I started out with cell phones like everyone one else—the devices were just a convenient means of staying in touch with key people at work and at home. Certainly they were a step above the pager. I'll also admit I was far from an early adopter when it came to cell phones. I never walked around with a "bag phone" or had one permanently installed in my car.

Somewhere along the line, cell phones stopped being a necessary evil and became an integral part of my life. This fact doesn't mean my life revolves around my cell phone. You won't see me on it trying to eke out the last bit of work while a plane is boarding or while I'm standing in line. Nonetheless, I regard it as an indispensable part of my business toolkit.

However unlike a hammer or a screwdriver, I don't wear my cell phones down until I'm forced to replace them. Indeed, I hop from one device to another and one mobile operating system to another in the blink of an eye. Part of my disloyalty can be attributed to shiny object syndrome. Part of it is I'm still looking for the perfect solution to all my mobile needs.

How do my experiences contrast with enterprise behavior? Unlike me, have IT organizations found the perfect cell phone for their businesses?

Hot: Freedom of Choice

Sadly, no single cell phone solution exists for the enterprise. The more cell phone options an IT organization can offer, the happier the end users tend to be. Users want to choose between flip phones, sliders, candy-bar designs, touch-screen models, and more. But IT can't support everything. So how does an IT organization balance choice and standardization? We don't have to look far for this answer. We can find it in our desktops, laptops, and servers. The answer is you standardize on an OS that multiple hardware vendors support.

Which OS is supported by multiple vendors and available in a wide range of phone models? In terms of market share, the "hot" mobile operating system is Symbian OS. Symbian OS is supported by Motorola, Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, and others. Depending on which research firm you want to believe, the market share for Symbian OS is 50–75 percent—no other mobile OS comes close to that.

If Symbian OS is so great, why are Microsoft Windows Mobile and the open-source Android operating systems getting so much attention? Like Symbian OS, both are supported by multiple vendors. Unlike Symbian OS, they offer something else: broad application support. Major software vendors and corporations have begun writing applications to make the mobile phone more integral to the business. Application development is easily facilitated for Windows Mobile and Android because of existing programmer alignments. Symbian OS is simply not as familiar to programmers.

Please don't misunderstand me. I'm not predicting the death of Symbian OS. Any product with a greater than 50 percent market share is doing something right. However, I'm saying that choice is "hot" and that choice today embraces phone models and application support.

Not Hot: One Size Fits All

I'm sure you noticed that I didn't mention the Apple iPhone in the "hot" section. Many of you are probably thinking, "What the heck is wrong with you? The iPhone is the perfect device for mobile application development." That's true to a point. Yes, hundreds of applications have been developed for the iPhone. But the corporate world lacks expertise to develop, install, and support iPhone applications.

More important, the iPhone fails the hardware-choice test. How many different iPhone models can you choose from? There's no flip option, no slider option, no option with any keyboard. And how many vendors can you buy the iPhone from? Umm . . . that would be "one."

These same arguments apply to the other popular phone I didn't mention in the "hot" section: the Blackberry. The Blackberry OS isn't developer friendly in a broad sense, and the vendors behind the Blackberry don't exactly outnumber the vendors behind the iPhone (although at least there are more Blackberry phone models).

The bottom line is that, although these phones may have outstanding features and functionality (remember, I'm an iPhone user), they're definitely "not hot" when it comes to supporting IT's future needs.

Sean Chandler is a computer and network consultant who has more than 30 years of field experience. Astro, a border collie with more than 40 dog years of data processing experience, provides technical support to his master, Sean.

Astro's Pick of the Litter

Let's put business aside for a moment. My master has downloaded dozens of iPhone applications, and although each has its pros and cons, one has the ability to drop jaws in public: Shazam. With Shazam, you hold up an iPhone to a song in progress—perhaps one playing on the car radio or coursing through the speakers in a restaurant—and the app tells you the title and singer of the song. It is, paws down, the coolest application I've seen for the iPhone thus far (and remember, I've seen quite a few by now). It will truly amaze friends and family.

—Astro