PenRight! Zooms into the PDA Market

PenRight! Now Available for Zoomer PDAs

While the market has seen the introduction of several stylus-based PDAs—and a few excellent keyboard-based ones as well—much of the attention in North America has focused on the struggle between Apple and Sharp’s Newton versus Casio, Tandy, and AST’s Zoomer devices.

In terms of declaring an early winner, the sales figures have proved to be anything but conclusive. However, the Newton has posted a significant trend in another early indicator: the number of readily available applications, both commercial and shareware.

Much of this can be attributed to the highly visual, object-oriented development environment Apple has dubbed the Newton Toolkit (NTK). Aside from supporting rapid prototyping, the structure of the tool somehow encouraged developers to want to learn more. In comparison, the Zoomer’s very conventional C-based development tools for creating GEOS-based applications were perhaps all too familiar.

Of course, as Newton developers quickly mastered NewtonScript, they yearned for more—much more and much faster. All of a sudden, we started hearing requests for a C-level tool that could compile into native code. However, even with the complaints, the NTK continues to serve its purpose extremely well—it has fostered the creation of an important critical mass of applications for what may have been a slightly doubtful platform in its early days.

The Vertical King of the Hill

With this background, Zoomer hopefuls must have looked on with envy. However, all this may be changing. PenRight! Corporation has just introduced version 3.6 of its highly-regarded PenRight! operating environment and the PenRight! Pro software development kit (SDK). This version, which includes full support for all Zoomer PDAs—including, of course, those from Casio, Tandy and AST—enables developers to quickly prototype and develop programs using the most popular environment for vertical, pen-based applications.

In addition, having PenRight! available on the Zoomer brings a wealth of existing applications to this platform, further increasing its appeal as a real-world solution. By last count, estimates of the number of these applications ranged from 750 to over 1000. In fact, the Zoomer’s attractive price point is likely to give PenRight! an extra kick by making some stylus-based solutions even more affordable.

The PenRight! Operating Environment

PenRight! is an operating environment that runs on top of MS-DOS; it is not an operating system proper. It is capable of running on machines sporting processors ranging from Intel’s 8088 to 80486. The system offers a simple graphical user interface and includes a user independent handwriting engine capable of supporting ten international languages with gestures—all in a mere 32 KB.

In fact, the entire PenRight! environment uses a modest 152 KB of system memory in the PDA. The advantage of this is that lower power processors and smaller memory lead to lower priced devices with lower battery life—a compelling combination.

PenRight!’s Here

Because of this, several hardware manufacturers including Dauphin Technologies, Fujitsu Personal Systems, IBM, NEC, Norand, Telxon, Toshiba, and Tusk, have licensed the environment for use with their pen computers. PenRight!-based applications are available for an equally impressive range of industries including healthcare, pharmaceuticals, transportation, public safety, and retail sales automation.

The PenRight! Pro SDK

Developers ideally like to have a combination of high-level design and prototyping tools, along with access to C-level libraries and interfaces. At the lower level, the PenRight! Pro SDK enables developers to incorporate new or existing C programs and libraries when creating PenRight! programs.

In addition, higher-level prototyping and user interface tools, such as DesignForm, PenResource, and CodeSource, will create C source files without coding, thereby encouraging prototyping. PenRight! on Zoomer PDAs also opens the platform for a myriad of applications developed using Power PEN PAL from PEN PAL Associates.

A number of companies have already adopted PenRight! as an application platform, including Ford, Boeing, British Airways, State of Alabama, Chrysler, Levi Strauss, Southern Pacific Railroad, State Farm, and others.

An Out-of-Box Solution

One feature that would make any VAR, system integrator, or reseller’s life simpler is a system by which they could deliver a turn-key, out-of-box solution that simply needs to be plugged-in or inserted to install.

PenRight! has arranged to bring this one step closer by signing a bundling agreement with SunDisk that enables ISVs, integrators, and resellers to purchase PenRight! preloaded on a flashdisk PCMCIA card at a reduced price.

The SunDisk flashdisks containing the operating environment will be sold by PenRight! Corp. for $169 for a 1 MB card and $495 for a 10 MB flashdisk.

For more information, please contact Chris Temple of PenRight! Corporation at (510) 249-6911, (510) 249-6920 (fax).