Is this the year of the Tablet? Has the mobile Internet finally arrived? What business purposes are served by using mobile Internet devices and how can they help us serve clients better? Whether you are working with products from Apple, Motorola, Blackberry, HTC, Samsung or a myriad of other providers, access to the Internet, and applications or “Apps” drive the mobile world. You can provide better client service with more convenience for you or your team members by using smartphones or tablets. Your practice management system, desktop or applications from your office can be accessed as well as web based applications.

Devices that enable the mobile Internet, whether phones or tablets, are used for consumption of content. They may not be the most efficient data entry devices, but are probably sufficient for light duty entry. Sitting in your home, during a commute, at a client’s office or in a meeting with access to items you consider critical or convenient can be very enabling or distracting. You can make the decision about what you look up on demand, check your facts before or during a meeting, and do more extensive work or research when you have a full computer available again.

Make a Plan.

Define your need. Each of us has our responsibilities and tasks that need to be completed. What would you like to be able to do when you are not at your desk and what do you have to do?

Define the purpose of your mobile device. Carrying only one mobile device would be a convenience and preferred, but the limitations of screen size, speed and convenient keyboard entry make this particular goal questionable. Products like

the Motorola Atrix are trying to overcome these objections by providing a docking station that is both a larger screen and a keyboard, while having dual processors in the phone itself. Others, like Steve Jobs from Apple, have backed larger screen sizes saying a 7-inch screen would be “too small to express the software.” He said 10 inches was the minimum for a tablet screen. Maybe it is age or maybe it is just failing eyesight, but the small screen of a smartphone can be too restric- tive to be productive. Yes, you can zoom the image in and out, but much time can be wasted with these activities. However, access to information may still be better than no access at all.

Define the top ten activities you’d like to be able to do while out of the office. My list would include: email, access to paperless documents, web browsing, contact information, access to productivity (Microsoft Office) documents, ability to run applications from the office, casual reading of electronic magazines, listening to books & podcasts, Voice Over IP services like Skype or GoToMeeting access, camera and/or video capabilities. Your list could easily be different. Note that I didn’t speak about presentation capabilities, approving workflow or managing travel, which could be important for some of you from your mobile devices.

What type and cost?

Tablet computers were dominant at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) show. There are two mainstream efforts for mobile devices: Apple with their iPhone, iPad and IOS and the open source market supported by the Google Android operating system, often simply called Droid, and supported by hardware players like Motorola,

Samsung and HTC. The Android shows more promise and increasing speed of adoption, but Apple has a clear market lead as of this writing.

Apps are what really drive these devices, and most apps have to be written specifically for the hardware and operating platform chosen. This means that Windows applications do not run without the addition of more technology. Vendors have responded to the demand of remote Windows applications on the iPad by updating the popular Citrix and VMware environments with the Citrix Receiver for iPad and VMware TeamViewer. These software products connect the iPad back to servers running the Windows applications, and permit all Windows applications to run on the iPad. Alternatively, an app to access a PC or Mac desktop called LogMeIn Ignition allows a tablet computer to run Windows applications hosted on a single computer at the home or in the office. All of these op- tions work today, albeit slowly, and possibly unacceptably for your purposes. However, slow Windows application access may be better than no Windows application access at all.

Which applications?

Native apps enable key functions like note taking, email or web browsing. Other apps can or have to be downloaded to your device through the app marketplace for your platform. For example, on the iPhone or iPad, the Apple App Store has over 350,000 apps at the time of this writing. The Android Market has approximately 88,000 apps and the BlackBerry App World just over 100,000. A good rule of thumb is that an app will show up in the Apple App Store first, and if it is popular, it will be rewritten for the Android Market and then rewritten for BlackBerry’s App World.

Apps are available for most business functions today. Some are crude, and some are elegant. All represent a new way of doing business and most are singe “point” solutions to a particular problem. Apps fall into many different categories such as travel, news, utilities, personal, game, and business. Each app marketplace lists their own categories and top apps. Most apps cost $10 or less, and some of the very best apps are free.

You can do it.

The new, portable Internet is making business and personal applications possible that were not conceived as little as one or two years ago. Make a list of what you would like to see done on your mobile platform. You will be pleasantly surprised at what is possible today. The future looks even brighter.