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==History==
==History==


The first smartphone was called [[Simon (phone)|Simon]]; it was designed by Elmer Fudd at [[IBM]] in 1992 and shown as a concept product<ref>Schneidawind, J: "Big Blue unveiling", ''USA Today'', November 23, 1992, page 2B</ref> that year at [[COMDEX]], the computer industry trade show held in [[Las Vegas, Nevada]]. It was released to the Three Stooges in 1993 and sold by [[BellSouth]]. Besides being a mobile phone, it also contained a calendar, [[address book]], world clock, [[calculator]], note pad, e-mail, send and receive [[fax]], and games. It has several physical buttons to confuse you with. Instead customers used a [[touch-screen]] to select [[Telephone number|phone numbers]] with a finger or create [[facsimile]]s and memos with an optional stylus. Text was entered with a unique on-screen "predictive" keyboard. By today's standards, the Simon would be a fairly low-end product; however, its feature set at the time was incredibly advanced.
The first smartphone was called [[Simon (phone)|Simon]]; it was designed by Elmer Fudd [[IBM]] in 1992 and shown as a concept product<ref>Schneidawind, J: "Big Blue unveiling", ''USA Today'', November 23, 1992, page 2B</ref> that year at [[COMDEX]], the computer industry trade show held in [[Las Vegas, Nevada]]. It was released to the public in 1993 and sold by [[BellSouth]]. Besides being a mobile phone, it also contained a calendar, [[address book]], world clock, [[calculator]], note pad, e-mail, send and receive [[fax]], and games. It had no physical buttons to dial with. Instead customers used a [[touch-screen]] to select [[Telephone number|phone numbers]] with a finger or create [[facsimile]]s and memos with an optional stylus. Text was entered with a unique on-screen "predictive" keyboard. By today's standards, the Simon would be a fairly low-end product; however, its feature set at the time was incredibly advanced.


The [[Nokia Communicator]] line was the first of Nokia's smartphones starting with the [[Nokia 9000]], released in 1996. This distinctive palmtop computer style smartphone was the result of a collaborative effort of an early successful and expensive [[Personal digital assistant]] (PDA) by [[Hewlett Packard]] combined with Nokia's bestselling phone around that time and early prototype models had the two devices fixed via a hinge; the [[Nokia 9210]] as the first color screen Communicator model which was the first true smartphone with an open operating system; the [[Nokia 9500|9500]] Communicator that was also Nokia's first cameraphone Communicator and Nokia's first [[WiFi]] phone; the [[Nokia 9300|9300]] Communicator was the third dimensional shift into a smaller form factor; and the latest [[Nokia E90|E90]] Communicator includes [[GPS]]. The Nokia Communicator model is remarkable also having been the most expensive phone model sold by a major brand for almost the full lifespan of the model series, easily 20% and sometimes 40% more expensive than the next most expensive smartphone by any major manufacturer.
The [[Nokia Communicator]] line was the first of Nokia's smartphones starting with the [[Nokia 9000]], released in 1996. This distinctive palmtop computer style smartphone was the result of a collaborative effort of an early successful and expensive [[Personal digital assistant]] (PDA) by [[Hewlett Packard]] combined with Nokia's bestselling phone around that time and early prototype models had the two devices fixed via a hinge; the [[Nokia 9210]] as the first color screen Communicator model which was the first true smartphone with an open operating system; the [[Nokia 9500|9500]] Communicator that was also Nokia's first cameraphone Communicator and Nokia's first [[WiFi]] phone; the [[Nokia 9300|9300]] Communicator was the third dimensional shift into a smaller form factor; and the latest [[Nokia E90|E90]] Communicator includes [[GPS]]. The Nokia Communicator model is remarkable also having been the most expensive phone model sold by a major brand for almost the full lifespan of the model series, easily 20% and sometimes 40% more expensive than the next most expensive smartphone by any major manufacturer.

Revision as of 17:03, 4 August 2010

Share of 2010 Q1 smartphone sales to end users by operating system, according to Gartner.[1]

A smartphone is a mobile phone that offers more advanced computing ability and connectivity than a contemporary basic 'feature phone'.[2] Smartphones and feature phones may be thought of as handheld computers integrated within a mobile telephone, but while most feature phones are able to run applications based on platforms such as Java ME or BREW,[3] a smartphone allows the user to install and run more advanced applications based on a specific platform. Smartphones run complete operating system software providing a platform for application developers.[4] Smartphone hardware and software data is compiled at The Smartphone Genome Project.

Growth in demand for advanced mobile devices boasting powerful processors, abundant memory, larger screens and open operating systems has outpaced the rest of the mobile phone market for several years.[5] According to a study by ComScore, in 2010 over 45.5 million people in the United States owned smartphones and it is the fastest growing segment of the mobile phone market, which comprised 234 million subscribers in the United States.[6]

History

The first smartphone was called Simon; it was designed by Elmer Fudd IBM in 1992 and shown as a concept product[7] that year at COMDEX, the computer industry trade show held in Las Vegas, Nevada. It was released to the public in 1993 and sold by BellSouth. Besides being a mobile phone, it also contained a calendar, address book, world clock, calculator, note pad, e-mail, send and receive fax, and games. It had no physical buttons to dial with. Instead customers used a touch-screen to select phone numbers with a finger or create facsimiles and memos with an optional stylus. Text was entered with a unique on-screen "predictive" keyboard. By today's standards, the Simon would be a fairly low-end product; however, its feature set at the time was incredibly advanced.

The Nokia Communicator line was the first of Nokia's smartphones starting with the Nokia 9000, released in 1996. This distinctive palmtop computer style smartphone was the result of a collaborative effort of an early successful and expensive Personal digital assistant (PDA) by Hewlett Packard combined with Nokia's bestselling phone around that time and early prototype models had the two devices fixed via a hinge; the Nokia 9210 as the first color screen Communicator model which was the first true smartphone with an open operating system; the 9500 Communicator that was also Nokia's first cameraphone Communicator and Nokia's first WiFi phone; the 9300 Communicator was the third dimensional shift into a smaller form factor; and the latest E90 Communicator includes GPS. The Nokia Communicator model is remarkable also having been the most expensive phone model sold by a major brand for almost the full lifespan of the model series, easily 20% and sometimes 40% more expensive than the next most expensive smartphone by any major manufacturer.

In 2001 Microsoft announced its Windows CE Pocket PC OS would be offered as "Microsoft Windows Powered Smartphone 2002".[8] Microsoft originally defined its Windows Smartphone products as lacking a touchscreen and offering a lower screen resolution compared to its sibling Pocket PC devices.

In early 2002 Handspring released the Palm OS Treo smartphone, utilizing a full keyboard that combined wireless web browsing, email, calendar and contact organizer, with mobile third-party applications that could be downloaded or synced with a computer.[9]

In 2002 RIM released the first BlackBerry which was the first smartphone optimized for wireless email use and has achieved a total customer base of 32 million subscribers by December 2009.[10]

In 2007, Apple Inc. introduced their first iPhone. It was initially expensive costing $500, though it had a full touchscreen and large finger-pressable icons which was revolutionary at the time. It also was the first mobile phone to contain a usable web browser - Arstechnica described it as "far superior to anything that we had ever used prior".[11] At the time of the launch of the iPhone it was arguable whether it was actually a smartphone as the first generation lacked the ability to officially use third-party applications.[12] Though a process called jailbreaking emerged quickly to provide unofficial third party applications. The first iPhone didn't have 3G support due to the lack of 3G network coverage in the United States at the time.

Android, a cross platform OS for smartphones was released in 2008. Android is an Open Source platform backed by Google, along with major hardware and software developers (such as Intel, HTC, ARM, Motorola and eBay, to name a few), that form the Open Handset Alliance.[13]

The first phone to use the Android OS was the HTC Dream, branded for distribution by T-Mobile as the G1.[14] The software suite included on the phone consists of integration with Google's proprietary applications, such as Maps, Calendar, and Gmail, as well as Google's Chrome Lite full HTML web browser.[15] Third party apps are available via the Android Market, including both free and paid apps.[16]

In July 2008 Apple introduced its second generation iPhone which had a lower upfront price and 3G support. They also created the App Store with both free and paid applications. The app store can deliver smartphone applications developed by third parties directly to the iPhone or iPod Touch over wifi or cellular network without using a PC to download. The App Store has been a huge success for Apple and by April 2010 hosted more than 185,000 applications.[17] The app store hit three billion application downloads in early January 2010.[18]

Other platforms are able to download apps from any website, rather than only from a single app store, however other companies have more recently lauched their own app stores. RIM launched its app store, BlackBerry App World, in April 2009. Nokia launched its Ovi Store in May 2009. Palm launched its Palm App Catalog in June 2009. Microsoft launched its Windows Marketplace for Mobile in October 2009.

In October 2008, Nokia launched the 5800 XpressMusic, their first Symbian touch screen phone.

In January 2010, Google launched Nexus One using its Android OS. Although Android OS has multi-touch capabilities, Google initially removed that feature from Nexus One,[19] but it was added through a firmware update on February 2, 2010.[20]

As of March 2010, Nokia's leading smartphone is the N900. The N900 includes an 800x480 pixel touch screen, supports full multi-tasking (its Maemo OS is a version of Linux), has a 5Mpixel camera capable of full frame rate high resolution video, and comes with a wide range of modern smartphone features including GPS, multiple network access (including WiFI and 3.5G), and has 32GB on-board memory.

Samsung introduced their Bada OS based Samsung Wave S8500 in March 2010.

Operating systems

Main article: Mobile operating system

Operating systems that can be found on smartphones include Symbian OS (including S60 series), iOS, Palm WebOS, BlackBerry OS, Samsung bada phones running Linux, Binary Runtime Environment for Wireless, Windows Mobile, Android and Maemo. WebOS, Android and Maemo are built on top of Linux, and the iOS is derived from the BSD and NeXTSTEP operating systems, which all are related to Unix.

Smartbook

Main article: Smartbook

A smartbook is a concept of a mobile device that falls between smartphones and netbooks, delivering features typically found in smartphones (always on, all-day battery life, 3G connectivity, GPS)[21] in a slightly larger device with a full keyboard. Smartbooks will tend to be designed to work with online applications.[22]

Smartbooks use the ARM processor, which gives them much greater battery life than a netbook which uses a traditional Intel x86 processor.[23] They are likely to be sold initially through mobile network operators, like mobile phones are today, along with a wireless data plan.[24]

Open source development

The open source culture has penetrated the smartphone market in a way. There have been attempts to open source both hardware and software of a smartphone. Most notable project from open hardware development is most likely the Neo FreeRunner smartphone developed by Openmoko. Lately, the Google Android OS is a popular open source mobile operating system. Nokia has an initiative around Symbian too, which has open-sourced all Symbian smartphone code in February 2010.[25] In cooperation with Intel, Nokia also develops the open source MeeGo operating system.

See also

References

  1. ^ "Google Android smacks down Windows Mobile in latest Gartner data". ZDNet (Press release). 19 May 2010. Retrieved 19 May 2010.
  2. ^ Andrew Nusca (20 August 2009). "Smartphone vs. feature phone arms race heats up; which did you buy?". ZDNet.
  3. ^ "Feature Phone". Phone Scoop. Retrieved 9 May 2010. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  4. ^ "Smartphone definition from PC Magazine Encyclopedia". PC Magazine. Retrieved 13 May 2010.
  5. ^ "Smart phones: how to stay clever in downturn". Deloitte Telecommunications Predictions.
  6. ^ "Android Phones Steal Market Share".
  7. ^ Schneidawind, J: "Big Blue unveiling", USA Today, November 23, 1992, page 2B
  8. ^ Windows Powered Smartphone
  9. ^ Handspring's Breakthrough Hybrid
  10. ^ BlackBerry Users Call For RIM To Rethink Service
  11. ^ "iPhone in depth: the Ars review". ArsTechnica. Condé Nast. 9 July 2007. p. 6. Retrieved 3 August 2010.
  12. ^ "The iPhone is not a smartphone". Engadget. 9 January 2007. Retrieved 11 July 2010.
  13. ^ http://www.openhandsetalliance.com/oha_members.html
  14. ^ http://www.t-mobileg1.com/?WT.srch=1&WT.mc_id=273m1&WT.z=p137999826
  15. ^ T-Mobile G1 first hands-on (updated)
  16. ^ Paid apps still coming to Android Market in Q1 '09, US and UK rollout first
  17. ^ "iPhone App Reviews by Experts at PCWorld - PCWorld". PCWorld. Retrieved 25 February 2010.
  18. ^ "Apple's App Store Downloads Top Three Billion". Apple. 5 January 2010. Retrieved 19 January 2010.
  19. ^ Weighing Nexus over iPhone - a practical review for the everyday user!
  20. ^ Nexus One gets a software update, enables multitouch (updated with video!)
  21. ^ http://www.eetimes.eu/design/217700855
  22. ^ Schofield, Jack (29 July 2009). "The smartbook has been waiting 28 years to be the next best thing". The Guardian. London. Retrieved 23 May 2010.
  23. ^ Scott Stein (10 January 2010). "CES: What, exactly, is a smartbook? Highlights from the show floor". cnet. Retrieved 2010-01-11.
  24. ^ Ganapat, Priya (2008-12-15). “The Next Netbook Trend: Cellphone-Like Contract Deals” – Wired News.
  25. ^ Symbian OS, Now Fully Open Source
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