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techtree: HP has unveiled it’s first smart phone line up, the HP iPAQ 500 Series that promises to deliver a flexible wireless email experience through convenient voice control and hands-free operation.

The iPAQ 500 Series Voice Messenger features Voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) capabilities, ‘push’ email, and the latest Windows Mobile 6 operating system.

The new iPAQ smart phone is available with more than 20 voice commands for hands-free operation. Using a powerful “voice reply” feature, users can reply to emails by dictating and sending a voice response. Users can also listen to email and text messages, navigate through phone and calendar tasks, and speak to start applications.

Additionally, the HP iPAQ Voice Messenger has built-in Wi-Fi to provide business customers a VoIP alternative to traditional office phone set-ups. By integrating it with office phone systems, businesses can eliminate the need for desk phones and benefit from streamlined communications and reduced IT management.

According to HP, based on the new Windows Mobile 6 platform, the HP iPAQ 500 series provides business professionals with an enhanced Outlook Mobile experience, allowing users to view emails in their original HTML format, and enjoy quick access to contacts with the ability to search a call history and contacts database. In addition, the built-in Microsoft Office Mobile suite provides a familiar, easy-to-use experience.

Moreover, the smart phone is the first iPAQ device to offer over-the-air device management capabilities that HP acquired with its purchase of Bitfone Corp. HP claims that using these capabilities, businesses can remotely manage and support the iPAQ devices’ performance, security and access to applications, data and networks.

cnn: Isaac Daniel calls the tiny Global Positioning System chip he’s embedded into a line of sneakers “peace of mind.”

He wishes his 8-year-old son had been wearing them when he got a call from his school in 2002 saying the boy was missing. The worried father hopped a flight to Atlanta from New York where he had been on business to find the incident had been a miscommunication and his son was safe.

Days later, the engineer started working on a prototype of Quantum Satellite Technology, a line of $325 to $350 adult sneakers that hit shelves next month. It promises to locate the wearer anywhere in the world with the press of a button. A children’s line will be out this summer.

“We call it a second eye watching over you,” Daniel said.

It’s the latest implementation of satellite-based navigation into everyday life — technology that can be found in everything from cell phones that help keep kids away from sexual predators to fitness watches that track heart rate and distance. Shoes aren’t as easy to lose, unlike phones, watches and bracelets.

The sneakers work when the wearer presses a button on the shoe to activate the GPS. A wireless alert detailing the location is sent to a 24-hour monitoring service that costs an additional $19.95 a month.

In some emergencies — such as lost child or Alzheimer’s patient — a parent, spouse or guardian can call the monitoring service, and operators can activate the GPS remotely and alert authorities if the caller can provide the correct password.

But the shoe is not meant for non-emergencies — like to find out if a teen is really at the library or a spouse is really on a business trip. If authorities are called and it is not an emergency, the wearer will incur all law enforcement costs, Daniel said.