applications Archives

Friday, August 8, 2008 -- 3:20 p.m. -- on my couch

Here's something that I just don't understand ... something that I believe could really help out the App Store.

If you go to Apple's iPod Click Wheel Games page, you'll see that all of the games feature little preview buttons that offer quick videos of the games in action.

And ... you can see them BEFORE you buy! This picture here is from the video that goes with Uno.

Imagine that. BEFORE you buy. Why in the world doesn't this exist in the app store? Granted, there are many more apps in the app store than on this iPod page, but at least give us the option -- or give the developer the option to include a video?

Sure, the developer could include the video on its Web site, but I think that defeats the purpose of the one-stop shop, don't you?

And don't even get me started on the fact that there are several really, really good looking titles on the iPod page that aren't available for the iPhone and touch - like Sims Bowling and Monopoly and Sonic the Hedgehog ... and UNO!!! Man, I'd love to have Uno. I might pay $1,000 for Uno.

OK, probably not, but it's only $4.99 for the iPod.

Anyhow, just wondering if anyone had noticed this and thought it was weird.

Let me know in the comments.

Thanks for calling.

Thursday, August 7, 2008 -- 9 a.m. -- on my couch

Even R.E.M. wouldn't be losing their religion if they carried an iPhone or iPod touch.

I must say ... while there's not as many Torahs and Qurans as there are bibles, developers are really firing on all cylinders and coming up with some nice looking stuff.

Take Siddur, for example. It's a pocket Jewish prayer book for $9.99. It's well-thought out, shows proper Hebrew text and looks to be really useful for someone who would rather tote around an iPhone or iPod touch than a prayer book.

And think a prayer app can't be cool? The app provides proper prayer times for each day based on your location determined with the iPhone's GPS. That's really something.

Then there's iQuran, which is, as you may have guessed, an electronic version of the Quran. There's a free version and a pro version for $25 that contains all of the Quran plus various translations.

There are too many bibles to list, but luckily, there are all kinds of choices in all kinds of price ranges so no one has to be left out.

Check them out and feel free to share your opinion.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008 -- 2:48 p.m. -- at my desk

I was commenting earlier to someone on Twitter that the App Store was starting to look a little stale. A lot of Sudoku puzzles and not much substance.

But I said there were definite exceptions and one is Plum Amazing's Plum Caddy.

I am not a golfer. I'll be right up front about that. But Plum Caddy looks, well, Plum Amazing.

It costs $9.99 and it's available for the iPhone and iPod touch. Plum Amazing mentions that it's about the same cost as a few golf balls. Well played.

Plum Amazing has announced the release of Plum Caddy for the iPhone and iPod touch. It costs $9.99.

For that $9.99 you get personal golf scoring, mapping and GPS ... all of that with really fantastic looking graphics. And, you can recall every stroke and each club on every hole for every course you ever played.

According to the press release, In August, the online complement of Plum Caddy called Plum Clubhouse, will become available and will feature the golf course construction kit for creating real and accurate maps of any course in the world.

Once a user creates a map and saves it, that map will become available to all other members of Plum Clubhouse and downloadable to their iPhones and iPod touches. These maps are not templates but accurate GPS capable maps that will allow seeing each hole with the locations of boxes, hazards, fairway boundaries, and range finding from the golfers position to any of these items.

That's a very real golf experience, folks, and it sounds to me like the developer thought long and hard before just putting something in the App Store, which was the point of my earlier concern.

Here's a direct link to the App Store if you'd like to check it out.

Let me and the rest of the IPTIB universe know what you think.

Thanks for calling.

Tuesday, Aug. 5, 2008 -- 5:25 p.m. -- at my desk

**UPDATE 08.06.08 2:18 p.m. -- the app is no longer in the App Store. Will be interesting to see if Apple caught on and pulled it or if the developer had second thoughts.**

Caller Sam just alerted me to either something really hilarious or really dangerous -- depending on how itchy your click finger is.

There's an app in the App Store that costs $999.99.

It's called I Am Rich

Here's the hilarious/dangerous part ... .it doesn't do anything.

I'm not kidding.

This is the description:

Art & Livestyle - Not for everyone The red icon on your iPhone or iPod touch always reminds you (and others when you show it to them) that you were able to afford this. It's a work of art with no hidden function at all. After pressing the (i) on the main page, a secret mantra will be shown. This may help you to to stay rich, healthy and successful. If it's to expensive for you - check out my other apps - they are all much cheaper.

And he's right ... his other app is Calc Pro, which costs $4.99.

Obviously, only someone who has enough money to buy a diamond encrusted iPhone or some other crazy impulse purchase would want to own this app ... And you know what? I bet someone in the world purchases it just to be the first. In fact, someone could videotape themselves buying it, put it on YouTube and achieve instant 15 minutes of fame.

As I sit here and write this, I find the whole thing a bit funnier by the minute. I mean, the author put it in the app store making it very clear that his app does nothing. And obviously it took him about 30 seconds to create. And he's probably not really expecting anyone to buy it, although if he does, he'll be buying steak dinners for everyone he knows.

Again to recap, $999.99 in the app store for an app that does nothing.

If you buy it, well, let me know first. If you have a comment about it, also let me know first.

Thanks for calling.

Tuesday, August 5, 2008 -- 11:49 a.m. -- on my couch

The short answer to that question is yes, they can, if you really want to.

The problems that I'm talking about of course are the multiple versions of applications that reside in iTunes and show us differently on your iPhone. So you might have everything up to date on your iPhone and see that an app supposedly needs an update in iTunes, when, in all likelihood, it doesn't.

So what's going on?

In a nutshell, iTunes downloads the update but instead of overwriting the old version, it's adding a new version and a number to the name of the file. So a situation where Ms. Pac-Man new should overwrite Ms. Pac-Man old is storing into iTunes as Ms. Pac-Man old and Ms. Pac-Man old1 .. 2 ... 3... etc.

So each update exists in multiple places. When you update on your iPhone you don't have this problem, but you do once you sync with iTunes 7.7 and 7.7.1 because that's where the overwriting problem is happening.

App store files end with the extension .ipa ... and if you want to see this problem live, you can go to your music folder. On a Mac, you'll find that under USER/MUSIC/iTUNES/MOBILE APPLICATIONS. (I'm truly not sure where it is on a PC, but unless you intend to fix the problem, I wouldn't bother looking. Believe me, it's there).

In my example photo here, Facebook is a problem app with two versions, one with a 1 after the name. And wouldn't you know, Facebook is the app that crashes the most often on my iPhone.

The "fix" is to rename the files yourself. Take the file with a number and get rid of the number so just the name shows. Then, drag the new file to your desktop and drag it back into iTunes. That "fixes" it.

I don't recommend you "fix" it this way. My recommendation, if you really feel the need to "fix" it is to delete the files and the duplicates and just download the app again. It takes a little more time, but it's the safest way to ensure that you don't overwrite the wrong file. Sometimes, there are several versions.

However, if you successfully sync without doing it, there's no reason to add the extra steps to your workflow, especially considering I'm expecting an iTunes update pretty soon to fix it. And with the bugs in 7.7.1, it only makes sense that Apple will release a maintenance update.

Of course, my idea of when Apple should release an update and when it actually will are completely different things. I have still not updated to 7.7.1 because of all the problems and unless I'm missing something, I don't think I really need to.

So hang in there ... help is on the way ... hopefully it's fast help, although I can't promise. But as I said in a comment to someone, this is a problem that is affecting every single iTunes and iPhone user out there, including Steve Jobs. And believe me, Steve doesn't like having his apps not update.

Thanks for calling.

Monday, August 4, 2008 -- 10:55 p.m. -- at my desk

**UPDATE -- so far, 3 of the 5 apps updated and no problems. Tap, tap tap (knocking on wood)**

The application syncing between the iPhone and iTunes seems to be a complete state of disarray, and sadly, everyone has different problems.

Add to that that not all the problems are post 2.0.1 and it's really hard to troubleshoot. Basically, what iTunes thinks needs to be updated and what your iPhone thinks needs to be updated hardly ever match. And in many cases, iTunes is showing and storing multiple copies of applications, which is a mess waiting to happen if data during syncing becomes corrupt.

Caller Vickie pointed out earlier that she had 3rd party apps just stop working after 2.0.1 was installed. Mine are working. There's no rhyme or reason to where the problem is - is it the iPhone or is it iTunes?

Luckily, if you need to reinstall an app and have already paid for it, you shouldn't have to pay for it again, but that doesn't mean that anyone wants to reinstall apps. Apple needs to take care of this problem.

There is no doubt in my mind that they are fully aware of the situation. Take, for example, this one support thread on apple.com. It's full of complaints and it's just one of about 5 that exist on Apple's site.

And as we know, iTunes 7.7.1 offers no relief to this problem -- and in fact, it's a reason I won't download it or even consider syncing with it. I'll sync when I get home tonight with 7.7 and 2.0.1 and we'll see how it goes then. I am crossing my fingers and simply hoping for the best.

I know that a lot of you have let me know about the serious issues you are having with syncing. Continue to do that please and perhaps someone here will be able to suggest something that helps another caller in need. Of course, I'll keep reporting what I find out as well.

Hang in there, everyone. I think it will eventually get better, but obviously patience is naturally wearing thin.

As you can see from the pic, I have 5 updates to install. Not looking forward to any of them, although some of them are decent and important. Still not looking forward to it.

Thanks for calling.

Monday, August 4, 2008 -- 8:35 p.m. -- at my desk

This is a question that's not based only on the 2.0.1 update.

I'm wondering if you all find that Google Maps does a good job of locating you to that little blue pulsating dot or if you find the blue pulsating dot to be a rare occurrence and are more used to the big wide circle?

I find the latter -- I see the blue dot only sometimes. I never see it in my apartment building. I never see it when I'm in the office here in the middle of Downtown Chicago. I see the big circle and it's close, but it's not giving me the dot.

But ... when an app asked to use my location and points out how far I am from something, it's spot on. I tried to new Metromix app today and it asked to locate me. I said yes and it showed me a restaurant that's 0.01 miles away and sure enough, it is ... just a few steps from the Tribune Tower here on North Michigan Avenue.

So I'm wondering how you find that it works for you? I mentioned in an earlier post about my travels this weekend in Ohio that it never really found me. It got close, but I never saw the pulsating dot.

Let me know in general how it works for you.

Thanks for calling.

Tuesday, July 29, 2008 -- 10:50 p.m. -- at my desk

I downloaded BreakClassic tonight, a new addition to the App Store that's not too shabby.

It's brick break, or break out, or whatever it is that you call it ... you know, the game with the ball and the bricks that becomes addictive really, really quickly.

This game has different levels that change as you advance. You start with a rather drab and slow black/white/silver motif and eventually graduate to more vibrant colors and stars that fall depending on which blocks you break. And the stars give you bonus points, but it requires some serious hand-eye coordination to watch the ball and the stars at the same time.

When you hit a brick, there's a colorful trail that follows the paddle and the color of the trail changes depending on the block you hit last. Nice touch. The sounds are what you expect -- nothing special, but the important bips, boops and beeps. And, the stars provide the occasional ding-dong.

Here's what I don't particularly care for ... if I'm in the middle of the game and exit out of the game, I have no option to resume a game. It just goes back to the beginning screen.

And when a game ends, there's no real indicator that the game is over, just a return to the first screen.

In version 1.1, I would suggest the developers add some sort of option that allows game play to resume and definitely an option under settings to change sounds.

Otherwise, though, for a free app, it's fun.

You can download it right here

Let me know what you think.

Thanks for calling.

Monday, July 28, 2008 -- 10 a.m. -- on my couch

Each day, there's new stuff in the App Store, and each day I find myself eager to download.

I haven't had time to get to all of them yet, but here are the ones that caught my eye.

Just click on the name of the app to be taken directly to the App Store, either on your computer or from your iPhone.

Let me know what you think, of course.

Thanks for calling.

300 Bowl
You can do just about everything—except MMS—on your iPhone, so why not bowl?

Now, your finger controls all the action, but a straight shot to a wild curve. There's an updating 1.1 version that improves control and features more realistic sounds.

Looks like the only thing missing from this version is a snack bar and a ball-cleaning machine.

I used to bowl often, and sadly, I was never that good at it. But I did get an opportunity to play Wii bowling a few weeks back and I really, really enjoyed it. We'll see how the iPhone version stacks up.

$3.99. Bowling shoes included.



Chopper
I haven't downloaded this yet, but if I believe the reviews written in the App Store, it looks awfully promising. At least one person said it was the best game ever and that he couldn't put it down.

It's a side-scrolling helicopter game, where, according to the descripton, you must complete your mission and return to base while avoiding enemy fire from tanks and bazooka-wielding mad men.

Ahhhh, now that sounds pretty imaginative. Apparently, there's 60 levels and three levels of difficulty. So hopefully you have lots of game play ahead for the $7.99 price tag.



Picoli
What's this I see? An image editor? On the iPhone? Well, hopefully, because if it's not an image editor, then I just found a photo of a glow-in-the-dark dog.

And, this isn't even Photoshop ... it's a photo retouching system for the iPhone that lets you adjust brightness, sharpness, saturation, illumination, contrast, color balance, sepia, color dither, gray dither, night vision (see dog), sunburn and other filters.

So all we need now is unsharp mask and clipping paths and we've got Photoshop in our pockets.

Well, it's not meant to be that full featured, however, just having the ability to edit an iPhone photo will have to be appreciated.



QUORDY
Ooooh, a word game and it looks like a lot of fun. This is one I plan to download tonight. I'm a sucker for a good word game.
In QUORDY, the object is to form words among the 16 letter tiles.

And, here's the best part ... you shake the iPhone to jumble the letters and begin a game. Or you can slide your finger back and forth. The amount of fun you have is up to you.

OK, wait ... I just found the best part ... you can send an invite to a friend, and that friend gets the same QUORDY board. Then, your scores are compared.

CHALLENGE!!

It's $2.99.



Touch Tennis: FS5
It's not, but it sure looks like the classic Pong to me.

The reviews are good ... looks like this is one of those games that can keep your entertained for hours.

I remember sitting in front of my little 13 inch television way back when with that dedicated system that played Pong and one other Pong-like game. I never got tired of it. Well, obviously I did at some point, but I understand the concept of playing it for hours on end.

And from what I'm reading, the controls are very fluid and fast -- a must for a game like this to be successful.

It's just $1.99 -- and that seems like a small price to pay for a trip back to your childhood. Or for some of you, even before that.

Thursday, July 24, 2008 -- 9 a.m. -- on my couch

I love the app store. There are some problems with it for sure, but I love the concept and how it works in general to bring me new and exciting stuff at my fingertips.

That said here are some of my favorite apps right now with a very brief bit of information about each.

Just click on the title to be directed right to the page in the App Store, whether you are reading from your computer or your iPhone.

Thanks for callling.

eWallet
It's been around on other devices for a while, but now there's a secure and nice-looking to boot way to save all your important information in one place. And next month, you'll be able to sync with Windows and with Macs in the fall. $9.99 but worth it is the idea of keeping everything in one spot is important.





iDrink
4,500 drink recipes that you can tweak, edit and make your own -- and even e-mail to friends. And, if you aren't sure what you are in the mood for, there's a random button that lets you leave it up to the iPhone. Then, if you like it, make it a favorite. $4.99 is a small price to pay to have all of this information at your disposal.





Morocco
If you've ever played Othello or Reversi, then Morocco will be worth your money -- oh, wait ... it's free. The object of the game is simple, but the game isn't -- you want to end up with more pieces on the board than the person you are playing. There's only three levels, so if you master it quickly or are already good, there may not be that much of a challenge, but it's fun for the price.





Space Out
I love this game ... I fell in love with it from the description and boy was I glad it was just as good to play. It's a tribute to old school arcade games and even has 8-bit sound effects created with a chip from the Commodore 64! Whoa! It's a blast and it's from the past. WIth all these games, it's a wonder I have time to blog! $4.99 but pays for itself in the first few aliens you kill.





Tuner
This is an Internet radio app that lets you listen to your favorite stations from around cyberspace. The choices of streams are awesome (BBC, NPR, Virgin Radio, etc., etc.). It works well enough over EDGE -- not great, but well enough -- and awesome via 3G and Wi-Fi. The only thing i wish is that it wasn't $5.99. It's not terrible, but it's the only app of its kind in the store. Someone could release something like it for a cheaper price if they wanted, but this is pretty well done.





YouNote
Where to start. First off, I can't believe this is free. It's great. Second, Apple, this is what that notepad icon you provided on the iPhone since day 1 should have always been. You can take all different types of notes .. audio, picture, text, Web, or a mixture of them all. Did I mention it's free? Seriously, this will help you be productive. And it's free. I'm very impressed by this app.

Monday, July 21, 2008 -- 5:41 p.m. -- at my desk

I'm going to review apps as often as time allows. Some reviews will be positive, others not so much.

Today, I'm pleased to review what is by far my absolute favorite app to date.

I spent $4.99 on it and I would have spent $19.99. It's all MotionX Poker, and while the name isn't the one I would have chosen if I ran the company, the game itself is phenomenal.

From great sound to action, it's just 5 stars.

Basically, it's poker with dice. You get 3 rolls to beat the dealer. And the best part is ... to roll the dice, you shake your iPhone. So you feel the vibration as the dice gets rolled. Obviously, all that vibrating can wear down your battery, so once the cool factor wears off you might want to go the game settings and turn off the vibration mode.

The graphics are beautiful. The sound is great. The game is fun. You get rewards for high hands -- like unlocking special tables and types of dice.

It's addictive. Once you start playing, it's hard to put it down.

And a word of warning ... I downloaded it over 3G and it took a long time - longer than any app I've ever downloaded on the iPhone. The progress bar for install took 4 times to finally finish -- I actually thought I had crashed but decided to let it go and it finally finished.

I would recommend doing it over 3G or Wi-Fi if that's an option, but I'm sure it will work over EDGE as well.

Seriously, this is $4.99 worth spending.

You can find the direct link into the iTunes store to check it out here.

Try it out and let me know what you think.

Thanks for calling and good luck!!

Thursday, July 17, 2008 -- 6:58 p.m. -- at my desk

Sometimes, after a few minutes shopping in the App Store, you feel inspired and amazed.

Take Shazam for example. Like magic, you hold up an audio source to it and it recognizes the song that's playing.

That's amazing.

Speaking of amazing -- Eventful would be near the top of the amazingly useful section if there was one.

This is from the company's press release:

Users can search for events, see what’s happening at their favorite venues, find tour schedules for their favorite performers, buy tickets for events and see what their friends are interested in doing. With the touch of a button, they can also participate in Eventful Demand, a free service that enables fans to influence the tour schedules of their favorite performers.

That Demand part, to me, is the sweetest part. While there's more to the app, it's the part that makes me want to go back to it again and again. Basically, you "demand" that a particular performer perform in your area. The information is then sent to the performers directly. So the performer may be tracking the numbers, or someone affiliated with their tour. Basically, you are able to influence where a band plays.

Who knew you could have so much power?

Brian Dear did ... he's the founder and chairman of Eventful Inc., and he spent a little time with me on the phone today explaining why he thinks his application is unique.

Brian's quick to point out that Eventful isn't about event planning. He wrote it very eloquently in his blog ... that it's the best way on the Internet to discover, share, track, create, and demand events. Since day one, Eventful's mission has been, in three words, to "maximize event discovery", something that I felt the Internet had done a poor job doing in the years prior to a service like Eventful being available. "Event discovery" is the act of discovering events that are interesting and meaningful to you such that you want to go to them and hopefully do wind up going to them.

Brian tells me that musicians everywhere are and have been using Eventful ... they provide a way for them to keep track of the demands. And you can tell when you talk to Brian that he's passionate about this.

I tried it out ... I found out where my favorite performers will be near Chicago ... I demanded that an act come to my city. I then saw that there's a direct link to purchase tickets (a nice touch).

And, as is the case with many apps for the iPhone 3G, it's location aware. Bonus for when you are traveling and just want to know what's happening where you are.

A little more info from the Eventful Web site:

At your fingertips you'll have…
-- Millions of events to choose from
-- Schedules for all venues near you
-- Tour dates for over 130,000 performers

You can also…
-- Get email event alerts tailored to your interests
-- Demand your favorite performers to come to your town
-- Participate in our community of 6 million event-aholics
-- Use iPhone's GPS to locate events near you

The reviews over at the App Store are mixed, but as I told Brian, I can see Eventful as being something that I'd actually use again. Brian tells me that the company is working on updates and hopes to continue to expand the functionality available for the mobile space.

Check it out under the social networking section at the store and let me know what you think. One thing that Brian said is that he and his staff are dedicated to improving upon the app, so if you have suggestions or concerns, send them to the company via the links on the app store page.

Thanks for calling.

Saturday, July 12, 2008 -- 11:38 a.m. -- on my couch

I finally got Remote App to work for me -- and it's great! All I can do is control iTunes because I don't have an Apple TV, but it's terrific.

Some great person named FlatE helped me solve it quickly over at the Apple discussion forums.

If you have had trouble, here's the secret:

1. Go to SYSTEM PREFS -- security
2. Select the FIREWALL tab
3. Click on ALLOW ALL INCOMING CONNECTIONS

Now while this is not secure, go to your iPhone and see if remote app works.

If so, do the following:

4. Change ALLOW ALL INCOMING CONNECTIONS to SET ACCESS FOR SPECIFIC SERVICES AND APPLICATIONS
5. Add iTunes as an application
6. Voila! Secure network again and working Remote App.

So glad that's working!!

Let me know what you think of the app, and let me know if this trick works for you.

Thanks for calling.

Thursday, July 10, 2008 -- 8:56 p.m. -- at my desk

As I sit here and wait patiently for the official iPhone 2.0 update, I'm taking a long hard look at what's in the app store. And I'm impressed on many levels -- it is exactly like the iTunes music store, complete with reviews -- and, the apps really aren't that big.

For example, Super Monkey Ball -- a super popular and pretty cool looking game that uses the accelerometer -- takes up just 35.2MB. That's not ridiculous by any stretch of the imagination.

Ms. Pac-Man, a game that I am actually really good at from my arcade days as a teenager -- is just 2.4 MB.

And then there's the smaller apps ... the New York Times, which looks beautiful and is just 0.2 MB.

Facebook is 0.5 MB and Twitterific -- a really cool Twitter app -- is just 1.0 MB.

So sure, there's going to be big files ... but overall, you shouldn't have too much to worry about.

I will reiterate one more time that even with file sizes like these, you should strongly consider the 16 GB version.

Do let me know what cool apps you find and how you are using them.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, July 9, 2008 -- 12:38 a.m. -- at my desk

I'm putting out a call to every single developer that wants their app store application mentioned here on iPTIB for the world to see.

If you have an app store application, let me know about it.

I won't post anything until Friday to make sure you don't violate any rules or regulations and people in 50-plus countries get an introduction to what your app is.

I would greatly appreciate a screenshot in either jpg or png format to go with the posting.

I've already got some great info on cool weather apps, sports apps and much more. But I'm looking for specifics now.

Even if your app won't be ready on Friday, that doesn't mean you can't share it with the world.

I look forward to seeing what you have to offer -- and I'm sure all of my callers look forward to it as well.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, June 25, 2008 -- 12:15 p.m. -- on my couch

So, whenever iPhone 2.0 software hits iTunes and whenever you are able to download it, I think the first thing most of us will do is rush for the App store.

Ok, maybe Exchange e-mail, but I think the curiosity over the App Store is really what's driving the excitement behind this release.

So iPTIB wants to know ... I want to know ...

What is the first app you really, really hope to see on that first visit -- the iPhone app YOU have been waiting for all your life?

Let's start a large comment chain where we talk about that dream app -- you can say as much or as little as you like.

Obviously, there's no master list so just because you want something doesn't mean it will be there, but perhaps it's one of the apps that you know will be there because the company said so ... or perhaps it's something that you'd come to the realization that you can no longer live without.

Ready? Set? Go.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, June 11, 2008 -- 8:33 p.m. -- at my desk

I recently had the opportunity to sit down with the mastermind of a new iPhone app called Nudgen, and if you are anything like me, I think you'll be impressed.

The best way to describe it is a location-aware program that announces where you are to friends via your Facebook and/or MySpace friends list.

So if you are walking up Michigan Avenue or Wall Street or Rodeo Drive and you wanted to know what other friends on your friends list were available, where they were and what they were doing Nudgen could tell you and allow you to instant message those people. So imagine walking the streets of an unfamiliar city and finding out that a friend you know from Facebook or MySpace is at a bar a few blocks away.

For now, the creator says that it requires a jailbroken 1.1.4 iPhone, mostly because it requires those background processes for messaging, which as we all heard the other day won't be available until September. The creator said he'll re-evaluate at that time and see whether or not he can take advantage of those services.

The MySpace and Facebook aspect, to me, is what makes this service unique. It's definitely cool. One of the other things I really like is that the creator seems to always be working ahead, which means it will change as needed and as technology allows. Always a good thing.

You can e-mail dominic (at) nudgen (dot) com if you'd like more information.

Thanks for calling.

Monday, January 14, 2008 -- 3:30 p.m. -- at my desk

I couldn't help but blog about the interview that CNET did with Vic Gundotra, who is the vice president of mobile at Google.

This is one of the questions/revelations from the interview and article:

“What’s next? Will more Google apps join YouTube and Google Maps on the iPhone’s home screen that shows up when the device is first turned on?"

Gundotra smiles mischievously.

"One thing that bothers me is that (mobile) apps don’t work offline, he says when prodded.”

But my question is how do iCal and Google Calendar and Picassa and iPhoto live in happy harmony on the same screen? We may find out tomorrow.

Thanks for calling.

Saturday, January 5, 2008 -- 2 p.m. -- on my couch

If you miss IM on your iPhone, BeeJive is worth a look.

It's not iChat, but in a way it's better because it covers multiple services, including AIM, MSN, Yahoo!, GoogleTalk, ICQ, Jabber, and MySpace IM. And you can use multiple accounts.

Here's some info direct from the Web site:
-- Real-time chats: quick switch between multiple simultaneous chats.
-- Customizable chat skins & emoticon support.
-- Click to browse, call, or send an email directly from the chat screen.
-- Full Unicode support, chat in any language supported by your iPhone.
-- Manage your buddy-list, including add/remove, nicknames, groups, block, approve/deny requests.
-- Control your own availability: set auto-away and custom status messages and be invisible.--
-- Full 128-bit encryption of all over-the-air data transmission.

And let me tell you what I really like: It automatically reconnects in case of data service disruption, including phone calls & loss of cell coverage.

Now, if you are in an area where you are going in and out of coverage, this may be a little challenging to use. Also remember that because it's Mobile Safari based, you aren't charged per message. It's part of your unlimited data plan, assuming you have one.

I still look forward to iChat Mobile, but I do like BeeJive and think it's worth you look at. Personally, I only use AIM and I have my IMs forwarded as text messages, but this still fills a great void in iPhone functionality.

Go here on your iPhone to get started. It won't work on your desktop.

Let me know what you think. Happy chatting.

Thanks for calling.

Monday, November 19, 2007 -- 10 a.m. -- at my desk

Know how I got the time in the stamp line at the top? I used this site.

WorldTimeServer lets you type in the time of any major city and find out the correct time instantly -- properly adjusted for daylight savings time.

When you bring up the main page, there's a list of some pretty major cities, but the search box is right at the top so you can pick the spot of your choice.

There are lots of ways to find out the time, Apple's World Clock application built into the iPhone being one of them. But there's something to be said for a quick bookmark that does all the work for you and, again, takes care of the daylight savings conversion. That's a big one.

So next time someone asks you what time it is in Kuala Lumpur, you'll be ready.

Thanks for calling.

Sunday, November 18, 2007 -- 9:35 p.m. -- at my desk

It's been hard to find a really good sports site on the iPhone -- one to get updates on scores and such.

I came across this one -- SportsTap -- and it looks pretty sweet.

It bills itself as the ultimate iPhone sports portal. It may be right. I haven't seen anything like this to date.

When I checked the scores, I saw the New England-Buffalo score and it was pretty close to live in terms of minutes left.

There's even a spot for MyTap, which may let you customize your scores. That would rock even more.

So check it out at this site and see what you think.

Thanks for calling.

Friday, November 16, 2007 -- 4:44 p.m. -- on my couch

On iPods, you can see the lyrics of a song when they play. No so on the iPhone ... yet.

But when the feature finally does appear -- I mean, it has to -- here's a head start that you'll love.

This only works on a Mac, but go to this link and download the Harmonic widget to your dashboard (Tiger or Leopard required).

Then, launch iTunes. Then, check your dashboard. The lyrics for the currently playing song automatically appear AND automatically paste into the lyrics tab in iTunes.

Now, there were some songs that didn't find a match, but many of my songs did. This is one of those simple apps that just works and just like J. Lo's love, it don't cost a thing.

Oh how I hope Apple builds this function into the iPod on the iPhone. A simple touch square called Harmonic instantly goes online and downloads the lyrics. I love it.

Try it and let me know what you think.

Thanks for calling.

Monday, November 5, 2007 -- 11:23 p.m. -- at my desk

I haven't mentioned this in a long while, and it deserves to be revisited. There absolutely needs to be printing from the iPhone.

But, Scott ... how can we print from a phone?

There are ways. One thing that keeps coming to mind is this CloudPrint service from HP. Here's some info from the Web site:

CloudPrint is a new service that allows you to share, store and print documents easily using your mobile telephone.

When you print a document to CloudPrint, we'll notify all the people you send it to with an SMS message containing a unique document code. With just your telephone number and that document code, you can retrieve your documents from anywhere.

Send CloudPrints to yourself to easily make your documents accessible wherever you go, or send CloudPrints to friends. Now wherever your go, your documents can go too.

Now we all know how successful Apple and HP have been partnering in the past, so let's assume there's a way to do it without HP. At the very least, couldn't we utilize a wireless printer over a Wi-Fi network to print a document? I think so.

And while it might not seem very useful to be able to print from a phone ... tell that to the traveler who wants to print his or her boarding pass without waiting in line at the kiosk at the airport. Tell that to the person who'd love a printout of a snapshot from the iPhone's camera or from an iPhoto Web Gallery page.

And when you think of unique functionality in a phone, you almost always think of the iPhone. How freakin' cool would it be to say that you have a wireless printer in your pocket? Very, very cool.

What do you think? Would you print if you could?

Thanks for calling.

Thursday, October 18, 2007 -- 9 a.m. -- on my couch

I found myself reading MIT's Technology Review last night and I found a fascinating article about how Google Maps works ... I mean, how it works on your computer and, presumably, your iPhone.

This is from the site because I couldn't paraphrase and risk messing up the translation.

Running inside a Web browser, the Google Maps client application contains more than 200 kilobytes of compact and obfuscated JavaScript that is downloaded when the browser first displays the map. The application determines which piece of which pyramid -- groups of data -- should be displayed next and requests it using a standard HTTP "get" command--the same command that's used to download Web pages and images from any Web server. The images are stored in the browser's cache and displayed when the user scrolls to the requested area, zooms in, or zooms out. The browser automatically throws away images from the cache when they are no longer needed.

So that's why you can scroll through the maps on your iPhone when you are using EDGE and it's still smooth. It's all about the cache, baby.

You can read the entire article right here.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007 -- 10:59 p.m. -- at my desk

Tonight, I was informed about something called TalkPlus.

I'll admit ... I'm not sure I understand the true benefit yet. But that doesn't mean I'm any less intrigued.

Oh, and now it's 100 percent optimized for the iPhone (see photo for a taste).

This information is directly from the site at talkplus.com.

TalkPlus Allows you to:
* Add a 2nd phone number your iPhone:
-- have that number ring your mobile, home, and office phones all at once.

Quickly view and manage voicemail to your TalkPlus number using TalkPlus visual voicemail.

Screen your voicemail - listen as your callers leave you a message on your TalkPlus number.

Make low cost international calls using TalkPlus.

And as I read and type at the same time, I'm starting to get it:

When you get a TalkPlus number, our system forwards calls to that number to whatever number(s) you have specified.

When you make a call using your TalkPlus number, you will use one of our mobile applications or WAP to initiate the call. TalkPlus will then use your mobile phone to place a call to a local number provided by our system, which then will connect you to the friend you are calling. This allows TalkPlus to show the TalkPlus number on your friend's callerID, instead of your mobile phone's callerID. This also allows you to place low cost international calls by dialing a local number to connect your call through TalkPlus.

So that means you call a local number and that number places the call. Interesting. And you have an account that you use to place international calls -- not too unlike a Skype account.

There's much more at the TalkPlus FAQ site here.

Anyone try this? If you have or do, please let us know about it.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, October 17, 2007 -- 7 p.m. -- at my desk

It's already been widely reported that Notes will become much more enhanced once Tiger hits the street.

I think it stands to reason that we are going to end up with to-do functionality as well. While I don't really have the scoop, I have this from Apple's Leopard page which, to me, seems pretty black and white.

Tell me what you think.

Notes
Write handy notes you can access from anywhere — including graphics, colored text, and attachments. Group notes into folders or create Smart Mailboxes that automatically group them. Your notes folder acts like an email mailbox, so you can retrieve notes from any Mac or PC or access them from your iPhone.

To-Dos
Create to-do items directly from email messages or notes in Mail. Simply highlight text in an email, then click the To Do button to create a to-do from a message.

I mean, doesn't the same functionality seem to carry over with Notes? It seems all integrated with e-mail somehow.

We'll see. To me, Notes is like an extra rare steak. It really needs to cook more. Hopefully Apple will do it medium-well this time.

Thanks for calling.

Wednesday, October 10, 2007 -- 10:32 p.m. -- at my desk

We get letters. We get lots and lots of letters.

I love letters. And tonight I got an email from caller Helen, who wanted to make sure everyone knew about the "recents" feature in Google Maps.

Turns out that I found it a few weeks ago while doing some mapping for my wedding in Pittsburgh. But I didn't share it with anyone. That was wrong of me because it's one of the most useful features in the program.

Here's what Helen had to say.

This may be well known, but I just stumbled over it today and find it a real bonus. In the Maps app, if you touch the bookmarks icon in the address window, it will take you, of course, to your bookmarks.

However, the thing I hadn't noticed before is at the bottom of this page: Recents. It lists addresses you have requested in the past. It seems to contain only one instance of repeated searches, saving much scrolling and and looking over the same thing again and again.

Also there is a link to your Contacts, which could also save typing (although the guessing function does a good job for me when there is a contact which contains the letters I type).

The real value of Recents, to me, is that I often need to find addresses not valuable enough to bother putting into my Contacts, but that I do refer back to after having done other searches.

I don't know whether this will shed any new light or not, but I was delighted to find, again, that this lovely instrument is ever more helpful.

Thanks for a delightful and informative blog.

You're welcome Helen. And thanks for a delightful and informative e-mail.

Thanks for calling.

Sunday, Sept. 2, 2007 -- 3:08 a.m. (yes, really) -- my couch, falling asleep.

Not sure if this is common knowledge or not, but you can find any CTA station by typing in some basic info into Google Maps.

For example, to find the Brown Line Paulina station shown above, I simply typed in (yep, you guessed it) Brown Line Paulina.

While on the surface it would only seem like a huge help for someone driving to a station, it can also tell you where you are in relation to that station or another one. Useful for those Friday night beer runs.

If you are using the regular Safari version as opposed to the built-in Google Maps on the iPhone, there are sites that have overlaid the colors of the rail lines on the maps. So the built-in version isn't quite as functional as some of these sites, but for me I get just enough information on the fly.

Thanks for calling.

Thursday, Aug. 16, 2007 - 7:11 p.m. -- at my desk

Caller Ken said he was hoping to find something cool when he checked back later.

I aim to please, so hopefully he and everyone else find it cool.

Minglets.

Apparently, it's all about mingling and getting to know people. The Web site, http://app.minglets.com, is broken down into several categories. When you click on one, you are taken into what looks like a really simple chatroom. I'm not sure how many people know about this site, so I"m not sure exactly how populated these rooms will be, but I like what I see.

If you click on menu in the lower left corner, you get more Minglets, including one for Chicago under cities and one for sex.

And the icons are fantastic! Check it out and let me know what you think. ... I was going to talk to the creator about one for this blog community where we could actually talk on the go. Stay tuned. We'll see how it goes.

Thanks for calling.

Tuesday, Aug. 14, 2007 -- 8:20 p.m. -- at my desk

Today, I bring you good news if you are a Skype user or if you have always wanted to try Skype. It's Skype for iPhone.

Basically, Skype is kind of like IM but you can use it to make phone calls from your computer or phone. And because you are going through your computer, it's usually relatively cheap, especially for international calls.

I know nothing at all about Skype other than the basics, and I don't even have an account.

But if anyone out there does and wants to let us all know how good or bad this software is, that would be fantastic.

You can link to the Web site from your iPhone here.

Thanks for calling.

Tuesday, Aug. 7, 2007 •  6 p.m. • at my desk

I'm still trying to piece everything together, but I will tell you that I'm very impressed by this whole .mac Web gallery stuff.

Really quick, here's what you need to know:

• To truly enjoy the full functionality of the .mac Web gallery, you need to purchase iLife '08 ($79) and have a .mac account ($99 per year and now with 10GB of storage).

• Using the new iLife, there's an excellent relationship between the software and the iPhone, along with the iPod.

I highly recommend you check out this link from Apple, which really goes into detail much better than I can about everything that's new.

And of course, as I get more information, you know you'll know first because I'll post it right here.

Thanks for calling.