Introduction
Wireless communications are becoming a major factor in our daily lives. The unbelievable processing power achieved by personal computers, the rise of the World Wide Web, the miraculous search engines and a myriad of applications, is changing the way we conduct our lives and increasing the demand for seamless wideband communications.
A series of technological innovations happened in the past twenty years that have significantly impacted our lives, but they occurred so smoothly that we adapted to them very easily:
- Personal computers came first and became the cornerstone that allowed the other innovations to follow. Word editors, Spreadsheets and Presentation software increased efficiency tenfold.
- Today, we count on the availability of wireless networks wherever we go. The offering became ubiquitous and wireless is displacing landlines, soon to be the dominant method of communications. Public pay phones are being virtually removed.
- Internet connectivity is a must and e-mails are overwhelmingly the main form of written communication. Soon hand-written letters will be a thing of the past also.
- GPS location is not yet fully explored, but paper maps are disappearing and many new and exciting applications are being developed.
All these fields are still evolving at a fast pace, one prompting the development of the other. Particularly in the wireless field the demand for ubiquitous broadband wireless communications is increasing and it will replace, over time, the existing ...
