Patent ID: 6965928

Claim:
A method for maintaining handheld computers at a location remote from a home maintenance node containing a maintenance database for at least one of the handheld computers and connected to the remote location through a network, the method comprising: connecting one of the handheld computers to a maintenance node; detecting whether the maintenance node is the home maintenance node for the handheld computer; locating the home maintenance node for the handheld computer if the connected maintenance node is not the home maintenance node; opening a maintenance session between the handheld computer and the home maintenance node; and performing maintenance on the handheld computer; wherein performing maintenance on the handheld computer involves scanning data on the handheld for viruses; wherein scanning data on the handheld computer for viruses includes reading said data from the handheld computer, storing said data at least temporarily on a computer system, scanning said data for viruses with a virus detection program, cleaning said data of viruses identified during the scanning, and updating the data on the handheld based on results of the scanning utilizing the virus detection program; wherein performing maintenance on the handheld computer involves running diagnostics on the handheld computer; wherein the diagnostics include operations including checking for broken shortcuts, checking for missing files, checking for temporary files that can be deleted, checking a registry area, deleting games, and deleting proprietary information that employees should not have installed on the handheld computer; wherein the maintenance database contains information on the handheld computer including a personal calendar, contacts, tasks, a list of software and corresponding versions installed on the handheld computer, and a history of diagnostics and repairs for the handheld computer; wherein a central maintenance node is the home maintenance node for all of the handheld computers; wherein the central maintenance node includes a central maintenance manager that has access to a tracking database, a rules database, and a download database containing information to be downloaded to the handheld computer; wherein the tracking database contains problem/action information relating to different problems found and different actions taken on a plurality of the handheld computers, configuration information, and software versions contained on each handheld computer; the rules database defines preferred configurations on the handheld computers and identifies software that should not be installed on the handheld computers; and the download database includes software license information that is downloaded to the handheld computers.