The Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) 1.0 was designed to make it easier to design software for mobile devices (the applications are called MIDlets). The idea was great but Java's mantra,'Write Once, Run Everywhere,' didn't quite come true since MIDP 1.0 was very restricted. Manufacturers wanted to offer more interfaces and features to developers and include proprietary interfaces such as messaging and graphics.

Who are the key players in the European wireless application market and how does J2ME fit into this picture? In this article I look at the current trends in Europe regarding J2ME and how the more interesting Java Specifications Requests could possibly affect the European and global markets.

Somewhere in the conglomerate of sponsor companies and forum management, the Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) specification committees lost track of their objectives. If you look at the challenges faced by developers of wireless applications, you'll find that WAP does not address the main problems.

The need for wireless security is often motivated by the image of a teenage hacker driving by and stealing your data with a mobile scanner. While such sensationalist ideas make good copy, the simple fact is that, wireless or not, serious business applications do not get deployed on the Internet today without security. So if you are thinking of using your cell phone for something other than playing Tetris or downloading the latest Britney Spears ring-tone, you'll need to give some thought to how you might secure access to your business applications.

The Java Community Process (http://jcp.org) defines the way Java standards are created. Through this process, members of the community are invited to work together in expert groups (EG) to create new Java specifications. If you wanted to create a new specification, you would file a Java Specification Request (JSR) with the JCP Program Management Office (PMO). To date, there have been over 200 JSRs filed, and they're at various phases of development. Some have been finalized and are being deployed in products, while others are just getting started.

J2ME developers have long desired the opportunity to build sophisticated applications for the personal digital assistant (PDA) market, applications common to resource-rich desktop computers. One thing stood in their way: most PDAs lacked resources to efficiently execute those applications. However, that's about to change with the introduction of ARM processor-based PDAs and the PDA Profile that's soon to be incorporated in SDKs and VMs.

For Java technology to fulfill its promise, it should be possible to test a Java application on just one device and, if it works properly, assume that it will run well on any other.

In the dense forest of emerging computing trends, technologies, and hyped life-changing applications, there are two developments that stand taller than the rest. In isolation, these two trends are having a huge impact on users - both individuals and corporations.

I have the dubious honor of having written one of the very first implementations of the RSA cryptographic algorithm in Java some years ago, and very badly I wrote it too.

Several years ago Motorola, Inc., and Sun Microsystems, Inc., recognized a potential new market for the Java programming language. Small mobile devices, such as cell phones, were becoming more powerful but did not provide a common programming platform.

The new kid on the Internet technology block is Web services and its implementation technology, SOAP. Simple Object Access Protocol is an XML vocabulary used to describe messaging and remote procedure calls between distributed components.

Parts 1 and 2 of this series (JDJ, Vol. 7, issues 6 and 9) demonstrated how I developed a remote control MP3 player by using a Bluetooth connection from my handheld (a Compaq iPaq) and employing a client and a server written in Java.

This article is the second installment in a two-part series on Java and Bluetooth. Last month you got your feet wet in Bluetooth (JDJ, Vol. 7, issue 8); if you don't remember what the role of a Bluetooth stack or a Bluetooth profile is in the context of a Bluetooth application, refer to Part 1.

In Part 1 of this series (JDJ, Vol. 7, issue 6), I showed how I developed an MP3 player in Java, and then added the ability to control that player from a wireless handheld device using a PersonalJava application.

Sun has poured a lot of resources into the Java 2 Micro Edition platform, recognizing that the next battleground will be the ubiquitous consumer device. Whether J2ME can make the huge impact that Sun (and the developer community) hopes for is still an open question, as the current rate of adoption has been underwhelming thus far.

This is Part 1 of a two-part article that will show you how to write wireless J2ME applications using Bluetooth. If you're a J2ME developer, this will quite likely be your first introduction to Bluetooth. Perhaps you've heard a lot about it, but you're not sure what it is or how it works. Well, you've come to the right place.

Ever since the Java Card 1.0 was introduced in 1996 it has been gradually maturing, and recently celebrated its fifth anniversary. American Express, Visa, and now the Department of Defense have all deployed solutions that utilize the Java Card specifications.

Java, in its J2ME guise, has all the attributes of a first-rate platform for embedded system design. More specifically, its platform independence, code portability, and robust operation render it particularly suited to such applications. The extensive use of embedded Java-based devices in the future is secure due to the proliferation of standards based on it, and, moreover, the endorsement of major OEMs committed to its use in their designs.

In this business we often talk about how easy it is to get computers to talk to each other; computers without networks are almost inconceivable. Despite being standardized as little as five years ago, we now expect them all to play nicely together.> Even in the home, a CAT-5 connection isn't too remarkable, but mobile devices still spend most of their time in lonely isolation.

In this article I discuss which displayable components are available in J2ME and explain how commands are associated with them. In particular, I examine how to create commands, add them to displayables, and define command behavior in CommandListeners. I then demonstrate how the resulting code is typically procedural and quickly becomes cluttered when too many commands are created.

J2ME's Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) promises to become one of the most widespread computing platforms over the next few years as an increasing number of mobile phones include a Java Virtual Machine.

In Part 1 of this article (JDJ, Vol. 7, issue 3) I introduced the idea of using the surrogate architecture within Jini as a platform for J2ME games. I also showed how to start Madison, Sun's reference implementation, and how to connect to it with the provided device simulator.

Making good software is hard enough, as most software developers can testify. There is, however, one aspect of software that is invariably even harder than we expect: How do we get the software into the target environment?

Here's a quiz: consider a physician accessing different patients' histories on a PDA while making rounds at a Manhattan hospital versus a field engineer whose responsibility is to monitor and repair sections of an oil pipeline that stretch across 200 miles in Texas.

How enterprise software is written has undergone a major shift with the introduction of distributed technologies like EJBs and Web-based thin clients. However, this new approach to writing software has not trickled down to consumer applications such as recipe managers, cookbooks, or word processors.

Your organization has decided to extend your enterprise applications into the mobile and wireless space. Congratulations! It will be an exciting time in your software development shop and your customers will no doubt be waiting with great anticipation for the results.

Imagine using your J2ME device to participate in a complicated online game – or a simple one, for that matter. You log in to a network where network services are elements of the game. You, as a player in a massive online world, are represented as an object, a peer of all the other game elements.

In the past, mobile warriors were the only ones who relied on portable information technology. Since PalmOS, RIM, and WindowsCE devices penetrated corporate walls, it’s no longer unusual to have over 60% of corporate employees using PDAs and handheld devices for time management. Indeed, Franklin-Covey, one of the world’s largest providers of time-management tools, adopted the medium and made it a large part of their overall toolkit.

You've heard this said before.  In fact, If you regularly peruse the pages of JDJ, you've heard it here more than once.  In case it hasn'y sunk in, repeat after me: J2ME (especially MIDP) will provide tremendous opportunities for developers

For location-based services, the open frameworks of J2ME and J2EE create interesting opportunities in the fields of software development and applied statistics. Traditionally, the software industry in these services has been closed and, as a result, the industry has suffered stagnation, particularly in the area of distributed systems and integration.

The so-called duopoly of Intel and Microsoft brought one great advantage to personal computing - a uniform runtime platform for application software. Application software developers need only code the application using the Win32 API and compile for Pentium to be assured that their programs will run on a majority of desktops. In contrast, Internet appliance devices are nonhomogeneous, using many different types and variants of microprocessors and many different operating systems.

PDAs are becoming a permanent fixture in the everyday lives of consumers and business people. There's no question that we have Palm to thank for bringing us a small, pen-based, easy-to-use organizer to help keep our busy lives on track. At the same time, Microsoft has been trying to hit one out of the park for years with its Windows CE operating system running on a variety of handheld devices. As with everything else at Microsoft, it usually takes them three times to get something right, and the Pocket PC is no exception.

Embedded Java technology, specifically the J2ME platform, provides a universal and secure runtime platform for transient, application-based content and services. Through the 'write once, run anywhere' promise of Java, the J2ME platform can support a range of Internet appliances, from mobile wireless devices to TV set-top boxes.

It could be argued that the clock speed of a given processing platform enables you to estimate the execution time of a user application running on that platform. However, quoting figures such as MIPS (millions of instructions per second) are somewhat futile, since the execution of a specific number of instructions on one processor will not necessarily accomplish the same end result as that same number of instructions running on a different processor. It's the execution speed of a given set of instructions that's of greater concern when selecting an appropriate platform to run application code.

Back when Java was called Oak, it was thought that this new language would be ideal for developing embedded applications, such as those that would run on set-top boxes. The developers of this new language were well ahead of their time. Java's momentum began to build not from its large set-top developer community but from developers wishing to enhance their Web sites using Java applets. Thank goodness that was short-lived!

I don't usually buy technical books. Most of the time I manage to find what I'm looking for after a bit of hunting on the Web, virtual elbow-grease, so to speak. However, occasionally a tree-killing madness does come over me and Amazon gets the chance to clear the electronic cobwebs out of my bank account.

Developers new to the Mobile Information Device Profile (MIDP) are often surprised by some of the limitations and their consequences, because they seem to be omissions of obviously needed functionality.

As time goes by, J2ME is the buzzword that's appearing in more and more magazines and talked about beside more office coffee machines than any other. And slowly, the big handset manufacturers are releasing their first MIDP-compliant phones into the marketplace. In previous issues of JDJ (Vol. 6, issues 7, 8, and 9), you may have read Jason Briggs' articles introducing general MIDlet development techniques. This article will take a swift sidestep and focus on MIDP as a platform for developing games. We can assure you, in the near future, you won't be firing up Snake the next time your train is late.

Here in Japan, where it's common to see someone thumbing away on a cell phone while on the train, NTT DoCoMo was one of the first companies in the world to release Java-capable mobile phones. In the ensuing six months, more than four million users have adopted the phones - and the number is growing. That's a good enough reason for an aspiring J2ME programmer with a sense of adventure to learn a little about programming Java applications for NTT DoCoMo phones.

This is the first in a two-part series on the benefits of using the Java development and runtime environment for embedded computing. Java, with its 'write once, run anywhere' paradigm, is ideal for embedded computing because of its portability, reliability, security, and Internet capabilities.