Top iPhone Resource » Utilities

Bookmark Audiobooks & Podcasts with Markr

karthik — Wed, 12 Oct 2011 12:41:01 +0000

I have a collection of audio books that I listen to but was faced with a problem. The iPod app would sometimes forget where I was if I played something else and came back to the audio book.

With audio books containing dozens of chapters, it is sometimes hard to find the spot you left off.

I found an app called Markr that lets you quickly bookmark the audio book/podcast or any audio you are listening to.

This is how simple it is

Start listening to your audio on iPod
Launch Markr when you want to bookmark a spot
Create a bookmark
When you want to play from where you left off, simply launch Markr and start playing the bookmark.

Even though there were plenty of paid apps for this functionality, I found the free app Markr work well for my needs. The only hiccup was that if your book was broken into smaller tracks, it stops with the track you bookmarked but useful nonetheless.

If you need bookmarks for audio you listen to for any reason, give Markr a try.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Availability: App Store

Price: FREE

Reviewed at version: 1.1

Bookmark Audiobooks & Podcasts with Markr - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2011/10/12 (RSS)

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iPhone App Review: SpeedUpTV

Slim — Mon, 27 Jun 2011 14:59:41 +0000

Half the point of having a smartphone is using it as a device to view, organize, and enjoy multimedia files. Mix1009′s new app, SpeedUpTV, is a full-featured video player, file viewer, and folder manager that promises a lot.

It delivers, too. The name comes from the fact that you can use SpeedUpTV to view video files at various speeds—from half speed to twice as fast, in 0.10 increments. But that’s only the tip of the feature iceberg with this tight little application.

Controls are intuitively based on what you’re already used to with your iPhone. The video player, as a matter of fact, looks a lot like the original iOS video player. The main difference is the addition of the speed adjustment bar. As far as the extra features are concerned, everything is intelligently and attractively designed for efficiency and ease of use.

It’s the extras (and there’s plenty of them) that really make SpeedUpTV stand out from the crowd. There’s the video player—adjusting speed is helpful, but so is the built in scene browser, and the looping feature. Then, there’s the folder manager. What a great built in feature this turned out to be! If you’ve got (or want to get) sensitive videos or pictures on your device, this is a must-have with password/hidden folder capabilities.

Playback and audio are great—the audio is a bit of a surprise, because if you’re familiar with slo-mo or speeding up videos, you’re also familiar with how the tone of the audio gets distorted. Not so with SpeedUpTV. Slower, or faster, it maintains the original pitch.

If you own an iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad (iOS 4.0 and up), you probably need this app. For anyone who watches videos or views files on their iOS device (and who doesn’t?!) the $0.99 investment is a good call.

Availability:

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Price: $0.99

Reviewed at version: 1.6.3

Developed by: mix1009

You can also watch live TV on iPhone over 3G including live Wimbledon on iPhone.

iPhone App Review: SpeedUpTV - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2011/06/27 (RSS)

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Find My iPhone Locates When Offline Devices Come Online

shriya — Thu, 09 Jun 2011 13:30:21 +0000

Apple’s Find My iPhone app is one of those best free insurances you can get against losing your beloved iPhone, iPad or iPod touch.

But, it only worked only if your device was turned on and Apple can get the GPS location. if the device was switched off when you are tracking it you were just out of luck.

The latest Find My iPhone update adds the ability where if you can’t locate your device, you will receive an email the moment the device comes online and is located.

You can also now remove an offline device from the list using the app.

Find My iPhone Locates When Offline Devices Come Online - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2011/06/09 (RSS)

Sharing Google Chrome Bookmarks with your iDevice

tonydeli7 — Wed, 11 May 2011 12:51:28 +0000

I use Google Chrome as my main internet browser and many times I find an interesting link that I want to have on my iPhone.

I searched but I couldn’t find a solution on how to share links between PC and iDevice. I was using Read It Later, but after a while it was cluttered and Google doesn’t have an official bookmark app on the Appstore.

Here is a way to do it

From PC to iDevice

Download an extension for Chrome called YAGBE. After installing, go to the page you want to share, right click on it and select "Bookmark Current Page". You can change the name of the page, add it to a folder or add tags. After pressing OK the page is saved to your Google Bookmarks.

To read my bookmarks I use GooMarks (iTunes link) by Diego Acosta, there are a couple of others but in my opinion, it’s the best . GooMarks simply connect to your Google account and lets you browse your bookmarks and lets you open them in Safari.

From iDevice to PC

To share a link from your iDevice to your PC/Google Bookmarks you just need to install this bookmarklet to Safari. To install this bookmarklet, open Safari on your iDevice and save Google start page as bookmark but name it "Add to GBookmarks". Then copy the text from the link above, edit the bookmark you created and paste it in the address field replacing the existing one. Now when you’re on a page you want to save, you just have to "run" the bookmark you created.

Hope I helped a bit. The bookmarklet part may be difficult. This page may help you more and also has some other interesting bookmarklets.

Editors note: If you are using Firefox Sync for your bookmarks, there is a free official Firefox Home iPhone app.

Sharing Google Chrome Bookmarks with your iDevice - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2011/05/11 (RSS)

iHome+Alarm App Helps You Track Sleeping Habits

karthik — Wed, 19 Jan 2011 15:30:00 +0000

iHome is a household name with the iPod and iPhone owner community. iHome has been making iPod compatible and iPhone compatible dock audio systems/docking station alarm clocks for a long time.

While looking for a new alarm clock utility on my iPad the other day, I found that iHome has a free alarm clock universal app in the App Store.

When I installed and played with it, I was pleasantly surprised to see it being full featured as well as beautifully designed.

In essence it is an alarm clock uility and it does it very well. It comes with a fully customizable alarm manager. You can set multiple alarms and can adjust individual alarms to your liking. You can set a time and repeat it everyday, or just weekends or just weekdays or even set your own custom schedule.

You can change the snooze time as well as set vibrate option for the alarm.

An unique feature in this utility is the ability to track your sleeping habit. All you have to do is just use the slider in the main screen and slide it to Bedtime when going to bed and Waketime when you wake up in the morning. Once you start doing this, you can see your stats and sleeping habits.

In fact, you can even announce your sleeping patterns to the social media by posting to Twitter/Facebook when you go to bed and when you wake up. (a bit extreme even for a social media fan like me but I guess some might like it)

In the home screen the clock screen can also show your local weather.

The Settings menu is filled with many delicious options. For eg. you can change your homescreen wallpaper. You can setup a twitter/facebook message to post on your wall when you wake up.

Plus, it comes loaded with configuration screens for iHome iA5, iA100 and iD85 models. You can even see a summary of social news as ‘Overnight news’.

The app supports iOS 4 background alerts but read this note if you use your iPhone or iPod Touch docked overnight.

On iOS 4.0 and later, iHome+Sleep supports backgrounded alerts for the programmed app alarms. This feature is NOT recommended for use when docked to any speaker dock, including iHome’s app-enhanced speaker docks. Background alerts from apps like iHome+Sleep will not sound from the iPhone/iPod internal speaker while docked to an audio accessory, and therefore may go un-detected by users if the audio accessory is powered off, or muted, or in a different mode (such as FM radio). iHome recommends only relying on background alarms when your device is undocked, or connected to a non-audio-capable charger accessory.

iHome+alarm is an excellent full-featured alarm clock utility for iPhone or iPod Touch. I highly recommend you try it even if you don’t own a iHome system.

Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars

Availability: App Store

Price: FREE

Reviewed at version: 2.1

Developed by: iHome

iHome+Alarm App Helps You Track Sleeping Habits - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2011/01/19 (RSS)

Track Data Usage and Services with Consume iPhone App

karthik — Tue, 18 Jan 2011 13:00:00 +0000

In my last trip abroad, I wanted to track my data usage with the prepaid cards I was buying. So, I used a nice app called DataMan to track my 3G data usage.

I just came across another app that helps you track your data usage but by signing into your cell phone carrier account.

Consume iPhone app is designed to track your usage for your mobile phone. But, it doesn’t stop there. Consume lets you track your usage for your home broadband, packages, highway toll cards, airline rewards cards and more.

Consume has a beautiful and attractive interface. It lets you add from more than 200 providers from 18 countries.

Consume works with text configuration files called Recipes. So, if a carrier changes their setup, an update can even be applied within minutes with new recipes.

In the US, Consume offers

Mobile Phone — GoPhone (Pick Your Plan), GoPhone (Pay As You Go), T-Mobile (Prepaid)
Broadband — Comcast (Portland only), Transport, American Airlines, Amtrak Guest Rewards, Delta, ORCA Card, Sunpass
Clubs — Hilton HHonors, Scooter’s Coffeehouse
Package Tracking — DHL (USA), FedEx, UPS, USPS
Gaming — Club Nintendo

Even though you can get your data usage on AT&T’s iPhone app, this offers a one-stop place to track multiple services in one app. Plus, this could be useful for international users where the carrier doesn’t provide an app to see this on their iPhone.

Consume is available on the App Store and is FREE.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Availability: App Store

Price: FREE

Reviewed at version: 1.81

Developed by: Bjango

Track Data Usage and Services with Consume iPhone App - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2011/01/18 (RSS)

Notified – What Apple Should Have Done to Notifications [jailbreak]

karthik — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 20:00:00 +0000

There are a few apps in the Cydia jailbreak app store that I won’t hesitate to pay for. Notified app is one of them. But, it is available for free! Free, as in beer.

One of the things Apple sadly has not improved since the introduction of the iPhone is the notifications. It offers a pop up modal dialog which on dismissal is gone forever.

With the introduction of Push notifications and local notifications, the number of messages I see on my iPhone screen everyday from various apps and services is mind-numbing. Depending on what I am doing, I might quickly dismiss it. Unless you knew which app sent you the notification you briefly glanced at, you may not see see it again until luck out and open that particular app.

With so many apps having badges, my poor eyes have gotten blind to the notification badges on apps these days.

Notified, available for free in Cydia, is an excellent solution to this problem.

Notified logs all the notifications coming to your iPhone screen. You can view all your notifications with a nice title of the app and the message itself in chronological order.

It gathers notification from your iPhone like SMS, mail notifications, missed calls, low battery, low memory, voicemail and Push notifications from apps like Boxcar, Facebook, etc.

You can view all notifications in Notified in offline mode as well.

You can pick and choose the kind of notifications you want to see on lockscreen, springboard and choose to not log a kind of notification.

You can choose to keep up to 150 notifications in the app. Also, you can apply redirections if you want an alternate app to open the message you have received. For eg. you can use GV Connect to launch on tapping a missed call.

Notified has made it easy for me keep track of the various messages and alerts I receive and don’t worry about missing or casually dismissing a notification and wonder about it later.

You can see the app at Notifiedapp.com. Notified is definitely making it’s way into our must have free jailbreak iphone apps collection.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Availability: Cydia

Price: Free

Reviewed at version: 1.3.6

Notified – What Apple Should Have Done to Notifications [jailbreak] - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2010/09/24 (RSS)

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Dropbox 1.3 Update Adds File Caching & Background Uploads

shriya — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 19:31:07 +0000

Dropbox iPhone app is one of my most used apps for transferring files from my iPhone and desktop. Dropbox has been having a flurry of updates in the mobile space like adding a Blackberry app.

It is good to see that the team is still keen on improving the Dropbox iPhone app as well. The new version 1.3 adds

UI re-design with numerous visual enhancements including retina display support
File caching (no need to re-download files you’ve already viewed)
Fullscreen landscape file viewing on iPad
Finish uploads and downloads while in the background
Create folders

The app also had recently acquired the ability to upload HD quality videos and the ability to increase local storage to upto 500MB. You can also set a passcode lock for the app in Settings.

For those unaware, Dropbox is the best file sync utility I have used and I highly recommend giving the free Dropbox account a try.

Dropbox 1.3 Update Adds File Caching & Background Uploads - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2010/09/24 (RSS)

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Google Authenticator iPhone App for New Two-Step Verification

karthik — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 19:30:00 +0000

Google has just unveiled a new security feature – two-step verification for Google Apps users.

Google has now introduced the two-step verification for Google Apps accounts. Instead of a key fob, they have ingeniously utilized another device we constantly have on us – mobile phone.

No special tokens or devices required. Once you enter your username and password, a verification code is sent to your mobile phone as SMS, voice calls or generated on an application for Blackberry, Android or iPhone.

Google Authenticator iPhone app works with two-step verification for Google Apps. You can use Google Authenticator to generate verification codes directly on your iPhone without needing to be on a network connection.

You can do an automatic setup with a QR code with the built-in barcode scanner in the app. The app allows for multiple Google apps accounts. It also supports OATH HOTP/TOT code generation.

Note that the two-step verification is now available only for Premier, Education and Government Google Apps users with support for Standard Edition users coming in the next few months.

Another good news for iOS developers is that this mobile authentication project is open sourced so you can customize it for specific enterprise needs.

Rating: not rated yet

Availability: App Store

Price: Free

Reviewed at version: 1.0.3

Google Authenticator iPhone App for New Two-Step Verification - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2010/09/21 (RSS)

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Grocery IQ App Review, Shopping Made Simple

phorz — Sun, 19 Sep 2010 00:18:39 +0000

It’s Sunday, and for me this means its grocery shopping day. Throughout the week we have written down a few things that we need to pick up, if we remember, as we run out. Then on Sunday morning we sit down to plan out our weeks meals and write a corresponding grocery list.

My wife is the champion for paper and pen lists. Even though I’ve given her my old 3GS when I upgraded to iPhone4, she still insists that all lists, especially grocery lists, must be written on paper. However I think I may soon be changing her mind with a gem I discovered that shines like a beacon, guiding you to grocery shopping heaven.

It may sound a little over the top, but I love this app. Grocery IQ is even on the front page of my springboard. Basically, you set up the store(s) where you shop, tell Grocery IQ what order the isles are in at those stores, and start adding items to you list.

“Big deal a grocery list, I could do that with the native notes app”, you say? Here is where the magic happens: Grocery IQ puts the items on your list in the order of where they are in the store. Now, I could easily go through my on-paper grocery list and rewrite it to be in the order of the store, but that just wastes more time and paper.

I can’t count the times that we have been at the store and thought we were almost done, but there was something we missed that we still need to grab. It’s almost always something that is clear at the other end of the store. Now that I’ve been using this app during my grocery endeavors, I have yet to traverse the store multiple times to get everything. Every second that I spend doing something that I would rather not do, is a second wasted. That’s why I love apps that help me gain precious seconds every time I use them. I know that I have better things to do, don’t you?

There are also other great features, like coupons that you can print (via coupons.com). For easy list making there is a favorites tab, and history of items you had listed that can easily be added to a new list. You can email your list to someone else. There is also list sharing for multiple devices! Especially useful in a scavenger hunt situation. Get this app before they decide to charge for it!

Rating: 5 of 5
Availability: App store
Price: Free
Reviewed at Version: 2.0.3
Phorz

Grocery IQ App Review, Shopping Made Simple - Originally published in Top iPhone Resource on 2010/09/18 (RSS)

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