Handhelds Link to Inventory Database

Amid the crush of thousands of basketball and hockey fans, vendors of jerseys and other sports merchandise at the United Center arena in Chicago are using handheld computers linked via Oracle Lite to an Oracle8i database to track inventory and sales.
The $250,000 project shows how critical handheld computing has become in linking sales to inventory. The technology helps ensure that the United Center doesn't run low on coveted Michael Jordan jerseys and other products, said Joe Inzerillo, technical director at the arena, which is owned by the United Center Joint Venture in Chicago.
Handhelds with bar-code readers are used to check in merchandise to a warehouse, and handhelds are again used to record each sale a vendor makes. Meanwhile, the back-end database is used to track inventory and will soon be linked over an extranet to allow automatic ordering of needed merchandise.
Key to linking the handhelds to the center's Oracle8i database is Oracle Lite, 50KB client/server software that resides on 50 SPT 1700 handhelds equipped with bar-code readers from Symbol Technologies Inc. in Holtsville, N.Y., Inzerillo said. The handheld runs a Palm III operating system from Palm Computing Inc. in Santa Clara, Calif.
Early Review Favorable
Oracle Lite, Oracle Corp.'s thin-client database for Java, appeared on the market last year, and analysts said the United Center seems to be one of the first customers that's willing to talk publicly about using it. Inzerillo said it was an obvious choice because the United Center has had an Oracle8i server for three years and it was already familiar with Oracle products and services.
"The Oracle Lite concept is you have reconciliation and synchronization (with the database server) built into the handheld, and that is what attracted us," Inzerillo said. "Nobody has attacked the mobile market as they have."
When the system goes wireless by next year for merchandise and food and drink sales, it will automatically work with Oracle Lite without requiring a new client software installation, said John Simon, business development manager at Braxton Butterfield Consulting Inc. in Arlington, Ill., the integrator for the United Center project.
One benefit of the handheld application is that vendors, usually rushed at breaks in the game, can complete sales by making only one or two keystrokes, without making pen inputs to the handheld, Simon said. Oracle Lite will also run on Windows CE-based handhelds if there's ever a need to switch hardware.
The handheld project was conceived last summer and only took six weeks to implement, in time for the start of