Almost unnoticed in the Windows Xp hoopla is the big bet Microsoft is making on wireless mobility. "Microsoft expects 802.11b to be present in most places where people spend time," said Chairman and Chief Software Architect Bill Gates in his keynote speech at the company's Professional Developers Conference in Los Angeles last month. That expectation complements the Pocket PC platform and sets the stage for next year's debut of the Tablet PC.
I wasn't an early fan of the Pocket PC device, falling into the camp that found it too much user interface on too little hardware. But Palm, like Apple, made the error of thinking that you have to be right only the first time. Microsoft is almost always right by the third time—with the Pocket PC 2002 as yet another example.
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