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Personal digital assistant
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{{short description|Multi-purpose mobile device}} {{More citations needed|date=April 2025}} {{distinguish|Virtual assistant}} {{For|the modern successor|smartphone}} {{Use dmy dates|date=August 2024}} [[Image:PalmTX.jpg|thumb|The [[Palm TX]]]] A '''personal digital assistant''' ('''PDA''') is a multi-purpose mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. Following a boom in the 1990s and 2000s, PDAs were mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of more highly capable [[smartphone]]s, in particular those based on [[iOS]] and [[Android (operating system)|Android]] in the late 2000s, and thus saw a rapid decline.<ref name="Obsolete CompTIA">{{cite book |title=CompTIA Strata Study Guide |author=Andrew Smith, Faithe Wempen |year=2011 |publisher=John Wiley & Sons |isbn=978-0-470-97742-2 |page=140 |access-date=5 July 2012 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VnXyJVotz2QC&q=%22Personal+digital+assistant%22+obsolete&pg=PA140}}</ref><ref name="GoldenAge">{{cite web |title=The Golden Age of PDAs |url=https://www.pcmag.com/news/the-golden-age-of-pdas |website=[[PC Magazine]] |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200924091259/https://www.pcmag.com/news/the-golden-age-of-pdas |archive-date=September 24, 2020 |url-status=live |date=November 20, 2018 |first=Benj |last=Edwards}}</ref> A PDA has an electronic visual display. Most models also have audio capabilities, allowing usage as a [[portable media player]], and also enabling many of them to be used as telephones. By the early 2000s, nearly all PDA models had the ability to access the [[Internet]], [[intranets]] or [[extranets]] via Wi-Fi or [[wireless WAN]]s, and since then generally included a [[web browser]]. Sometimes, instead of buttons, later PDAs employ [[touchscreen]] technology.
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