| Abstract: |
In recent years, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs) have been successfully used in many areas. However, PDAs are still primarily used for PIM (Personal Information Management) functions such as scheduling and organizational tasks. PDAs are not frequently used for taking notes. Even though digital documents are legible, searchable and editable compared with paper documents, class notes are still produced with pen and paper. Obviously reasons are limitations of PDAs, such as poor resolution and limited screen size. Another reason is the characteristics of taking notes. Lecture notes are produced under time constraints and contain diagrams, sketches and texts. Capturing heterogeneous information remains a serious challenge to take notes on PDAs.
In order to overcome these difficulties, we implemented an application to support PDA- based note taking. This application allows a user to write notes directly on lecture slides. Later, the user can view, edit, delete, or even transfer notes to a desktop pc for further editing. Based on user testing, we think taking notes on PDAs is feasible, though significant challenges to a practical, PDA- based note taking application still exist. |
