I had a client who had challenges with this the other day.
Why call forward?
Here are just a few reasons why people do.

• If you might be out of your carrier coverage range
  
• You want to use landline phone when you are at home
  
• You carry 2 phones and want to consolidate to 1 phone for a short period of time
  

How?
On most cell phones:

• Go to Menu
  
• Settings
  
• Call forward
  
• Select call forwarding
  

Things to consider:

• For most carriers, you must still be in their network coverage to activate and deactivate.
  
• If you select “when unavailable,” it will still ring the phone being called first
  
• Best if you select “all calls,” this will forward all calls immediately
  

*Some manufacturer’s phone menu are not as intuitive. Please review your phone manual for instructions. If you have lost yours, the support section of the manufacturers web site usually has downloads of handset manuals.
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I get a lot of clients who have children, particularly teens, texting them all the time. They    often complain of understanding their short hand text with smiley faces and different punctuations to communicate various emotions.

 The fact that this is being done is actually a good thing. Before it was just a fun thing, or laziness to type and write. Now it’s a cost savings. At up to $.15 a text message to receive, you may want to get as much communication in one text as possible.

Anyway, I decided to put together a main list of what many people use. While this may not cover them all, this is most of the popular ones.

:-)               Happy face: funny or laughing, friendliness, sarcasm
:D               Super Happy or big smile
:(                Sad Face
;-)               Winking
:->              Follows a really sarcastic remark
:/                Wry face
((hug))         a hug
All Caps       Yelling

Want more? While there are more created all the time, this link will cover the common ones. Click here for more.

For many people, their cell phones are their life line. It’s even truer in an emergency situation. What would happen if you were unconscious or unable to tell the EMT who to call if God forbid you were in an accident. 

Well after most notably 9/11 and other incidents, a British EMT Bob Brotchie developed the ICE initiative. Cell users would be encouraged to put ICE and acronym for “in case of emergency,” before the people in the phone address book. Ex. “ICE – Mom or “ICE-Kelly.” 

This simple idea may save valuable time In case of a disaster or emergency. Currently Paramedics and other emergency personnel must look through wallets, etc. for clues. Many people put their spouse in their phone book by name, making it difficult to identify the entry they need to call. They are left guessing if you have any allergies or who to call. 

Bottom line, Input an ICE entry. Hopefully it will never have to be used. But if it does, those precious minutes could make a difference.        

Do you get lots of usage charges on your cell bill because of all the 411 you use?

Well Google Mobile offers FREE number look up via SMS text messaging. If you do not know how to text message, find a teenager. While you may still incur up to $0.15 per text, its better than the $1.49 most carriers charge.

Google SMS is an easy way to get listings of local restaurants, businesses, or whatever info you need. Just text to the short code 46645 (GOOGL on most phones) and you will usually get an answer in about a minute or two.

If you start using SMS text messaging a lot, then get a small text package to begin with. Regardless, it should save you money. I have seen people spend as much as $100 on 411 use.

Do you want more realistic surfing on your phone?

Opera mini offers a more web like experience than your old WAP (Web Access Protocol). Opera optimizes and renders quickly. It is compatible with just about any current model phones.
                                            

I will spare you all the  technical jargon and explanation. Bottom line you will like it better. See for yourself @ http://www.operamini.com/demo/

What I love… you can download over the air. You can do it traditionally via your PC, but then, that is not the Wireless Warrior way. Best part? Its FREE!

Negatives…still tough to read some sites and will take you a click more.
Overall though, it makes it worth it to surf via cell phone.

Oh no! I just dropped my phone! It’s smashed in a million pieces. It’s water damaged. It’s just plain broken. If any of these things ever happened to you, you know what a nightmare it is getting all the numbers from your phone. Not to mention time consuming.

For many, this is the only place you have kept your numbers. No PDAs, No Outlook, No paper, No NOTHING. Unfortunately, most people still just use a plain cell phone and do not sync their info and back up their numbers. 

If you are a GSM user, meaning you use either Cingular, Now the New at&t (gotta get use to saying that) or T-Mobile, you might be in luck. GSM phones (this is why I love GSM) use a SIM (Subscriber Identity Module) card.

This SIM card identify you the user, phone number and stores up to 250 phone numbers. Often times, the manufacturer design the phone software to save your phonebook entry to the SIM. Sometimes you have to specify. Many times even if you damage your phone your information, specifically, phone numbers which most people care most about, are still in tact. Although, if you drop it in water or even juice, soda, etc ( I have heard them all from my clients) you may have totally damaged your SIM and you our out of luck. If you are a CDMA user, Verizon, Sprint, Alltel and other U.S. carriers, you do not have a SIM and definitely are out of luck. Unless…you have backed up your phone. There are several ways to back up your phone.

For GSM users there is a USB SIM reader. It comes with software and you can actually type on a PC first and load it back on your phone. This is great if you are a gadget junky and like to switch phones often.   For others who are not on GSM, there are software’s like  Snapsync and Data Pilot. Their various products can back up your numbers, music, media, wallpapers, and just about anything you can put on your phone.

Data Pilot even has versions that work with Macs! It’s a little steep though if you are cost conscious. Their products run from $19.99-$79.99 depending what you are syncing and if you have the sync cable to your phone or not.

My favorite option is the software the phone manufacturer produces. The software is often free or at a low cost on the OEM website. NOKIA and Samsung gives theirs away. Motorola charges up a small fee depending on where you look.

All you have to due is get the cable for it which can range from $9.99 to $59.99. The later usually comes with the software on CD. The OEM is usually easy to use and has a lot of cool features like SMS texting from your PC using your phone contacts.

You can even sync to Outlook or other PIMs (Personal Information Management). Also, it can be used as modem software for your laptop if you have purchased that feature from your carrier. The only catch is if you decide to switch to another manufacturer’s device, then you will need to switch software and sync cable.
Now a days, many phones are Bluetooth and you can wirelessly connect to your PC or laptop if it is Bluetooth capable.
 
I recommend syncing it weekly or anytime you have added info on your phone. It is a huge time saver. Do it now and you will thank me one day.

Tired of lugging around your heavy laptop? Would your like to use your Blackberry or Windows Mobile to do your Powerpoint presentations? Now you can.
Many people would like to be able to carry just the smaller, lighter PDA device instead of their laptop. With the lower prices of LCD projectors, most companies have their own and allow the sales person or presenter to use theirs. Presentations are the one thing holding many back from having to carry their clunky laptop too.
 There is an accessory for Windows Mobile, Palm OS, or Blackberry devices to able to present Powerpoint off their mobile device.
The first is the Margi Presenter-to-Go. They have versions for Windows Mobile/Pocket PC, Palm OS. Depending on the model of your device you will need to choose either Compact Flash Type I/II expansion slot version or the SDIO. Go to the Margi link to check which version this device will support. If you can still find them online it is priced around $199.99. Unfortunately there are no longer supporting this and only a few sellers are left who have them. But if you like to stay wired, you still can find them out in cyberspace.
Margi has now created the Wireless Presenter which is integrated with some HP model projectors. These are small and light and best of all wireless. No need for cables. You can even use your Wireless WiFi or Bluetooth device to connect and do your presentation from up to 30 feet away for Bluetooth and 100 feet for WiFi.    
 For both Blackberry users and PDA users with Bluetooth, there is the Impatica Showmate(click here to get 10%off) It is a small, lightweight hardware accessory to project PowerPoint presentations wirelessly from a handheld device. You simply attach the ShowMate to the VGA port of any projector or monitor and your handheld delivers your PowerPoint presentation wirelessly using Bluetooth technology. You can now roam the stage and interact with the audience to deliver a more engaging presentation, without being tethered to a laptop. In fact, you can now travel without your laptop! It retails for $249.99. If you do a lot of presentations, it’s worth it! Wireless Warrior

Thanks to the Energy Policy Act of 2005, we will start Daylight Saving Time three weeks earlier and cause havoc to our clock and calendar for PCs and PDA devices. What will happen if you do not update your device before March 11, 2007 @ 2 AM? Appointments and their reminders might appear 1 hour late on your PDA device if the appointments start in one of the following windows in any year: 

Tired of spending a lot of time listening to long voice mails after voice mails? Trying to retrieve voice mail in a loud environment? Would like to know who called and why while in a meeting? Well fear no more. I have found a great service that will automatically converts the voicemail message to text, and sends it straight to your mobile phone or email inbox - or both! While the system doesn’t transcribe it perfectly it does a pretty good job. It spells things correctly most of the time but like in life tends to butcher non traditional names. It will display the phone number it came from and if you want you can click the audio later to listen to the voicemail if you need to. Services There are several services out there like Dictomail, Spinvox, Simulscribe and Phonewire. I lean towards Simulscribe because of their interface but you may browse a few of them and see which is best for you.