The need for visualisation applications developed for small handheld devices such as PDAs and intelligent mobiles are growing. A visual user interface VUI model based on zooming user interface techniques (ZUI), to adapt two complete different visualisation application areas; online brand shopping and flood warning system for PDAs, is presented. The online brand shopping was evaluated in a benchmark usability study comparing it to traditional PC-based eNet shopping. We also give a blueprint to inform researchers and software engineers about our experience in developing visualisation applications for PDAs with existing development platforms.