By the "handheld technology" we hereby mean portable, compact data-loggers with compatible sensors, controlled by and used together with programmable graphing calculators or computers. These popular, versatile, inexpensive products of advanced information technology give complete, modern, flexible and efficient data acquisition systems. Handheld technology enables basic experiments to be performed quickly and efficiently, by many students working in parallel with apparatus individually controlled (or shared within a small group), or by the teacher giving classroom demonstrations. Immediate access to the mathematical tools means that sophisticated analysis becomes a natural part of students' physics.