Screenshot courtesy of My Media

If you enjoy doodling on photos, the iPhone app...

MyPaint Free (iTunes App Store)

...is free for two weeks. This app lets you finger paint on a photo or a blank canvas (free form drawing). Looks like fun. I'm installing it now.

Screenshot courtesy of QuickOffice

If you really need to edit Microsoft Excel spreadsheets on your iPhone, here's a $9.99 solution for you from QuickOffice...

MobileFiles Pro (iTunes App Store)

Read the press release...

Quickoffice Unveils the Industry's First Editable Office Application for the iPhone

...and product info carefully though. MobileFiles Pro can both read and edit Excel 2003 spreadsheet files (XLS) but can only read the newer Excel 2007 (XLSX) files. If you are an Excel 2007 user, you can save files to the older 2003 XLS format to let you edit it on the iPhone.

Google's plan to provide a way for developers to get paid for apps in the Google Android Market is almost ready to launch. TG Daily reports on the letter sent to Android developers that lays out the basics of the plan...

Paid Android applications to arrive this month

I hope the developers are able to keep initial app pricing down somewhat low (say $2.99 to $7.99) to kick start Android app demand. My gut feeling is that if Android apps are in the $9.99 to $19.99 range that I see in online shops like Handango, we will not see the kind of app frenzy we see for the iPhone.

It is relatively easy for someone (like me) to mentally write-off a couple of apps that costs 99 cents to $4.95. It is much more difficult to mentally write-off four or five disappointing apps that each cost $19.95.

One of the things I miss most since switching my primary voice phone from a T-Mobile Dash to a Nokia N96 is the Dash's physical QWERTY thumb keyboard. I expected the N96 to partially make up for that by using T9 or some other predictive text software (the Dash provides predictive text when using its thumb keyboard). Strangely, it is not turned on. But, I knew it must be hidden somewhere on the device. Here's how you find the option to turn on predictive text on the N96.

- Tools
- Settings
- General
- Personalisation
- Language
- Predictive Text - ON

Once turned on, pressing the pound sign key "#" (sometimes referred to as "hash") switches between predictive text and other input modes.

Screenshot courtesy of Beejive, Inc.

The first thing that popped out at me as I read this item over on MobileCrunch...

Exclusive First Look: BeeJiveIM 2.0 for iPhone

...was this sentence: Long established as a top choice IM app for BlackBerry, the iPhone release rocketed up to the #2 best selling application in the iTunes Social Networking category for 2008 - even with the eye-widening $16 price tag. It is down at #6 in the social networking category. But, that is still pretty amazing for what is a relatively expensive app in the iPhone world. Note, however, that it is a bit less expensive than the version for the BlackBerry which sells for $19.95 (device license) or $29.95 (user license that allows the app to be transferred to a new BlackBerry).

I stopped using IM a while back (I just use Twitter these days to stay in near-real-time touch). So, I don't even look at free IM clients much anymore.

The app works with AIM, Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber, and other IM platforms. It also lets you send and receive files. You can find it in the iTunes App Store at...

BeejiveIM 1.1.1 (iTunes App Store)

One way to note how the iPhone app market has matured is that many of us have reached the point that we need to start removing iPhone apps to avoid hitting the maximum app limit. I haven't hit my iPhone app limit yet. However, at the rate I add apps I need to remove at least an app or two per week to avoid hitting the max app limit.

The app that gets booted this week is a free game named SuperPoke! Pets. There's nothing functionally wrong with it. I simply don't use (play with) it. My daughter, on the other hand, plays with it now and then on her iPod touch. So, it does have its appeal. I definitely need to remove at least two or three apps next week. So, this process is going to become brutal.

Which iPhone apps have you given the boot lately? And, why?

TwitterTrend 1.0 (iTunes App Store)

...is a free iPhone app that displays tag clouds of terms frequently used/found in the Twitter tweet stream.

Tapping any of the terms in a tag cloud displays the most recent tweets that includes the phrase. If you are a daily Twitter user like me, you may find the ability to use your iPhone or iPod touch to quickly see what terms are rising in popularity a handy tool.

[iPhone] MobileAppsToday: Twitted Trend for iPhone on 12seconds.tv

Source code segment courtesy of aeroxperience blog

Last week's Zune 30GB December 31 brain-freeze was an annoying experience (to say the least) for many Zune owners (including me). A lot of speculation focused on the idea that the problem had something to do with the fact that 2008 was a Leap Year. Bryant Zadegan over at the AeroXperience blog took a look at the Zune driver in question in this blog entry...

A lesson on infinite loops

...and dissected it at the C code level. Head over the blog entry linked above to see the gory code details and lively comments that follows it.

Lingolook has a set of iPhone apps that provides key travel words and phrases in five languages: Japanese, French, Italian, Chinese (Mandarin), and Spanish (Mexican). Each language app is $4.99.

I haven't tried any of the Lingolook apps myself. But, I remember hearing Alex Lindsay recommend it a week or two ago the MacBreak Weekly podcast. The app provides an audio pronunciation of many of the hundreds of words and phrases it contains.

Have you tried it in real life (i.e., while traveling)? If so, please let me know how well it worked for you.

One of the intriguing trends we've seen since the iTunes App Store opened for the iPhone this past summer is the turning content into applications. Book apps, weather apps, and news apps are the three big categories. Books have traditionally been delivered in one or more e-reader data formats. The best known are Adobe Acrobat PDFs and the format for the Amazon Kindle. News and weather have tended to be, more or less, web sites. There are a couple of weather and travel related apps for Windows Mobile and other mobile platforms. But, I'm amazed by the number of book, weather, and news apps for the iPhone. The ABC News app bring the number of news apps on my iPhone to four. It would be five if I installed the NYTimes app that I removed back on October 27, 2008. It has been updated at least once that I recall since then. But, I haven't found any compelling reason to reinstall it since (a) I have other good news apps and (2) the NY Times web site for mobile devices works fine (unlike their app).

I haven't gotten into the book-as-an-app area. But, I have my share of weather and news apps. And, I think one of the weather apps will be on my "booted off the iPhone" list next week Monday.

The Nokia N96 smartphone's digital photo and video recording features continue to intrigue me. I took some video of aerial fireworks on New Year's Eve using the N96 and a Canon PowerShot G9 (a digital camera with video recording capability).

If you've recorded video using other smartphones, you will probably be as impressed as I am with the N96's video quality of the fireworks. The audio volume is quite a bit higher on the N96's video compared to the G9. I'm not sure if this is the result of volume clipping on the G9 or some other factor.

The latest iPhone news app to enter this crowded app genre is the free...

ABC News 1.0.2 (iTunes store)

app from, who else, ABC News. The main difference between this news app and others is that it focuses on ABC's video content. That is the first thing that shows up in the app. Note that Pictures is the second tab and Stories (text content) is in the third tab. I haven't quite decided if this app is a keeper yet. There's nothing wrong from a functional point of view: It doesn't crash, it seems to respond pretty quickly, etc. More on this later.

Here are my wild guesses for mobile related announcements during MacWorld 2009 in San Francisco next week.

1. Apple will NOT announce a netbook-like device or larger iPod touch tablet-like device. This will probably happen in 2009. But, it seems more like an announcement Steve Jobs would prefer to make himself. I'm really hoping I'm wrong about this, however.

2. There's 50-50 chance that an iPhone nano or some kind of lower cost iPhone will be announced. This, again, seems like a Jobs announcement. But, on the other hand, Apple needs to give Phil Schiller something of significance to talk about.

3. Apple iLife and iWork components will get web counterparts that will be usable from an iPod touch or iPhone Safari browser.

4. Apple will announce a major firmware upgrade for the iPhone & iPod touch that adds copy/paste and a number of other long desired features. This upgrade will not be available until spring or later, however.

5. More "transportable" than mobile. Apple will fold Apple TV functions into a new Mac mini which replaces both Apple TV and the old Mac mini line.

OK, we'll see how many (if any) of these predictions hold up next week. Stay tuned!

I find it hard to believe that I only mentioned...

TwitPic.com

...once in all of 2008. TwitPic is a free and simple to to use web service that lets you easily share photos on Twitter. You can use it either from your desktop/notebook or, especially if you are a regular MobileAppsToday reader, your cameraphone.

I'm currently waiting for my car to get its safety check completely. So, I walked down from the service station to the nearby marina for breakfast (see first photo above). And, then I walked over to a nearby Starbucks to grab a cup of Caramel Apple Spice (second photo) and use the WiFi hotspot to get online.

Both photos were taken using an iPhone 3G. I used Twitterific Lite to post the first photo and TwitterFon to post the second. Both free iPhone apps let you post photos to TwitPic very easily. A short web link shows up in the Twitter tweet that other people can click on to see the photo. You can check my twitter feed to see the two links associated with the two photos above: toddogasawara

Just a belated note that today will be a slow day for MobileAppsToday. I'm taking some time off today. I hope everyone's 2009 got off to a good start yesterday!