Smartphones are computers. There, I feel better having said that, and in a public forum, too. While some will disagree with that statement, the smartphone of today easily qualifies as a computer. The real question to ask: Is the smartphone a good enough computer on which to get work done? The folks at InfoWorld recently wondered that and one intrepid writer spent a whole month working with just an iPhone. Not one of those fancy new iPhone 3G S models either, he used a lowly (and now outdated) iPhone 3G.
Overall the iPhone 3G seemed to make for a pretty decent laptop replacement for the experiment:
The iPhone comes very close to being a laptop replacement for many basic business and field-service uses. Its file-handling limitations and lack of support for enterprise mail servers other than Exchange are the biggest reasons it can’t really replace a laptop. Some silly flaws like the calendar integration issues also get in the way.
I wonder how many times the author found himself close to tears trying to do something on the iPhone using that little onscreen keyboard? I think this was a good experiment; it brings to mind Kevin’s experiment to live solely in the cloud. Maybe we should talk Kevin into using just his Palm Pre for a month? Heck, his last experiment was 60 days, this should be a piece of cake. The Pre has a real keyboard, too, not one of those hinky virtual things.
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