New Pocket PC from Socket Mobile

Socket Mobile, long famous for their mobile computer accessories, are launching their first Pocket PC. It's called the "SoMo 650" and comes equipped with these great features:

• Intel 624 MHz processor
• 128 MB Base RAM
• 256 MB Flash RAM [permanent storage]
• WiFi
• Bluetooth
• Windows Mobile 5.0
• Extremely durable case
• Pre-loaded Socket Mobile scanning software
• Compact Flash and SD sockets
  

Into this device you can insert one of their many RFID and/or Barcode scanning adapters. The device will retail for US$650.

It reminds me a lot of the old Casio E-800 Pocket PC that I absolutely loved. It was super durable - not military grade but good enough for most industrial applications. But the internal guts of this unit are very modern and fast!

Working with an iMate Phone

One of my clients had an iMate phone onto which I installed Pocket Pollster. In the early days of the software I would have faced such a situation with great trepidation because there were so many different devices, each with different nuances. But this forced the "smarts" of the installation engine to be tremendously beefed up.

With this unit, the .Net Compact Framework 1.0 had to be installed and then Pocket Pollster. It ran flawlessly the first time!

Compact Framework 2.0 - Moving Ahead

The original version of the Pocket Pollster mobile software was built using Microsoft's "dotNet Compact Framework 1.0" (CF 1.0). This is a comprehensive library that provides functionality to do an assortment of tasks. The great thing about this version was that it could be installed on any Pocket PC dating back to the very first. In fact, I've successfully tested Pocket Pollster on the original HP Jornada - circa the late 1990's. Even with just 16MB of RAM, the software actually works fine on it!

To date, every line of code of the Pocket Pollster software has been created using Visual Studio 2003. A newer version - Visual Studio 2005 - has been available for some time but I stayed with 2003 because it was the last version to support the CF 1.0.

But all things must eventually come to an end. I'm now in the final stages of transitioning from 2003 to 2005. This newer version will only support the CF 2.0. A comprehensive table of information is provided here.

What I plan to do is compile a "final" version of the mobile software for the older devices, which will always be available should a customer happen to have such a device. I'll then be free to proceed forward with a new version of the mobile software, which will have a host of new features that take advantage of the great new offerings bundled in CF 2.0.

Make no mistake that this was a difficult decision to make. But I spoke with a number of industry experts and they pointed out that mobile devices get upgraded even more frequently than PCs. The good thing is that CF 2.0 supports as far back as the Windows Mobile 2003 devices so it's really only the much older ones that won't be able to use the many new features being planned.