In the course of various discussions involving RHS Wisley, it has come 
to my attention that my sister's mobile phone appears to be able to 
access the Internet somehow. Does anybody happen to know how that's 
possible?

Obviously the entire purpose for a mobile phone existing is to perform 
wireless communications. Back when my mum was a travelling engineer 
(many, many years ago), her works laptop had wireless Internet access. 
The way it did this was to basically use a normal dialup modem, but 
instead of plugging it in to a land-line, it effectively made a call via 
GSM.

It's still modulating the digital data into audible tones and sends them 
to a server somewhere which demodulates them into digital data before 
sending it over the Internet. It's just that the connection is GSM 
rather than copper.

Oh, and if you thought a 56k modem was slow, try doing it over GSM. Then 
you will know what "slow" actually is. :-P

I'm also aware that various wireless LAN technologies exist. But that 
requires you to either find a location with free Wi-Fi, or somebody with 
an unsecured wireless access point. Neither of these things are 
especially rare (although the latter is strictly speaking "theft"). But 
I'm not sure that's how the phone actually works.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:
> In the course of various discussions involving RHS Wisley, it has come 
> to my attention that my sister's mobile phone appears to be able to 
> access the Internet somehow. Does anybody happen to know how that's 
> possible?

  Cellphones send and receive digital data to/from the phone company.
What's so strange in supporting the reception of web pages in addition
to digitized voice?

  If you want the nitty gritty details, start here and navigate the links
as needed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3G

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 08/07/2011 9:27 AM, Invisible wrote:
> In the course of various discussions involving RHS Wisley, it has come
> to my attention that my sister's mobile phone appears to be able to
> access the Internet somehow. Does anybody happen to know how that's
> possible?

Magic! Before making an internet connection someone must kill a chicken 
and study its guts... ;-)

Mobile phones are no longer analogue and have been digital for some 
while. This makes it easier. And if you thought a 56k modem was slow 
then you should have been around when 9k6 bit/s was standard.

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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On 08/07/2011 09:40 AM, Warp wrote:
> Invisible<voi### [at] devnull>  wrote:
>> In the course of various discussions involving RHS Wisley, it has come
>> to my attention that my sister's mobile phone appears to be able to
>> access the Internet somehow. Does anybody happen to know how that's
>> possible?
>
>    Cellphones send and receive digital data to/from the phone company.
> What's so strange in supporting the reception of web pages in addition
> to digitized voice?

Not "strange" - obviously from a theoretical point of view this ought to 
be quite simple - I'm just surprised that the practical stuff required 
to do this has actually been implemented now.

>    If you want the nitty gritty details, start here and navigate the links
> as needed: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/3G

Oh, is *that* what 3G actually means?

(I somehow came away with the impression that 3G was a meaningless 
marketing buzzword with no technical basis.)

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Stephen <mcavoys_at@aoldotcom> wrote:
> Mobile phones are no longer analogue and have been digital for some 
> while.

  The last analogue cellphone probably died a horrible death in the
mid-90's.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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On 08/07/2011 9:56 AM, Warp wrote:
> Stephen<mcavoys_at@aoldotcom>  wrote:
>> Mobile phones are no longer analogue and have been digital for some
>> while.
>
>    The last analogue cellphone probably died a horrible death in the
> mid-90's.
>

No, I'm sure it was put out to pasture. :-)

-- 
Regards
     Stephen

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Le 08/07/2011 10:41, Stephen nous fit lire :
> Magic! Before making an internet connection someone must kill a chicken
> and study its guts... ;-)

I thought it was a goat that was to be killed, and the study of its liver.

Now, where are my bones of sheep and would you mind if I burn a hellfire
over here ?

3G: the G is for Generation, the third.

Nothing related to Dilbert 26 march 2010.

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>
> I'm just surprised that the practical stuff required
> to do this has actually been implemented now.
>

NOW!?!??  I realise you live in a backwoods third world country, but 
here in the civilized world, phones have been hable to browse the 
Internet since the early 2000s or so...

-- 
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/*        @        */{P(0,a)P(a,b)P(b,c)P(2*a,2*b)P(2*b,b+c)P(b+c,<2,3>)
/*   gmail.com     */}camera{orthographic location<6,1.25,-6>look_at a }

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On 08/07/2011 02:48 PM, Francois Labreque wrote:

>>
>> I'm just surprised that the practical stuff required
>> to do this has actually been implemented now.
>>
>
> NOW!?!?? I realise you live in a backwoods third world country, but here
> in the civilized world, phones have been hable to browse the Internet
> since the early 2000s or so...

When I said "it works now", I didn't mean to imply that this happened 
recently. I don't follow mobile technology particularly closely; it's 
not something of great use to me. (Also, I'm presuming that this 
requires an extremely expensive phone with an extremely expensive 
service plan. That would be another reason why I've never heard of it.)

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On 07/08/2011 11:33 AM, Invisible wrote:
> On 08/07/2011 02:48 PM, Francois Labreque wrote:

>>>
>>> I'm just surprised that the practical stuff required
>>> to do this has actually been implemented now.
>>>
>>
>> NOW!?!?? I realise you live in a backwoods third world country, but here
>> in the civilized world, phones have been hable to browse the Internet
>> since the early 2000s or so...
>
> When I said "it works now", I didn't mean to imply that this happened
> recently. I don't follow mobile technology particularly closely; it's
> not something of great use to me. (Also, I'm presuming that this
> requires an extremely expensive phone with an extremely expensive
> service plan. That would be another reason why I've never heard of it.)
>
most plans have free phone associated with them now ... didn't pay a 
dime for mine, also my plan isn't that much (don't recall) as I don't 
use the cell for primary communication. I'm in rural area and just have 
the phone in case I get stranded on some out of the way country road ... 
particularly a good idea to have a cell during winter.

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