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> This may sound like a really stupid question but here goes!! What exactly is a PDA and how do you use it to go to paperless caching? I have

> paper caches all over the house and would really like a new way of caching!!

PDA stands for "Personal Digital Assistant". It's a catch-all term that's used to describe the hand-held organizers that are made by several manufacturers. If you've heard of "Palm Pilot", that's one brand of PDA (although Palm doesn't use that brand name anymore). At one time Palm Pilots held so much of the market that's what everyone called them. But PDA is more generic and accepted now. They all keep track of addresses and phone numbers, appointments, to-do lists, etc.

One thing all PDA's have in common is the ability to move information to and from a computer, usually just by plugging the PDA into a cable and pressing a button. This process is often referred to as "synching". To use a PDA for paperless caching, you download the caches you want to hunt onto your computer, and from there you sync them on to your PDA. Then instead of carrying sheets of paper about the caches with you, you just carry your PDA out on the trail, and you have all the information you need.

Depending on the type of PDA you buy and how much caching you do, you may need to buy other software for either your PDA or your computer (or both) to make it all work right, but that's a whole other discussion. I hope this is the information you were looking for.