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As in the desktop versions of Windows, in Pocket PC you launch applications from the Start menu. Tapping the Start menu at any time will open the list. Note that when an application is launched, the Start menu is replaced by the name of the program that you are currently running, but tapping on the program name will always cause the Start menu to appear. All PDAs except for the H1910 come loaded with Pocket PC Premium. The H1910 has Pocket PC Professional, which doesn’t come with some of the embedded software such as Terminal Server. Software that isn’t included on the H1910 will be pointed out in the various sections.
The top bar of the menu the icons shows up to six of the last applications that you ran. Tapping any of these icons will relaunch that program. Note that this only works for programs, not for shortcuts or documents. Below that bar are the most commonly used programs that you can launch. This list can be customized (discussed in the “Customizing the Start and New Menus” section later), but initially provides links to the Today page, ActiveSync, Pocket Outlook applications, Pocket Internet Explorer, and the Pocket PC Media Player.
The Start menu is the primary launching point for applications on the Pocket PC. The next section of the Start menu contains two shortcuts: Programs and Settings. Programs will take you to the folder where shortcuts to all programs loaded on the Pocket PC should be stored. This folder contains the full set of applications installed on your PDA, not just those featured in the short list above it.
The final section contains a Find tool to search for any data contained in your PDA. It also has the Help utility. The Help utility is context sensitive. If you are in PocketWord and you tap the Start menu, and then tap Help, you will receive Help for the section ofWord that you are in. This aspect of Help makes it particularly handy while you’re getting to know the Pocket PC applications.

From the time your PDA is first turned on until you complete this task, your Today page (which is the page that will appear first) has a line reading, “Tap here to set owner information.” Tapping this line will open up the Owner Information dialog box.
This is very important to set up to ensure that someone finding your PDA can return it to you. On this screen you will enter your name, company, address, telephone number, and e-mail address. You can also set an option that causes your information to be displayed every time the device is turned on. That way anyone turning it on will immediately know it’s yours. The option to show your owner information on startup is very important if you decide to set a power-on password for your device because it is the only way someone finding your device will know it’s yours.

When you power up your iPAQ for the first time, the iPAQ will initialize and ask you to run through some initial calibrations. To configure the touch screen, you must tap on the screen in the various positions indicated. If you ever find that the places you tap on the screen register inaccurately, you can rerun this setup from the Settings area. If you have an older iPAQ (37xx series and earlier), when the device is shipped, the master power switch is turned off. To turn it on, you must open the hard reset port on the bottom of the iPAQ. Use the tip of the stylus to slide the cover to the left. Underneath the cover, you slide the switch to the left to turn on the power. Be sure to slide the switch cover back after turning on the power, to prevent it being accidentally switched off.
The initial setup will also get you to select your time zone. Once you have worked through
these initial screens, your iPAQ is ready to use.

Most Pocket PC PDA models feature similar external hardware configurations with the exception of the
SD slots on the newer series, the fingerprint scanner on the 54xx series, and small variations in button size and location.
The front of the iPAQ contains most of the items that you will use as
you work with the iPAQ. From left to right, top to bottom, the features are

• Microphone The built-in microphone is useful for voice dictation and voice control software. On the 5400 series iPAQs the microphone is on the bottom left. On the H1910 it is on the very top of the unit.
• Light sensor This sensor will automatically adjust the side lighting based upon the light in the room.
• Power indicator/Charging/Alert light This light glows solid amber if your iPAQ is connected to AC power and fully charged. It is off if your iPAQ is running on battery power, flashes amber if your iPAQ is charging, and flashes green if you have an alert or reminder. On the 5400 series iPAQ it is on the left and is one of three indicator lights. The other two lights are for 802.11b wireless connection and Bluetooth connection. On the H1910 a single indicator light in the top middle is also the power button.
• Speaker Built-in speaker for any sound coming out of your iPAQ. On models prior to the 38xx series iPAQs, the speaker was hidden inside the Navigation Disc (see later in list).
• Power button This button turns your iPAQ on and off. It also turns the side light off and on when held down for one second.
• Screen This is a 320×240-pixel touch-sensitive screen.
• Button One (Calendar button) This programmable button is by default set to open the Calendar, but can be modified to perform a number of functions.
• Button Two (Contacts button) This programmable button is by default set to open Contacts.
• Button Three (Inbox button) This programmable button is by default set to open the Inbox on all iPAQs since the 37xx series. On 36xx series or older iPAQs it opens the Quick Menu application.
• Button Four (iTask button) This programmable button is by default set to open the iPAQ iTask program, which is used to switch between running applications or to shut down open applications. On older iPAQ models, this button opened the Compaq task switcher. On the H1910, this button will return you to the Today screen.
• Navigation Disc A multiposition disc for navigating through applications and data. This disc’s size and shape vary by model of iPAQ.
• Biometric Fingerprint Reader This is on the 54xx series iPAQs only and compares the fingerprint of the device user against a stored fingerprint to authenticate the user. If the fingerprints do not match, the device will not allow access.

Looking down on the top of the iPAQ, note three controls (from left to right):

• Headphone jack Use this jack to plug in stereo headphones and listen to any of the sounds the iPAQ produces (incidentally, it makes a good MP3 player).
• Top microphone hole This is a small hole that is linked to the internal microphone like the hole on the front of the iPAQ. It lets you record a sound by pointing your iPAQ at the sound source (on the 54xx series, this hole is on the bottom).
• Secure Digital slot On the 38xx, 39xx, 19xx, and 54xx series iPAQ this slot allows you to insert Secure Digital (SD) memory cards, or SD-based devices such as a digital camera (except on the H1910, which does not support the SDIO—Secure Digital Input/Output—standard, so the slot can only be used for memory).
• Infrared port This port is used for sending and receiving information from other infrared devices. On the H1910, this port is on the left side of the iPAQ. More information on this is in the “Beaming Data for Easy Transfer” section later in this chapter.
• Stylus The stylus is conveniently stored inside the body of the iPAQ.

Press the silverbutton to pop the stylus out of its slot if you have a 37xx series of iPAQ or earlier. If you have a 38xx series iPAQ or later, the stylus is released by pushing it down so it pops out. To slide the H1910 stylus out of its slot, slide your finger or thumb along the back-right corner in an upward motion.
On the bottom of the iPAQ you will find four items (from left to right):

• Adapter jack Use this jack to plug in an external charger. This jack doesn’t exist on the 38xx, 39xx, or H1910 iPAQs, as they must be charged through the Sync port.
• Hard reset switch (36xx and 37xx series iPAQs only) Use this switch for hard resetting the device (this will wipe out the memory of the device). Hard resetting is not something you want to do by accident, so the switch to cut and restore power is covered by a sliding door.
• Sync port This port is used for plugging in an external sync cable. On most models of iPAQ this port can also be used to charge the iPAQ.
• Expansion port This port is the long port close to the back of the device. It is used to attach the iPAQ to its expansion sleeves. The H1910 does not have this port, as it does not support expansion sleeves.
• Soft reset switch Use this switch for soft resetting the system (no data is lost). This is like rebooting your computer. The switch is recessed and must be pressed with the tip of your stylus or other pointed object.

On the left side of the iPAQ you will find a single button. This button is intended for voice memos. When you press and hold it, you can record a voice memo that will be stored in the Notes area. Each press and hold will be stored as an audio file with the name “Recording X,” where the X is the next sequential number that doesn’t already exist in the directory. Note that on the H5450, this button can also be used to turn the volume up or down on playback of an audio file.
Finally, if you have a 54xx series iPAQ or an H1910, you have the option of removing your battery and replacing it with a spare. This is great if you are a heavy user and find you run through your battery quickly. A release button is on the back middle of the 54xx series units and on the right side (below the stylus) on the H1910.
Do not leave the battery out for long. Although these iPAQs contain a “backup battery” internally, it is only good for a few minutes, so switch your batteries quickly to prevent losing your valuable data and having to reinstall your programs!

Different versions of the PDA come packaged differently; however, what is packed inside the box varies only slightly from model to model. Your PDA should come with the following:

• Your PDA (of course!).
• A case. Depending on which model of PDA you have, you may or may not have receiveda case. The H1910 doesn’t ship with a case, but a case is a must-have accessory to help protect your PDA from damage. The 38xx, 39xx, and 54xx PDA ship with a very practical plastic flip-top case, which is what we use on a day-to-day basis. The older models of PDAs come with a case that is sufficient for protecting the “naked” PDA (without any expansion sleeves—slide-on accessories used to provide hardware expansion capability on your PDA), but is really inadequate for day-to-day use. Many third-party cases are worth considering for protection as well as style, but discussing all the case manufacturers is beyond the scope of this book. A full review of cases and case manufacturers can be found at www.PocketPCTools.com.
• A cradle (or sync cable if you purchased the H1910 or H3135 PDA).
• An AC adapter for charging your PDA.
• PDA companion CD-ROM.
• Spare stylus. (Not all models ship with a spare stylus.)

Some PDAs, at various times, shipped with either CompactFlash (CF) expansion sleeves or PCMCIA expansion sleeves. When you first pull the PDA out of the box, a thin film covers the screen. This is to protect the screen during shipping, and you should peel this off before using your PDA. Some third-party manufacturers produce similar plastic adhesive overlays that you can place on your screen to protect it during use. Many users swear by these. The ones most commonly recommended are WriteShields from www.PocketPCTechs.com. Make sure ActiveSync is fully installed before plugging your sync cable or cradle into your USB port. Setup of ActiveSync is covered later in this chapter.

Making the best use of your iPAQ also means that you need to keep it with you as you live your mobile life. The iPAQ, although small and lightweight, isn’t quite small enough to slip into your shirt pocket or the back pocket of your pants like a wallet (with the exception of the H1910, which will fit nicely into a shirt pocket), especially if you are using an expansion sleeve and a wireless card.
As future versions of the product are released, we will likely see the two form factors exhibited in the current lines continue. The integrated WiFi and Bluetooth also remove the need for bulky expansion sleeves to enable wireless communication. Hopefully, the form factor will continue to get smaller, and the overall weight lighter. Right now the best method is to carry it in a briefcase or purse when you move around. But what about those times when you don’t want to carry your briefcase or purse?
Your iPAQ doesn’t weigh any more than a conventional portable CD player and is as easy to carry with you. In fact, you will probably find your iPAQ works as well or better than your CD player while you run, work out, or perform any such activities. What’s more, with MP3, you will never again experience that annoying skipping that even the very best “skip-free” CD players are prone to.
For casual walking around, cargo pants with the side pockets can be very useful places for storing your iPAQ. For more of a business casual appearance, Dockers has released a line of casual pants called “Mobile Pants,” which contain a special pocket for holding your iPAQ. This idea is a good one; unfortunately, Dockers’ execution wasn’t great. The pocket (specifically identified in advertising as being good for an iPAQ) is too small. It is possible to squeeze in the iPAQ with no expansion sleeves or accessories, and the H1910 fits, but the fit is extremely tight. Unless you are standing at just the right angle, the bulge of the iPAQ is still obvious, and don’t you dare sit down! Dockers has the right idea; hopefully other clothing manufacturers will actually try putting an iPAQ into the pocket and using it before they tout their clothing as “mobile” wear! One popular method for carrying the iPAQ is to get a third-party case with a belt clip. The cases that came with the older iPAQs were generally of poor quality, didn’t fit the expansion pack, and did not feature a belt clip. As a result, they are mostly unusable. The current iPAQ lines don’t even have cases included. If you want a case, you will need to search through third-party offerings. On the www.pocketpctools.com web site we review many of the cases available from third-party manufacturers and give you the pros and cons of each one. There are other carrying methods as well, such as the secret agent–style under-the-jacket holster, or the multipocketed vest. One of the vests specifically targeted to the PDA owner is the SCOTT eVest (www.scottevest.com). It is a lightweight water-repellent vest that looks like a safari vest. It is loaded with pockets for all your wireless toys and has a unique feature:
Velcro-enclosed conduits to hold all the wires that connect your devices together and to keep the cords tucked safely away. They call this a personal area network (PAN). The vest isn’t something that you could wear to a business function, and for personal recreational wear, the $160 price tag is rather steep. For those of you who like leather, they have also introduced a leather jacket with the same integrated pockets and personal area network features.

Here are some suggestions to help you integrate your hand-held device into your life:

• Pick one point in the day, usually at the very beginning or very end of the day, where you will enter any business cards that you have picked up into your Outlook Contacts folder. This will keep your Pocket PC business contacts completely up to date. Then you can discard the business cards, or, if you feel compelled to keep them, you can place them in a binder to be kept in your office.
• Whenever someone gives you personal contact information such as a phone number, resist the urge to scribble it on a piece of paper and stuff it in your pocket or briefcase. We all have drawers of unidentifiable scribbled phone numbers that are of little use. These scraps of paper also don’t tend to be in your hand when you need to call that person back. Instead, take the extra 45 seconds to put that person’s information into your Pocket PC. Now it is permanently preserved and will be available to you anytime you need it.
• When you book an appointment or plan an event, even in the distant future, always immediately enter the event into your hand-held calendar. If you are consistent with this behavior, you will learn to trust the calendar in your Pocket PC. If you aren’t consistent, you will find yourself missing appointments or double booking as you try to organize yourself with both a paper system (or worse, your memory) and a Pocket PC.
• If you use your Pocket PC for expense management, use the same diligent technique of once a day entering all your receipts or financial information into your system.
• Whenever you think of something that you need to do, personal or professional, instead of “making a mental note,” put it into your task list. You can categorize it, prioritize it, and assign a date to it.
• Every morning when you get up, look at your calendar and to-do list. If something that you know is happening that day isn’t in your calendar, enter it. If there is something you need to get done that day, put it on your task list. Not only does this help to keep track of your tasks and appointments, it helps you to feel that you’ve accomplished something when you look back on your day. Instead of that “where did the day go, and did I actually get anything done?” feeling that sometimes comes at the end of the day, you will be able to look at your list and see at a glance all the activities and tasks that you knocked off.
• When a special event such as a birthday or anniversary occurs, record it in your calendar as a recurring event. That way your Pocket PC will become a true personal assistant by reminding you to make a dinner appointment or pick up a gift well in advance of the date!
• Try to find things that you are already doing that you might be able to do better with the Pocket PC. For example, I work out at the gym regularly and am an avid runner. I use software to help me track my workouts and fitness goals from www.MySportTraining .com. If you are watching what you eat, check out www.PocketDietTracker.com. If you are an avid wine connoisseur, you can load databases of different wines, and so on. The amount of software now available for the iPAQ is impressive.

The Pocket PC can be expanded through one of four standards (or any combination) depending on your hardware options. The most common expansion technique is through CompactFlash (CF) cards and Secure Digital (SD) cards. The SD card, the size of a postage stamp, is the smaller of the two. The CF card is slightly larger, but boasts a very impressive range of accessories in its format, including digital cameras, miniature hard drives, GPS units, and much more. All of the current lines of iPAQs contain built-in SD expansion slots, although the older 31xx, 36xx, and 37xx series units have no SD support whatsoever. The iPAQ handhelds use an expansion sleeve (a hardware add-on that allows for expansion of the iPAQ platform) to support CompactFlash (with the exception of the H1910, which doesn’t support any expansion sleeves).
Another option for expanding your Pocket PC is through PCMCIA. This is the PC card
standard that has been used in laptop computers for many years. This means that if you have a PCMCIA slot or expansion sleeve on your Pocket PC device, you can use almost any card that your notebook computer uses. You can share your modems, network cards, wireless accessories, VGA display adaptors, and a plethora of other tools.
The third option is available integrated within the higher-end iPAQs such as the 3870/75, 3970/75, and H5450. These units have built-in support for the new Bluetooth standard. Bluetooth is a short-range, low-power, wireless networking and connectivity protocol that allows your iPAQ to communicate with any other Bluetooth-enabled device. For example, if you have a Bluetooth-compatible phone, your iPAQ could (with add-on dialer software) automatically look up and dial numbers of contacts in your address book on your cellular phone. This feature also allows you to synchronize your iPAQ without having to plug it into a sync cable (as long as the host PC is Bluetooth enabled). The use of Bluetooth is spreading rapidly, which will result in many other ways for you to use your iPAQ without wires, such as navigating with a Bluetooth GPS, printing to any printer, surfing the Internet from a public Bluetooth node, sharing notes or Microsoft PowerPoint presentations with other Bluetooth iPAQs and devices, and much more. If you have an iPAQ that doesn’t feature built-in Bluetooth support, you can add it through the CF or SD slots (except on the H1910 model, which only supports storage of data though its SD slot). The combination of CompactFlash, PCMCIA, Secure Digital, and Bluetooth means that you will have a tremendous range of expansion and connectivity options on your iPAQ. When comparing this with the Palm, we see that early versions of the Palm device had little expandability, but third-party licensees of the Palm technology, such as Handspring and Symbol, added to the expandability of the hardware. Handspring was one of the first to introduce hardware expansion through their proprietary Springboard module. You could plug in third-party modems, pagers, GPS units, and more. Later versions of the Palm have adopted the Secure Digital format to allow for expandability. The SD format is growing, but still has limited support for more than file storage and Bluetooth connectivity at present, in contrast to the widely supported CompactFlash format.

Consider two categories when looking at applications: those that come with the operating system and those that are provided by third parties. A number of applications come bundled with your iPAQ, including contact management, e-mail, notes, to-do lists, and calendaring software. Whether you prefer these built-in applications or third-party products will usually depend on what you used before you turned to your hand-held device. Users of Microsoft Outlook will likely appreciate the similarity between the Pocket Outlook features and those on their desktop. Pocket PC also comes standard with many other applications, including Pocket Excel, Pocket Word, and Pocket Internet Explorer. Each of the applications that come with Pocket PC will be addressed in detail in subsequent chapters. At a minimum, these applications allow easy access to your existing files, or to file attachments that arrive in your e-mail Inbox. The current version of Pocket PC does not include Pocket Money preinstalled like it was on the first versions of the Pocket PC operating system. Pocket Money can be downloaded for free at the Microsoft web site:
www.microsoft.com/MOBILE/pocketpc/downloads/money.asp. The Palm comes with basic contact management, calendaring, e-mail, and to-do list software as well. In addition, you can purchase third-party applications separately for the Palm that will allow you to do some rudimentary work with Microsoft Word documents and Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, but these come at an additional cost and with limited functionality. Where the Palm really shines is in the variety of software designed for it; more than 10,000 third-party applications are currently available for the Palm. In contrast, fewer than half that many applications are currently available for the Pocket PC platform. The large number of Palm applications is a direct result of Palm’s early ability to grab market share and Windows CE’s previous inability to achieve significant market share. This ratio is coming down dramatically as consumers and businesses are buying more and more Pocket PCs. The quantity of third-party applications available for the Pocket PC platform is growing so quickly that it is getting very difficult to keep track of them all, and by some estimates, it now actually exceeds the number of Palm apps that are available. In other chapters of this book and on the www.PocketPCTools.com web site we will examine some of the best third-party applications that you can take advantage of to extend your iPAQ’s functionality.
Another element to consider is that some companies are currently working on Palm emulators for the Pocket PC that will allow you to run any Palm application on your Pocket PC device.
Although there will likely be little need to run Palm applications on a Pocket PC, and the legality of doing so is certainly questionable, should you locate a particular Palm app that you must have, with an emulator, you will be able to run it directly on your Pocket PC. A few companies have been working on emulators, but to date, no commercial emulator has ever been produced. With the increasing amount of Pocket PC-based software, we believe that a Palm emulator is becoming less and less valuable.

The ability for the processor to work on more than one task at a time is an important feature of the Pocket PC environment. For many day-to-day activities, this can be a mixed blessing. On your iPAQ, every time you launch a new application, the other application keeps running in the background, just as on your Windows desktop. However, because you don’t see the other applications, this can get a little confusing. Suddenly, you have several applications open and running at the same time. With a little practice, this isn’t hard to manage. The Palm OS, on the other hand, does not support multitasking, which means that every time you start a new application, that action effectively closes the previous application. This is a simple, tidy way to work and is very effective on a hand-held device, but can be limiting in more complex work environments. Multitasking can become an extremely valuable feature as you learn to expand your PDA experience beyond the basic built-in applications. For example, with multitasking, you can connect to your wireless provider and download your e-mail in the background while surfing the Web and pasting information from a web site into your Pocket Word document. This complex activity isn’t possible on the majority of the Palms currently in circulation. Palm’s latest OS5 release is technically multitasking, but they licensed the technology from a third party and are expressly forbidden as part of the agreement from exposing the multitasking capabilities to developers. This limits the ability to do multitasking on even the newest Palm platform.