August 16, 1999 Web posted at: 11:08 a.m. EDT (1508 GMT) by John Cox

From...

(IDG) -- A handheld computer pioneer now hopes to blaze a direct trail between these devices and existing corporate applications and databases.

Psion Enterprise Computing, a unit of Britain's Psion PLC, this fall plans to release the netBook handheld PC, running the Epoc operating system. The netBook will look a lot like computers running Microsoft's Windows CE: It will have a color backlit screen and an 84-character keyboard, and will weigh just under three pounds.

But what's not obvious may be what's most significant. Inside, the netBook will have software to run Java applications as well as some new code from IBM to connect directly with enterprise applications via IBM's MQSeries messaging software. MQSeries is widely used to let applications reliably and accurately exchange information over corporate nets.

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By contrast, Windows CE devices generally link to personal information management applications running on Windows PCs. Microsoft does offer a connection to its Exchange Server for e-mail and some scheduling functions. There are similar third-party products and some others that can copy data between the handhelds and server databases. But creating direct data exchange with existing server-based applications is difficult.

The netBook will be the first device to run a microversion of MQSeries, called MQSeries Everywhere. This software, comprised of no more than 50K bytes of code, will let applications on the netBook connect to an MQSeries server software running on a Windows NT computer. So data captured on the netBook can be exchanged, via the MQSeries server, with an array of server applications that also use the MQSeries APIs, such as billing, credit check, inventory, accounting, scheduling and shipping.

With the Java Runtime Environment, a Java Virtual Machine and some Java classes, netBook can tap into software being written by nearly two million Java developers worldwide.

Psion developed the 32-bit Epoc software and a line of successful handhelds years ago, marketing mainly in Europe. A few years ago, Psion spun Epoc off as a separate company, Symbian, which also is funded by Ericsson, Matsushita, and Nokia.

Psion had not returned calls requesting an interview by press time.

"The netBook basically provides the same types of features [as the Windows CE machines]," says Frank Maddlone, an independent consultant who specializes in mobile technology. "The main difference is the way in which Epoc provides those basic functions - more intuitively, with fewer stumbling blocks and procedural issues to contend with," he says.

But Psion needs to make sure the netBook can tie in more smoothly to the Web and to e-mail, a weakness in its current products, Maddlone says.

"Windows CE machines gain much of their function through their connection to a Windows PC," says Mark Paulhus, a quality assurance technician with an air conditioning manufacturer. "Psion products can stand alone. That is the most important difference for me." The MQSeries Everywhere software will exploit this capability and connect the netBook directly to enterprise servers.