Guest post by Chee. Need some awesome free Android apps? Apple’s iPhone may have the kudos, but Google’s Android phones are no longer playing catch-up. In the all-important market for apps, 2011 was the year that Android-powered smart-phones hit number one, in terms of app downloads.
And the great news for Android smart-phone users is that, for a big fat wedge of this year’s outstanding apps, you don’t need to reach for your wallet. They’re free. So lets run down some of best apps to be had on Android – totally awesome and totally free.
Awesome Free Android Apps
1. Google Translate - No surprise that a Google app starts off the Android app list – especially an app that is amazing as Google Translate. Not only does this app translate written text to-and-from any number of languages, it can also speak the translated phrase for you.
It can even translate someone else’s spoken phrases, and turn them into something vaguely intelligible to you. Great for anyone traveling outside of their language comfort zone. And great as an ice-breaker when you’re in company in another country – the translations are not always perfect, but that adds to the potential for humorous unintended consequences.
2. Where’s my Droid? - Phones may be extra smart these days, but us humble users can be pretty dumb at times. And topping the list of not-so-clever human-phone interactions is the misplaced phone – which, naturally enough, you will have left on ‘silent’. But you can save yourself a lot of cushion-lifting frustration, trying to track down that errant phone, with this helpful little app.
Just send a text to your phone’s number, with the phrase ‘Where’s my droid’. Immediately the app triggers your phone into a noisy attention-grabbing response. Even better, with GPS enabled, the app can tell you where your phone is. Shame it can’t do the same fore car keys.
3. Sleep Talk Recorder - Love this one. There are some slices of our lives for which we have to rely on hearsay for – what we get up to whilst fast asleep being one of them. Now with this neat little app, Sleep Talk Recorder, you can find out whether you really do you snore; or, more importantly, whether you can actually talk Klingon in your sleep.
The app is simple to setup, and relies on clever noise-filtering technology to start recording only when you’re sleep-talking. You end up with a nicely-edited and revealing insight into your night’s utterings and splutterings. Great for sleep-talkers, but it may just be defeated by sleep-walkers..
4. Shazam - This is an app to end those endless bar-room debates, over who is playing what song on the radio. Shazam is another acoustically-tuned app, but this one picks up snatches of songs, rather than sleep-talk. It takes those acoustic slices, and compares them to the stored-signature sounds found online.
Once it’s zeroed-in on the song in question, Shazam tells you the artist, song title, and even shows the album art. Shazam works best on better known radio-edit plays, rather than obscurities – and keep the banter down; a faintly-heard song over a lot of bar-room chatter is likely to draw a blank.
5. Google Skymap - Another one from the boys’n'gals at Google, but this is a gorgeous crystallization of all the potential lurking in your Android smart-phone. Take one smart-phone, add Google Skymap, and then point at the night-time sky. Suddenly all of those anonymous points of light, usually swamped-out by street lamps and flashing plane-lights, spring to life.
This app shows you which of them are planets, which are stars, what their names are; it even connects the dots for all those fancy constellations. With this app, you really will never look at the night-sky in quite the same way again.
6. Pandora Radio for Android - Radio stations may be two-a-penny on smart-phones, but Pandora’s offering is a distinctive and accomplished blend of radio station and personal play-list – as well as being no-penny-at-all.
You simply throw Pandora the name of an group or singer that you like, and it builds a radio station play-list around that, and similar, artists. It also provide a pretty mash-up of album and group art, backgrounders on the artists and a rating system. This is 21st century radio on-the-move, as it was meant to be.
7. Dropbox - With even the average Joe Sixpack juggling – in the course of one day – smart-phones, tablet PCs, laptop, and computers (at work and at home), keeping all of your info up-to-date is often a nightmare. Luckily, cloud-based apps like Dropbox have stepped in, to rescue us from a mish-mash of data confusion. Dropbox works so well because it seamlessly threads everything together.
Just drop those important files, pictures, contacts or music files into Dropbox, and they’re stored online and synchronized with all your other floating devices. You’ll never be lost for a file again.
8. Layar - In many ways, Layar is the app that, on Android phones, defines AR – augmented reality. AR takes the world around you and draws over it – on your smart-phone – with reams of useful information streamed down the internet. Layar includes, in its free version, such useful layers as special offers at restaurants, where the nearest ATM is, which houses are for sale – even who is twittering in your neighborhood.
There are now a huge number of customized layers that can be added to Layar, making your experience of reality potentially an ever-evolving one. Who’d have thought that reality would end up being super-sized like this?
9. Scoremobile - Finally, one for the sports fans. With this app tucked away on your Android smart-phone, you need never have to holler across the bar, for the TV sports channel to be turned up. Instead, you get all the latest results from your favorite sport – from NFL to NASCAR, baseball to golf – delivered straight to your handset.
Scoremobile let’s you set up a ‘stock-ticker’ style screen, which runs through the latest scores as they come in. Or you can tell the app to load up with scores from your selected sports/ teams at a certain scheduled time. There’s plenty of flexibility in this app, and you can even drill down into game and player stats. Obviously, for in-depth commentary or background you’ll need to turn elsewhere, but this free app is ideal for those who need their fix of sports news to hit hard, and fast.
This article is a guest post from Chee Seng, a blogger who writes about freeware reviews at BestFreeOnline.net
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Guest post by Ashish. Facebook recently launched the new Timeline feature to all its users. While most of the users loved the new update, like always there were some who didn't quite like it. One of the major reasons for the dislike was the complicated interface.
So, if you are one of 'em who think that the new timeline feature is a bit too complicated, here are 5 nifty tips to get you started.
Get a Nice Cover Image
Cover Image is a very new concept introduced with the new timeline view. A cover Image, just like a magazine cover, speaks about you, and thus you must not neglect it. Though you can upload and customize the cover image manually, but if you are looking for some special effects with the ease of editing, you can try CoverCanvas. It's by far the best I have come across.
Hide The Past
With the new timeline feature, all the older posts and updates you made years back will be easily accessible. As years back there was no provision in Facebook to mark your updates as friends, friends of friends and public – all your older posts becomes public by default.
Thus, the first thing that you should do after activating the timeline in your profile is make all your older posts private. To do so, click on the dropdown arrow near the home button and click on Privacy settings. In the privacy settings page look for Limit the Audience for Past Posts and click on Manage Past Post Visibility.
Now click on the button Limit old posts in the new dialog box to hide you all public updates you made in your past.
Add Life Events
After the timeline feature was introduced, Facebook is now no more a simple social-networking service, instead it's like your biography online. You can now add your life events to Facebook like your convocation date, your first anniversary, the day you got promoted, the day you brought your first car or bike. Let it be any event and Facebook lets you share it with your friends.
To create an event go to your timeline view and click on the Life Events button next to the update status button. Now add your desired event to your Facebook profile and share it with your friends.
Feature your Posts
In the timeline view, a post is shared in a two-column newspaper like format. They are trimmed to occupy the left or the right half of the screen. If you would like to highlight any story in your timeline and would like to feature it occupying both the columns, just click on the star button located above the update.
Your post will now be expanded to use both the column in your timeline view thus featuring the story.
Change Album Primary Photo
In the new Facebook, whenever you upload a photo album to your profile, it automatically selects an image as the cover image for your album.
Now, if you want to change the image with another existing image in your profile, click on the small pencil near the star button at the top right of the update and select Change primary photo. Select the new primary image and select OK.
Conclusion: I am sure, with these nifty tips you will be able to make the most of the all new Facebook timeline. Don't forget to share your experience with the all new timeline feature.
Guest author Ashish Mundhra is Editor at WorkYourOffice and is an enthusiast in the field of technology.
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