One of my least favorite kinds of iPhone App is the “web clone.” Typically these are little more than a mobile version of a web page kept within the skin of a downloadable App. The premise of a web clone is that encapsulating the website in the App will make it more convenient to the user. In reality, most of them exist because the owner of the web service (whether it be a site, a bank, or a social network) is too lazy to code up a “real” App but wants to benefit from the publicity of the App Store. On the other hand, there are a few exceptions to the rule. This week’s App appears to be a web clone of Wikipedia, but as it turns out, the developers did a great job and found new ways to navigate the site.
If you’re an iPhone user you’ll know why it’s such a knock-out device. It has email, browsing, calling, texting, and tons of other functions. Now with the addition of the App store, it has the potential to be much more than any prior incarnation. Here are a few great utility apps to turn your iPhone into a veritable Swiss army knife:
Clearly iPhone users have a serious need for instant messaging. After the App Store launched it seemed like everybody and their brother created an AIM client (including the protocol’s creators, AOL). Since then, I’ve been looking through the list and sorting the good from the bad. As it turns out, the 3rd party developers really busted their butts and turned out some fairly impressive apps. Even the AOL-made app is solid.
A quick search in the iPhone App store can return you more than a dozen to-do list apps. If you can’t make up your mind over which to-do list app to choose, here are five of the best free to-do list apps that I have reviewed.
If you like simplicity and just want the bare minimum, then Dobot is the one for you. Dobot provides a plain text interface, but with some really useful features. Usage is easy. Simply press the ‘+’ button to add a task. For each task, you can edit the Task name, due date, priority and note. On the front end, you can easily change the task priority by tapping on the blue horizontal bar.
With the hustle and bustle of the new iPhone 2.0 firmware, the App Store, and the 3G iPhone, it can be easy to forget the foundation that got the whole ball rolling: iTunes. Yes, Apple’s jukebox from the first days of Mac OS X has undergone many changes over the years, but the tight integration with iPod (and later iPhone) syncing cemented it for many users as their primary music player.
Now Apple has created a new way to get the most out of iTunes. It’s called Remote (App Store Link) and it’s an iPhone App that creates a direct link (over a local access network) between the iPhone in your hand and iTunes on your computer.
If you’ve spent any amount of time playing Flash games instead of whatever you SHOULD have been doing, you’ve probably played Bejeweled. It’s a gem-matching game where lining up three or more of the same color cancels out the set. Now a very similar game has come out for the iPhone and it blends the classic gem game with something resembling a Role Playing Game (RPG).
If you’ve got an iPod Touch or iPhone, you’ve got to give this neat little app a try. Its called “Writing Pad” and it’s free.
It may look like your average textpad or notepad, but it’s far from it. You can type the old fashioned way by tapping on individual keys, or you can type the new fashioned way, by sliding your finger across the soft keyboard.
Instead of tapping, you slide or drag your finger across your iPhone’s soft keyboard, making a continuous line from one letter to another. It’s shape writing technology from ShapeWriter.
There’s a free ‘if-found-please-return-to’ app in Apple’s app store that creates an image you’re supposed to set as your default wallpaper. It’s called If Found and was one of the first things I downloaded when the app store opened for business.
It struck me as a great idea, but the simplicity of the thing got me thinking that a) I could have done this myself with Photoshop and a little trial and error and b) I could have made something a lot nicer. So I did and you can too even if you have an older device and don’t feel like shelling out the $10 for the 2.0 software update.
The advent of Web 2.0, blogs and various social networking sites has ensured that there is an ever increasing flow of information which is not possible to consume in one go. There are millions of websites on the internet and if you are an internet addict like me, you would easily come across hundreds of those sites every month. Some of them capture your attention while you skip the others after a glance.
Transmission is a free and open source bit torrent client that runs natively on multiple operating systems and is available in many languages worldwide. Transmission is very lightweight and probably one of the best bit torrent clients around. Transmission was first released on September 15th 2005 and has came quite a long way since its first release.
If you use Ubuntu then you will most likely know of Transmission because it is the default bit torrent client.
There have no doubt been plenty of services out there whereby you can download video to your mobile telephone. Some of them are good, most are bad. But a new program from VeVeo called vTap is right up there. And best of all, its FREE.
Videos are everywhere these days. They flood your inbox, they find their way into social media sites. They even allow you to watch them at the most convenient time for you. But none of them on the mobile front, can mess with vTap.
I’ve had a Twitter account since the early days, but I haven’t really used it all that much. I’ve tweeted occasionally and I’ve even set up several of my feeds to automatically tweet for me, but I never really got twittering. That is, until I got myself an iPod Touch. Now I can’t stop Twittering and I’m seriously considering some type of 12 step program.
With the advent of Apple’s new iPhone and iPod Touch, a whole host of websites have set up mobile version of their regular site. Notable among these various sites is Gmail and all of the related Google web services. (disclaimer: for the rest of this article I will be referring to the iPod touch, but I tested the application to the same extent on the iPhone as well.)
For a while I didn’t have any native mail application on my iPod touch. I bought by iPod in September and didn’t want to pay 20 dollars for the January application upgrade. Being a Gmail user, I was delighted to find that Gmail was such a versatile web app and can be conveniently accessed both from iPhone and iPod Touch.
I’ve spent a lot of time over the past years figuring out how to get my DVD collection onto my PC so I can use my Home Theater PC (HTPC) to play my library on my TV. The following is the two step process I’ve come up with to do this; all other programs I’ve used either are not free, install spyware, or desync the audio.
Install and use DVDFab HD Decrypter.
The settings here are pretty straightforward. Select “Full Disk” and where you want to save the file. Click start, and about 40 minutes later you will have your DVD on your hard drive and ready to encode.
Over the past couple of months, I have gone from being a passive uninterested Twitter user to an addicted engaged Twitter user. Why the sudden change? Partly because I have seen how the product has evolved for the better and also partly because the number of tools, features and users for Twitter has grown exponentially. All the major news networks and blogs also maintain Twitter feeds.
Here’s a prime example of how Twitter has grown into something useful. Before writing this article, I sent a Twitter message saying that I was writing this and I asked people for opinions and input. In a matter of minutes, I was flooded with private direct messages with website links, ideas, tips and much more to consider for this piece.
I did some research on iPhone specific websites and found out, to my surprise, that there were quite a few out there. Aibek has covered iiPhone web apps before, but here’s a small list of more websites specifically designed for the beautiful iPhone.
Information / News Web Apps :
CBS News: www.cbsnews.com/iphone
Fox News: iphone.foxnews.com
Google: Google.com
Reuters Mobile: mobile.reuters.com
BrainyQuote: www.brainyquote.com/iphone.html
Social Apps :
Digg: www.digg.com/iphone
Facebook: iphone.Facebook.com
Twitter: m.twitter.com/login
Reference:
Wikipedia: www.keishi.net/ipodia/
People Finder: www.2robots.com/iphone/#_ByNumber
Urban Dictionary: www.idotg.com/apps/iwurd.php
Realtor: iphone.realtor.com
Weather Web Apps :
AccuWeather: apple.accuweather.com/widget/iphone1/iphone.html
Weather Underground: i.wund.com
Weather.com: www.weather.com/iphone
We have covered ways to backup emails, wordpress blogs, Firefox settings, computer files …. all but mobile phones. So it’s time to introduce some services to backup your mobile phone, i.e. contacts list, calendar entries, text mesages, browser bookmarks, phone settings, notes etc. As usual, all listed services are free or come with a dececnt free account option.
(1) Mobical - Simple and straightforward over-the-air mobile backup and restore service to automatically backup mobile address book, calendar, settings, bookmarks and notes online. Mobical supports pretty much all modern handsets and can be accessed from any web-enabled device. You can edit contacts, add appointments, and save notes online and it will sync added changes with your handset. Similarly, all on-phone edits will be synced with the web copy. Simple and convenient.
Do you fancy yourself a world traveler? Do you like to use the Trains, Subways, Tubes or the umm… Metro, when you are in a strange place? If you do and you hate asking for directions, then this post is for you! I have been using a little free program called MetrO, for about 5 years now… That’s right 5 long years ago all the way back on my first Ipaq… But I digress.
Métro is a free worldwide public transport guide that always sits on your PDA (Palm, PocketPC, Smartphone…). It is a small database application that allows you to download different cities metro information. And it is totally search-able.
Since the Holiday’s were recently upon us and many of the readers out there no doubtably got a new cell phone, I wanted to introduce an old friend to your new cell phone. Google Mobile, meet our readers’ new phones. You guys will get along great together!
Google has been really stepping up their efforts in making many of their products usable from the mobile phone. Whether you’re using a regular cell, an iPhone, or even a SmartPhone, Google has you covered. So here at MakeUseOf.com, we’ve summarized all the Google Mobile services here in this comprehensive list.
I have an old 20GB iPod and even though I have a lot of music on there, I am only taking up half of the space available. So there’s another 10GB kicking around doing nothing and so I decided to start putting some useful iPod tools on there for when I’m on the move. Some of that space was allocated for installing one of my favourite websites - Wikipedia.
Quick look at 3 different applications for accessing your music library directly from mobile phone.
IMPORTANT: All listed services are FREE, however depending on your mobile plan data transfer fees may apply. I recommended that you contact your mobile carrier and find out about your ‘data transfer’ charges before going with any of the below listed music applications.
SimplifyMedia is a one of a kind application (Mac, Win) that lets you easily share your music library with friends and allow them to access and stream your tracks without leaving their iTunes player (screenshot). The best part about it is that it works even if you are NOT in the same network. You can also use it to access your own music library from other computers and most importantly from your iPhone or iPod Touch.
A list of useful mobile apps that bring excellent features to your phone. Enjoy!
1 UnwiredBuyer - Receive last minute eBay notifications and place bids directly from your mobile. Definitely a must-have for every eBay junkie. (US and Canada). Video Demo.
2. Soonr - Need to access your PC directly from the handset? Enter Soonr, a free mobile client that brings remote PC access to your phone: search files, view documents, check emails, run programs and more. US only. Video Demo.
Over the last week I came across a couple of handy services that let users sell their old or broken iPods, cell phones and other gadgets. These aren’t a marketplace-style website but services that WILL buy your gadgets at a sound price. Since we haven’t seen anything of this kind before, I decided to run a quick comparison and see how they stand against eBay. Actually both of the services were already covered in MakeUseOf Directory, but in case you missed it, here is a quick overview:
Whether you already have an iPhone or thinking about getting one, here is a list of links to make your life with the iPhone better. Below you’ll find Top iPhone startpages, couple of excellent iPhone Tools, over 10 HowTo’s, huge collection of iPhone reviews (in-depth, video, comparative, stress-tests, etc.), and some fun stuff in the middle to give you a break. Enjoy!
The idea behind the iPhone startpage is to bring all essential applications on one iPhone-friendly page. These apps can be anything, ranging from news sites to To-Do lists, Office apps, IM clients, VoIP services, Calculators, and more. All iPhone friendly and easy-to-navigate through.
In the previously posted ‘20 Tools to Make your iPod Better‘, Kaly mentioned that with time we’ll make it better, and we did it. So, here you go: 50 free Tools to Make your iPod better and almost 30 problem-specific tips to fix it.
GENERAL iPod MANAGERS
(1) Floola (Win, Mac, Linux) - portable iPod manager. Features: (1) move audio and video to/from iPod, (2) manage and import/export playlists, (3) last.fm support, (4) multi-lingual, (5) lyrics and podcasts support, (6) search files, (7) iPod troubleshooting, (8) manage notes, (9) sync files between PC and iPod
Now that we have published list of tools for Youtube and Myspace it’s time to add another biggie to the lists category and iPod seems to be just the right option. Finding good tools and yet free turned out to be little harder then I expected, and now once I am done I get a feeling something is missing, anyways I’ll get it right over time.
General Ipod Management Tools
YamiPod: cross platform(Mac/Windows/Linux), multi-purpose tool that can run directly from your iPod. Features include; PC to ipod AutoSync, playlists import/export (PLS,M3U), built-in music player, last.fm support, search, song list export and more
