As mobile computing becomes increasingly prevalent due to advances in virtualization and cloud computing, mobile devices will continue to relegate the desktop workstation computer to a quaint caricature of clunky inefficiency. Formerly thought to be cutting-edge, trendy toys, mobile devices have become developed, practical business tools. The future of computing is handheld.
Consider the cellular phone. Before Apple introduced the iPhone®, Internet enabled cell phones were limited to something called wireless application protocol (WAP). This was a very specific and minimalistic way of delivering web content to a telephone. The iPhone introduced to the realm of mobile devices the full-featured web browsing experience formerly reserved for conventional computers. Today, the Blackberry Storm and other similar devices offer full html browsers with Flash and allow us to seamlessly connect to virtual desktops.
With this technological progress, no longer are we limited to the boundaries of WAP, the limited number of websites that accommodated it, and the devices designed around it. Cell phones have now developed into full-featured mobile devices called “smart phones”, consolidating several separate technologies into one tool. We can check email, browse the web, access business applications, watch streaming video or television, dictate correspondence, download and store music, use moving-map GPS, and make phone calls, too. Almost every technological whim is now being bundled into a small phone. Widely and wildly popular with individual users, smart phones have gained recognition as effective business tools.
Migrating away from the desktop to two-pound laptops to ultra-light notebooks to the latest smart phones while leveraging virtualization and cloud computing technology, businesses now realize in one portable package performance and functionality that equals or exceeds that which was realized from desktop workstations. Untethered from computers the size necessary to carry bulk processing power, sales people, service engineers, and other remote users can access databases, business applications, and perform essential tasks on the fly, on a small phone, with the required processing power being handled elsewhere and delivered via the Internet. These phones can also remotely link to stationary servers and workstation computers back at home or in the office, offering the user operational access those computers as well.
As mobile devices sweep the market, the speed and functionality increases, the size decreases, and broadband communication providers strive to keep up with the ever increasing capabilities these devices offer, your business can benefit now.