Bluetooth Nirvana

Having a Bluetooth-enabled device is no longer such a big deal nowadays. Some people are still willing to pay a premium in order to get a gadget with such a capability but generally most high-end phones, PDAs and laptops already have them built into the system. However, I rarely see people using Bluetooth extensively.

Well I am one of those who take advantage of this technology and in doing so may have found my own Bluetooth nirvana. I currently use an old model Ericsson T39m cellphone -- the second model of cellphone that had built-in Bluetooth. I'm also using the first model of Palm PDA that has Bluetooth -- the Tungsten|T. My notebook, an Apple iBook 800 does not have built-in Bluetooth but gains that capability whenever I attach a Bluetooth dongle into it.

These three gadgets is a part of my very own Personal Area Network of devices that communicate with each other wirelessly, exchanging information with each other and keeping the data kept in each device current using a Mac OS X's built-in iSync application. Whenever the Bluetooth dongle is connected to the iBook and I initiate a Hotsync from my Tungsten|T, my iBook will start synchronizing its data with *both* the Tungsten|T and the Sony T39m. All changes I do on the laptop's (or palm's or phone's) contact list, calendar and to-do list will be propagated to the other two gadgets.

Aside from keeping my data current across the three devices, ad hoc data transfer between them is also quick and painless. From both the phone and PDA, sending files to the laptop is simply pressing (or tapping for PDAs) the "Send using Bluetooth...". In fact, whenever I need to take a quick picture of something, I often borrow a friend with a SonyEricsson K700 cellphone, take the picture and simply send that image to the laptop via Bluetooth.

Address Book, Mac OS X's built in contacts management program can connect to the phone using bluetooth. Once connected, whenever someone calls me while I'm working on the laptop, the name of the caller will be displayed on-screen. Incoming text messages are displayed on a window on-screen, allowing me to immediately answer them and even save it if the message is important.

Using 3rd party application called "Salling Clicker", the iBook can be controlled remotely using either the cellphone or the PDA. Using this clicker program, I am able to do a PowerPoint presentation without having to go near the laptop in order to move the slides. By using my Tungsten|T to control the presentation, I can even see my presentation notes for each slide, allowing me to take a peek at my notes in case of a mental block. Salling Clicker can remotely control other applications such as Apple's DVD Player, QuickTime Player, iTunes, iPhoto, Keynote and others. Using scripts, additional functionalities can be added to Salling Clicker making it even more useful.

There are certainly other uses of Bluetooth that even I have not explored yet but as it is now, using it to converge my three gadgets is more than enough to bring me to Bluetooth Nirvana.

technorati tags: convergence, apple, bluetooth