03 Current Features

Features on Your Current Mobile Phone

We are interested in the features and applications on your current mobile device to find out what is possible in mLearning at this time. We have grouped the features as following:

Calendar
The Calendar is an application in which you can organize your daily tasks and set reminders for the coming events. It can be used on the computer: Google Calendar, Yahoo! Calendar, Microsoft Office Outlook Calendar, but also many mobile phones have a Calendar application. Depending on it’s complexity, the mobile calendar can be:
- simple mobile calendar: with basic calendar functions (adding personal events, setting reminder alarms)
- mobile calendar with internet synchronization: the mobile calendar can be synchronized with the web calendar. Reminders from the web calendar can be sent via E-mail on personal computer as well as SMS to mobile phones.
- mobile calendar for group cooperation: allows members of the group to share their calendars to facilitate setting up meetings (example: HandStep’s TeamCalendar)
- mobile calendar with time zone: when a meeting between members of different countries is set, it takes in consideration the time difference between the two countries, using UTC (Coordinated Universal Time)
- mobile calendar with extended services (example: RSS feed alarms)

Connectivity
There are a few ways in which a mobile device can be connected to a computer, another mobile device or to the internet. Here is a list of the connectivity options available for mobile devices:
- USB (to connect to a computer)
- Bluetooth (to connect and exchange data with mobile devices, computers, printers, GPS receivers or digital cameras )
- Infrared Data Association (for short-range exchange of data with mobile devices or computers, over infrared light)
- GPRS: General Packet Radio Service (data transfer is typically charged per megabyte of throughput)
- EDGE: Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (allows increased data transmission rates and improved data transmission reliability)
- 3G-HSDPA: High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (allows higher data transfer speeds and capacity)
- WLAN: Wireless LAN (mobility to move around within a broad coverage area and still be connected to the network)
- WAP: Wireless Application Protocol (enables access to the Internet from a mobile phone or PDA)
- Wi-Fi (wireless-technology brand owned by the Wi-Fi Alliance)
- GPS: Global Positioning System (determines the mobile device’s location, speed, direction, and time)
- NFC: Near Field Communication (enables the exchange of data between devices over about a decimeter distance)

Internet applications
The Mobile Web refers to the World Wide Web as accessed from mobile devices such as cell phones, PDAs, and other portable gadgets connected to a public network. Here is a list of applications to facilitate the use of internet through a mobile device:
- internet mobile browser (example: Safari, Opera Mobile, Nokia, MotoMagX, Internet Explorer Mobile)
- E-mail: facilitates access to your e-mail account
- RSS Feed for mobile devices: facilitates receiving up-to-date information of your interest areas on internet
- Audio and video capabilities: downloading, watching and listening to audio and video content, streaming multimedia
- VoIP: protocol optimized for the transmission of voice through the Internet or other packet switched networks (example: Fring, Skype, Windows Live Messenger, Google Talk)
- Push-to-talk: immediate communication and sharing of documents in a group

Support for other applications
Some of the mobile devices have other facilities also, like support for:
- Flash animation: to facilitate web conferences and sharing of documents (example: Adobe Connect Pro)
- PDF documents
- Microsoft Office Mobile (example: Word Mobile, Excel Mobile, PowerPoint Mobile, OneNote Mobile, Outlook Mobile)
- Java applications (example: games)

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