Sunday, July 20th, 2008

Allow me to be the last blog owner in the galaxy to write a post about the iPhone apps that I’m using, and a few that I’d love to see come to fruition in the near future. I’ve been really impressed with the first batch of software released last week, but a few have really stood out:

Twinkle - Twinkle is a really cool Twitter app that also shows you folks around you that are posting to the service. Stalker-ish, but not too terribly much as it only gives the city and how many miles (roughly) they are from you. The UI is kind of lame, but overall a nice product.

Facebook - the 1.0 release was kind of weak, but by 1.1 they have really put out a solid version that quickly allows you to update your status, look at other’s profiles, and upload photos and whatnot. Pretty cool stuff if you’re a Facebook user.

OmniFocus - I have a tendency to forget things if I don’t write them down and keep them super organized. OmniFocus for the Mac lets me quickly enter my thoughts, assign them to contexts, and remind myself to get things done when they need to be done. Having a mobile interface for the same program is excellent, as it insures I can always enter those random thoughts into my OF database.

BofA - The Bank of America app isn’t all that pretty, but it does what it’s supposed to do, and rather quickly. A UI refresh (it currently looks just like the mobile version of the website) will surely improve that.

Remote - A cool app that allows you to control any iTunes installation on your LAN, or an AppleTV if you have one. Great for when I’m playing video games and want to change the tunes on my Mac.

Last.fm - Streams music over WiFi, EDGE, or 3G to your iPhone from the excellent Last.fm service. Unfortunately, as of now it doesn’t submit songs played thru your iPod to the online service (yet). Fingers crossed on that.

Yelp - Yelp is an excellent service for finding ratings and info on local restaurants. This application finds your location and shows you the top rated places around you. Very cool, especially when you’re lacking inspiration on where to eat and need a nudge in the right direction.

Exposure - Nice app by Frasier Spears (of FlickrUploadr fame) that allows you to browse your Flickr library and view and comment on other’s. Very nice app.

NYTimes - A very straightforward app that allows you to browse the NYtimes site and customize what type of news you see when you launch the app. It has a customizable bottom row of icons, much like the customizable iPod app’s buttons. If you don’t care about political news and want to see an editorial menu items instead, so be it.

Shazam - If you’ve ever been out and wondered what the song on the radio or in the store was, Shazam can help. Simply open the app and press the ‘tag this song’ button, and after about 20 seconds, Shazam will record the audio, send it to their server, analyze the waveforms, and send back a result. I’m yet to stump this app with any songs in my iTunes library. It’s truly amazing how far technology has come.

Other apps I’m using

Here are some other great applications I’m using on my iPhone right now. Some of these I either don’t use much, or are rough around the edges and need some work.

• AIM
• Twitterific
• NetNewsWire
• Instapaper
• Jott
• CheckPlease
• Mobile News
• Scribble
• SportsTap
• Loopt

Apps I’d love to see

Amazon.com barcode scanner - Let’s say that I’m at my local Target, Barnes and Noble, or some other retail establishment. I’m browsing around, and see a book that I’d really like to get, but not today (for whatever reason), or that I just cannot carry at the moment. It would be amazing to have an app that let you use your iPhone’s camera to scan the barcode, and either a) buy it now or b) add it to your wishlist. Someone would make a killing off of the referral cash alone.

Fantasy football app - Once fall gets here, I will be playing Yahoo! Fantasy Football. I would love an app (even if it’s only for the paid members) that allows you to quickly see lineups, player news, and league standings.

And Finally…

I’m really excited to see where the software development community takes us as the platform matures, and competition begins to spring up. I think that the iPhone OS will be the dominant Apple OS within a few years, and this is going to be a huge cash cow for them. Moreover, I can’t fathom what type of amazing technology is going to be in our hands within the next 5 or so years. The iPhone 3G and the iPhone OS 2.0 is just the beginning.

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Posted on July 20th, 2008 | 6 Comments »

Wednesday, July 16th, 2008

I was wondering something today, and figured I’d throw out out there. Is there a term for words or phrases that can be typed with one hand (while still on or near the home row position)? For example, with my left hand I can type some of the following words quickly:

• draft
• stewardess
• freeze
• trace
• stewart
• racecar
• earwax

It should be noted that this is by no means a comprehensive list, but a simple overview of what I’m talking about here. So the question is, does a term exist for such a word?

Posted on July 16th, 2008 | 1 Comment »

Tuesday, July 8th, 2008

Steven Frank of Panic fame has managed to capture my feelings perfectly in his post about blogging. Almost daily I alternately think that I should write a blog entry, or that I should blow the whole thing up and make a simple portfolio site.

Much like Steven, I ponder if I should be writing about what generally boils down to either a) personal matters or b) trivial matters - both of which would be better suited to places that aren’t my personal website. Still, other days I think that without my website, I would have probably not have learned as much about web design, nor would I have had as much fun going thru the old entries seeing what I had to say, what others had to say in reply, and generally just shaking my head wondering what I was thinking. Surely one day I’ll look back at this post and do the same.

Twitter’s existence certainly has complicated things for me as well, as Frank also notes. Not that I really churn out much good content anywhere, but Twitter does suck up all of those little ideas that could certainly grow into longer winded blog posts down the road. Dumping them onto my Twitter page allows them to die the short, painless death that is probably for the best in the long run. In any event, most of my ideas for blog posts (generally about something relating to a website or user interface that bugs me) gets sucked into that vortex and goes away, thus leaving my material for this site much thinner.

Ah well. As long as it’s still fun in some weird or small way, or as long as someone still stops by and reads this thing (surprisingly, a lot of folks still do), it’ll be worth my while.

Posted on July 8th, 2008 | 1 Comment »

Tuesday, July 1st, 2008

One of my biggest complaints with the first-gen iPhone was it’s weak ringer volume. I’d miss a ton of calls when walking around (maybe 1 in 10 - although I only get about 10 calls a year anyway, so…), and it really started to annoy me. That’s when I decided to take a look and see if it was the ringer, or the actual ringtones that were at fault. As it turns out, most of the sounds that come with the iPhone are just pathetically quiet. With a little time in Garageband (or QuickTime Pro), you can have some ringtones on your Jesusphone that are substantially louder than the default ones. Honestly, the first time I gave this a test run, it scared the hell out of me it was so loud.

The first thing that you do is find a track that is to your liking. If you have Garageband installed, there is a good cell phone ringtone in /Library/Audio/Apple Loops/Apple/iLife Sound Effects/Work-Home/ and it’s called ‘Cell Phone Ringning.caf‘.

I made a copy of this file on my desktop and opened Garageband. From there, I just dragged the file onto the stage, clipped out the deadspace, and bumped the master track volume to the absolute loudest it would go. I exported it out to the desktop as an AAC file, and then opened up MakeiPhoneRingtone.app, which can be found here for free. Drag the exported song onto this app, and you’ll have the new ringtone in iTunes.

From there, you just sync up the new ringtone to your phone and change it in your iPhone’s system prefs. If you’re lazy, I’ve attached the m4a of the ringtone that I created. Enjoy!

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apple, applications, iPhone, macintosh, software, gadgets

Posted on July 1st, 2008 | 3 Comments »