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Nokia to Introduce Combined Cell Phone, PDA

Nokia 9000 Communicator and Smart Messaging bring e-mail, Web to cellular network.

By Niall McKay, PCWorld   

The Nokia 9000 Communicator is designed to enable mobile professionals to send and receive Internet mail and browse a limited version of the Web over a cellular network. It also will have the usual capabilities associated with a mobile phone and a personal digital assistant.

At the Handheld Systems Conference last week, Nokia also announced its Smart Messaging technology, designed to enable Internet access from cellular phones with Short Messaging Service.

%dquotSMS can only handle 160 characters so its capabilities will be very limited,%dquot said James McAteer, wireless technology consultant with Stanford Research Institute Consulting of Menlo Park, California. %dquotThis service might be useful for stock quotes. But throwing in the Web is a misnomer. What they are doing is repurposing Internet protocol data for SMS.%dquot

Smart Messaging will also be optimized for the Nokia 9000 Communicator, allowing a new range of applications such as Internet-based entertainment and information services, including flight schedules, weather reports, stock news, currency rates and tele-banking, according to a company statement.

Communication between the Nokia 9000 Communicator and the Web is possible through Nokia%squots Tagged Text Mark-up Language gateway, which lets network operators and third-party providers offer information from the Internet to subscribers. The technology optimizes Web pages for narrow-band connections by filtering out extra information such as logos and graphics.

The company did not say when Smart Messaging will be available, but said pricing will be set by individual network operators.