an electronic filofax

11 responses to “an electronic filofax”

1. Claire | February 18, 2007 at 23:32 | Reply

   Sounds like a Blackberry could be the thing for you not sure if they do spreadsheets though. A PDA would do spreadsheets – something like Palm.

2. Tim | February 18, 2007 at 23:46 | Reply

   Depends very much what you are trying to achieve with it, but there are a lot of phones which are natively capable of doing this.

   My current Sony K750i can, and there are a huge range of apps that can be added to any Java capable handset Getjar has a list, but I am assuming you would do most of the work on your pc and transfer it via Bluetooth or cable. BTW T-Mobile Web ‘n’ Walk is a good way to reduce the financial pain of mobile email/data charges.

   But if you are really looking for a pocket office then you would have to spend ?100s for a PDA which is still going to be a fiddle to work with. For that kind of money, you could probably acquire a highly capable phone and a cheap laptop to keep in the boot of the car for if you ever do have to do any real typing.

   BTW, the Sony Ericsson K750i is superb, I have a K800i which is the top of the range camera phone and needs to go in for repair – the K750i is a better tool in all sorts of ways, more pocketable and very capable.

3. t-bird | February 19, 2007 at 10:31 | Reply

   Windows PDA or Palm would both do the trick, which you go for very much depends on which one you think looks nicest Both will dock with your PC, both will share files and appointsmens etc (but check with Palms, not sure if they talk to MS stuff or not, never tired!) Pocket Office is basic but will do a simple spreadsheet (won’t do really complicated formulae), Word can do you pretty much most of the stuff you would ever want to create a document, there is a way to write e-mails ready to send as soon as you dock and you can download web pages to browse off line. Not played with Palm yet so I can’t comment on that but they are popular so must be okay!
   Windows PDAs seem to have more handy bits of software and little games etc available.
   Either way you can use a stylus to either “scribble” (write slightly stylised letters which the software converts to proper type) or tap on an on-screen keyboard to “type” which is reasonably quick once you have the hang of it.

   A basic one is well udner ?200 last tiem I looked, cheaper on EBay obviously. Expect them to last 2-3 years before getting weary (Duke is on his second but then he hammers his and they still last 2+ years) If you can get one with blue tooth you could get a blue tooth GPS thingie at a leter date if you flet the need adn it can tell you where to go (in the nicest possible way!)

4. Tim | February 19, 2007 at 12:13 | Reply

   I thought I posted another comment??

5. Helen | February 19, 2007 at 18:14 | Reply

   can’t find it any of the usual spam traps

6. Tim | February 19, 2007 at 20:58 | Reply

   Aha. Was going to say that whatever you choose is some kind of a compromise. For me, I don’t think any PDA would satisfy, so I will settle for an email equipped, web browsing, Java enabled mobile phone, and use a laptop for everything else.

   I understand Palm Tungsten Es are good – and under ?140, that is probably what I would be inclined to try out first off.

7. Chris | February 19, 2007 at 22:34 | Reply

   hmm, so would a notebook – although more extravagant be a better option [would have to upgrade handbag as well!!]

8. Tim | February 20, 2007 at 23:31 | Reply

   YMMV

9. Helen | February 20, 2007 at 23:35 | Reply

   so what does that mean???

10. Chris | February 21, 2007 at 01:17 | Reply

    Your Mileage May Vary

11. Tim | February 21, 2007 at 13:39 | Reply

    Sorry, didn’t mean to be cryptic, I was having commenting problems again.