IrDA robust? Requiring line of sight is highly unreliable for mobile devices. I had my connection drop many times back in the days when I accidentally bumped my phone slightly off the laptops sensor cone.
And line of sight also reduces the applications. Hands-free headset would be impossible. Mouses too. GPS receivers impractical. I can't imagine in what way IrDA can be considered more useful than BT.
this. beaming between palms and psions with irda was childs play compared to swapping via bluetooth on later devices. searching, pairing, authorising. and that's assuming the other recipient knows how to use bluetooth. these days i swap more info with qr codes than with bluetooth. convert info to qr code, have their barcode app read qr code. line of sight was so simple.
