockets Layer/HTTP server outside the company firewall to connect to Palm.Net. That server would have pinhole access to specific company data. Palm VII-equipped workers could retrieve current pricing or availability information from the field. Palm says several companies are working up proprietary query apps to do just that.

Palm VII's wireless e-mail is limited, but it could be used as a two-way pager. Short messages can also be written using Graffiti, Palm Computing's handwriting code--if you use abbreviations, that is. Plus, you are able to send e-mail to anyone with an Internet account. However, you can only receive mail that has been sent to your Palm.Net account. One of the shortcomings of the Palm VII is that you are not able to check mail in a different account. We would like to see that option in a future version.

Another oversight we found during testing is the lack of an alert signal when you receive new mail. It's a trade-off since not having the alert signal lengthens the unit's battery life. Power is not wasted on keeping the alert signal active. But who really wants to keep checking for mail every few minutes? We hope to see an alert signal next time around.

But the real major negative of the Palm lies with its cost: $599 is a lot of money for an organizer-- even if it is wireless. A one-time $19.95 setup charge--the cheapest plan available is $9.95/ month--gets you 50 KB worth of e-mail and Internet content. That is roughly 150 screens of information. If you want to receive more information each month, the cost is $24.95 for 150 KB of messages and services. It is 30 cents more a kilobyte after that. This means that daily activities, such as checking the weather, will eat up 748 bytes. Reading an important InternetWeek breaking news headline will kill another 273 bytes. Getting the full story on that same headline costs you 7 KB. Finally, just one set of directions from MapQuest.com would use up 1.6 KB. It adds up quickly. Power users could run up a tidy monthly bill.

Palm Computing sources confirmed to us that the company is re-evaluating its pricing. Clearly, there will be a price adjustment if the company wants the Palm VII to become popular with more than just well-heeled gadget lovers. It's also a must if they want the unit to live up to the potential of a truly wireless handheld. At press time, the Palm VII was available only in the New York tri-state area. However, national rollout is scheduled for Fall 1999.

I.J. Hudson is a freelance writer and also covers technology issues for NBC4 in Washington, D.C. He can be reached at ij.hudson@nbc.com.