Net by Matt » Mobile App

Google Mobile Sync

Matt Walsh — Sun, 17 May 2009 01:46:23 +0000

A few months ago Google rolled out Google Mobile Sync. This syncs your Google calendar and contacts to your mobile phone. On Windows Mobile, you don’t even need any software for it. It runs right through the built in Active Sync interface in Windows. Syncing happens very quickly, and it is very smart about resolving conflicts when both the mobile and on-line calendars change. I was surprised to see that Sync also pulled the photos from my phone that are associated with contacts and put them into GMail contacts as well.

Bonus Tip: When you’re using Google calendar, or a widget, use natural language to enter your events. “Lunch with Jim 12:30 Tuesday at Quiznos” Google will figure out and fill in the date, time, event and location and set up the appointment automatically.

SCalc

Matt Walsh — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 17:00:28 +0000

The calculator included with Windows Mobile is rather limited. If you need trig, scientific functions, constants, and more check out SCalc. It’s a very simple command line-like interface, but also very powerful.

Windows Mobile Mail Shortcuts

Matt Walsh — Sun, 01 Feb 2009 17:00:53 +0000

The mail application built into Windows Moblie includes several shortcuts to make managing email easier. To use them simply hold down the corresponding number for about 1 second.

0 – List Shortcuts
1 – Replay All
2 – Reply
3 – Mark Read/Unread
4 – Flag
5 – Move
6 – Forward
7 – Delete
8 – Download
9 – Send/Receive

You can also search the message list by typing your search right at the message list. It will update the message list immediately with messages that match your search and highlight the matching term in the message.

Tetris for your phone

Matt Walsh — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 17:00:44 +0000

Instead of paying your wireless carrier way too much per month to play Tetris on your Windows Mobile, get the free Kevtris. Nothing unusual here, it has all the normal playing modes and an online high score list if you want to participate in that as well.

Sudoku Mobile

Matt Walsh — Wed, 21 Jan 2009 17:00:56 +0000

Instead of paying for one of the many Sudoku mobile apps offered by my wireless carrier, I downloaded Sudoku Mobile. The game also includes a solver, so you can, uh, check your answers to the one in a newspaper without having to wait until the next day.

The Core Pocket Media Player

Matt Walsh — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 17:00:15 +0000

The Core Pocket Media Player (TCPMP) is a replacement for Windows Media Player for your phone. It’s much less bulky than Windows Media player and has a lot more options for controlling how your media is played back. Make sure to download and install all of the plugins for it so it can play nearly and media type. Then once it’s up and running, go to options and file types and make sure its set up to play all file types as well.

Slick

Matt Walsh — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 17:00:29 +0000

Slick is a Windows Mobile instant messaging client that supports ICQ, Yahoo, AIM, MSN, Google Talk, and Jabber. It’s very light weight so it tends to stay open in the background without being shutdown by the OS often.

Google Maps Mobile

Matt Walsh — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 17:00:23 +0000

Google’s popular Maps service is also available for your phone. Point your phone’s browser at http://m.google.com/maps and you’ll get the download that’s right for your phone. The app is GPS enabled so you can search nearby, or use it for turn-by-turn directions. They’ve also integrated satellite view, street view and traffic. I’ve noticed that the traffic is usually quite accurate, as in when I’m at a dead stop, the road I’m on is also red. I’ll usually take a look at it before my commute home to help decide which route to take.

Total Commander CE

Matt Walsh — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 17:00:12 +0000

Windows Mobile has a built in file manager, but it’s slow and doesn’t give you all the features you’re used to in Explorer. Total Commander CE fills this gap. In addition to letting you view hidden and system files and having a search feature, there are also included plugins for FTP and registry. These allow you to move files around via FTP and to edit the registry on you Windows Mobile device. I’d recommend reducing the font and icon size slightly once you install it so you can get a lot more files listed on your screen at one time.

PockeTwit

Matt Walsh — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 17:00:29 +0000

I finally decided on PockeTwit for posting to Twitter from my phone. The app has an Iphone like interface with smooth scrolling menus and a full screen display. The developer is actively adding features to it and is very quick to respond to bug reports and general support questions. There’s just one trick to getting used to it, especially on a smartphone. You need to scroll left and right to get to the menus that have all of the post, reply, time line and settings. Once you get used to that you’re good to go.

Opera Mobile (Bonus tip)

Matt Walsh — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 17:00:32 +0000

Opera Mobile also has some built in keyboard shortcuts for common tasks. Since I couldn’t find these documented anywhere very well here’s what I’ve found through trial and error:

1 – Open URL dialog (also includes history and bookmarks)
2 – Window list
3 – Home page
5 – Toggle images (requires page refresh)
6 – Page up
8 – Next window
9 – Page Down
* – Full Screen
# – Toggle between desktop and fit to screen display
Space – Page down

Opera Mobile

Matt Walsh — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 17:00:01 +0000

After trying to get Pocket IE (the Windows Mobile version of Internet Explorer) to behave nicely, and display web pages quickly and in a usable format I finally gave up. I switched to Opera Mobile. It’s not free, but with Firefox Mobile still a ways off the $25 is well spent. Some things that it does better than IE include:

Formatting pages better for the smaller screen
Handles multiple windows with ease
Quicker forward an back functions
Faster as-you-type URL auto completion
Quicker loading, rendering and scrolling of large pages
Option for reporting itself as a desktop browser in case you don’t want the mobile version

There’s a 30-day free trial, so you can try it out yourself before buying it.