If you're using a mobile phone, smartphone, PDA or some sort of converged device then chances are that you're using one of five different operating systems. Those are BlackBerry, Palm OS, Windows Mobile, Symbian or OS X (for the iPhone/iPod touch mob).

A week or so ago, Nokia announced that they have purchased Symbian. They've been a major shareholder for a while but have procured the remaining stock. What many people don't realise is that Symbian is the dominant player with over two-thirds of the mobile market. So, while Apple grabs the headlines and Microsoft tout the brilliance of their handheld OS, they are all merely filling the gap. Why is that?

I've been using different mobile operating systems for some time. While Symbian may not be the most glamourous it's exceptionally robust and flexible. It can be adapted for touchscreens and keyboard only handhelds, the PIM apps can sync with just about every desktop app you can throw at it and there are many applications freely available for the platform.

What this means for other Symbian handsets such as those made by Sony Ericsson isn't really clear yet. But what I do know is while Apple, Microsoft, RIM and Palm collect the headlines it's Nokia and Symbian that really own the mobile phone market and are likely to do so for quite some time.

OK - I admit that last week's headline might have been a little inflammatory. However, I don't regret the debate it stimulated and I certainly learned a lot. The title of this blog within the Hydrapinion family is "Carry" and the focus is on mobile technology. That's why I'm continuing on my Eee PC focus this week.

I've used the Eee PC every day this week. I've written articles on it, browsed the web, collected email, blogged (as I am now) and played a few games. It's been used on trains, buses, in meetings, at home and in the office. In other words, I've been able to carry it around and use it all over the place.

I've installed applications to it (Firefox 3 and Opera 9.5 - there's a little head to head comparison at other blog) and modified some of the default icons on the Easy Menu screen to use the new apps and to make it easy to jump to my preferred web-mail services.

I faced all of the issues I mentioned last week. Installing apps was too hard (lots of command line and editing of text files just to install Firefox and get Flash working) but, by and large, it's now doing most of what I want. Getting Bluetooth to work with my phone is the next challenge (I have a dongle that responds to command line stuff - I just need a GUI app that works).

I've been documenting much of what I've learned along the way and reckon that I'm slowly starting to understand the Linux way of doing things. I still think that application installation needs to be simplified but I agree that the Eee PC isn't pitched at tinkerers.

It's interesting that the Eee PC was originally designed for the education market so I assume that most schools would want to add applications. That said, I'm pretty happy with what the Eee PC lets me do. I might even trade up to the 9" unit when it comes out in a few weeks.

A week or so ago, one of the online shopping sites I frequent was selling Eee PCs on the cheap. The Eee PC has been one of those computers I've liked the idea of but couldn't justify the original price of $500 on. Now that the price is close to $300 I figured it's was worth getting. I reviewed the Eee PC for Australian Macworld when it was first released but, as is sometimes the case with product reviews, my "play time" was a little limited.

Let me start by saying that the Eee PC is a wonderful computer. Out of the box, it's easy to use and has almost all the apps one needs to be productive. My plan is to use the Eee PC in meetings, interviews, for the odd Skype call (Skype is included without any need to install extra software) and in my studies. This is where it starts to get annoying.

I really only need one extra application installed on my Eee PC - the Bible. I need to be able to read the bible and search for specific text quickly and efficiently. On my Mac I do this using Macsword. The Sword project and others have produced many different open source Bible applications so I figured this would be five minute task.

My problem with the Eee PC, running Linux, is that installing software is a bitch. I've spent many hours trying to install applications from repositories using Synaptic. Accessing that requires that you launch a terminal (like a DOS prompt for the Windows folk out there) press Ctrl-Alt-t and then enter the following at a command prompt

sudo synaptic

This runs an application that after much fiddling lets you download application packages. I found a package that had the right software for me and tried to install it but got an error that a file I needed was incompatible. OK, these things happen. I then searched for the file I needed, installed it and it crippled my system. Fortunately, getting the Eee PC back to factory condition is very simple and only takes a few minutes.

After spending yet more time I discover that installing application onto Linux (the Eee PC runs a version of Xandros) is really, bloody hard for regular users. I've been messing around under the covers of Windows since Windows 3.0/DOS 5 and with Macs for about five years and installing applications was never this hard.

Now, it's easy for me to be really critical but I'd like to offer some simple advice. can the developers working long and hard on the various Linux distributions out there do the following - please.

1. Get together and standardise the names of commands. If I run a script for Xandros, the same commands should execute on other linux distros and vice versa.
2. Make installing applications really easy. personally, I like the Mac way. Distribute a package (zip, tar, dmg, whatever) and give users a single place to drag/drop it. Synaptics is OK but adding repositories and the like is not for regular, mum and dad users.

Linux has come a long way in making the user interface more friendly and straightening out installation processes for the OS. Getting Linux on to a computer is almost trivially simple. The challenge is to overcome the next step. Until then, I suspect my Eee PC will end up running (shudder) Windows XP as I can easily get applications up and running.

The iPhone 3G has finally made the leap from rumour to reality. Despite all the speculation, there's just one model, with a 3.5", 480-by-320 display. Comms are covered by WiFi, Bluetooth and UMTS/HSDPA (850, 1900, 2100 MHz) and there's fallback to EDGE and GPRS. GPS is now part of the package as well. The camera's still a 2MP unit and it comes in either black or white (according to the Australian Apple Store). There's no word yet on whether Jailbreaked apps will run.

Australian iPhone availability starts on 11 July 2008 with only two carriers officially on the list - Vodafone and Optus. No word yet from Three (although they have made announcements regarding other territories so, given the month before official availability we might expect something soon) or Telstra. I suspect that Telstra might not be hgh on Apple's list of potential carriers given their infamous "stick to your knitting" outburst.

Optus is taking a $100 deposit for a place in the queue and there's no guarantee that the iphone will be available in every Optus store.

Personally, I'd rather walk in to a shop, make sure they have stock and just buy one. I'm with another carrier but given that I have some flexibility I might just look to make a change as I just have to have the latest and greatest.

The iPhone is listed on Apple's Australian online store but that just directs you you Optus' and Vodafone's web sites.

Other than Optus' $100 deposit queue holding payment there's no other indication of pricing so it would seem that until some further announcements are made it's worth holding back on any commitment. I suspect that pricing announcements will be made at the last possible moment so that there's little chance of one carrier undercutting the other.

I recently purchased an iPod touch. This would be the fifth iPod (I've owned a 4th gen, two fifth gen and a Shuffle) and it is by far the best. The user interface is a thing of beauty and the hardware is sublime. If you think I'm sounding like an impartial fan-boy, remember, I've been using handhelds since the very early Palm days, I've owned at least one device in every generation on the Windows mobile side of things and have tested gazillions of different smartphones running other operating systems. The iPod touch (we don't yet have the iPhone officially in Australia) has only one deficiency - a lack of storage capacity - and there's a 32GB option that costs less than many PDAs from just a couple of years ago that boasted on 128MB of memory.

However, despite all this, there was one serious deficiency - applications. Apple's walled garden approach meant that you could run any software you liked as long as it came from Apple. Fortunately, there's a easy way around this. My 16GB iPod touch has been updated to the latest firmware, 1.1.4, and has the software update that adds Mail, Google Maps and some other stuff. And I've added one more thing...

I decided to jailbreak my iPod touch so that I could run third party applications. I know I could wait for Apple to open their promised App Store but that's a whole week away - who can wait that long? After chatting to a couple of friends who have jailbreaked their iPods I settled on Ziphone. Ziphone loads an application catalog that lets you choose and then download apps directly to the iPod touch (or iPhone).

My first attempts to load Ziphone resulted in panic - my iPod touch was bricked. However, there are easy instructions on Apple's web site to resolve this. You need to put the device into Recovery Mode. This reloads the default firmware to the iPod so you're back in factory condition. My iPod touch was quite full so I started by restoring the iPod so there was no data on it and then jailbreaking it.

The result is that I have a fully functional iPod touch with all of Apple's original functionality as well as the ability to install third party applications. I now have the ultimate handheld - till I get my 2nd Generation iPhone.