Noun

Singular personal digital assistant

Plural personal digital assistants

personal digital assistant (plural personal digital assistants)

1. A hand-held electronic organizer or computer (abbr. PDA).

Synonyms

• palmtopA small computer that literally fits in your palm. Compared to full-size computers, palmtops are severely limited, but they are practical for certain functions such as phone books and calendars. Palmtops that use a pen rather than a keyboard for input are often called hand-held computers or PDAs.

Because of their small size, most palmtop computers do not include disk drives. However, many contain PCMCIA slots in which you can insert disk drives, modems, memory, and other devices.

A personal digital assistant (PDA), also known as a palmtop computer, is a mobile device which functions as a personal information manager and has the abiltity to connect to the internet. The PDA has an electronic visual display enabling it to include a web browser, but some newer models also have audio capabilities, enabling them to be used as mobile phones or portable media players. Many PDAs can access the internet, intranets or extranets via Wi-Fi, or Wireless Wide Area Networks (WWANs). Many PDAs employ touch screen technology.

The term PDA was first used on January 7, 1992, by Apple Computer CEO John Sculley at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Nevada, referring to the Apple Newton. In 1996, Nokia introduced the first mobile phone with full PDA functionality, the 9000 Communicator, which has since grown to become the world's best-selling PDA and which spawned a category of phones called the smartphone. Today the vast majority of all PDAs are smartphones, selling over 150 million units while non-phone ("stand-alone") PDAs sell only about 3 million units per year. The RIM BlackBerry, Apple iPhone, Nokia N-Series, and HTC are typical smartphone brands.