Author Archive

Android fans need no longer miss out on all the goodness offered by Amazon’s e-books service – the mega-retailer has just released the Android variant of its Kindle app, which has already proven popular for iOS-based devices. With 750,000 books available on the Kindle Store, it’s not hard to see why.

Producing free apps may seem an odd move given that Amazon is selling the actual Kindle Reading Device, a low-powered gadget that employs E Ink screen technology to act as a specialist gizmo designed for reading. But the Kindle hardware is just a low-cost way to drive sales of eBooks – and Amazon knows that people want to read digital books on multiple devices. We approve.
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As we enter the new year, one thought that’ll bring resounding good cheer to Android fans is that the movers and shakers of the technology jungle are finally swinging behind it in terms of app support. This will, hopefully, bring an end to the dark era of having to wait months for big brands to even think about Android while smug iPhone owners got to tinker with all the best goodies.

It’s about time, too, given that Droids account for one in four or all smartphones sold, according to Gartner (see table below), as of November 2010. Better still, though, is that this big talk is being backed up by deeds rather than promises. Two recent examples illustrate the extent to which Android’s star is on the ascendance here.
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No matter how much you love your Android phone, it can be a chore to sift through the reams of me-too apps that tend to clutter the Market in order to find a few that will truly hit your turbo button. That’s why we’re here to help you sort the best from the rest.

But we’re not the only show in town. AppsFire is a sophisticated app-management tool. At the simplest level, it gives you a faster and more effective search function that takes a much more visual approach than the standard means of doing so.

That, however, barely scratches the surface of what AppsFire can do for you. For starters, it will provide personalised recommendations of apps you might well like based on your tastes, your location or both.

Better still, it will overlays tips or hints of how to use other apps as you use them, which can, obviously, save you a considerable chunk of time when you are trying to get to grips with new ones. read more

Amid the entirely understandable hoo-ha that surrounded Google’s outrageous recent decision to slash the refund Android Market window from 24 hours to a mere 15 minutes it was largely overlooked that Big G was about to unleash a massive revamp of the Market itself.

This redesign has already taken effect in the USA and is set to go live any day now in the UK for handsets running Android 1.6 or higher. Some of these changes may sound largely cosmetic but promise to usher in an entirely new Market that is much easier to use and, crucially, much more transparent with regard to the way that apps are described.
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The curse of covering technology is that as soon as you write something it’s often instantly out of date. Nevertheless, even Batman would struggle to keep up with the pace that the Google Maps team is cracking along at. The caped crusader would, however, be proud to use version 5 of this Android app, released this week, in order to chase down the Joker around Gotham.
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