The drive to become ever more productive both in work and in life has helped create a wide variety of mobile productivity apps. For the iPhone in particular, there are several useful task management or ‘to-do list’ apps that are doing quite well.
Two productivity iPhone apps that we have taken a look at include the popular Todo application from Appigo (iTunes link for Todo), and the ToDo’s iPhone app from Austin Bull Software (iTunes Link for ToDo’s).
The ToDo’s app is fine for a basic (and free!) list app where you do not care for extra bells and whistles. And while there’s a lot to be said for its simplicity, there sure is a lot to like about the Todo app from Appigo. Simply put, version 2.0 3.0 of Todo has so many more capabilities around managing multiple lists and prioritization. Of course, Todo is $9.99 on the iTunes App Store, so it’s not quite fair to compare the two directly.
As with any new tool, we’d encourage you to try them for yourself and see what works best for you. Below are the demo videos so you can see exactly what they look like without trudging over to iTunes to download them. Once you’ve decided, click the iTunes buttons or download links below to download.
How many times have you had to fumble around trying to dial a number on your mobile phone while driving? I’ve done it more often than I’d like to admit, though I am happy to say that I have completely stopped. If you own the iPhone 3GS, you can kick that habit too, and maybe even save a life in the process.
The new iPhone feature is called Voice Control. You can use Voice Control to dial a contact by name or by phone number, play a song on the built-in iPod, find out the song currently playing, or even create a genius playlist based on the current song playing.
To use Voice Control, simply press and hold the home button. At the tone, speak a command such as “Call Will Ferrell”, or “Call 408.555.1212″. To play a song, simply say, “Play Darius Rucker”. You get the idea.
So stop using your fingers to dial while driving and start using Voice Control on the iPhone 3GS. Who knows — the life you save may be your own.
Fire up the popular Rocket Taxi app on your iPhone, and it uses GPS or WiFi to find your location and list nearby taxi companies. This is handy when you’re in someone else’s house and need a ride (especially if you’ve had a few), or in some other semi-remote area where cabs are not roaming the streets.
Feature Suggestion: Automatically call the nearest cab company. That would be a logical next step.
Download it now and then check it out the next time you need a lift!
Many are singing the praises of Facebook 3.0, the latest iPhone version of the world’s most popular social networking site. Just released on the Apple App Store on Thursday, the application now allows you to view Events, view profile photos, and post video from your iPhone 3GS.
You’ll notice there are still a few bugs to be worked out, as you can see on the Facebook wall. But by all accounts it is still worth downloading.
Have you downloaded it yet? For all you SimCity junkies out there, the iPhone version of this game definitely helps you get your Sim fix. It’s not perfect – we’ve seen multiple reports of crashing and a bit of slowness ourselves, but that should not dissuade you from shelling out the $5 for this one.
SimCity image courtesy of EA Mobile
Take a look the next time you are loading up with games and apps on iTunes.
Anyone else take this game for a spin yet? Let us know your thoughts!
Have any of you out there sorted your way through too many iPhone apps to find what you’re looking for. And then once you buy what you think is a great app, you find out that the 14-year old “developer” seems to be better at writing marketing copy than writing code?
Enter, Appulo.us, the self-proclaimed “Solution to a flawed app store.” This site essentially provides users with links to free trial versions of iPhone and iPod Touch apps to use before they buy. Not a bad concept at all.
There are a lot of questions about this service, and many our answered on their own FAQ page.
Go take a look yourself before you buy that next app, and try it out for free. Then let us know what you think about this service. Will Apple try to stop them?
I ran across the iQ Search “iPhone application” the other day, and it struck me that it is not an iPhone app at all. Rather, it is a mobile website, with that unmistakable look and feel of the iPhone interface. In fact, because it is a simple website, you can use it right now on a Windows desktop if you’re so inclined. You don’t need an iPhone, an iTouch, or even a Mac for that matter.
Now, I do not have a problem with that in and of itself. The problem is when I see it included in a list of iPhone apps — it just irritates me that the author of those lists clearly don’t know what they’re talking about. If it’s not in iTunes, and it can be run on non-Apple platforms, then I say it’s not an iPhone app.
Getting back to the app mobile website itself, iQ Search can indeed be very convenient. Simply enter your search terms, then decide which search engine/social network/website you want to query. After using it a few times, I started to appreciate the ability to quickly decide which search engine would be most appropriate for that particular search.
Pandora Radio creates custom radio stations based on your favorite artists that you specify. Despite it’s apparently uncertain future, the service has developed a huge fan following.
Now Pandora comes in a free iPhone App, available through iTunes. One unique feature of this iPhone application is that it lets users create custom music channels, without requiring an existing Pandora account.
If you’re a music fan or if you currently use Last.fm, you really need to give Pandora a try. To download Pandora for your iPhone or iPod touch, get it from iTunes.
There continue to be a fair amount of complaints from iPhone users about their iPhone locking up or freezing. We ran across this video the other day which shows you how to reset it.
After venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins launched the iFund back in March, they received a ton of plans and have witnessed major developments in the mobile services and applications market.
The iFund is a VC fund which invests in mobile services and applications for the iPhone and iPod touch platform. The company has already invested over $30 million from that fund.
Go check out the first post on their blog and catch up on who’s hot in the ‘open mobile ecosystem’.
