﻿ Can phones and tablets do "real work?" | ZDNet  Can phones and
tablets do "real work?"  Summary: Some readers were skeptical
that "real work" could be done on a tablet. Get over yourselves!
People did "real work" even before computers were invented.  In
Will iPhones replace desktops? and When will the iPad replace
desktops? I touched a nerve with some people who dismissed the
iPad as a "viewing device" and missed the larger picture: a
tablet has a network, a display, a CPU, storage and runs
programs. It is a computer and it can do real work.  Will
tablets and smartphones wipe out notebooks and desktops? No, no
more than PCs wiped out servers and supercomputers. But let's
step back and think about what "real work" really is.  It's
simple Charles Babbage, who conceived the first stored program
computer, sold it as a tool to compute astronomical and
mathematical tables. The first general-purpose electronic
computer in the US, ENIAC was designed to calculate artillery
firing tables for the United States Army's