Nov 19th, 2009 |
Ahh, mobile devices for enterprise applications. I came in a little late on this one, but got here in time to hear Craig Mathias say that the iPhone isn’t going away as a platform. Since I like my iPhone a lot, I’m hooked. This is already a great session.
We hear about different operating systems (including a pitch for us to try Ubuntu — I’ve got to load that onto one of my spare laptops when I get back home), and different hardware platforms. He then goes on to say that one of the models we’ve been using for mobile computing — the “take it all with you” model — is inherently broken. We’ll be hearing about alternatives for the rest of the session.
OK, this is interesting — we’re hearing about LodgeNet (those good folks who bring you TV and Internet in lots of hotels), and the possibility of linking a handset into the network for controlling all the various functions of my hotel stay. Why can’t I, for example, use my handset to control the room temperature, check in and check out, make purchases at the hotel, and get me into my room? With proper authentication (and perhaps a good USB key containing data), I should be able to use that nice, large monitor in the room as my window on the Internet. The point is, with my handset and the right infrastructure at the hotel, I really shouldn’t need to carry a laptop computer. Hmmm.
Now, Craig is looking at another mobile option, the Novatel MiFi that we heard David Pogue talk about yesterday. It’s a product we’re hearing more people talk about, so it is going to bear some more watching in the future…(on a personal note, I’d love for AT&T to get one of these, hint, hint…)
Now we’re touching on mobile device management, a field that’s going to be a much bigger issue as companies put more applications and services on mobile devices. Craig’s major question is how mobile management tools work with devices that are owned by the employee. He sees this as a larger issue as more companies allow employees to use their own devices as corporate tools. Again, this ties into one of the things we heard about in yesterday’s keynote address, when Mark Templeton spoke about the consumerization of enterprise IT.
The ultimate limitation on handsets, Craig says, is batteries. He;s not a fan of fuel cells (actually, he’s not a fan of gaseous hydrogen as an energy storage medium), but thinks that better batteries and super-capacitors will help.
The final area here is “Openness 2.0″ which will include, he thinks, net neutrality and open access. He thinks that traffic prioritization will be allowed, rather than pure network throttling, I agree that it’s going to be very interesting if we’re able to take any phone onto any carrier’s network.
The wrap-up is that mobile life, rather than mobile work will be the future. We’ll ultimately, though, be doing it in a device-independent way. So far, carriers and vendors have tried to use mobile devices to constrain consumers, but the end-game is using them to enable users rather than limiting them. He points out that the sociological implications haven’t been fully explored (and he’s right, though I’ve seen some good work from a uses & gratifications viewpoint) and that there is good work to be done here.
This was a high-level session, but that’s good — you don’t need everything to be on the level of the very technical sessions I sat in on yesterday. That’s one of the great things about Interop — there are sessions aimed at all kinds of IT pros, from implementers to managers. Now, on to the next session,..
