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Phillip Torrone
www.fallon.com
www.flashenabled.com

A few years ago, Sony introduced a line of PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants) called the CLIÉ series. Many users consider these to be the best Palm-based PDAs on the market. According to Gartner Dataquest, Sony currently has about 20 percent of the United States PDA market share and roughly 13 percent worldwide. Depending on who you talk to, there are roughly 48 million PDAs worldwide, and about half of those are in the United States.

For a fairly new player in the PDA arena, Sony has exceeded many expectations in both design and market share, all in a very short period of time. It shouldn't be too much of a surprise however—Sony is one of the most comprehensive entertainment companies in the world with annual sales of over $57 billion.

For some, it's very clear that the attention to multimedia, user interface, and industrial design made the Sony CLIÉ Series an easy PDA choice. While the Sony CLIÉ has been the winner in multimedia features on the Palm platform, other mobile platforms, like the Pocket PC, have been the only way to play many forms of rich content. That is, until now. Macromedia Flash Player is now included on the next generation Palm OS 5-based PDAs from Sony.

Figure 1. The Sony CLIE NX (NX70V pictured).

Figure 1. The Sony CLIÉ NX (NX70V pictured).

The Sony CLIÉ NX series is the latest edition to the very popular Palm OS-based “Personal Entertainment Organizer” line of PDAs featuring a speedy new ARM-based processor, Video-MP3 player, optional Bluetooth, Wi-Fi support, voice recorder, still and full motion digital camera (NX 70V).

Before you begin, download the source files for this tutorial.


Windows		Macintosh
	sony_clie.zip (1.5 MB)		sony_clie.sit (1.5 MB)

This article covers the following topics:

·	Sony CLIÉ NX Series specifications
·	What is Macromedia Flash Player?
·	Using Macromedia Flash with the Sony CLIÉ
·	The MMFlash directory
·	Take a tour with Macromedia Flash Player for the Sony CLIÉ NX Series
·	Maximizing screen real estate
·	Getting Macromedia Flash content for the CLIÉ
·	Limitations and caveats when using Macromedia Flash Player for the Sony CLIÉ NX Series
·	Using Macromedia Flash to create content for the Sony CLIÉ NX Series
·	Resources to get you going

About the author
Phillip Torrone is well known in the handheld industry as a visionary and pioneer, having worked on several software and hardware projects including the Newton for Apple Computer. Phillip is director of Product Development at Fallon Worldwide (www.fallon.com): one of the world's most critically acclaimed creativity companies, delivering innovative strategic business solutions for some of the world's leading brands. Fallon recently released "The Hire" a series of Internet only films on BMWfilms.com by top directors in Hollywood. In addition to being a designer, developer, and inventor, Phillip is co-author of three books on rich media and device application development and runs the popular device site site: www.flashenabled.com/mobile/.