If you have yet to be convinced that you can travel without your notebook, consider all of the hardware and software accessories available for smartphones. Depending on the tasks you need to accomplish, these accessories can often help you be just as productive with your smartphone as you would be with your notebook. Going smartphone-only also lets you ditch the laptop bag, broadening your carry-on options for your next flight.

In this article, we’ll examine a few of the tools you can use to liberate yourself from the weight of your notebook and help you to start traveling lighter.

Get A Charge Out Of Your Accessories

One of the biggest challenges when traveling with electronics is keeping the batteries charged and ready to use, and your smartphone is no different. When you use your smartphone for multiple activities (as you would if you didn’t have a notebook), your battery can run out quicker than usual. Luckily, there are several products available that can help you keep your smartphone juiced.

Energizer Energi To Go Portable Power For Cell Phones. The Energi To Go portable power product ($19.99; www.energizer.com) is a charger that works with lithium AA batteries. All you do is plug your phone into the Energi To Go, and the charger’s batteries will power up your phone. You can also use your phone while it’s plugged into Energi To Go, even if it isn’t fully charged yet. You can purchase Energi To Go for phones with a Mini or Micro USB connector, or you can purchase Energi To Go chargers specifically designed for LG, Nokia, Palm, and Samsung mobile phones.

Adrenaline Technologies Turbo Charge. Adrenaline Technologies also offers adapters that come in both one-battery ($19.95; www.adrenalinetechnologies.com) and two-battery ($24.95) models. The single-battery models are not much bigger than the AA battery it calls for, and the double-battery models are about the size of a standard wall charger minus the lengthy cord. You can choose from a variety of adapters on the Adrenaline Technologies Web site to get the right tool for your phone.

Verizon Wireless Network Extender. If you are worried about hitting an area with limited service for phone calls, you can purchase a network extender that will help to boost your wireless connection. It’s like having your own cell phone tower in your hotel room. The Verizon Wireless Network Extender ($249.99; www.verizonwireless.com), for example, utilizes a broadband or DSL connection (a minimum speed of 300Kbps is required) to extend indoor cell phone coverage.

Communication Is Key

We all understand the calling, emailing, and messaging capabilities our smartphones offer, but what about speech recognition? There are numerous tools that use speech-recognition technology to help us be even more productive on the go.

Jott. Jott has a line of products aimed at making your smartphone a central hub for communication and productivity. It offers Jott Voicemail ($9.95 per month for 40 transcribed voicemails; http://jott.com), which transforms voicemail messages into emails and text messages you can read at your convenience and manage easily. Jott Assistant allows you to record notes and make to-do lists and set reminders and appointments using your voice. Then, Jott Assistant will send an email and text messages to you as reminders. You can also use Jott Assistant to post items on Web services such as Twitter (www.twitter.com) and Facebook (www.facebook.com). Jott Assistant has two subscription plans ($3.95 per month; $12.95 per month), as well as a pay-as-you-go plan ($6.95 for 5 minutes). Sales professionals might also be interested in Jott for Salesforce ($25 per month), which lets users enter account and opportunity updates, take notes, and set reminders and appointments, with a phone call.

Nuance Mobile Speech Platform. Some mobile phones use the Nuance Mobile Speech Platform (www.nuance.com), which offers Mobile Messaging, Mobile Search, and Mobile Navigation. Mobile Messaging includes T9 and XT9 text input tools to help you type quicker SMS (Short Message Service) messages, along with its speech-recognition tools. The speech-recognition technology allows you to send SMS, email, and instant messages from your phone so you don’t have to type out individual messages, which can be time-consuming or inconvenient. Mobile Search will find spoken queries from your phone, such as a local coffee shop or a nearby gas station. Finally, Mobile Navigation utilizes Mobile Search to find addresses and destinations, and then it offers turn-by-turn directions to those destinations.

Skype. In addition to speech-recognition tools, VoIP (Voice-over-IP; aka Internet telephone) services, such as Skype (basic service is free; other prices vary; www.skype.com), are making it easier for business professionals to make phone calls over the Internet and avoid paying steep fees for international calls. Whether you’re in New York and you need to reach your Hong Kong branch or you are in Madrid and need to call to Los Angeles, VoIP is an inexpensive way to communicate.

Practical Productivity Tools

With all of the mobile software available on the market, combined with email capabilities and the expanding mobile Web, you can do almost as much work on your smartphone as you can when you are sitting at your computer. You can read and edit documents, catch up on the local and national news, and keep track of the stock market—whether it’s the global financial markets or your own portfolio.

Quotestream Wireless. Professionals who are wrapped up in the financial world can download applications such as Quotestream Wireless for Windows Mobile phones ($9.95 per month; www.quotestream.com) to keep them connected to vital information. This and similar applications help you manage portfolios, get detailed quotes, look into the time and date of sales, and stream market news. It will also give you information about foreign exchange, symbols, actives, gainers, losers, and other useful bits of information.

DataViz Documents To Go. DataViz offers a handful of useful mobile software programs, including Documents To Go (prices vary; www.dataviz.com). With Documents To Go, you can create, read, and edit Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, and PowerPoint) documents and PDF files. Documents To Go even offers many of the same features you would get with the desktop version of Microsoft Office, such as inserting and editing bullets and numbers, viewing tracked changes, and formatting options.

DataViz Beyond Contacts. DataViz also offers Beyond Contacts ($29.99), which is designed to work in a fashion similar to Microsoft Outlook Mobile. It helps you manage your Outlook information, such as appointments, contacts, emails, and calendar events. With the combination of Beyond Contacts and Documents To Go, you can create a file and then send and receive it as an attachment to both colleagues and customers.

ScanR. When someone hands you a business card, you probably stick it in your wallet so you can enter the information into your contacts as soon as you get back to your computer. With an application such as scanR ($3 per month for unlimited scanning and 100 faxed pages; www.scanr.com), you can immediately enter the information into your smart”phone and sync it with your notebook when you get back to the office. ScanR uses the camera on your smartphone to capture text and save it on your smartphone. Not only can you capture and save business cards, but you can use it with receipts, notes, books, forms, and any other document. Once you have the text in digital form, you can email or fax it on to your co-worker back at the office or to yourself for follow-up when you get back to your desk. You can also save your scans online so that your memory card is free for other things, and so you can access your digital scans from anywhere.

Planon PrintStik PS950. If you’re toting along a Windows Mobile or BlackBerry smartphone, you can print documents you scan or receive via email with the Planon PrintStik PS950 ($349; www.planon.com). This compact, lightweight, portable printer receives documents through a Bluetooth wireless connection and prints documents in 600dpi resolution. It comes with a car adapter and a travel case for your convenience. Rather than ink or toner, the Planon PrintStik PS950 uses thermal paper that’s rolled inside the printer for ease of use; it supports two-sided printed materials.

EasyReach. Leaving your notebook at the office or at home can make even the toughest salesperson anxious. With all the important files and documents you have, what happens if you forget something? Services such as EasyReach (www.easyreach.com) will let you remotely access your notebook right from your smartphone. With EasyReach, you can email or fax documents to yourself or clients or find the document you need in the online storage account that comes with the program. EasyReach also offers Google Desktop Search so you can quickly get to documents when you’re jetting from one meeting to the other.

Collaborate With Colleagues

When you leave your office for a business trip, you are often leaving projects and people behind. Just because you’re on the road, however, doesn’t mean your projects can be forgotten about and left alone. With collaboration tools and software for your phone, you can share information and documents while keeping your eyes open for announcements and opportunities. It will help you keep caught up so you have less to catch up on when you get back to the office.

Carry The Day TrailGuide. TrailGuide ($1.99 per month for a single user; www.carrytheday.com) expands Basecamp’s project management and collaboration features to your mobile phone. Deadlines and notifications are available through the Dashboard and Overview features, and the Milestone component shows due dates and identifies who is responsible for each task. The What’s Fresh view gives you all the recent activity on a specific project and lets you add comments for everyone to see. There is a place for messages and to-do lists, as well as the Projects view, which gives you an overview of all your projects.

Zoho. Web-based productivity app provider Zoho (www.zoho.com) has broadened its services to mobile phones. Zoho’s mobile project collaboration service, for example, lets you send and receive emails to project members, as well as view attached files and access multiple accounts. The calendar feature lets you view events associated with your project and add new events. You can also use your mobile to view both private and shared documents from Zoho Writer, Sheet, and Show.

HyperOffice. Another project collaboration Web program, HyperOffice (www.hyperoffice.com), also offers support for mobile devices. With HyperOffice on your mobile device, you can gain access to your corporate email, calendars, tasks, and documents. This helps everyone stay up-to-date on the project information, regardless of whether they are sitting at their desk or out on a business trip with only their smartphone. HyperOffice also offers the ability to synchronize contacts, calendar information, tasks, and email with Microsoft Outlook.

Downsizing For Good

There are many other programs available, such as Google Docs (docs.google.com), that bring the functionality of your notebook to your smartphone. Leaving your notebook at home might seem like a risky proposition, but you could find the experience liberating. Just imagine: You won’t have to hold up the airport security line as you dig out your notebook and re-pack it, and you won’t have to worry about it getting lost, stolen, or dropped as you rush from one place to the next on your trip.

by Tessa Warner Breneman