• Stage 1: New, use for everything, seek out add-on applications, HotSync daily, talk about PalmPilot every chance you get.
• Stage 2: A few months old, use for just a few features, HotSync once a month, and only discuss when necessary.
• Stage 3: The Re-Birth - Use often, look for new value applications and ways to use the PalmPilot more regularly.

I am in Stage 3. One application that I have had for a long time, but only recently found useful is Image Viewer. This program was originally discussed in the February 1998 issue of PalmPower in the article called "Displaying Pictures on Your PalmPilot" (see http://www.palmpower.com/issues/issue199802/picturepilot001.html). In that article Bob Freud explains in detail how to find and set up Image Viewer and Image Converter. These programs allow you to take images you have in your computer and put them onto your PalmPilot. These programs will both be very useful, but not essential to the content in this article.

I took the February article, downloaded the software and went to work. In the end I found that photographs generally do not translate very well to the PalmPilot, but maps do. In fact many simple high contrast images do, complex grainy images do not. I also found that the map feature on Yahoo in conjunction with these programs may be very useful to you. Between the February article by Bob Freud and this one you may begin to benefit from the use of these applications. If you travel to unfamiliar places, there are some very powerful tools that may be of use to you.

Street Maps
In conjunction with Yahoo (see http://www.yahoo.com), the PalmPilot can be a personal travel companion. When making sales calls or going to business appointments where I do not know where I am going, I get onto Yahoo and use the Map feature to locate the address. [Be wary of over-reliance on Yahoo directions and take a spare map. Your editor-in-chief once found himself in the middle of a quarry instead of the office complex the Yahoo directions indicated.] An example of a Yahoo map is shown in Figure A.

FIGURE A


This is a typical Yahoo map. Roll over picture for a larger image.

I took the map and load it onto the PalmPilot. Here are the step-by-step instruction on how to get a Yahoo map into the PalmPilot via Windows 95/NT:

1. On your Windows 95/NT browser go to http://www.yahoo.com.
2. Select Maps.
3. Enter the address you are interested in finding or the two points for driving directions.
4. Look at the map and select appropriate view (zoom in or out to get appropriate detail).
5. Right click on your mouse and select copy. This may also be done from the Edit menu.
6. Start the Image Converter program.
7. Select "Load From Clipboard".
8. Click "Preview".
9. Click on "Convert".
10. HotSync your PalmPilot.