Semantic Werks

G. H. Forman, J. Zahorjan, “The Challenges of Mobile Computing,” IEEE Computer, Vol. 27, No. 4, (April 1994), pp. 38-47.

… we survey the principal challenges faced by software designers of a mobile computing system.

Looks at three issues: communication, mobility, and portability.
Wireless is always lower quality than wired, due to interference etc. which may increase latency (eg. rebroadcasts)
Talks briefly about techniques for dealing with low bandwidth – logging, compression. I think it is important to consider bandwidth as a limiting and valuable resource.
Security concerns: I don’t really understand this completely – isn’t the issue that the signal is slightly easier to grab? Theoretically one could tap into a wire too, no? The underlying message must be secured, because relying on the fact it’s harder to tap a wire is not all that secure. And is it me, or does all security discussion end up with a caveat like “provided you trust X, this protocol is secure…”