Shipments of Windows Mobile PDAs grew 64 percent in the first quarter of 2007, and this strong growth helped propel worldwide PDA shipments to 5.1 million units, a 39.7 percent increase from the first quarter of 2006, according to recently released report by Gartner, Inc.

It seems as though Microsoft is really doing well in the PDA / smartphone industry, and it’s definitely helped by the support of manufacturers like HTC, although it looks as though things may change.

Windows Mobile will certainly be an important part of the mobile computing landscape, but at the moment it appears it may not be as dominant as Microsoft wants it to be.

The page starts with:

Can you code? Enter and win!

Palm is inviting programmers to develop applications for the Treo™ Windows Mobile® Challenge Contest — entrants can either develop a brand new application or port an existing application to the Treo Windows Mobile platform.

Entries Will be Judged on

• Concept originality
• General usability of the application
• Specific utility to mobile phone users
• Reliability and compatibility
• “Wow” factor of graphical look and feel

Entrants must be part of the Palm Developer Network to register their competition entries.

Via Brighthand.

Jason Langridge (MR Mobile) on MSDN Blogs has posted a PDF document comparing Windows Mobile 5 and 6 with simple checklists. Exchange 2007 is required for quite a few of the new features. This news comes via msmobiles.com.

It’s not quite ready for the UK yet, but with support for the US, Canada, France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain, Google Maps on your Windows Mobile (2003 and up) device* might be all you need for a quick visit to any of these countries.

According to NaviGadget, Google Maps Mobile supports GPS data, and provides loads of information — including real-time traffic, directions, and local search results. NaviGadget is very positive on this Google utility, and rightly so, but it is worthwhile remembering that its user-friendliness will be limited to your device’s interface, screen size and hardware setup.

TotalPDA does not vouch for this software in any way.

*Requires an Internet-enabled phone and a data plan from your network carrier — therefore, charges may apply.

continue reading "Google Maps on your handheld"

As the use of handheld computers and smartphones moves toward ubiquity, it’s natural that vulnerabilities and exploits will become more commonplace. Here are the two latest warnings:

In the Pictures and Videos application that ships with all Windows Mobile 2003/2003 SE and 5.0 (Pocket PC and smartphone editions), if you open a malformed .JPG file, it can hang for 10-15 minutes, and this opens a vulnerability to a denial of service attack. There is also a fault in the default version of Internet Explorer on these Windows devices, too (why am I not surprised). The mobile device will shut down IE and become unstable if exploited, and the only thing users can do is reset their device to keep using IE.

The advice from Trend Micro (with respect to the second threat) is to avoid visiting untrusted sites on your Windows Mobile handheld.

There have been relatively few applications written for Windows Mobile (Pocket PC or 5.0) smartphones, especially when compared with the well-established Palm OS. StyleTap could change all that. Their application claims to run Palm OS third-party applications on your Windows Mobile device. All you have to do is download their application (a 14-day free trial or buy it for US$49.95), install it on your phone, load your chosen Palm application (they have a page listing all compatible applications), and, in theory, you should be good to go.

The catch is StyleTap is still pretty new, and an official release is still in the future. It sure sounds like a useful utility, though. If anyone has installed it and is now running Palm apps on their WM phone, let me know what your experience has been so far.

TotalPDA does not vouch for this software in any way.