IrDA is the standard wireless communication protocol used by most new notebook PCs, palmtops, and may cordless appliances such as cell phones.

IrDA is a convenient way to communicate with a device without the hassle (and in some cases, hazard) of wires and cables.

Palmtops such as the Palm series and the Handspring Visor devices are relatively low cost, have a wide range of development tools (such as the Java KVM), and include IrDA.

A Palmtop device then is a natural choice as a user interface to an ethernet node such as TINI. This is even more true now that Java KVM is available for the Palm and Visor. The new color Palm IIIc makes possible a color interface.

Palmtop devices have much greater battery life than sub-notebook PCs, they are smaller, lighter, and lower cost. This could all change in a few months (and probably will).

TINI doesn't have a user interface. So rather than build on the hardware to TINI, why not create an ephemeral link to it via IrDA and use the hardware you already have - a Palm or Visor?

Goal #1: demo some interchange of data between a Palmtop and TINI at Java One 2000. This has been achieved.

Goal #2: to be determined. Ultimately implement ORBEX the object layer so that IR code could be written on the Palm in Java.