Can I ( how do I ) do the requested PDA programming project?

I have been asked to consider doing a PDA based programming project,
and since this is a new area of development for me I was hoping someone
could tell me if what I am being asked to do is possible etc.

Over all project description:
This is a data capture application, think of it as an ongoing survey.
Every so often ( several time a day ) the PDA needs to 'wake up', play
a sound to notify the user, then ask the user a series of multiple
choice, true/false type questions. Next after a few days the PDA will
be brought to a location for the data to be dumped into a
laptop/desktop
system for data analysis.
This is for a 'medical' research study, the idea is to ask how the
subject is feeling etc so we can see how the treatment is working.
There is of course all kinds of details like data encryption, data
storage etc. but those tasks I feel that I am capable of handling.

My developmen status:
While I have been developing for 25+ years, for the last ~15 years I
have been doing mostly Visual FoxPro ( or it's earlier versions ). I
have recently been learning .Net and C# but I am a
beginner at best with it. OOP and general programming skills I am
advance at, so I will be doing lots of what is the command to 'X'.
Furthermore I have never owned and only play very limitedly with PDAs
of any type.

My Questions:

a) Is my assumption that using 2003 .net ( or even the 2005 beta .net )
will allow me to 'easily' program a pocket PC based PDA

b) Can the application wake up every so often to alert the user? I'm
thinking that for power management reason it would have to power down
for a while. Maybe PDAs can run for a week with out having to shut
down. I expect a weeks is about the time lapse between data dumps.

The again the PDAs will most likely be recharged each nght. Side
question if some other application is running on the PDA ( There should
not be, but lets be prepared ) can this application keep running in the
background and come forward to get it's survey questions answered.

c) Since this application is the only thing that needs to run on this
PDA, what is the least expensive model that I should purchase. ( This
project might need up to 80 PDAs )

d) Should I consider other PDAs and Oss like Palm? Would this result in
significant hardware/software costs reductions.

e) Is there anything obvious that I missed?

Thank you so much for your time.

__________________
Anthony T.

r_z_aret
Tue Nov 01 13:03:19 CST 2005

I am definitely biased, but think buying is likely to be less
expensive than building your own. It will certainly be faster. Please
contact me or check our web site (see signature).

More below (in line).


On 29 Oct 2005 16:00:42 -0700, "AnthonyT" <altcs@mindspring.com>
wrote:

>I have been asked to consider doing a PDA based programming project,
>and since this is a new area of development for me I was hoping someone
>could tell me if what I am being asked to do is possible etc.
>
>Over all project description:
>This is a data capture application, think of it as an ongoing survey.
>Every so often ( several time a day ) the PDA needs to 'wake up', play
>a sound to notify the user, then ask the user a series of multiple
>choice, true/false type questions. Next after a few days the PDA will
>be brought to a location for the data to be dumped into a
>laptop/desktop
>system for data analysis.

The questionnaire part can be rather straight forward.

>This is for a 'medical' research study, the idea is to ask how the
>subject is feeling etc so we can see how the treatment is working.
>There is of course all kinds of details like data encryption, data
>storage etc. but those tasks I feel that I am capable of handling.

I gather that you, the programmer, are close to the folks who will be
deploying your app. So you will have minimal layers between you and
the users. Also, you are not building a mission-critical application
that will be deployed to many users, so you can be at least a bit
relaxed about code revisions.

Encryption and storage are generally the trickiest pieces. So if
you're comfortable with them, you may be in good shape.


>
>My developmen status:
>While I have been developing for 25+ years, for the last ~15 years I
>have been doing mostly Visual FoxPro ( or it's earlier versions ). I
>have recently been learning .Net and C# but I am a
>beginner at best with it. OOP and general programming skills I am
>advance at, so I will be doing lots of what is the command to 'X'.
>Furthermore I have never owned and only play very limitedly with PDAs
>of any type.

I just used google (http://groups.google.com/advanced_group_search) to
look up
foxpro
in this newsgroup and got 34 hits. I took a quick look and _think_
you'll find at least a few useful leads/thoughts. I _think_ several
similar products exist, but don't use any of them.


>
>My Questions:
>
>a) Is my assumption that using 2003 .net ( or even the 2005 beta .net )
>will allow me to 'easily' program a pocket PC based PDA

I use C/C++ straight Win32, so I can't judge alternatives well. But
for the UI part of your project, VB.NET and C#, along with the
resource editor in Visual Studio, should do handle a lot of the
details, and thus make your life easier.


>
>b) Can the application wake up every so often to alert the user? I'm
>thinking that for power management reason it would have to power down
>for a while. Maybe PDAs can run for a week with out having to shut
>down. I expect a weeks is about the time lapse between data dumps.

CeRunAppAtEvent can trigger such events. And that will definitely
improve battery life. A week is possible for at least some devices.
You might want to store the data on some sort of persistent medium
(that will survive even if the battery goes). The app will be a bit
slower, but probably still way faster than the users.


>
>The again the PDAs will most likely be recharged each nght. Side
>question if some other application is running on the PDA ( There should
>not be, but lets be prepared ) can this application keep running in the
>background and come forward to get it's survey questions answered.

Yes.


>
>c) Since this application is the only thing that needs to run on this
>PDA, what is the least expensive model that I should purchase. ( This
>project might need up to 80 PDAs )

Chris De Herrera has a great site for such info. In particular, he has
a good chart comparing WM 5 devices:
http://www.pocketpcfaq.com/faqs/comparison/wm50ppc.php
But it doesn't give prices. I've been happy with my Dell, and think
they have some for < $150 U.S.

But before you go for least expensive, you might consider rugged
devices. Several companies make Pocket PCs that can handle water
and/or being dropped. They are definitely more expensive (> $1000),
but may be less expensive if the less expensive ones need to be
replaced often.


>
>d) Should I consider other PDAs and Oss like Palm? Would this result in
>significant hardware/software costs reductions.
>
>e) Is there anything obvious that I missed?

See my note at the top:-)

>
>Thank you so much for your time.
>
>__________________
>Anthony T.

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