Archive for the ‘Reference’ Category

What I’ve been up to..

Monday, May 17th, 2010

On my mobile handset (and I’ve been using an Android handset in addition to my BlackBerry lately), I tend to look for apps that are either media portals (those that deliver news and or blog content seamlessly) or tools (such as a flashlight app). As I walk between the BlackBerry and Android worlds I’ve been looking to see which specific apps, media delivery and types of tools, that work well in both worlds.

Here’s what I’m up to:

Media
There are a ton of media sites and apps. I believe that very soon you will be able to find an app for your favorite news source on any platform. For the moment here are my picks (all are free unless specifically noted):

Android
• Huffington Post – Original content from one of the most popular blogs out there.
• Engadget – My personal favorite gadget news site.
• AP Mobile – For all AP wire stories.

Black Berry
• New York Times – All the news that’s fit to Print
• Slate – My favorite online magazine. Lots of great writing, debate, and even a bit of fluff.
• AP Mobile – For all AP wire stories.

Tools
For the most part I think the simpler the app the better. Here are my top faves:

Flashlight tools – Completely awesome when it is all you have. When your parking meter change falls out of your pocket at night, a flashlight app can save you from the risk of parking tickets. There are a number of apps out there. Some use a handset’s flash LED (on my BlackBerry tour, for example) and some use the handset’s LCD screen (as on my Android handset).

BlackBerry
• BestFlash ($2.99)

Android
• Color Flashlight

Guitar Tuner – This little app replaces my standalone guitar tuner and tuning fork. Yea! There a number of them for Android. There are a few for Blackberry but they tend to be pricey.

Android
• G Strings Guitar Tuner

BlackBerry
• Guitar Studio ($9.99), also includes chord library and some other useful utilities.

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Public transportation goes mobile.

Monday, May 10th, 2010

Many of us use public transportation to go to work, school and events. A convenient tool for checking schedules and maps is right on your CREDO Mobile phone! If you are like me and you live in the Bay Area, you can access BART’s mobile website by going to http://www.bart.gov/wireless/ on most mobile devices.

If you don’t live in the Bay Area, check your local Transit Authorities website since most of them also support a mobile version. In example, Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority can be accessed by going to http://www.wmata.com/mobile/ .

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Zagat To Go on BlackBerry

Wednesday, January 13th, 2010

Restaurant week is occurring in many cities so I thought this was the ideal time to try out Zagat to Go 7.0 for Blackberry. Zagat to Go provides up-to-date Zagat Survey ratings and reviews for over 40,000 restaurants, nightspots, hotels and golf courses in hundreds of cities worldwide.

ztg_blackberry_home

Features of the mobile version include:

Ratings: Just like the Zagat Survey books, Zagat to Go rates each restaurant on Food, Décor, Service and Cost using a 30 point scale.

Search: In the app you can search for a restaurant by name or browse by cuisine, neighborhood, or one of the numerous features like child friendly and power scene. I often also take advantage of a variety of lists of top rated restaurants by category. When traveling, it’s especially valuable to use the GPS search to find a nearby location.

Usability: The app is easy to use and navigate. It allows you to quickly make a reservation using the click-to-call button or map it using a full color downloadable map and directions. You can even add a reservation to your calendar or establishment to your address book.

Coverage: People typically either love or hate this application and it primarily boils down to the coverage in your area. I recommend the 14-day trial to ensure you’re satisfied with the results before you invest in this app. Zagat covers restaurants in the following regions: New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, London, Washington DC/ Baltimore, Philadelphia, Boston, Chicago, Miami /Ft Lauderdale, Seattle, Atlanta, Houston, Dallas Ft. Worth, Sacramento, Las Vegas, New Orleans, San Diego, Hawaii, New Jersey, Connecticut, Texas, Westchester NY/Hudson Valley, Long Island, Montreal, Toronto, Paris, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai and the top restaurants and hotels in other major cities and regions.

Download 14-day trial: Go to http://mobile.zagat.com/blackberry.htm. You can download the 14-day trial by entering your phone number to receive installation instructions via text message or use the BlackBerry Desktop Manager (Note: Only supports Windows based operating systems) to download directly from this page.

Purchase Zagat to Go:

  1. Go to Handmark’s site. www.handmark.com
  2. On the site – select your handset model and type “Zagat to Go” into the search box.
  3. In order to download the application you’ll need to set up an account. Handmark charges downloads to a credit card, debit card, or paypal account that you provide. Handmark is a partner that CREDO recommends to our customers for Smartphone content. In addition to the BlackBerry, Handmark offers content and applications for many other phones including almost all smartphones and some standard phones including the Motorola Razor.
  4. You have the option of selecting an annual membership to Zagat to Go for $19.99 or a monthly subscription for $3.99/month. Once you’ve made a selection, you’ll receive a text message with a link to download the application. You’ll need to have a phone with a data service plan in order to access the mobile web link and download the application.
  5. After you have successfully downloaded you’ll find the application’s Icon on your phone’s main menu/icon list.

BTW wondering when restaurant week is in your area? Check out: http://www.eatdrinkdeals.com/2010/01/restaurant-week-across-usa-2/

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Fandango BlackBerry Application

Tuesday, January 12th, 2010

Fandango has released a BlackBerry application that provides a quick way to browse movies, preview coming attractions, and purchase tickets through the application. The application has three main sections: Movies, Theaters, and Search. The Movies section of the application pulls up current movies based on newly released features, top box office draws, and movies that are playing near a specific zip code. The Theaters lists movie theaters near your zip code and allows quick access to show times and links to purchase tickets. The Search function has a very basic feature set, but gets the job done as far as pulling up movie title results.

Overall there are many helpful movie research features to the application in terms of browsing movies and checking out upcoming movies. Where the application is a let down is in terms of the location settings; which don’t seem to take advantage of the GPS capabilities of BlackBerry smartphones. The ticket purchasing feature works well with a way to store a credit card and Fandango account information in the application. Perhaps the biggest letdown of the application is that it still requires you to print the tickets, show a credit card at the ticket booth, or retrieve the tickets from a Fandango kiosk. The application would be better if tickets could be purchased on the BlackBerry and then a unique barcode was generated which could be scanned directly from the phone to grant theater admission.

You can find more information on the Fandango BlackBerry application and a link to send the application to your smartphone:
Fandango BlackBerry Download Link

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Improving transportation planning for cyclists through smartphones & GPS

Monday, January 11th, 2010

The San Francisco Transportation Authority (SFTA) has released a mobile application that will improve its ability to understand the traffic patterns of cyclists in the city. Traditionally, the SFTA has used far less accurate and more manual methods of collecting data on bicycle use – e.g., someone standing on a corner counting. By installing an app on your GPS-enabled smartphone and then providing some data on your trips, you can provide rich, accurate, and real-time data to SFTA on how you bike in the city. This is a great step forward in quantifying the growing number of cyclists in the city and making the roads better for them.

The application is currently only available on the iPhone and Android platforms. This has driven some concern for a variety of reasons:

  • It doesn’t provide an accurate view of a very large segment of users. Blackberry has far more current users than the iPhone and the Android platforms combined.

  • It doesn’t provide as representative a picture of users from a variety of income backgrounds. The iPhone is one of the most expensive devices out there ($200 for the newest model). You can get a Blackberry for $50 or often less.

  • It probably undercounts bicycle commuters heading downtown. There are 16 million more enterprise Blackberry users than there are enterprise iPhone users in the US. I believe that addressing the bicycle needs of commuters represents the largest opportunity for taking cars off the road.

  • It isn’t available on CREDO Mobile. Bicyclists such as myself love CREDO Mobile, the greenest mobile phone carrier in America. The iPhone is only available on AT&T, a carrier with a history of contributions to right-wing politicians, including U.S. Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) who opposes government spending on bicycle infrastructure. Also, CREDO Mobile is a San Francisco business and woman-owned.

    • If you are interested in having the Cycletracks app support Blackberry, please contact Billy Charlton via email or at (415) 522-4816.

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    Ebay BlackBerry Application

    Wednesday, December 16th, 2009

    Ebay has released a new free mobile BlackBerry application currently in beta that allows users to bid on auctions, track auctions, and monitor saved searches and favorite sellers. The application fares pretty well as far as searching for items and saving items to your Ebay Watch list or to your calendar. I don’t quite feel as comfortable bidding or buying items on Ebay via the application, though, because the item pictures aren’t very detailed and reading through the terms and conditions in auction descriptions is hard on a mobile screen.

    You can find a link to download the application via this link:

    Ebay Application @ BlackBerry AppWorld

    The downside is the application is only geared towards buyers on Ebay and completely omits sellers from utilizing the application. The reviews on BlackBerry AppWorld are very critical of this missing feature in the application. This is a big omission, as much of the appeal of an Ebay application is for Ebay sellers to monitor live auctions. I hope Ebay can improve the application in the future by including more sellers’ tools and allowing users to set preferences in terms of which items are highlighted on the main search page.
    ebay_blackberry_beta

    To use the eBay for BlackBerry smartphones, you will need the following: 175KB of available application memory, BlackBerry Internet Service browsing capabilities, and BlackBerry® Device Software Version 4.5 or later.

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    WiFi surfing on the HTC Touch Pro

    Monday, November 23rd, 2009

    The HTC Touch Pro is a powerful device. As a touch screen smartphone, it is the essential mini windows computer in your pocket. And because it’s WiFi capable, you can even get broadband speed data connection just like on your laptop.

    Say you are:

    • Traveling abroad and you want to use your phone on your trip where you wouldn’t necessarily be able to have phone service.
    • You don’t want to incur a huge international data roaming bill but you want to check email and be able to map where you are traveling in google maps.
    • Make low cost international calls using Skype
    • Sitting at home or work or a cafe and you want really fast connection speeds – much faster than on a cell phone network

    Here’s how you setup WiFi:

    1. From the top left corner of the home screen select start -> settings
      This will bring up a menu of options and select the connections tab at the bottom of the screen.
    2. Select the WiFi icon on the screen and look for a WiFi network to connect to and select the Connect soft key in the bottom left corner of the screen.

    3. You’ll need to enter in a network key if the connection requires a password. Select Finish to finish setup and establish the connection.

    Once setup, it should remember the connection settings so that once you return to your house or your workplace, you will have instant broadband connection.

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    DriveSafely. Just say no to TWD.

    Friday, November 6th, 2009

    In a recent AAA survey, 21% of respondents admitted to texting while driving (TWD). Even California’s first lady can’t resist the urge to use her mobile phone while driving. It’s also tempting to read your emails and texts while at the wheel. To reduce my chances of an unfortunate incident, I installed DriveSafe.ly from BlackBerry App World on my BlackBerry Curve.

    drivesafely

    DriveSafe.ly automatically reads your messages to you as they arrive. You just turn it on when you get in the car or even when you are about to go for a long bike ride and you’re good to go.

    DriveSafe.ly will automatically respond to your messages for you, but you can turn this feature off easily by clicking on Advanced Setting. Then you can respond personally when you arrive safely at your destination. The free version will read up to 25 words of each message and DriveSafe.ly Pro will read a maximum of 500 words plus give you a choice of speakers.

    If you’re one of the tempted, download DriveSafe.ly today. Keep your eyes on the road. Your fellow drivers will thank you.

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    Evernote For BlackBerry

    Thursday, November 5th, 2009

    Evernote is a solid note-taking app that integrates with a web account to store all your daily notes in a variety of formats. Anyone trying to implement a “Getting Things Done” (GTD) system in their life should check out this application. Anytime you need to remember something on the go you can use Evernote.

    Evernote is a free and premium BlackBerry application that lets you create text notes, save pictures to your Web account, record quick audio memos, attach files to notes, and search and find notes both on your phone and the Web.

    You can download it from the BlackBerry App World or visit the Evernote for BlackBerry page for more info and direct OTA or ZIP download links.

    Evernote_BlackBerryInterface

    Evernote offers two account levels, free and premium. Free users have access to all the tools, recognition, and synchronization, but are limited to a 40MB monthly upload allowance. Premium accounts receive 500MB monthly upload allowances, SSL security, priority image recognition, and premium support.

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    Words of the Day: Galumph & Genial

    Monday, October 26th, 2009

    galumph [guh-LUHM(P)F] – intransitive verb

    1. To move in a clumsy manner or with a heavy tread.

    While I think today is the first time I’ve ever read the word “galumph”, I can certainly say that I’ve embodied the definition – generally it’s before I’ve had my first cup of coffee in the morning. Thankfully I can now aptly describe my pre-caffeinated state and expand my vocabulary regularly, due largely to the free Dictionary.com app I just downloaded onto my CREDO BlackBerry. Featured in BlackBerry’s App World, this application offers access to Dictionary.com’s reference content – which includes more than half a million words, definitions and synonyms. In case you’re not sure how to say words like “onomatopoeia” after looking them up to make sure you’re spelling them correctly, the Dictionary.com app offers audio to provide pronunciation assistance. The thesaurus tool is also useful – you probably could have guessed that “advanced”, “broad-minded”, “modern” and “forward looking” are all synonyms for the word “progressive” but now you know for sure.

    You can download the app from your CREDO Mobile BlackBerry via BlackBerry App World or online from the BlackBerry App World website.

    Dictionary.com App for BlackBerry

    Dictionary.com App for BlackBerry

    My favorite feature of this app is the “Word of the Day” – which I credit for adding “galumph” to my vocabulary. A Spanish version of “Word of the Day” is also available – today’s word is “genial”, which means “brilliant, awesome.” “Se me ha ocurrido una idea genial” is the example sentence provided by Dictionary.com – meaning “I’ve had a brilliant idea.” Looks like my brilliant idea today was downloading this app to my phone. Or having coffee.

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