[08.10.2007 first posted on silicon republic]
Thanks to new technology, breaking free of deskbound drudgery has never been easier or more rewarding.

Time was, working from home or away from the office meant being a second-class citizen in technology terms.
While colleagues back at base had fast internet access and easily available applications, home office workers and field sales executives often had to contend with slow connectivity or limited access to critical business information.
Not any more. What’s changed, in a word, is mobility. Laptop demand far exceeds that for desktops as mobile PCs make good on their portable promise.
“Mobile broadband is going to bring the usability of your notebook up another notch,” says Martin Cullen (pictured), general manager of the personal systems group with HP Ireland.
Now internet access comes to the user, no wires attached. The massive pent-up demand for 3G mobile broadband technology was vividly illustrated by recent figures from ComReg, showing 45,000 subscriptions alone in the six months to June 2007.
Operators are pitching 3G mobile broadband as a viable alternative to fixed-line connections. You don’t have to subscribe to a particular mobile operator to use its broadband service, but there are cost savings to be had this way.
O2 pay monthly business customers can get mobile broadband for €24.79 per month, with the first three months available for half price. Standard customers pay €33.06 a month. Vodafone charges a similar rate, although the modem costs slightly more at €81.83. (All prices exclude Vat.)
Colm McVeigh, director of the enterprise business unit with Vodafone, says people’s greater willingness to use mobiles as their only phone is helping to push the concept that internet access works the same way. “There’s been significant acceleration in adoption and usage,” he reports.. “We’ve seen growth in the last quarter in the region of 50pc. It’s touched on a user need that’s out there.”
Similarly O2 Ireland offers a range of products and services for business customers working remotely, whether from home or while travelling, says Billy D’Arcy, head of business markets with O2 Ireland.
“PDAs such as the BlackBerry or the Xda have become hugely popular for enabling people to keep on top of email while they’re out and about,” he says.
There are various flavours of push email available: BlackBerry tends to be for larger enterprises but there are alternatives for small firms.
“The other market trend is the rising importance of Microsoft Exchange in the push email market,” says McVeigh. Combined phone and email devices in this category include the Palm Treo and Nokia E Series.
Edel Creely, commercial director with Datapac, says providing email and calendaring functions to remote workers through Microsoft Exchange is cost-effective and starts paying for itself quickly because of the improved productivity that staff gain.
“It’s not typically very expensive to run with it. It’s probably fair to say that mobility is a question for most firms.
“When they’re buying the technology now, this feature is available. It’s not something extra they have to buy. The potential to do it is there and it doesn’t take a lot of extra effort to make it happen.”
“That’s just the tip of the iceberg,” adds D’Arcy, who points out that O2 also provides a service called AccessMyLan, which offers an easy and secure way to remotely view documents stored on an office server.
“The availability of these services is encouraging Irish businesses to embrace remote working, providing greater flexibility for many of their employees,” D’Arcy states.
The ‘push’ concept is being expanded so that other business applications can be delivered to mobile handsets or computers.
Barbara D’Introno, volume product manager with Fujitsu Siemens, says these kinds of applications are popular in sectors such as healthcare, insurance, logistics and transport: “You can get tablet PC devices that are convertible notebooks for customers needing pen input or handwriting recognition.”
Cullen gives the example of the construction industry, where orders for raw materials could be placed via a handheld and sent wirelessly back to the office. “That’s a very practical example of mobility at work, and you don’t have the risk of inaccurate information through sending orders by fax and paper forms,” he says.
These kinds of projects are usually more complex than enabling email, according to Creely. There are flexible ways of providing data to remote users. “From a security perspective, you might want to define that if someone is logging on from an internet café, they can only see their email but not business applications,” she says. “You need to ask all the questions at the start and find out what people need to access and where do they need it.”
In a nod to the growing popularity of broadband, the leading laptop manufacturers are including embedded 3G as standard with their business machines. “There’s no need for a PC card; you just put in a SIM card and go online any time,” says D’Introno.
Sometimes the advantages of being mobile are outweighed - literally - by the strain of lugging around a heavy laptop. To counter this, lighter form factors are now available.
“O2-commissioned research, which examines the technology needs and wants of the SME market in Ireland, has shown that 46pc of owner managers now work from home at least once a month and 24pc do so more than four times a month,” according to D’Arcy.
It confirms many of the new working trends and the signs clearly point to a workforce no longer tied down by wires.
By Gordon Smith