Sharp Corp has a new family of portable data-entry terminals in Japan, which features a large-format semi-transparent touch screen. The new terminals weigh only 1 lb 12 oz in an A5 sized package, the lightest of that size on the market. The screen is equally readable in bright or dark locations. The terminals also features 300Kbps data transfers facilities, 10 times the speed of existing models, which can be used by connection to a host computer through a SCSI-3 interface. The terminals are intended for use by retailers for re-stocking, customer liaison support for banks and insurance companies, and package pick-up and delivery control. The application software was developed using a special version of Cobol to enable program control of devices specific to portable terminals. The price is around $2,755 and Sharp will be manufacturing 1,000 of the things per month.
