pcworld.com
Handhelds Tell You Where to Go
AvantGo-MapBlast team crams huge databases onto palm-size systems.
by Mike Hogan, special to PCWorld
July 6, 1999, 6:40 p.m. PT
The digital equivalent of refolding a paper map may be the dream of cramming a CD-ROM full of geographical data onto a handheld PC. A convenient resource, yes. But feasible?
AvantGo.com and MapBlast have become partners to find a way. Vicinity's MapBlast site will become one of AvantGo's more than 1000 channels for free driving directions and full-color maps to be downloaded on Microsoft Windows CE-based handheld PCs, the family of Palm OS connected organizers, and smart phones.
As always, you can download interactive maps and driving directions from the MapBlast site to your desktop PC, and then synchronize it to your handheld with your desktop. But this pairing of technology will let you do this from any PC, anywhere you can establish an Internet connection.
To access Web-based directions from your handheld system, simply enter starting and destination addresses in the MapBlast application, then go online. MapBlast will return driving directions for your queries and store them in the AvantGo cache on the handheld. The text directions will contain hyperlinks to HTML graphics that you can call with a click.
This two-step process conserves the limited resources of the handheld for this memory- and graphics-intensive application, says Stuart Read, AvantGo's vice president of marketing. MapBlast can fit this application onto a handheld because it downloads only the answer to your query. All the searching and parsing information is done on the Web server.
A Larger Vision: Intranets
Although the mapping application is an excellent example of how the Internet's power and flexibility opens new resources, it's just the groundwork for a larger vision shared by AvantGo and Vicinity, Read says. Before 1995 the only way to leverage computing resources among a workgroup was on client/server architecture over a rather limited distance. The Net takes that paradigm further, and frees participants from the physical constraints of strung cable. An intranet, a Web-based private network, is cheaper than old style multiuser computing.
AvantGo and its information partners are offering 1000 channels partly to demonstrate their capabilities. They hope companies will hire AvantGo to host their business applications on its server. Each channel can be a private intranet between a company and the handheld systems of traveling workgroup members. They'll share information such as customer databases, price lists, inventory levels, or messages.
"We want to be the intermediary technology sitting between these limited devices--limited in terms of memory, screen size, processing power--and that huge amount of information out there," Read says. The various information channels AvantGo now markets will get people to "think about handhelds as something more than just a calendar and address book," he adds.
Custom Channels
Until last May, AvantGo's channels updated information on the handheld in its cradle during desktop synchronization. Now, AvantGo.com is one of the first Web sites to offer similar handheld synchronization via the Internet. AvantGo.com acts as the server in one, large client/server network. Or it can be considered a Net channel provider the way that cable companies and Baby Bells provide communication channels.
Similarly, MapBlast is a free service from Vicinity, which provides business customers (among them, FedEx, Ford, and Hewlett-Packard) a suite of private-label and co-branded content and services for their customers. Besides providing mapping, Vicinity's services include a business finder, the wireless locator Service, and a comprehensive business directory.
When you download data to a desktop, MapBlast also gives you extensive information on services and products near your travel route including lodging information with reservation capabilities, local weather and traffic reports, and points of interest. You can use MapBlast's MapSave utility to store as many as 10 maps.
AvantGo has signed up more than 300,000 customers using handhelds so far, but is a leading contender in this trend.
The current installed universe of handhelds numbers about 5 million, according to market researcher International Data Corporation. Of those, around 40,000 are wireless, Read says. IDG expects the handheld population to grow to around 25 million by 2002. |
