The Little Palm Book represents a decent introduction to the most rudimentary aspects of the latest models in the Palm series of personal digital assistants (PDAs), including every generation from Palm III to Palm VII. If you need to have your hand held through the initial Palm setup and familiarization process, this book will serve you well. If, however, you've learned the basics of your Palm on your own and want a book to help you with more obscure aspects of the PalmOS and the universe of aftermarket software, you'll find The Little Palm Book dissatisfying.
Coverage of the Palm's electronic mail capabilities are strong, though, as are the author's comparisons of the various models. The book does a good job of explaining how to configure your Palm out of the box, and The Little Palm Book deserves praise for the patient introduction of Grafitti letters, numbers, and punctuation marks. It also clearly explains how to do practically everything with the Date Book, Address Book, and other built-in applications. The mode of explaining procedures avoids numbered steps in favor of little stories about how the features can be used--something you may or may not like. The point: buy this one for its coverage of the basics, and then look at David Pogue's PalmPilot: The Ultimate Guide for better coverage of the add-in software available to you. --David Wall
Topics covered: Differences among the Palm devices, initial device setup, the Grafitti language, HotSync procedures under Windows and Mac OS, aftermarket software, and Palm.net wireless applications.
Book Description
The Palm III launched a new era in computing, giving its parent company a 70 percent share of a market that is projected to have 13 million devoted users by 2001. With the release of three new modelsPalm IIIx, Palm V, and Palm VIIthe next era of handheld computing is underway.
But learning a new device, even such a small one, can sometimes cause anxiety. The friendly, reassuring style of The Little Palm Book relieves any of that. This book guides readers through the basics of using a Palm computer, shows them how to maximize the power of all the built-in applications, and acquaints them with the more advanced Palm uses. It offers extensive coverage of the Palm VII, whose built-in wireless connectivity and Palm.Net Service for easy Internet access and Web Clipping garner content supplied by hundreds of providers. Corporate users will find this book particularly useful for its advice on linking directly to their company networks and using organizer and scheduling applications.
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