I have been trialing JoikuSpot over the last couple of days as the concept looks great. JoikuSpot turns your wifi enabled 3g Nokia phone into a wifi hotspot. This allows wifi enabled but crucially non-phone devices to connect easily to the internet. So for example the browsing experience on a iPod Touch is great but it can only get access through a wifi connection. Similarly the Asus EEE PC only has wifi and no bluetooth, although that is pretty simple to add. In both cases they can easily search out and connect to wifi hotspots. So with JoikuSpot you can connect to your phone via wifi and use the 3g connection.

OK, so much for the theory. In practice things are a little different. The software installed without any problems on my Nokia E61. Starting it is easy enough and you get sufficient feedback to know that it has initiated. I then tried to connect via my iPod Touch. This instantly saw my phone (listed as JoikuSpot_00119FFA55…) and connected. I then opened up a web page and was impressed with the speed - however, then I got my first problem. After 30 seconds or so the connection was dropped and I wasn’t able to reconnect without stopping and starting JoikuSpot. This pattern repeat on all the occasions I tried it. I then tried from my Asus EEE PC and while it was able to see the network it was never able to connect. A quick look at the logs indicated that there was a problem getting a DHCP lease. At this point I gave up.

JoikuSpot is a great idea and once it it out of beta and has ironed out the kinks in its service it is going to be great. In the meantime I am going to wait until I get my Nokia N96 before I try again as it is, allegedly, more stable on this platform. Then I look forward to easy surfing wherever I am.

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We have added a mobile working simulator to the website that allows you to get a feel of what an AppSwing solution would look like on a mobile device, in this case Windows Mobile. While there is no data saved it does show the sort of process that is being adopted. You can run this either from a desktop browser by Clicking here or directly on your mobile device by going to http://www.appswing.com/downloads/simulator/mintro.htm

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A recent report from Frost & Sullivan says that xMax & Mobile WiMAX are “poised to revolutionise wireless broadband”. The problems with current systems, such as wifi, are the relatively short range, something which WiMAX are supposed to address. However, promise of this has been a long time coming but perhaps, finally, we may see some live implementations. As soon as 2008 the report suggests. Such technology upgrades are required to help push along the mobile working possibilities.

More details here.

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Just stumbled upon the following article from Microsoft on managing a mobile workforce. Not sure how old it is as there doesn’t seem to be a date on the page, however, the detail is interesting as it is looking at the management of the mobile workforce rather than the devices or applications. This seems to me to be an overlooked aspect of mobility.

7 rules for managing a mobile workforce 

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Interesting blog regarding a survey of CIOs and their attitudes to mobile working. It seems that they are concerned about things such as sensitive data being held on the device. This is something AppSwing have been saying for a while and the only safe way forward is to have nothing reside on the device at all - you simply view a copy of the data that is held securely behind your corporate firewall.

Read the full article here…

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It seems that the market for mobile working in India is looking pretty compelling after Nokia announced that it is now it’s second biggest market (by sales) beating even the US. The largest market though is China.

Full story here.

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It has been reported that a man has been arrested on suspicion of unauthorised access to a neighbours wireless internet connection. There are a couple of points about this story. The first is that there are still people around who have not secured their wireless connection, either because they feel it is not necessary or don’t know how. The second point is the implication for business. With more and more devices becoming wi-fi enabled and more businesses wanting to take advantage of this as a way to reduce costs, how do you ensure that your staff remain legal? Education is a start but the only effective way is to employ device management to ensure that employees cannot tamper with settings, such as authorised access point, on their devices.
Full story here.

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A couple of interesting and related articles on the BBC website today. The first reported that the symptoms felt by those living near mobile phone masts were “in the mind”. The research went on to conclude that “If you really believe something is going to do you some harm, it will.”.

This is good news for the company producing femtocell which essentially puts a mobile phone base station in your home and connects it to the internet. This means that those who have a poor signal at home will in future be able to continue to use their mobiles at home as they will connect to the femtocell and route the call via a broadband connection.

Both stores may not, however, have a happy ending. Those who feel the effects of living and working near mobile phone masts will continue to dispute the results and carry out their own studies. For femtocell the question is whether they are swimming against the tide of mobile devices that have wifi inbuilt that can connect to wireless routers and make voip calls cheaper than using a mobile.

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An article at silicon.com discusses whether mobile devices rather than being a positive benefit in your life are actually bad for your work/life balance. I guess that this depends on how you deal with it. I have auto on/off set on my device which helps but I have also started leaving my BlackBerry at home when I am out with the family and only taking a personal phone. This is better for all concerned.

However, looking at the early results from our mobile working survey it seems that one of the strongest outcomes recorded by those that are doing some form of non-email related mobile working is an improved work/life balance. Maybe the biggest gain in this area is when you do more with the device than simply email. That will come out as the survey progresses and we analyse the results.

Read the original article here.

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AppSwing are interested to know if your company is already getting the benefits of mobile working or if you haven’t already implemented, when and if you plan to. We are currently running what will become an annual mobile working survey. With no more than six questions from start to finish it isn’t very onerous and for completing it you could win a BlackBerry Curve courtesy of RIM.

If you haven’t already done so you can enter here results will be published in the Autumn.

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