iPhone Hill

I don’t consider myself a newshound, but I do like to be in the know.  I keep an eye on Wiki trends, Twitter trends and get weather and breaking news updates by SMS.   

Anytime a story about the iPhone or BlackBerry comes out, I want to know.  Plus, there are artists, authors, and actors I’m a little ashamed to say I know more about than I probably should. 

RSS feeds are a good way to stay on top of those tidbits and I have three such apps that I rotate among depending on the features included in their latest updates.  But as good as RSS is, it’s a pain to have to mine through 1000+ articles to find that small handful of gems worth my time to read.  

That’s where NewsAlert can be a handy app to have.

If an RSS app is a scalpel, cutting away extraneous stories of little interest to you, then NewsAlert is a high-powered laser allowing you to hone in on what truly matters. With it, you can specify by keyword (choose up to 10 keywords with the initial purchase cost, with the option to buy more) the news issues and topics you want to read about.  Once a keyword is chosen, whenever a story with that keyword is released on the web, you’ll receive a notification. 

The degree of customization is impressive.  You can specify the news sources you don’t want to hear from, the times you want to receive push notifications as well as the total number you wish to receive in a day.  

The app is simple to set up, does what it’s designed to do and quickly became a valuable resource.  It allowed me to keep tabs on issues that don’t often break through the typical news cycle.  

NewsAlert is currently on sale for $.99, so if you’re even slightly interested, snap it up now before the price returns to $2.99.

iTunes Link – NewsAlert

Version 1.3

Tested on an iPod Touch 3.1.3

UPDATE: This is now $.99, not free

Have you ever wanted to be a penguin? Have you ever wanted to bounce on snowflakes up to outer space? Have you ever wanted to be a penguin that bounces on snowflakes to outer space? If you answered, “Yes,” to any of those questions, read on! And if you didn’t, you should still read this review.

In Penguin Bounce, an app designed by screensmudge, you are a cute penguin who lives on an ice berg. You try to bounce on snowflakes higher and higher to obtain the best high score before falling safely to your cozy little ice berg. This game seems like a spin off of the game Doodle Jump, but in this game you control your penguin by swiping your finger to the left or right.

Being free, I would recommend this game for any penguin lover, snowflake lover, or Nutcracker lover (the background music is from the Nutcracker). So check out this game in the App store today.

iTunes Link – Penguin Bounce

Version 1.0

Reviewed on iPhone 3GS OS 3.1.2

I once read that in the lobby of Google’s Corporate Headquarters (the so-called Googleplex) are a series of projector screens that show real time aggregated data on active Google searches around the world.  That struck me as an interesting concept, one I thought- for the briefest of moments- would be kind of cool to see in person.

Although the average person may never set eyes on the Googleplex (beyond those exaggerated pics we’ve all gotten via email), we do have resources available that will allow us to see what people all over the world are reading and searching for on the web.

That’s where WikiTrend, from Oooo Software, comes in.  WikiTrend is an app that will allow you to track trend information on Wikipedia.  It will provide a listing of the top recent Wiki hits as well as the top recent Wiki movers. 

If you’re the kind of person who finds him- or herself constantly checking your trend page on Twitter to see what people are talking about, this is the app for you.  If you’re someone who likes to follow the news or wants to go deeper and explore the details behind the headlines, this is the app for you. WikiTrend updates every hour, so you can be reasonably sure that the information you have before you is current and not yesterday’s trends.  And if there’s a topic that you want to gather more information about or explore in more depth, simply click the arrow beside the topic and the app will open the Wikipedia page that addresses the topic in question. 

I was intrigued by this app, if only for the fact that I do try to stay connected with the news of the day via text messages and email from a variety of news agencies.  

I think there are a few things that might be added to further enhance this app.    There aren’t a lot of layers to WikiTrend, meaning that it’s pretty much a what you see is what you get kind of app.  That’s ok, but it does leave a lot to the user to determine and conclude without a lot of data.  For example, this weekend, most of the trending topics have to do with the Olympics or Valentine’s Day.  But determining exactly why can be a challenge.  It would be good to incorporate a brief summary statement for each listed topic so that the user wouldn’t have to guess why an item is trending.  In addition, it would be nice to see this app incorporate trend information from other social networking or bookmarking sites.  Trend information from Twitter, Google, or Yahoo, for example, would be great.  It would be interesting to see the degree to which trends across sites are in agreement. 

But that might be too far outside the scope of an app called WikiTrend that focuses on Wikipedia data. 

Also, it would be good to have fresher trend information.  Hourly updates aren’t a bad start, but a lot can change over the course of an hour.  Stock data is generally down to a 20 minute delay and I think that 20 or 30 minute updates in trend info would be great. 

The bottom line is that if you’re interested in following Wikipedia trends and being aware of what everyone’s talking about, WikiTrend is the app for you.  At .99 cents, it’s not a bad investment at all. 

iTunes Link-  WikiTrend

Version 1.0.0 

Tested on iPod Touch 3.1.2 

History is made one moment at a time, day by day.  And for every person born, there is a unique history surrounding their birthdate.  I believe that we are all curious to learn more about our birthdates.  We want to see how many other cool people were born the same day we were and whether anything notable happened that day.  Ruslan Morozov’s The Day I Was Born answers that question by unlocking and allowing us to remember that history.

Here’s how it works: the application requests a birthdate: day, month, and year.  Once it has that information, The Day I Was Born generates even more information associated with the supplied date of birth.

What kind of information?  How about Western Zodiac, Chinese Zodiac, Earth elements and stones associated with your birthdate?  Not enough, you say?  Add in numerological elements including life path and destiny, historical accounts of your birthdate across time, births and deaths, and any holidays coinciding with the supplied date.  That’s a lot of stuff, right?

I thought so.

The Day I Was Born also allows you to share the information with friend via SMS (iPhone users only), email, or Twitter. 

The Day I Was Born is an entertaining app, but once you’ve read through everything associated with your date of birth, it’s usefulness to you is probably going to be fairly limited.  But you can use it to look up your friends’ dates of birth, your boy- or girlfriend’s, as well as other family members’ info, too. 

It will keep you entertained for a while and probably tell you some things you may not have known about yourself and others.  It’ll definitely increase your awareness of history.  And if you’re into astrology or numerology, there’s a lot of stuff that you’ll probably appreciate knowing about yourself and others.

There’s not much I could suggest to add to this app, but I think it would be cool see or link to the front page of a major newspaper on a given birthdate.  I once went tooling around in my university library’s microfiche and -film section because I wanted the see the front page of the New York Times on my birthdate.  I do, however, recognize that the Times certainly wouldn’t be the best paper for everyone depending on their homeland.

iTunes Link- The Day I Was Born

Version 2.1

Tested on iPod Touch 3.1.3

 

 

The widely used PC-EFI boot-loader has been updated today to version 10.6 by netkas himself. In case anybody needs a reminder, PC-EFI is a boot-loader which allows vanilla Mac OS X kernel to be run on not Apple hardware. This update adds support for desktop Radeon 4300/4500/4600 graphics cards via the GraphicsEnabler feature. It also adds a system-id fix which resolves the issue of your keyboard settings being forgotten, and finally, a fix for Lynnfield Intel CPUs has been added. As said by netkas, “So it’s ready for snow leopard finally.” You can download the latest update for PC-EFI here.

After years of anticipation, the Apple tablet device has finally been unveiled as the iPad.

Essentially, it’s an iPod Touch on steroids – here’s some key facts:

• 9.7-inch LED-backlit multi-touch display with IPS technology (high quality LCD panel)
• 1024×768 resolution (compared to 480×320 on the iPhone/iPod Touch)
• 9.56×7.47 inches, and just 0.5 of an inch thin (242.8×189.7mm, and 13.4mm thin)
• 1.5 pounds for the Wi-Fi only model, and 1.6 pounds for the Wi-Fi + 3G model (0.68 and 0.73kg respectively)
• 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB flash drive
• 1GHz Apple A4 processor
• H.264 video playback up to 720p @ 30FPS
• 802.11 a/b/g/n Wi-Fi
• Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR technology
• 3G model featuring UMTS/HSDPA and GSM/EDGE
• Unlocked for all networks
• Digital compass
• Built-in 25Whr lithium-polymer battery
• Up to 10 hours of battery life during normal use, up to one month one standby
• Dock connector
• 3.5-mm stereo headphone jack
• Microphone
• GSM micro-SIM card slot

Head on over to Apple’s iPad web pages for further info. It’s very interesting to note that they’ve developer their own silicon to run the iPad in the form of Apple’s own custom-built “A4″ processor – I wonder where else we may see this make an appearance?

However, it’s also lacking a few things that the rumour mill had been hoping for such as:

• Built-in front-facing camera for video-conferencing
• Phone functionality as per the iPhone
• App multitasking, so that apps can be run in the background
• No support for Flash, although not necessarily a bad thing since Flash is on its way out

That said, it’s an interesting step for Apple to take as they seem to err more towards mobile devices. Whilst for many professionals the iPad will come across a casual toy or gadget, I can see people like my Mum happily using this given that it caters for all the use she currently gets out of her MacBook for instance, and in a really nice hardware package not to mention very straight-forward software too. It’ll be very interesting to see how this develops, and what Apple can do in the future for their desktop line of hardware. Check this video out as a starter for ten. I can possibly see a point, maybe even at the end of this decade, where we see convergence between the iPhone OS and the Mac OS…

Day 1: Well, I’ve always liked destroying buildings. So when Mommy told me about an opening at a local building destruction business ran by iauns (the foreman is part of her book club, and they meet on the third Tuesday of every month for discussion and scones), I reasoned that I was the person for the job. And I don’t think I had any plans for my life, anyways.

Day 2: I did not know a stick of TNT cost only one dollar. Must be that blasted economy.

Day 3: I was given a few tutorial levels to start with, but I ended up making the intern do them while I supervised. Apparently, the buildings I’m knocking down are just pieces of wood stacked on top of each other. I think I could have taken them down with a good shove.

Day 4: Foreman gave me a stack of one dollar bills and told me to go blow out building number four. I used one stick of TNT to do the deed, and then hid the rest in my truck. You can’t get one dollar TNT anywhere, you know.

Day 5: I found out I could rig TNT to explode at a later or earlier time. I guess that’s useful, if I ever came across a building that took more than one stick of explosive to bring down.

Day 6: Given a new type explosive to use. My foreman is impressed with my work, and I’ve been making sure to give that intern plenty of field experience. The kid’s rather sharp, you know. I haven’t heard from him in a while though. I hope he’s finished my dry cleaning.

Day 7: Buildings are getting kind of challenging, especially after the intern left. But it’s not like I needed him anyways. I’m starting to rethink wasting my extraordinary talents on a job as mundane as this.

Day 8: I slid my resignation under foreman’s door, and then went home, retreating back into the recesses of my parents’ basement. I still think I have that car full of TNT, though.

-

I’ve spent nearly a week (that just tells you how much I’ve procrastinated in getting this review out) constantly playing this game, and I’ve barely made a dent in it.

The ability to control the falling blocks (to an extent) with the accelerometer is clever, and I enjoy being able to rig bombs to explode at different times. The strategy of buying bombs is also present, as bigger bombs cost more and become less efficient, but are sometimes necessary. And it’s just fun to fill up a building with 60 sticks of $1 dollar TNT and compare it to a building with a single mother-hen bomb.

The campaign of the game is gigantic, filled with several pages of structures to demolish. Progressively harder buildings are made out of some sturdier stuff and are much more difficult, requiring increasingly clever tactics in order to meet your status quo.

I’m always a fan of being able to generate your own game content, and iDemolished has a neat feature that allows the creation of your own to-be-obliterated buildings. The building creation interface is slightly intimidating and confusing at first, but after sifting through all the stuff, it’s pretty intuitive. And it’s a lot of fun making things and blowing them up.

iDemolished is a fantastic game, having the unique ability to keep a gamer enthralled for hours (which is good for the game, but not so great for my sleeping habits, or battery life). The game is streamlined and high quality, and I haven’t had any problem with the crashing or bugs that plagues other promising apps.

For those looking for a pyrotechnic fix, iDemolished is a great way to spend that dollar (well, other than on $1 TNT, of course. But where can you find that, these days?)

Bust out the party poppers and balloons, today is cause for celebration: it’s the youngest of the Mac family’s birthday today; the Mac mini.

Announced five years ago today, the Mac mini was the last entirely new computer product line that Apple introduced, making its debut at Macworld Expo San Francisco on January 11th, 2005.

“Starting at just $499, Mac mini is the most affordable way to enjoy Mac OS X and iLife,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Just plug in your display, keyboard and mouse and you’ve got an incredibly compact Mac for a price that almost anyone can afford.”

Initially introduced to compete with PCs in the ultra-competitive sub-$1,000 desktop market, the Mac mini has retained its form factor over the past five years, but gained in popularity and ways of use, possibly not even originally intended when Apple first released it. It’s $499 price point made it the cheapest Mac ever, but as time has gone on and its place in the market settled a little bit left of the field from its original intention, today’s current entry level Mac mini is the same price as the original Mac mini’s high end configuration.

Specs & Pricing – then & now

On launch, these were the specs & pricing of the PowerPC-based Mac mini’s:

• 1.25GHz or 1.42GHz PowerPC G4 processor;
• 512kB on-chip shared L2 cache running 1:1 with processor speed
• 167MHz frontside bus;
• 256MB of 333MHz DDR SDRAM, expandable to 1GB;
• 40 or 80GB Ultra ATA hard drive;
• Combo optical drive (DVD-ROM/CD-RW) or SuperDrive™ (DVD±RW/CD-RW);
• ATI Radeon 9200 graphics processor with 32MB video memory;
• One FireWire 400 and two USB 2.0 ports;
• 10/100 BASE-T Ethernet networking and 56K V.92 modem;
• Internal support for AirPort Extreme wireless networking and Bluetooth;
• DVI or VGA out (adapter included), composite/S-video out with optional adapter; and
• Built-in speaker and headphone/line out.
• Two models priced at $499 and $599.

And here are today’s Intel-based Mac mini specs, five years on:

• 2.26GHz, 2.53GHz, or 2.66GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor;
• 3MB on-chip shared L2 cache running 1:1 with processor speed
• 1066MHz frontside bus;
• 2GB of 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM, expandable to 4GB;
• 160GB, 320GB or 500GB Serial ATA hard drive;
• SuperDrive™ (DVD±RW/CD-RW);
• NVIDIA GeForce 9400M graphics processor with 256MB video memory;
• One FireWire 800 and five USB 2.0 ports;
• 10/100/1000 BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet networking;
• AirPort Extreme 802.11n wireless networking and Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR;
• DVI and Mini DisplayPort output;
• Built-in speaker;
• Combined optical digital audio input/audio line in (minijack); and
• Combined optical digital audio output/headphone out (minijack).
• Two models priced at $599 and $799 plus a Server model at $999.

Whilst the Mac mini has barely changed cosmetically, its made the transition from the ill-fated PowerPC G4 to Intel’s Core 2 Duo, seen its memory capacity quadruple, had its 100 BASE-T upgraded to Gigabit, shed the 56K modem and gain a Mini DisplayPort (allowing dual-monitor capability), upgraded its analogue audio output to combined optical digital input and output, and much more.

Mac mini uses and applications

The Mac mini was originally designed to over Windows PC users and encourage them to switch – the idea behind shipping an affordable “headless” Mac without a keyboard, mouse or monitor is that a PC user could use their existing VGA/DVI monitor and USB input devices and peripherals.

However, the Mac mini’s tiny form factor and ultra-quiet running, coupled with Apple’s Front Row software has made it popular amongst home cinema enthusiasts. Apple acknowledged this by later introducing a bundled remote with built-in IR receiver in the units. There’s even a dedicated website about using the Mac mini as an HTPC. Whilst Apple has released the Apple TV with an HDMI output for streaming movies and music from iTunes libraries to home cinema setups, the Mac mini offers an equally useful DVI connection with an optical digital audio output and lets users not only play iTunes content without streaming, but also play DVDs, add additional hardware such as Elgato’s EyeTV, and pair up a Bluetooth keyboard & mouse for web surfing.

The Mac mini has also proved popular in the server market due to its very low power requirements and, again, its diminutive form factor. Apple has gone a step further to acknowledge this by releasing a Server edition of the Mac mini which ships with Mac OS X Server and loses the slot-loading DVD drive in favour of a 2nd internal hard drive, allowing a maximum capacity of 1TB.

Here’s hoping for another five years of exciting updates and uses of the Mac mini – oh and Steve, how’s about a case design update? Aluminium & gloss white is soooo last decade…

If you have little ones like I do then Kideos might be for you. Earlier Media brings the aggregation of kid videos to your device.

I don’t have the time to comb through YouTube for kid videos so I was hopeful for this app. The app does do just that, it just does it in a very poor way. The videos are supposed to be organized by age groups but every video seemed to have the tag for 0-2 and not every video was geared for a kid of that age. The categories tab has a large yet redundant list to choose from , and the Wiggles section has zero videos. So why have that as an option? To top it off I can’t ever seem to get through more than 3 videos without the app crashing.

Great concept, bad execution. I’ll keep the app until the next update in hope of some major bug fixes.

iTunes Link – Kideos

Version 1.0

Reviewed on iPhone 3G OS 3.1.2

I hope you guys like fishing ‘cuz I got another round coming after this!

iTunes Link : After the Catch

On deck: After The Catch, part III

—————————————————————–

Thank you Paul Wood Software!

Please play nice and LEAVE A COMMENT telling everyone which code you took. If you get one, I’m sure the developer would also appreciate an App Store review!

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Instructions on how to redeem promo codes can be found here:

http://www.iphoneappreviews.net/how-to-get-free-apps/

You must have a U.S. iTunes account to redeem codes.

* Codes are normally posted in the comment box, but these are being posted on a schedule due to the Thanksgiving holiday