What's on your iPhone - useful apps

[vicente solano]

Quote:

Originally Posted by W2R Goonie, thanks!! Maybe remembering your experience will help me to battle the craving to surrender to my impulse (to buy an iPhone)!!! Vicente, I don't know - - maybe I will give in! I am trying really hard not to.

I can resist everything except temptation-O. Wilde

...there are terrible temptations that it requires strength, strength and courage to yield to-O. Wilde

So, follow the advice of the classics

[calmloki]

Psst.... Telephoto for the I-phone, or, as they say: "The new design to run of rays can effectively avoid the contortion of image, and makes the super wide angle, the larger luminous flux, the higher visual acuteness, good for color reduction, which makes the high quality of photography." Give your iPhone 3G a telephoto lens

or for the crafty, SLR telephoto: captin nod: The Phone-O-Scope: Attaching SLR lenses to an iPhone

[CuppaJoe]

I’ve had an iPod Touch only a few days and have already deleted a couple of redundant or useless apps. A very good one so far is called Instapaper Pro. While I’m at my computer looking at the forum or elsewhere on the net and see an article I want to read later, I just click on the Instapaper icon on the bookmark bar, it instantly flashes, “saved.” Whenever the iPod has a wireless connection, Instapaper will download the article. I can later read it offline. It looks similar to e-book text on the screen, with adjustable font sizes, no ads. It includes working links if I happen to have a wireless connection while reading it.

[FIREd]

Quote:

Originally Posted by CuppaJoe A very good one so far is called Instapaper Pro. While I’m at my computer looking at the forum or elsewhere on the net and see an article I want to read later, I just click on the Instapaper icon on the bookmark bar, it instantly flashes, “saved.”

Instapaper Pro is a great app. You can also install the Instapaper bookmark on your iphone, so that if you see something you want to read later while browsing the internet on your iphone, you can save it and read it later too.

[CuppaJoe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FIREdreamer Instapaper Pro is a great app. You can also install the Instapaper bookmark on your iphone, so that if you see something you want to read later while browsing the internet on your iphone, you can save it and read it later too.

Thanks for that tip; it took me forever to get though all the steps to install the bookmark on the iPod but it is so cute the way it works.

[FIREd]

OK, that's not a useful app, but I bought a iPhone game called "build-a-lot" and I am completely hooked. The goal: maximize your net worth and income by flipping real estate and renting your investment properties... Now I want to become calmloki...

[CuppaJoe]

Quote:

Originally Posted by FIREdreamer OK, that's not a useful app, but I bought a iPhone game called "build-a-lot" and I am completely hooked....

In my book, anything that prevents boredom while waiting, say for a bus, grocery or Post Office line is useful. I now have many games on the iPod and now SO wants to borrow it, uh oh; he never wanted to look at the Kindle.

[calmloki]

For (cheapazz) car enthusiasts that drive BMWs. OK, maybe it will work in any old car, but for maximum joy a BMW is suggested. Free at the App store. Thanks for the app BMW!

BMW Announces Free M Power Application for iPhone, iPod Touch – Automotive News & Car Rumors at Automobile Magazine

"Other applications promise to harness the built-in accelerometers in both the iPhone and iPod Touch to record speed, g-forces, and acceleration times, but most cost at least $10 in Apple's Application Store. M Power is the first free version to be widely offered -- and, in our opinion, the best-looking interface yet (but hey, we're suckers for the traditional M colors).

Once downloaded, users simply need to affix the phone to the car (a windshield mount may suffice), select what parameter should be measured, hit the start button, and go. These types of applications may not be 100-percent accurate, but for the enthusiast who wants a quick estimate of vehicle performance, it may suffice..."

[Goonie]

Let's see....I've only had my iPhone for a couple of days, and I've found a few useful apps for it...and at least one that it's usefulness may be questionable.

I installed 2 apps for things I use on the PC regularly...Facebook and The Weather Channel. Then I installed AOL Radio...let's you find and listen to all sorts of radio stations...including my favorite news radio station in Chicago, WBBM-AM 780....it nice to be able to hear my 'local' news while I'm traveling. You can search by genre (rock, country, jazz, talk, sports, etc.) or by locale (Atlanta, NYC, LA, Dallas, etc.).

Also installed Epicurious, which is a nice recipe 'book' that's got detailed ingredient and recipe procedures, and also let's you make a shopping list.

Then there's the perhaps less than truly 'useful' app.....iStooges! It's a bunch of sound-bytes of various 3 Stooges sayings and sounds....since I love the Stooges, it's a great time-waster, and perfect for annoying people that don't like them!

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goonie Then there's the perhaps less than truly 'useful' app.....iStooges! It's a bunch of sound-bytes of various 3 Stooges sayings and sounds....since I love the Stooges, it's a great time-waster, and perfect for annoying people that don't like them!

What? No farting app yet? There are several out there.

[Goonie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rich_in_Tampa What? No farting app yet? There are several out there.

Hey, I'm just getting started...I'm a newbie. I'm sure I'll have one before very long, but I had to get the Stooges first.....a matter of priorities! Heck, what good is an electronic gadget that can't produce gross, disgusting, or annoying sounds?! If they can't at least do that, what good are they! Ha!

[Ronstar]

DW has an Iphone, me a Blackberry. She has a weight watching calorie totaling app, a couple of radio stations, movies nearby app, and a few others including one we put on yesterday that controls our stereo from anywhere in the house. I just have google maps on my Blackberry.

[Goonie]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rich_in_Tampa What? No farting app yet? There are several out there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goonie ...I'm sure I'll have one before very long.....

Got one...iFart! I'll be perusing for a better one though....I want need one that has a good solid, earth-shaking fluttle-blaster!

Also now have 'Walgreens'....so I can check out their weekly flyer and see if need to go there after my coffee run just down the street, like we did this morning because the had 'Nature Made' vitamins, fish oil, and such on sale 2-for-1, plus I had $1 and $2 off coupons too!!!

For cooking I've added:

"CrockPot Slow Cooker Recipe Finder"....lots of slow-cooker recipes!

"McCormick Recipe Finder"...more good sounding recipes.

For my gardening addiction:

"Botany Buddy" (that I still have to figure out how to use...it was really late last night).

"MyGarden" which will allow me to log all sorts of info on my gardens and plants and stuff...pretty much a garden notebook that I can carry in my pocket and 'write' in while I'm out in the gardens and BEFORE I forget to do it later!

"Herbs+" has info on growing and using various herbs, and a little (very little) info on medicinal uses of herbs.

I'm still digging through the zillions of apps available, in search of useful and/or stupid stuff.....Thus far, I've found bucket loads of both!

[Bestwifeever]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Goonie ....iStooges! It's a bunch of sound-bytes of various 3 Stooges sayings and sounds....since I love the Stooges, it's a great time-waster, and perfect for annoying people that don't like them!

Maybe I DO need my own iPhone! I love the Stooges. I'm going to download that one to DH's phone. Nyuk nyuk.

[Goonie]

I've added on:

"WhitePages"....an easy to use people finder (phone number & address), I use the the WhitePages.com website all the time!

"TruckStops"....pick a state, pick an interstate, and it show where the truck stops are, for some it shows the current price for gas/diesel. You can also find out the locations of rest areas, and the where there are WalMarts. It also uses Google Maps so you can see where these thing are located, get directions to them (or from them), etc.

"TideGraph"...find when high and low tides are for various areas. Also includes sunrise/set, and moonrise/set, etc.

"LSolitaire"......just a plain old solitaire game similar to the one that comes with MS Windows......I gotta have something creative to do when I not just wasting time and annoying people!

[Bimmerbill]

I've been looking at the Droid since I have Verizon and like the coverage. Saleswoman told me that it can not be tethered either. What's up with that?

Can the Google phone be tethered?

I was put off by the high monthly cost too. I have a $40 plan now. If I added a second line, then the phone with data plan it would push the monthly bill way up.

There are some really nice apps out there! I saw one that is a tachometer for radio control helicopters (my newest hobby). Measures the sound and uses some algorithm to tell you the RPM.

[tgotch]

Bimmerbill,
I just bought a Droid last week (came from a Blackberry Curve). I love this thing. Didn't know what I was missing with my BB.

In regards to your tethering issue. You can download PDANet (they offer a free version in the market - limits you to non-https: sites). This will allow you to tether the Droid for no monthly charges from V (The way I understand it, as long as you are not using un-godly amounts of data, Verizon can never tell if you are tethering or not).

There are also ways to tether by "rooting" the phone. I have not explored this yet.

[Chuckanut]

I really like the new weather app from Yahoo!. You might try it if you have been using the usual apps.

[imoldernu]

Don't know if this qualifies as an app, but "FindBigMail" looked at my Gmails, which I hardly ever delete and found 5 gigabytes in large downloads... videos, multiple picture files etc, which I could easily delete.
As far as I know there is no easy way to sort old Gmails by size, so this was a good deal (free) for me...

[ERD50]

TIMER++ for IOS is a fantastic kitchen (or other) timer.

https://sites.google.com/site/kurtas.../timerplusplus

Here's how I came across it:

The other day, DW brings me our kitchen timer - it's not working. So I check the batteries, no go. I take it apart, but can't fix it. And, I can't find the same model on-line. And this timer had some features I liked, and it seems that many other timers I've seen a deficient. These might seem like small things, but if I buy a timer I want it to do everything right - why should I have to compromise for such a simple little device, when all of this is do-able? I had to actually think about everything I like or dislike to guide my purchase, and here are my requirements for a simple timer:

1) AA or AAA batteries - I keep those on hand, don't want one that takes odd/expensive coin cells.

2) Must do multiple hours, minutes and seconds. I found that a LOT of timers only went up to 100 minutes. How the heck are you supposed to time a long-cooking dish?

3) Needs to start counting UP after the time is reached. This is hard to figure out from the descriptions on-line. But I really want this. If you walk in and it is beeping, many just sit there at zero. With the count UP function, you can see how much you missed it by - one minute, or am I five minutes late? That can make a difference. And why not just do it?

4) Once it alarms, it should be easy to go back to the same time, rather than have to re-enter it each time. Like when you time multiple 5 minute events.

5) Needs to be easy to set - hard to detail w/o trying it.

Well, after spending way too much time on-line trying to find one, it occurred to me to see if something was available for our old iPod Touch. And I finally found this TIMER++, and it does everything I listed. Plus, it actually does multiple timers in a good interface. I've had multiple timers that were too confusing to use.

And it's free!

Now, the Apple app WARNING: I'm really frustrated by the way Apple controls the app store. This iPod Touch is an older gen, can only be upgraded to IOS 4.2.1. But you go to the app store, select an app, it asks you if you want to install it, it starts the process and then 9 times out of 10 it tells you that the app requires IOS 5 or 6. Why show it to me then? Worse, the app store only allows the most recent version in the store. So even though there is often a version that will work on my older device, I can't access it. This forced, artificial obsolescence is a terrible abuse. It has really moved me towards Android and Linux in general, and away from Apple.

So be sure you keep a back up of any apps you use, if you delete them or need to re-load them, they may not be available! You have been warned!

-ERD50