Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Android must haves, July 2011

Righty, time for a quick update on what's being used.  All change since February.

In no particular order, and no links cos i'm lazy...

  • zeam - first thing to be added!
  • google+ - and we'll see how that goes
  • facebook - for the rest of the time, not liking new version, too much unclickable whitespace
  • gtasks - lovely, syncs with google tasks
  • flick note - also lovely, syncs with simplenote
  • advanced clock widget - since you can customise it
  • circle battery widget - for it is simple (although use previous mostly)
  • blue skies [live wallpaper] - nice and subtle effect, not too garish nor distracting
  • google goggles - for the occasional 2d barcode or price check
  • national trust - for the occasional 'what shall we do now?' moment (good work Martin!)
  • sms backup - the one by Christophe Studer, very nice - SMS into a gmail folder
  • wifi analyser - for rare occasions finding hotspots
  • free english dictionary - by oeri, which is most useful (top work Neil!)
  • google translate - helps with my french, a lot
Besides that, the normal handset core apps are good enough.  I tend to change phones quite often, and can't be dealing with the hassle of changing too much everytime.  So, gmail, native exchange capable mail client, calendar, native messaging, native browser, google maps (love this) - they all tend to be daily use.  Replacing the stock apps for core functions is a bit of a faff just now to be honest - particularly as the native ones are very good indeed.

Other things I don't bother with - kindle, I just take my kindle...  Ebay, well, can't be bothered.  Games - on occasion, but bored of Angry Birds (and it's related Seasons, Rio) a while ago.  Google Reader - same really.  Nowadays, I prefer to keep things simple. 

No comments: