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I will be blogging at the Apps World 2010 Conference in London.
Keep the date: 30-1 December.

I want to hear what you have to say about the future of the app industry, discover the latest apps trends and learn from some top speakers. See you there!

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Let your friends know you're getting things done - Dunnit reviewed

If there is one app category overpopulated in the AppStore that is productivity tools. I'm pretty sure you even have a ToDo app installed right now on your iPhone, but they all follow more less the idea of collecting information and ticking actions as you complete them. 
Dunnit [iTunes Link] by Runloop is a ToDo app which adds a social element to the mix: The tasks completed will earn you OpenFeint points and will unlock achievements, making it the first productivity app to use social networking to motivate users to complete their tasks. 

At launch Dunnit will display a list with the items to complete, the task list, where you can tick as done the activities, edit, or just see your overdue or upcoming projects. Every item has a headline and description (notes) and the option to set priority as well as set recurring tasks. Even though it might not be part of some people's GTD routine, it is a much demanded option in mobile devices, since you won't have to enter the information next time you need to complete that task. Dunnit will sort the tasks on a timeline looking at the due dates. Again, GTD purists might not agree, but I suggest to always set a completion date for the app to display your next activities efficiently.

via youtube.com

Activities can be organised with tags, which are used here as a context field, although you can also add your own ones. For this type of applications I've always found more useful to sort tasks according to a location: Things I can do when I'm at home, at work, on the bus… these days you can get a lot of things done on the phone while I wait for the bus for example. Combining the task list timeline will give you an overview of your day/week, while the tag view is the ideal for actually get cracking on them. 

Conclusion and screenshot gallery after the break

Read the rest of this post »

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Filed under  //  iphone   review  
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Posted 3 months ago

Tomorrow's Friday - Release your stress with Face Fighter

via youtube.com

For the ones back to work, it's finally Friday tomorrow. If you feel you need it, here you have a stress release game that you know from 2009 - Face Fighter from Appy Entertainment.
For some reason I used my face to try this app, not a good idea. You are meant to use with your boss or father in law. Fun game with fun references. Don't miss it (they have a lite)

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Posted 6 months ago

Backup your iPhone pictures to a DVD with iPhoto

Since the launch of the original 1G iPhone I have been taking pictures, and later on videos with it. After two years and more than 4.000 photos, I needed a way to backup those precious pictures. I sync them with iPhoto, so the contents are pretty much the same, plus everything is copied to a Time Machine drive automatically. Where is the need to save them somewhere else?

Time Machine would delete older copies to save the latest information from my Macbook. I can stand not having a picture in physical format, but I need a hard copy, something I can store in a safe place and won't get corrupted or deleted as easily as an external hard drive. The day after Christmas I decided I would save them on DVD.

I found out that backing up your iPhoto library burning it to a CD or DVD is dead easy. I have chosen a Sony AccuCore DVD-R 16x compatible, which sound very impressive but was the cheapest I found at the local Fnac during my holiday in Spain. One DVD won't be enough, so I'm going to try different brands, including the fancy double layer ones, that I hope my laptop can handle.
The process is simple: Open your iPhoto and select all the pictures you want to back up. I have sorted them in events to make it easier, you can also use a smart folder. In the menubar select Share>Burn and you'll be prompted with some burning options. You can also select the name of the DVD and you get a representation of the space used and empty in it.

Saving your pictures with this method will ensure that iPhoto can recognize the library, but Windows PCs won't be able to read them. If you need to take a CD to print your pictures in a shop, for example, iPhoto recommends to export the pictures and burn using the Finder. I found much more convenient to burn it the DVD as an iPhoto library, since it's richer and contains original and modified versions as well, just like your Mac.

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Filed under  //  howto   iphone   mac  
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Posted 7 months ago

Plushed! Reviewed - A surreal 2D platformer with beautiful art

If you follow me on twitter and read the reviews in this blog you will know that one of my biggest complaints about iPhone games is the lack of a story or interesting plot. It works for some games while others don't really need it. Perhaps I'm simply tired of bad attempts.
When I previewed Plushed [iTunes Link] I was surprised,and now after testing this game I can surely say that they have put some effort in that matter. Plushed by Blacksmith games is an iPhone platformer like no other. Set in a wicked fantasy world, you are in control of a plushy bunny in search of its owner, who happens to be the princess. It is all around food, with spaghetti balls trees (similar to the flying spaghetti monster) and pizzas to tease the game creatures. 

The plot originality is one of the most remarkable elements of this production, but I also like the story flow. The player will need to talk to characters, read post notes and event get advice from its sword. Yes, the sword talks and it is the cutest thing ever! 

The visual style is beautiful and full of hand drawn illustration-like characters, varied backgrounds and cartoony animations that work very well together. This makes the game purely 2D and currently the aim of the developer is to add new characters and content via updates. 

Every chapter is different, with different goals, techniques to be used and varied scenery. So far I have played the three first levels and I have the feeling that as much as I like Plushed, there is a certain something missing. The gameplay is fair, but not perfect. Classic platformers where so basic that were easy to play and guess what one had to do. Plushed is so rich in content and surreal fantasy that you really have to get immersed to understand what to do straight away.

via youtube.com

 The platforms, walls and objects are very nice, but they are so novel and do not get repeated in levels, so it's difficult to make sense of what they do. You know what I mean: You can jump to a platform, you can't jump a ceiling. I found it impossible to differentiated them, specially because some have odd shapes and end in edgy corners.

The main gameplay fault is the absence of damage  UPDATE: The latest Plushed update gives the bunny 3 lives solving the "one hit and you're dead" issue. You don't even get a second chance. There are infinite lives as well. I would like to get my character blinking indicating danger so next time I know! At least there are checkpoints so you don't loose all the progress. Some of the enemies are so cute that it is difficult to know they are harmful. A blonde girl moving around is going to kill you? I will hug you to death!
Plushed fails to deliver in that sense, but it is otherwise a cool game with lovely 2D graphics and even some minigame surprises along the way. There is no doubt that this game breeds from the real videogame classics Mario and Sonic sagas, but is missing a level of freshness, speed or freedom to move that is counter attacked with a great history. If you like games with level of detail, the amount of random stuff and crazy references is breathtaking. See the screenshots for an enemy inspired in the dancing banana forum emoticon.

For their first game, Blacksmith has done something really good but must need to listen to feedback to follow other successful iPhone devs that do the same. They certainly do not lack imagination nor initiative (These are the chaps who organised the AppVent calendar). The game has been release recently, and it is currently on introductory sale. I suggest you grab it since it will gain value with time. 

 

 

                   

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Filed under  //  appstore   game   iphone   ipod touch   review  
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Posted 7 months ago

Maps, the Apple way. Four ideas to improve user experience in the iPhone.

via flickr.com

A lot has been written about two of the last Apple job postings. Apple looking for an app developer with experience in games and weeks later asking for a top engineer with passion for maps. I really liked the comments from the Keith Andrew interview with Rob Fahey and his approach. The hiring is more likely to be oriented to prepare Apple to grow and to have internal knowhow to give a useful SDK to third party developers. 

I have to think that the job opening about maps has to go up that alley, and not necessarily to develop a substitute for the Maps app and to finish with Google. I don't think this is the case. It is true that Apple acquired last month Pla cebase, a mapping company, but I think they where more interested in their API that finding an immediate substitute for Google Maps. 

As an engineer on the Maps team, your responsibilities will range from implementing low-level client/server code to implementing high-level user interfaces. You'll be responsible for implementing new and innovative features, fixing problems and enhancing the performance of Maps. You will work closely with the other engineers on the Maps team, other iPhone and iPod touch teams as well our partners in other companies.
via jobs.apple.com

After reading the job description carefully  and reading some comments, seems clear to me that what Apple wants is to revamp the iPhone Maps. They're looking for an engineer to work on:
  • Base code, implementing Placebase's API PushPin.
  • User interface and usability (new app features will be added at some point).
  • iPhone teams, MapKit framework to use the new features in other apps and even desktop or MobileMe. 
Hence the title of my post. Apple what is really looking is to reinvent maps, continue using Google Maps, but the Apple way. We all agree that is not going to wait sitting to see how Android gets real navigation GPS, for example. 

There have been some innovations since the last Maps update. Now augmented reality is used in a bunch of apps, but not as impressive as I thought they could be. The navigators industry has jumped and created software and hardware for the platform. Could Apple imagine two years ago that TomTom would be fighting to be at the top earning lists in the App Store? Nope. 

There has been a lot going on. These are my five suggestions for them to catch up and bring Maps to the next level:

An app location aware
There must be a better way for "This app would like to use your current location". There must be a point between revealing too much information and not using it at all. If you think about it we use member cards for supermarkets, public transport and even gyms that track our behaviour. The moment your iPhone is aware of it's location it could do cool things for you and save time: Instead of a Tube map it could suggest a journey based on my daily commute in the mornings.

Augmented reality
So you use your camera and thanks to the iPhone compass you can see items in your screen. As futuristic as it sounds, this is in it's Stone Age. If Apple, or anyone else, can make that flat information be displayed around me more interactively and... smarter, it will be a huge step.  

Multi-perspective
Google has pictures from space. They even sent out cars to get a Street View perspective. Even Microsoft has pulled out a more than respectable Bird's Eye View for Visual Earth (now Bing). The most innovative concept I've seen in maps is Jack Schulze’s featured on WIRED where he included a multi-perspective view that combined satellite and street level in the same view. This is the beginning of something. 

Layered information
Using Placebase's PushPin to let third parties, read content providers, to include a wealth of informations to the maps. This could be traffic, demographics, traffic, tracking buses in their itineraries, properties for rent/sale,… you name it! A new layered Maps will contain Google's a base and custom content. This could be a powerful tool for all those maps apps that promote businesses (say Starbucks) and to have a chance to be in an Apple default app. 

This is my take on three aspects that could be integrated some day in our iPhones. What do you think? Are those feasible? Is Apple preparing something just in case their relation with Google deteriorates?

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Filed under  //  insight   iphone   ipod touch   maps   opinion   rumour  
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Posted 8 months ago

News of the week - New iPhone in the works
The iPhone as a media message amplifier? via flickr.com
One of my personal favourite and most reputated Mac sites, MacRumors, have triggered the crazyness in the iPhone community. They reported last Saturday that developer Pandav has spotted usage records for an unreleased iPhone in their app's analytics.

"iPhone3,1" was first spotted in Pandav's usage logs in November. This "iPhone3,1" identifier does not match up with any shipping iPhones. The last iPhone released to the public was the iPhone 3GS which carries the identification string "iPhone2,1".

References to "iPhone3,1" was first discovered in the iPhone firmware files back in August, but this seems to be the first time that it has been spotted "in the wild". Apple similarly began testing the iPhone 3GS (iPhone2,1) back in October of 2008 about 8 months ahead of its launch. At the time, the usage was similarly focused in the San Francisco Bay Area where Apple is located.

via macrumors.com

The response in their forums and twitter has been very positive and I get the feeling some are getting too excited. As MacRumors makes clear, last time records of a new hardware type were found, it took Apple eight months to deploy in into the markets.

Isn't it absolutely normal that Apple tests new products? Because we are all willing to see more iPhone updates, but for me, this information only means that someone has been using 3rd party apps with a hardware model not official. This could be a jailbroken device, a new concept (tablet anyone?), a new iPhone OS version and of course, new iPhone hardware.

If you look back to January, PinchMedia provided reports of an 2.1 iPhone and now they do the same with 3.1. Data was gathered at the beginning of the month, so what's the point of releasing it now? Is it because this was a Black Friday weekend? You tell me about it.

UPDATE: This is trending topic now at Mashable

 

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Filed under  //  apple   appstore   iphone   rumour  
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Posted 8 months ago

iPhone gamer memorabilia: Beneath a Steel Sky, signed comic booklet

         

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Posted 8 months ago

No dish, no box. Sky television fits in your iPhone

Sky, the British subscription television channel is now in the iPhone, and oh boy, it works. First ones to get the treat where Xbox 360. From last week, O2 customers can install the service in form of an app that runs in your iDevice and allows you to stream your Sky content via WiFi. That's it: Tele in your pocket! The app has the not so creative name of "Sky Mobile TV News and Sports" and it is available only in the UK store

UPDATE I have included a massive picture gallery and a demo video for everyone to see loading times and how smooth it runs.

 

How's the app? Spartan. But works. With almost no flaw. The interface is kept to a minimum, a part to log in, the TV channel listing, what is currently played with a description, and of course, the killer feature: Live streaming of Sky Sports 1, 2, 3, Xtra, Sky Sports News, Sky News, At the races, and even ESPN. The app follows the line of other BSkyB apps in the store, that range from score center, news reporting and a remote Sky+ box recorder. 

Let me tell you about the video playback. The quality is up to the iPhone screen standard and under WiFi I noticed no lag and the image was super smooth (for an iDevice...). This runs better than Youtube for me, and the loading time is about 4 sec. Disregard iTunes reviews from people that don't know WiFi is required to stream content. 

The video controls include play and pause, with the possibility to go 30 seconds earlier in case you missed something. This ability to fast backwards and forward was very handy when watching a football game and wanted to se that tackle again. Then I can go back to real time. 

You don't need to be a current BSkyB customer, the application has it's separate subscription package. O2 is currently offering three months for free for early subscribers. Later on it will be at £6 per month. You can sign up for the service texting "Sky" to 2020. When you compare the costs of a Home subscription you can see how the deal is: Getting Sky at home won't be less than £16 per month. If you happen to be interested in their sports channels, you will need to chip in for the sports package. If you even want the Cricket, Rugby, and in my case the Spanish La Liga, you'll need to get the Xtra pack, that is among the high tier  ones, up to £36 per month. 

For me the only drawback will be the subscription based service and the channels available do not always stream. I do think that for the price being asked and quality delivered it is a steal. I get a bitter feeling about "Free apps will be always free", because this one is not. I haven't watched a full game yet on the iPhone, but I could if the battery could last 2 hours streaming. (That screenshot is from a NBA game on ESPN)

 

From the first 3 months trial offer, yes I love it. When this period is over, let's see if they make any change or add more channels. For me this is getting closer to sci-fi. I'm tired of being told how Japanese and Koreans watch TV on the phone. Now we can in the UK. If only worked under 3G... I have included a massive picture gallery and a demo video for everyone to see loading times and how smooth it runs.

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Filed under  //  app   appstore   gallery   iphone   review   UK  
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Posted 8 months ago

Cookmate for iPhone - Exclusive Video Preview

via youtube.com

Hands on Cookmate. Can this be the biggest innovation in modern cooking? Have a look yourself.

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Filed under  //  app   appstore   iphone   preview   review   youtube  
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Posted 8 months ago

Apps on TV - Big Bang Theory mentions Doodle Jump

via youtube.com

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Posted 8 months ago