A Paper Presentation on

WELCOME TO THE WORLD OF COMPUTING

 ABSTRACT
 INTRODUCTION
 DISTINCTION BETWEEN WIRELESS AND
MOBILE.
 MOBILE DEVICES.
 CHALLENGES IN MOBILE COMPUTING.
 MERITS.
 DEMERITS.
 APPLICATIONS.
 CONCLUSION.
 BIBILOGRAPHY.
 Mobile

Computing has been undergoing a bit of renaissance

lately. A Few years ago it was a simple matter of
finding a data compatible mobile phone, a PC card
modem, and a matching cable and installing it as
modem. then people started to use PDA’s as well. Cell
phones started to come with infrared ports to allow
communication with laptops. Then cell phones started
to come with modems built in. The connecting methods
of mobile computing, its introduction, connection types,
factors affecting connections, mobile applications and
its limitations are explained.
  Wireless networking technology has engendered a
new era of computing, called mobile computing.
mobile computing is an umbrella term used to describe
technologies that enable people to access network
services any please , any time , and any where.
Ubiquitous computing and nomadic computing are
synonymous with
mobile computing. mobile computing helps user’s to
be productive
immediately by reducing the training requirements
associated with
traditional automated data collection methods and
provides a higher
Level of portability than keyboard based systems field
based uses can
access any information available from the system at
any time to make
 critical business decisions this information is available
at the point of
use wherever and whenever they need it.
 Portable devices like laptop and palmtop computers
give mobile users access to diverse sources of global
information any where and at any time.
 One of the most important and highly publicized
recent developments in the PC world has been the
introduction of the pen interface. by using stylus to
replace the keyboard , mobile computers are turning
thousands of computer illiterate people especially
those
 Involved with field based data collection into
computer users. the market potential and breadth of
application requirements for mobile computing has
Prompted Numerous hardware and Software
Companies to focus their efforts in providing solutions
to the vertical form oriented market place .
 The pen interface allows users to interact with the
computer in a very natural familiar way by entering
text, numbers and graphics in “electronic ink “ directly
on the screen the pen interface also provides users
with highly intuitive and efficient applications,
whether tapping graphical icons to navigate through
applications or selecting of options from scrolling lists
and check boxes .
 Mobile computing applications can closely simulate
the original paper one form line providing users with a
familiar look and feel through the use of the latest
PCMCIA technology data storage is large, fast and
 more efficient with minimal power consumption and
the highest level of ruggedness. While
communications via modem Or wireless is also tightly
integrated, fulfilling the requirements of the mobile
user and standardized ports give users across to
printers, barcode readers and various other peripheral
devices.

o DISTINCTION BETWEEN “WIRELESS”

AND “MOBILE

 Wireless refers to the method of transferring

information between computing devices, such as a
personal data assistant (PDA), and a data source, such
as an agency data base server, with out a physical
connection. Not all wireless communication
technologies are mobile. For example, lasers are used
in wireless data transfer between buildings, but can’t
be used in mobile communications at this time.
 Mobile simply describes a computing device that is
not restricted to a desktop. A mobile device may be a
PDA. A smart cell phone or web phone a laptop
computer or any one of the numerous other devices
that allow the user to complete computing tasks
without being tethered, or connected, to a network.
Mobile computing does not necessarily required
wireless communication .in fact it may not require
communication between devices at all.
Here we have seven different types of mobile devices
 Laptop computers.
 PDA’s and, handheld PC’s.
 Pagers.
 Smart phones and cellular phones.
 Task devices, such as bar code readers.
 Bluetooth.
 Bridge.

 Laptops are typically used

and supported in the same
way as desktop PC’s. in fact
many organizations have
replaced desktops with their
portable cousins , as the work
force has grown increasingly mobile.

 PDA’s however, Are the

least planned for and
supported devices. they
are undergoing rapid
evolution and are being
brought into organizations in the same way the earliest
PC’s were .that is adventurous early adopters buy the
devices for their personal use and then ask IT
departments to integrate the devices in to the corporate
 IT environment. at present PDA’s are most often used
for storing and synchronizing personal information
such as addresses, schedules and E-mail .however the
medical industry has developed numerous applications
for PDA’s .at least one web ring( a collection of
websites with a common topic) has been created to
discuss medical software that automates functions
such as patient and diagnostic data entry ,patient
monitoring and diagnosis ,and messaging .in a
hospital setting, these applications may include
wireless communication between staff members
handheld devices and a base station at which patient
information is stored .
 Smart phones that allow users to access phone calls,
two way radio transmissions, paging and data
transmissions on one device are also finding
applications in hospitals and other situations that have
intense and constant need for time sensitive
communications.
 Pagers that support one and two way text messaging
are also used in similar situations .third party vendors
most often provide support for these devices .
 Task devices such as the parcel tracking devices used
by FEDERAL EXPRESS(Fed ex) and the UNITED
PARCEL SERVICE (ups) delivery personal are most
often bought as part of a complete system from a third
party vendor. Because they are frequently mission
critical most corporations support task devices as
rigorously as desktop computers.
  Bluetooth, a short range wireless standard that
specifies radio connections between devices within a
ten meter range of each other. Bluetooth is designed as
a personal area network (PAN or WPAN for
“wireless personal area network”)technology with a
wide variety of
theoretical uses .
  Bridge, a device that connects two local area networks
(LAN’s), or two segments of the same LAN. bridges
simply forward packets from one segment to another
without analyzing or routing messages .

this allows them to connect dissimilar networks (ex :a

bridge can
connect an Ethernet and Token ring network).

 Wireless and mobile environments bring different

challenges to users and service
 Providers when compared to fixed ,wired networks
.physical constraints become much more important,
such as device weight, battery power, screen size,
portability, quality of radio transmission, error rates .
mobility brings additional uncertainties, as well as
opportunities to provide new services and
supplementary information to users in the locations
where they find themselves. the major challenges in
mobile computing are described including ;bandwidth,
high error rate, power restrictions ,security ,limited
capabilities, disconnection and problems due to client
mobility.
 Wireless networks deliver lower bandwidth than wired
networks. as a result, mobile applications have to be
carefully designed to control the bandwidth
consumption.
 Software techniques to improve effective bandwidth
usage include data compression logging requests to
combine multiple short ones , lazy write back,
difference based updates, caching , pre fetching, usage
of proxy, priority scheduling etc.

 The network quality varies as the mobile computer

moves across the heterogeneous network connections .
the wireless environment exhibits higher error rates,
which results in retransmission and affects the quality
of service . by minimizing the usage of wireless
transmission , the data is less exposed to transmission
errors. in addition ,error correction schemes can be
employed to improve performance . however , these
schemes add to the communication overhead and
reduce the usable band width.

 Mobile computers are concerned with the limited

power supply, an issue that does not appear in
distributed wired environment. Hardware
 improvements on batteries can help to lengthen the life
of a charge and reduce the battery weight. In addition
effective software operations can help to lower the
power consumption. examples include: shifting the
processing to a fixed host, aggressively caching and
pre fetching data to reduce disk traffic, and
transmitting less data while receiving more.

 Security and piracy are of specific concerns in

wireless communication because of the ease of
connecting to the wireless link anonymously.
Common problems are impersonation , denial of
service and tapping. The main technique used in
encryption . in personal profiles of users are used to
restrict access to the mobile units.

 Unlike stationary computers mobile computers are

similar in physical size and have smaller storage
capacity. PDA’s like info pad and parc tab are
designed to have extreme portability and provide
ubiquitous information access. However, their
application relies heavily on the interoperability of the
pads and other servers. even ordinary laptops typically
 have less RAM and smaller hard disks than stationary
computers.

 Disconnection and be voluntary or involuntary.

Voluntary disconnection occurs when mobile users
want to disconnect the mobile unit from the network
temporarily, like working on a plane. Involuntary
disconnection is mainly due to network failures.
 The mobile application should not be disrupted under
these circumstances. some applications are designed to
run entirely locally on the mobile unit, but it may not
be feasible for distributed applications where users
have to communicate with one another. Again, pre
fetching and lazy write-back are some useful
techniques that allow to work under disconnection.
 The CMU CODA file system allows shared files to be
modified even during disconnections.
 Upon reconnection, application-specific conflict
resolution schemes are used in the file servers to
reconfile any update conflicts maybe by various
clients. it also uses concurrency control and pre
fetching techniques .however ,this approach is
designed mainly for file systems and does not for all
kinds of applications .

 There are two types of mobility described(a)mobility

of clients and(b)mobility of resources .mobility of
clients raises the issues of unique naming of the clients
 and finding their current locations. unlike stationary
computers ,where information on location is
configured statically mobile computers have to
configure information dynamically mobility of
resources addresses this problem. When a mobile host
moves into a new cell or administrative domain , it has
to discover the resources available there . at the same
time , any server that needs to communicate with the
mobile host has to identify its new location. Location
transparency should be provided to the mobile
applications by the underlying runtime system so that
the users are not aware of the effects of mobility.

The benefits of automating data collection applications

with mobile
computing are the reduction of hard and soft costs,
enhancement of
revenue potential , and a distinct competitive
advantage through:
 Improving the data collection process.
 Improving data accuracy.
 Reducing paper work.
 Facilitating collection of more useful information.
 Eliminating redundant data entry.
 Reducing administrative costs.
 Reducing billing errors.
 Reducing data backlog.
 Improving information flow.
 Allowing faster adaptation to change the business
conditions.
 Increasing responsiveness and customer satisfaction.
 Providing access to unavailable information.

 The demerits of the mobile computing are discussed as

fallows.
 Information access via a mobile device is plagued by
low available band width, poor connection
maintenance, poor and addressing problems. Unlike
their wired counter parts, design of software for
mobile devices must consider resource limitation,
battery power and display size. Consequently, new
hardware and software techniques must be developed.
for example, application need to be highly optimized
for space, in order to fit in the limited memory on the
mobile devices.
 Mobility brings additional uncertainties , as well as
opportunities to provide new services and
supplementary information to users in the location
where they find themselves. in general, most
application software, operating systems, and network
infrastructures are intended for more conventional
environments , and so the mobile, wireless user has
great difficulty exploiting the computational
infrastructure as fully as he or she might . there is an
emerging consensus among researchers that a new
architecture and dynamic infrastructure is an
appropriate way to address this problem .
 Day by day as the standard of the mobile computing is
increasing the boons of mobile computing are
changing to banes. eg : the most deadly terrorist
attack occurred on September 11th , 2001

 New technical and application developments have

established that mobile systems can be a cost
effective, efficient and productive solution in several
different types of application environments . they
are :-a new generation of satellites , especially low
earth orbit systems (LEOS)are under development
with the internet in mind .companies like Teledesic
and Orbcomm are actively promoting internet access .
 Vertical industries where mobile technology has
already been successfully adopted include consumer
 goods. Delivery and root sales , government ,
healthcare , market research , pharmaceuticals ,
transportation and utilities .

Typical applications include inventory, merchandising ,

order entry and sales automation. features found in these
applications usually provide access to stock and pricing
information, monitor promotion , and perform shelf space
analysis including number of facings and product age .
customer detail helps reps to act more as consultants than
order takers .

 With fierce competition and an increasing inventory ,

having timely and accurate information is more
important than ever.

 Applications center around assessments, inspections,

and work orders. Most of these applications involve
auditing some sort of facility or process(food service,
restaurant, nursing home, child care, schools,
commercials and residential buildings).
 The focus in this industry has been on automating
patient records, medication, dispension, and sample
collection. A common goal is to leverage mobile
computing in the implementation of positive patient
identification.

 Automating the survey the process has enabled these

companies to get their data more accurately and
quickly while being able to customize their queries at
will.

 In addition to the reps need to perform account

management and cell reporting functions ,the FDA’s
requirements for physician signatures for all drug
samples dispensed was an ordered complication that
was eliminated through the use of mobile technology.
 Transforming freight damage inspection from paper
to mobile computing greatly expedites the process and
reduces cost by providing online pre-shipment
inspections. This technology also offers a more
efficient means of storing and transmitting
maintenance inspection reports . in conjunction with
GPS(global positioning systems),
 Mobile computing allows companies to provide better
customer service by being continuously aware of
exactly where any given shipment is when in transit .

 Eliminating the rekeying of data and providing a

means to perform on site analysis are instrumental to
an industry that is required to perform inspection on
routine basis.

 There’s more happening than many people suspect.

the difficulty , though is to provide the right network ,
the right device , the right price and the right
applications. Wireless is not wired, and there are
numerous advantages and disadvantages. The wireless
industry “mindset” is different from the computer
communities. these different philosophies produce
what we call a “wireless-web culture clash”. Also
much of the information we obtain via the internet
isn’t worth paying for in a mobile environment. the
internet will change is already changing the way
 mobile companies and computer companies offer
products and services, and deal with customers.
Indeed, many wireless subscribers will demand these
changes, ranging from online customer service to
electronic bill paying to creating profiles that
automatically transmit personalized information via
the internet to wireless devices. We are in a period of
tremendous change. It’s mobile computing jungle
where old technologies must evolve to survive and
where proponents of new technologies are jockeying
for dominance. it’s a dangerous and exciting time
where existing business models can crumble and more
nimble , innovative companies can usurp established
institutions.
 Uncovering these developments, analyzing there
impact and recommending solutions to corporations is
what wireless internet and mobile computing
consulting is all about.

 Mobile computing is rapidly becoming popular, and

user demand for useful wireless applications is
increasing.
 Additionally, this paper shows how these behavioral
extensions serve as a powerful abstraction for practical
systems.
 In this paper, we have looked at issues related to
portable devices, merits, demerits and applications in
mobile environment.
 Because of these banes of mobile computing the
security level should be improved.
 Terry Watson:- application design for wireless
computing.
 Application design for wireless computing;
M –mail a
case study of dynamic application portioning
in mobile computing.

Christine julien and gruia – catalin roman : active co-

ordination in adhoc networks.

 Raymond j.Brunsting:- quality of service issues in

wireless networks.