Google & my phone

I have become so dependent on my phone its not funny. Fifteen years ago when some one explained the concept of a PDA to me I couldn't see it becoming reality. PDA to me would always be couples kissing in a mall ... public display of affection, not personal digital assistant! A device as small as a cell phone (and cellphones were huge in 1994) that would act as a personal computer and people would communicate with both e-mail (what was that?) and via a normal voice phone and to browse the Internet (huh, what is that?) In 1994, if people had email at work it was the archaic TSO accounts viewed only with green screens and white lettering and only to someone on their network. When someone wanted to send an email outside of their network most people used CompuServe, Prodigy, or the newbie AOL.

My first exposure to the Internet was in 1995 when somehow Leo & I used the telnet utility that came with Windows 95 and the Netscape browser to connect to a webserver and see www.ibm.com over the phone line in our basement. In mid-1994 there were only 2,738 public websites, according to Gray's statistics; by the end of the year, more than 10,000. A year later Yahoo! was published by two guys that had been working on a way to find websites without knowing its URL (Uniform Resource Locator, or simply put an Internet address). Do you know what Yahoo stands for .... Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle.

Fast forward 15 years, I don't buy those fancy Palms or Blackberries because I only need to call to people. I usually pick the phone that is either free or just a few dollars. Text messaging sounded cool so when I replaced my phone back in April I decided to splurge and get one with a QWERTY keyboard for $50, the Samsung Rant.

The Rant came with a short cut to Google mobile. Within Google mobile you could use online Google applications like You Tube, Maps, Reader (to read blogger.com!), Calendar, Weather, Gmail, Photos, etc. I started using the Calendar and that's all she wrote. I'm so dependent on it now I wouldn't know what to do without it. I no longer use the Franklin planner that I've carried around for 15 years. I enter most of my calendar entries from my PC and I can subscribe to other's calendars. Currently I subscribe to Riley's Girl Scout troop calendar, the Mizzou Tigers Football schedule, and US Holidays. If I enter an address in the calendar entry it will have a link to Google Maps. And during Mizzou Football games it continuously updates the score on my calendar. To create a new entry I simply send a text such as "Dinner with Riley, sat 6pm" and it will automatically create it.

I'm not quite to the full adoption level of PDA but I'm getting there. I can view any website but if it isn't fit for a 2-inch by 1.5-inch screen it is very difficult to use. Now I'll get to my point of this blog which was not to ramble on about the evolution of the Internet and technology.

I discovered Google Text Querying last week. If you send a text message to Google (466-453) with a question it will text you back within seconds with a response. For ...

• current weather text W and your zipcode "W 64158"
• movies text "M 64158" or for a specific movie "Where the Wild Things Are 64158"
• foreign translation "translate deck to spanish"
  
• measurement conversions "1 tablespoon in teaspoons" or "1 us gallon to liter"
• currency converter "1 usd to euro"
• find local time "time Athens Greece"

It has been very convenient a few times already. ..

• Last Monday I wanted to pickup a pizza on the way home from work. I pulled over and texted "Papa Johns 64119" and it sent the address and phone number of all the Papa John's restaurance within a few miles of zipcode 64119. I scrolled down to the phone number and pressed the call button.
• Later that night I was out running errands and at 8pm I wondered if I had time to run by Sam's Club which is near CYT where I had to pick up the girls at 9pm. I texted "Sam's Club 64119" and it sent back the address and phone number and with one stroke I called Sam's and found out they closed at 8:30pm.
  

I realized I'm growing closer and closer to depending on a PDA. I'd really like to et the HTC Hero that will run Google Andriod applications. It is very similar to the phone offered by that fruity company. I hope the current cost of $179 is drastically cut by next April when I am eligible for a new phone.