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November 16, 1998

Professional Edition Improves E-Mail, Browser

By Andy Feibus

he Handheld PC Professional Edition 3.0 version of Windows CE is really a combination of the CE 2.11 core system, Office 3.0 applications, and Windows CE Services 2.2. All three are required to get the Professional Edition software and synchronization features. The CE core, Office, and Pocket Outlook applications reside in ROM on the CE device, while CE Services 2.2 runs on your desktop system.

The key changes for this release are the inclusion of Pocket Access and the significant changes to the Inbox and Internet Explorer programs. Pocket Access is a very simplistic database tool that partially synchronizes with your desktop and company databases. Only a database's tables and their fields and indexes are copied to the CE device. Pocket Access also lets you create tables on your H/PC Pro device, which can then be copied back to the desktop.

Once the Pocket Access database resides on the CE device, you can create SQL queries based on a limited set of SQL SELECT and DELETE statements, as well as table creation and modification statements. SELECT statements support inner joins, sorting, and filtering. You can view either the whole table or the results of a SQL SELECT statement. Three views are supported: a datasheet view, a single-record view, and a combination of the single-record view and the datasheet view. You can only select the view you want and make a few minor field-width changes to the datasheet view; otherwise, you can't adjust these views. Single-field sorting and filtering is supported directly from these views; for more complex sorting or filtering, you'll need to create a SQL statement.

The data synchronizing algorithm ignores changes made to CE data that conflict with changes made to the desktop or enterprise database. You aren't provided with any control over this synchronization algorithm, and the inability to enforce data changes made from the CE device will limit the usefulness of this tool for anyone not collecting new data or just wanting to have a read-only copy of their corporate information.

Pocket Inbox has a number of added features, including the ability to create mail folders for storing inbound and outbound messages, improvements to the message composition window to show more header information, and control improvements to make Inbox more useful for high-volume E-mail users. IMAP4 and Lightweight Directory Access Protocol support has also been added; this will significantly improve synchronization with corporate mail servers that adhere to these standards.

Windows CE 2.0 Inbox provides only four folders that cannot be subdivided: inbox, outbox, deleted mail, and copies of sent mail. For many E-mail users, storing all inbound messages in one inbox complicated life. With H/PC Pro, you can now subdivide these boxes--or create new ones--by adding new folders to organize the messages you send and receive in ways that make sense to you.

The CE 2.0 Inbox tool would show you one header line at a time for your outbound messages; in other words, you could only see and edit the "To" line, the "Subject" line, or the "cc" line, but not all three at once. The H/PC Pro solves this problem by letting you see either all three lines or these lines plus the blind copy and service lines. The primary reason is that you have more screen real estate--640 by 480 pixels on most CE devices, with higher resolutions possible--for applications to use.

High-volume E-mail users will also be happy with the new ability to view only messages received in the past few days. On-device file converters for Word and Excel will improve the lives of those who want to exchange attachments with other users over the Internet but don't use a desktop PC as an E-mail conduit. In version 2.0, only the desktop PC had the ability to convert file formats between desktop Office products and the Pocket Office applications; version 3.0 includes Word and Excel conversion, and a PowerPoint converter can also be obtained from the CE device vendors.

Pocket Internet Explorer has also been significantly upgraded to support client-side JScript scripting, 128-bit encryption (where allowed by law), and HTML 3.2 support that improves frame handling. These additions let users access most Web sites without having strange problems occur the way they did with CE 2.0.

For existing users, the compelling reasons to upgrade are the changes to Pocket Outlook and Pocket Internet Explorer, as well as the on-device file converters. For users who haven't thought about purchasing a Windows CE device, the bigger screen sizes, improved connectivity, and on-the-go features in a lightweight package make these H/PC Professional products potential replacements for notebook computers.

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