Heather's Droid Does

Droid Themes - GO

2012-02-04T10:48:00.001-08:00

Loving this app! It allows you to add extra homescreens, download themes, and use fun transitions.. it's just pretty. :-)

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.gau.go.launcherex

Using Google Voice

2012-01-29T13:58:00.000-08:00

In all the time I've been using a droid phone, I have never set up a google voice account before. I'm not sure why exactly, I guess I never took the time to do it, it didn't seem like something I really needed. But more and more, people are actually CALLING my smart phone. Rather than texting or emailing, I recently have a lot more voicemail. (Probably in part because we no longer use a house phone, so more people have my cell phone number...)

Today I was frustrated with a build up of voicemails in my account, and what I consider a tedious process of listening to all of them to clear them out, so I did a search on how to better configure my voicemail, and of course came across info on google voice. It's pretty cool. I can create custom messages now - I can even set it up by group, or phone number, so different people receive different messages when they call my voicemail. I can read transcripts of my voicemails, rather than listening to them - it turns my voicemails into emails. VERY cool, since I can do that more quickly than listening to them.

I'm sure it does more - but that's all I really cared about right now, and I'm rushed. It was very easy to set up - these are the sites I looked at quickly before setting up my account and downloading the app, they have great overviews on how to do it. Very, very simple.

http://maketecheasier.com/install-google-voice-on-android/2010/07/05

http://www.djangelic.com/2010/11/how-to-setup-google-voicemail-on-android-phones/

How to store your voicemail password so you don’t have to enter it everytime:

2012-01-29T13:26:00.001-08:00

1. Touch the Menu Key.
2. Touch Settings.
3. Touch Call Settings.
4. Touch Voicemail Settings.
5. Change the number to *86,,XXXX#
– each , represents a pause
– XXXX is your pin number
6. Now when you call your voicemail it will automatically enter your password for you.

Texting gloves

2012-01-12T06:05:00.001-08:00

Found these for $5 at AC Moore this week- love them! The grey fingers work well on my phones touch screen.

Replacing My GoogleReader with Feedly

2011-12-30T09:10:00.000-08:00

http://www.feedly.com/

to see how feedly looks

I love this app! But it take awhile to figure out how it all works. I mean, you can use it right off,it looks great, but then you are going to want to start customizing it, and that is where it seems to take a little bit to figure out.

Feedly App for Android - https://market.android.com/details?id=com.devhd.feedly&hl=en

The best part is simply the way it looks. Instead of a list of titles like in googlereader, feedly shows the articles in short blurbs you swipe through. This feels like a digital magazine crossed with a newspaper.

I like that it already has "essentials" - so after browsing through my feeds (synced with google news) I checked out the feedly essential feeds on world news, gardening, and tech. Nice. This replaces a newspaper for me.

Any articles that interested me, but I didn't want to take the time to read right then, I clicked the button at the top to "save for later". There's a "saved for later" section under the menu (tap the top left icon) so I can read those, well, later. :-)

Fantastic social integration! Email the articles, tweet them, facebook them... add your tumblr acct, your bitly account, and more that I didn't even recognize, but will probably feel the need to check out now.

I came across this - which is helpful to know - "there are 4 touch shortcuts: a) tap on the right edge of any article to mark is as read/unread, b) take on the left edge to save for later, c) swipe on the black bar at the bottom to jump to the next source and d) swipe from the top to the bottom to mark a card as read."

http://www.feedly.com/home#personalize
to use feedly on the web, and give it permission to take over GoogleReader

Then go here -
http://blog.feedly.com/personalize/
9 ways to personalize your feedly - I'd skip right to numbers 6, 7, 8, and 9 to start out.
The problem is - the article doesn't exactly tell you HOW to do these things.
For instance:

Essentials editUse Essentials > Edit to filter out the set of essentials you are not interested in.

Ok.. where do I find essentials?? I finally located them, on the web version, by clicking on the weird little spaceship like icon on the left, near the top. Then I chose "explore". Now I have the essentials, and beside each one I can see how to follow them.. but how do I delete the ones I have no interest in whatsoever, so they do not show up on my app on my droid? I cannot find the "edit" button anywhere, and suspect the blog post above was written for an earlier version of feedly.

While playing around trying to find that, I did some searches and found that I can add twitter feeds right in with my blog feeds! I'm liking this more and more.. As much as I love twitter, the randomness of all of my twitter feeds in one list, rather than by topic, often annoys me.

But back to editing the essentials.. I of course googled it, and found a LOT of people asking the same question, and also this obscure mention - "Note: Essentials will go out as soon as you login and personalize your feedly."

Ok - I personalized my feedly on the web, so I logged into the app on my phone.. Nope, all the essentials still there. But they are at the bottom of the menu, after all of my favorites - so maybe they just stay there in case I ever change my mind and want to add them? I don't see them when I scroll across my feeds from my "my feeds" page - only the ones that I added.

Like I said - this isn't the easiest app to learn. But I think it is worth it.

This article is a good overview too - but it is written for an iphone I believe - the app is free on droid, not $2.99, and the apps are not identical, but for an overview, it's helpful http://appadvice.com/appnn/2011/03/quickadvice-feedly

More Tips for using Feedly on your Computer
http://basicblogtips.com/feedly-review.html

And in Feedly, check out the feeds related to feedly, for more tips
http://www.feedly.com/home#subscription/feed/http://api.diffbot.com/rss/http://www.feedly.com/

A Youtube channel with lots of helpful feedly videos -
http://www.youtube.com/user/videofeedly

I'll try to come back and add more tips on how to use it, as I figure it out myself! :-)

My Color Screen

2011-12-30T09:01:00.000-08:00

See screenshots of android and ios homescreens. Caution - some of the photos are not pg - but most are.

http://mycolorscreen.com/?os=android

The Cozi App - Our New Family Planner

2011-12-30T08:13:00.000-08:00

Our New Family Organizer

http://www.cozi.com/

This is awesome! All 6 of us can login to the exact same agenda/calendar/to do lists/shopping lists, all color coordinated by person, all from our phones/unactivated droids/laptops.

I set the "set" events for the day- school, lunch, supper, youth group, etc. at the same time, the kids added their individual shower times (6 people, 1 shower- showers have to be scheduled) work schedules, and all their other plans- like running with evan, etc. The agenda widget on my phone now shows who plans to do what, including when Luke plans to clean his car, every hour of the day, in a clear, concise, format.

There is even a separate area for schedules- to sync with school calendars, or add sports schedules. If you enter a schedule, like a sport schedule, you can email the link to others, like grandparents, to give them access to view it.

Then each of us has our own to do list- which we can all add to. So I made the kids each a basic to do list of odds and ends they need to take care of, and they can cross them off as they are done, or add their own things to them. This is especially nice for little things we notice around the house... Meg can add to Dan's list "please fix my bedroom doorknob", and I can add "clean your car" to Luke's list. (I'm sure the kids will have fun adding to each others lists once they figure this feature out... but if it keeps them looking at a to do list, I'm ok with that )

Under the shopping section we created lists for groceries, household, and clothes. Matt needs new dress pants, Meg needs shampoo, Nate uses the last of the ranch dressing... they can all add the items right to the appropriate list.

LOVE this! We will all start our days reviewing this app over breakfast, updating the agenda for the day, going over to do lists, etc.

It even allows us to email lists and agendas to each other, as a reminder... although it is unlikely we will need to do that, since we all have the app.

There are widgets too- I added a 4x4 widget of our agenda to one of my homescreens, making it simple to see our days plan in a glance.

When my kids were little I probably would not have needed something like this. But with 4 teens coming and going, their work schedules, practice schedules, their plans with their friends... this is just awesome. I've been going nuts for months, trying to find a good way to keep track of all of it. Our google calendar is great for the events, but this gives us a space to add the non events we don't want cluttering up the google calendar- like the shower schedules, when Meg plans to practice the piano, when Matt & Nate have blocked out time to work out, Dan and my daily walk... it outlines how each of us plans to spend pretty much every hour of our day, so that others can work around that. For instance, if I schedule my workout at 9:30am, the kids know the living room is off limits, unless they want to work out with me.

syncing with picasa

2011-12-22T16:47:00.000-08:00

When I first got this phone, it automatically synced the photos I took with the phones camera to a picasa album.

I shut that feature off.

Now I want to turn it back on, and I cannot figure out how! Most websites say to go to Settings > Accounts > select your Gmail account > DE-select picasa web albums.

That would turn that feature off. But when I go there, there is no picasa option, so no way to just turn the sync back on.

So far the work around I found is to use picasa tools (I like that app for accessing my picasa account anyway)and at the very top of the screen, click on the mountain photo (gallery icon). It will take you to "local photos" - the photos on my phone, and you can check which photos you want to upload, then upload them.

It is not as seamless as the auto upload, but it's pretty simple and will work for me.

NIV Version Free For YouVersion

2011-12-01T05:44:00.000-08:00

http://blog.youversion.com/2011/11/12-days-of-christmas-come-early-as-niv-made-available-for-download/

Open the app, go to bible, click on the version on the top right - it will now drop down a menu with all the versions available.

To the right, there will be green icons.

Click on them to download that version to your phone for offline use. NIV is free through December 12th only. :-)

Droid 4 specs

2011-11-28T05:45:00.000-08:00

My husband just got his new phone this week - a Droid RZR. He LOVES it. But no keyboard. I'm just not sure I am ready to give up my keyboard. So I was very happy to see a tweet from mashable this morning, with the specs for the new Droid 4. It looks like the rzr, just a little bit smaller screen, and with a keyboard! :-)

http://mashable.com/2011/11/28/droid-4/

Calendar Pad stopped Sycing - FIx

2011-11-18T11:24:00.000-08:00

Recently when I added events to my phone calendar, they were not being added to my online google calendar.. so when I viewed my calendar from my computer, not everything was there.

I googled the problem, and it was a simple fix:

Open the Calendar app (NOT calendar pad, the stock calendar app)
Choose manage calendars
Tap the buttons to the right, to shut syncing off, then tap again to turn it back on

Now go to the calpad app - and it should once again sync with google calendar.

I don't know why - but it did fix the problem! :-)

Printing Wirelessly

2011-10-29T19:07:00.001-07:00

http://www.androidpit.com/en/android/market/apps/app/com.hp.android.print/HP-ePrint-Home-Biz

We have a wireless printer at our house. I downloaded this app, and now I can print from my phone, also wireless. LOVE it!

Handecent doesn't work on DroidX2 ?

2011-08-27T07:00:00.000-07:00

I love handcent for texting - I've been using it since the first week I had a droid phone. But a friend of mine said it causes problems on the Droid X2. and the verizon rep said that's common?

What a shame. It's never been a problem on my Droid, or Droid3

Quick Pics

2011-07-31T11:37:00.001-07:00

I love the social widget that allows me to update fb & twitter both at once, quickly.

But if I enable it, it means when I go to the gallery, the first photos I see are my friends fb photos. It's really, really stupid that you can't change that... at the very least my own pics should be the default, and ideally I should be able to choose what is shown. But that is not an option.

First I tried other widgets for status updates... but I didn't care for any of them.

So next I looked for a gallery replacement app, and I found Quick Pics. It has pinch and zoom, and slide show options. Not quite as nice looking as the gallery app, but at least I see my pics, not everyone elses, when I open the app.

Using Google Music (Beta)

2011-07-30T09:40:00.000-07:00

Cnet has a great video that gives you an overview of how it all works

http://cnettv.cnet.com/use-google-music-android/9742-1_53-50104713.html

It will sync your music from itunes, your hard drive, windows media player.. and any combination of those items.

I hate itunes. Seriously hate that program. But I have giftcards for 15 free songs, so this seemed like a good time to try it out with google music. After fighting with the program to get it installed (first time it gave an error message and told me to try again. Second time it wouldnt' link to my paypal account, it apparently didn't like google chrome. Third time, with a credit card and several attempts to find a password with the proper combination of lower case, capital letters, and numbers - I finally got the program installed.) I typed in my code to download a sampler of 15 songs from Creation Fest.

This is where I liked how it worked. Once Itunes downloaded the songs, I opened music manager and told it to sync with itunes. It automatically created the playlist in music manager named "creation sampler" and placed those 15 songs in there. I then opened google music on my phone, went to that new playlist, and had it play the 15 songs so I could see which ones I liked.

That worked well. I haven't used itunes in years - so I can't be sure, but I think Itunes created the Creation playlist, and Music Manager just copied it over? I really don't know. I know I didn't create the playlist, one of the programs did it all by itself.

My favorite feature is that I can create playlists on my laptop, in the music manager, and those playlists sync to my phone. Love that!

The first problem I had was that I had auto sync shut off, so the music was not syncing for me.

this is the android power widget. The buttons, in order are -

Wifi/bluetooth/gps/auto sync/screen brightness

These are great for turning services on and off to save battery life - I keep this widget on one of my homescreens and use it frequently. To sync your music, you need to turn the auto sync (second from the right) on. On means there is a green strip under it. No green strip means it's off. :-)

To sync with auto sync off, you have to go to settings, accounts choose google accounts, then click on google music to manually sync. I think there should be a manual sync option in the google music app, but there isn't.. so just turning on auto sync in the power widget is so much easier!

My next concern is data usage. Our son has only 2gb per a month, so I want to be sure he's not using them all up playing music. Ideally all of my music would download to the phone and stay there - but I'm not completely sure that is how it is working. There is the option to make playlists and albums available offline, so it SHOULD work that way.. as long as he chooses "make available offline" while he is on wifi for the downloading, he should be fine.. but we haven't tested it all out yet. To see how well it works, I need to delete all the music off the memory card in my phone. I'm wondering if it will automatically play the music from the cloud when online, or if it will play from the memory first? If it chooses to play from the cloud even though the songs are in the phones memory, that's going to be hard on the data usage, I'm afraid.

This is the help topic for playing music offline - it doesn't answer my questions yet.

http://www.google.com/support/music/bin/topic.py?hl=en&topic=1250225 It does however, answer how to make sure google music only plays what is stored on the phone unless it's on a wifi connection -

You can also be offline if you’re connected to a mobile network but you’ve configured the Music application to play online music only when you’re connected to a Wi-Fi network, to conserve mobile data use (see Changing settings in the Music application)

This will enable our son to be sure he doesn't go over his data limit, and since I almost never use my phone on wifi, this setting should force google music to play the music straight from my phone, not the cloud. Perfect. Now to set it up and see how it works. :-)

From there I want to see how to add my husbands phone to my account. I wish it was simple, like sharing google calendar - but it doesn't appear that way. I'll let you know how it works. According to music manager, I can add up to 8 devices to my account. Right now I have two devices - my laptop, and my Droid3. Only one device can play the music at the same time - that make sense. What I'm not sure of is whether or not we can both have that music available for offline use, on both of our phones, at the same time. If we can, no problem. If we can't - he's going to need his own account.

Disappearing Shortcuts

2011-07-29T10:57:00.001-07:00

On two of my homescreens, some of the shortcuts keep disappearing. Not all of them. On one screen its just the blogger shortcut, on another its the OI Shopping and Our Groceries shortcuts. It's happened 3x now. I'm stumped as to why!

Love this!

2011-07-27T18:03:00.001-07:00

Just got out of the pool. Its dark out, the solar lights are on, lightening bugs flying around me, kids in the pool for a night swim...

And I'm on the deck on my swing, reading facebook, updating my blog, checking my email... all from my phone. Next I'll finish my book. No booklight needed, no worry about getting the book against my wet swimsuit... an ebook, in the aldiko app, night settings, on my phone.

Smartphones are awesome!

Testing Out Camera Apps

2011-07-27T07:30:00.000-07:00

This morning I downloaded 3 camera apps from the market to see if any of them are better than the stock camera on the Droid3.

Zoom FX

Camera 360 Free

Vignette Demo

After taking photos with each of these apps today, the photos would REALLY have to wow me for me to switch to any of them (I haven't seen the photos on my computer yet, I'll get to each of them as I type this post). All of the apps were so much slower than the stock app, and cumbersome to use. If I'm going to take that much time to wait on an app, I might as well go get my "real" camera - the whole point of my cell phone camera is for quick photos. Vignette was not too bad - it starts with an "initializing camera" screen that is a tad annoying, but not too horribly slow. Camera 360 is the fastest to load. Camera FX takes the longest, and if you press the wrong button when taking the photo, you have to go through two more screens to get back to taking the shot.

First, here is the photo taken with the Camera, no additional app, on the Droid3

If you look to the top left, around the top of the pine trees, you can see how bad the discoloration (bluing) is with this camera. I want to play more with the brightness, and maybe some of the other settings.. but for a base comparison, this is what I got, and why I am frustrated with the camera on this phone.

Same Camera, attempting to zoom in a bit on the hummingbird bee.. This is only about half way up the zoom sliding bar, and it's this blurry. :-(

Camera 360 only took a few minutes to set up. The biggest thing I am noticing in all of these apps is that you have to go to settings and tell it to automatically save the photos you take, otherwise you have to take the time to save each photo after you take it. The size option was set to 1200x1600, larger sizes were available, but with the warning that it would make the app unstable. Sizes were not given in megapixels, only in the 1200x1600 format. There are not many "mode" options for this app, most of the options are for color effects.

Apparently, with two tries on this app, I still did not figure out how to SAVE the photos I took. They are not anywhere on my phone - I have checked every folder on both my phone and my sd card. Then I went and took more photos, came back and tried again - they are still not there. I'm sure there's a setting I'm missing, but already I'm too annoyed with this app to look any harder, this one is off my list, and off my phone.

CAMERA FX

I didn't center this shot exactly the same as the first one. I should probably look for a more consistent base photo, but this is the type of shot I will take often, so this is where it matters for me. I take photos of butterflies on the butterfly bush, peacocks in the back yard.. things that move, with varying lights. Not great for scientific comparison shots, but these shots tell me what I need to know. The color contrast and white balance here are better, but not good enough, and the overall photo is blurry.

FX Camera is the most annoying to start up as well. You have to go through two screens to get to where you can even take a photo. That's way too slow of a start up for me. The photo size is too small. 720x480 is the "standard", with an available "960x640 *not recommended (crashes sometimes)" Yes, that is exactly how it looks in the menu option. There are some fun features on this camera, it's for FX. Just as the title says. For symmetry photos, andy warhol effects, etc.. For regular pictures? It sucks. It's not meant to replace the camera on your phone, it's meant to be a toy.

VIGNETTE (DEMO version)

Vignette shows promise right off the bat. It allows you to auto save photos, it has the option to use the volume keys to take photos (instead of adding fingerprints to the screen!) and a variety of other settings and options that are just nice. The Demo version only allows small size - .3 megapixels. The paid version allows for 5 and 8mp. I could also choose between "low, normal, fine, and superfine" in quality.

Additional options are available for scene mode, white balance, focus distance, Auto Banding (I have no idea what that is) Exposure, & Shutter sound

This app has a nice quick menu down the right side, and a zoom slider down the left.

So my verdict? I'm going to play with the stock camera a bit longer, and see if I can find a setting that takes more decent photos. If I cannot, I'm going to pay the $4 for the full version of the Vignette - it looks like a good app, my hesitation comes from the extra time it will take to take for the app to load, and for me to learn all the menu options. So far the pic quality didn't wow me enough to make me want to switch immediately. If I do download vignette, I will take better comparison shots and share them. :-)

Setting up CardioTrainer

2011-07-26T12:55:00.000-07:00

I've been using cardio trainer for so long, that until I switched phones and the app reverted to all of it's defaults, I forgot how many things I had tweaked. :-)

First, when you open the app there is a screen across the top with the days of the week. Tap on it and you can schedule your work outs. Or remove all the workouts that are prescheduled. I do not using the schedule feature, personally.

Next click on Settings.

Here you can choose the Notification settings and uncheck all the things you do not want showing up in your notification bar. I uncheck everything here.

Under Voice Output you can change how often it speaks to you during your work out, or shut it off so it doesn't speak at all. I have it update me every half mile.

Show Pace is where you can change it to minutes per a mile, or miles per an hour - whichever you prefer.

Under Calorie Calculator Settings - enter your weight if you want an accurate calculation of calories burnt

Under music settings, you can set it to automatically play one play list when you start a work out (Mine plays my "run" playlist) or you can set it to play all of your music, shuffle on or off - or you can tell it not to automatically play music.

There's a cardio trainer widget that I like - it's just a little box that displays how many calories I have burnt in the last 7 days. Tapping the widget opens cardio trainer to start a work out.

For backing up Cardio Trainer when switching phones -
http://heathersdroid.blogspot.com/2011/07/backing-up-cardiotrainer-when-switching.html

What My Home Screens Look Like -

2011-07-26T11:30:00.000-07:00

Still not perfected, but after a few days with my Droid 3, this is what my Home Screens look like -

Games & Books are "groups". You can quickly form groups by holding down on any icon in the menu of your apps, and choose "add to group"

The Date is part of the Retro Clock Widget. I just use the date, the clock is redundant for me since the time is already on the top right of my screen.

The weather across the bottom is the Weather Forecast Widget

The bottom 4 icons will appear no matter which home screen I am on. You can change those items by holding down on the one you wish to change. The only change I made was to change the stock texting app to handcent, which I prefer.

Quick Dialer, Handcent, Camera, Apps Menu

My Social Networking Screen. :-)

I love the Social Networking Widget across the top - it allows me to quickly update fb & twitter in one step.

The Social Networking app came installed on the Droid3. It's nice for a quick overview, but lacks too many features for me to give up the separate twitter and facebook apps. Places also came installed, I have been playing with it, but facebook seems better for finding what is nearby. Google + is new, sort of like facebook. I want to love it, but in reality do not, and probably will not use it. Blogaway is an app for updating my blogs. I keep my email accts in seperate apps - Gmail in one, my isp email in K9. I like K9 better than the stock app, because it's easier to delete emails from the trash. The bottom widget is Quick Contacts - the people I call and text the most often.

The screen to the far right on my phone is a full screen widget of Calendar Pad, one of my favorite apps. I choose to display the entire month, but you can display agenda for the day, or week form.. I love this because it shows all the events in text, not blocks of color that just show there is something there. It syncs fully with Google Calendar.

To the left is my "Productivity Screen"

Google Widget for quick web access

Files app for exploring, and organizing, files on my phone

Tasks app - to do list app that came on this phone, so far I haven't used it

GoogleDocs app - I love google docs for everything from scout by laws to a collection of recipes.

Quick Office App - NICE addition on the droid 3!

OI Shopping - my favorite shopping list app

EEBA - budgeting App, another one of my faves

Our Groceries - We use this more for to do lists than shopping lists. This app syncs between Dan's phone and mine, immediately. So if I add things to the list, they will appear while he's in the store. We use it a lot for to do lists around the farm

Mobisle Notes Pro - My favorite to do list app, it syncs with google docs so I can update lists from my laptop as well. Check lists, Lists can easily be sent by email

Calorie Counter App

Cardio Trainer Widget

Music Player App (need to look into better options, this is the stock app)

Games & Performancs Screen

The Scrabble app is slow, and cumbersome - it's only still on here until I finish the game against my daughter

Scrabble Helper - for Scrabble games

Words With Friends is a huge battery and resource hog - but I like it. I just don't use it if I am worried about running my battery dead that day.

Games Group - The only game I play on my phone is scrabble, but my son likes to play lots of others.. he can download them and add them to the "games" group so he can find them easily.

C:geo & Geocaching.com for Geocaching

Munzee (Like geocaching)

Power Widget - I use this to turn the wifi and gps on and off, to save battery life.

Wifi Hotspot app - haven't tried it yet

The Camera on the Droid 3

2011-07-26T10:38:00.000-07:00

One of the things I was really looking forward to with this phone is the camera. Since I was upgrading from the Droid 1 to the Droid 3, I was expecting a MUCH better camera.

Not so much. :-(

The first thing i did was unclick the top setting here - widescreen. I do not care for widescreen photos, personally. (I know this photo is hard to see, sorry! you can get the basic idea of where to find the setting though)

I've been playing with the brightness option (5th button over in photo above), but so far it's either making them too light, or too dark- and I don't see an "auto" brightness? Or does the Auto option override the brightness settings?

Options for Auto, Portrain, Landscape, Sports, Night Portrait, Sunset, Macro, Steady Shot

I DO like the steady shot setting, that has helped a lot, especially when zooming in low light

There is no dedicated camera button, but the menu on this phone has a "static" bar across the bottom with 4 icons you can change to any shortcuts you want. No matter which home screen you are on, those 4 buttons will stay the same across the bottom of the screen. The Camera came preset in one of those slots, I've liked the convenience of that. On my Droid1 I kept a camera shortcut on my main homescreen, this is better.

Two pics taken with the Droid 3 camera, stock app -

With the brightness as it came set when I bought the phone - the colors are all "off". After reading up on this others are calling it a "blue tint".

I switched the brightness down a bit, thinking that would help.. this was on a nice sunny day, but the picture is way too dark. :-(

You'd never guess that this was a bright, sunny, 90 degree day.. I had the brightness turned down too much.. but if I put it up the colors were all wrong, it looked over exposed.

Something I read online.. I'll be looking at other camera apps to see what is available.
"On another forum we seem to have determined that the blue issues with the pics are due to a driver or firmware issue with the white balance in the camera. The only workaround I know of is with a 3rd party camera app, manually setting the white balance. Leaving the white balance set to auto results in blue pictures, especially with the flash."

Camera Apps I'll be Trying Out -

Zoom FX
https://market.android.com/details?id=slide.cameraZoom&feature=search_result

Vignette Costs $4, but comes pretty highly recommended
https://market.android.com/details?id=uk.co.neilandtheresa.NewVignette&feature=search_result

Camera 360
https://market.android.com/details?id=vStudio.Android.Camera360

I've seen some photos online using the Vignette app, they look really nice and give me hope! I'm not looking for this to be my ONLY camera, but this is the one I like to use for quick shots around the farm and while hiking and biking. My old Droid did a much better job than this one, so far!

Where's My Droid

2011-07-26T09:42:00.000-07:00

It's sad how many times I set my phone down and can't remember where I put it. I often have one of the kids calling my phone to locate it, but I also often have it on silent. We go to church, I shut the volume off, it might be 2 or 3 days later before I remember to turn the volume back on...

Where's My Droid enables you to set a phrase you can text to your phone from any other phone, and it will turn the volume on, so you can page your phone to locate it. AWESOME app.

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.alienmanfc6.wheresmyandroid&hl=en

When setting up my new phone..

2011-07-26T09:38:00.000-07:00

I was surprised that my apps were all transferred. I had been worried that it would be a hassle to transfer my paid apps, like Geocaching & Mobisle Notes Pro, but they were all transferred to my new phone as soon as I entered my gmail account.

Awesome!

Oddly enough though, some of my apps would disappear in a day or two. I had to go to the market and redownload them? Odd. It only happened with a few. On Mobisle Notes Pro is said it was "purchased" on the markets page for the app, and gave me the ability to download it again.. so no real problem, my notes were even all intact.

This is the list of apps I knew I'd have to have on my new phone right away - these are my most used -

Aldiko - for reading books
Calendar Pad - MUCH better calendar app (I use the largest widget, month view, on one of my home screens - it shows all the events, not just blocks of color)
K9 email app
Facebook
Twitter
Blogaway - for updating my blogs from my phone
Cardiotrainer - tracks my exercise/speed/calories burnt
Calorie Counter
MyDays - tracks my period
Google Docs
Mobisle Notes - I love it because I love checklists
Geocaching
Munzee - another game like geocaching
YouVersion - bible
CherryRplayer - for playing radio stations
Pandora
NewsRob - syncs with google reader for blog reading (keep meaning to look for other options, I'd like one I can share by email without having to go through 3 or 4 screens)
PicSay - for resizing photos to the right size for emails
Where's My Droid - I can text my phone from anyone elses phone, and it will turn the volume on and make it ring so I can find it.
ZumoDrive - I use zumodrive as my cloud app for ebooks, so I can access books from my laptop through the cloud.

No Picture Frame Widget on Gingerbread

2011-07-22T11:29:00.000-07:00

The Droid 3 on the left, Droid 1 with picture frame widget on the right

On my droid, Android 2.2, I had a stock widget, Picture Frame. Simple to use, I could set it to display one photo in a frame on my home screen. It did other things, like slide shows, too, but I liked the simple, one photo, frame.

That widget is gone in Gingerbread, Android 2.3. :-( I've been going through a few options in the market today, but none so far are as simple and nice as the stock one. There's one that is clickable, making the photo a contact.. but I'm afraid I'll end up pocket dialing that contact all the time. There are several that are slide shows, or change the picture every time you turn your phone on and off.. but that's not what I want.

Android Free Photo Widget
https://market.android.com/details?id=org.thinkjava.androidphotowidgetfree
This one was close, but it does all landscape.. I like portrait sized photos. There might be a paid version with more size choices, but I'm looking at more free options first.

Clickable Photo Frame Lite
http://www.appbrain.com/app/clickable-picture-frame-lite/com.mfelix
this is the one that you can make the photo a contact short cut. I don't want that feature - I just want a simple photo frame, with one photo.

Photo Widget Free
https://market.android.com/details?id=widget.photofree&feature=search_result
This one has a lot of "fancy" circular frames and is sort of cool.. but it will not center properly on my screen, which makes me nuts.

I'm not using any of these - none are quite what I'm looking for. I may end up with a paid app, but there are so many of them, I haven't had a chance to see which one will do what I want. For now, my center homescreen feels incomplete. :-)

Backing up Cardiotrainer when switching phones

2011-07-22T10:40:00.000-07:00

http://www.worksmartlabs.com/blog/2010/09/15/google-health-and-cardiotrainer/

It's a little thing, but when upgrading to the droid3, I wanted all of my cardiotrainer stats to import over. I tried moving the file from my sd card, that didn't do it. So I googled it, and found the above article. Worked like a charm!

First I went to google health, and agreed to the terms to form an account. I got a message that Google Health will be discontinued in Jan of 2012, which is disappointing, but doesn't effect me transferring my data now.

With my old phone on wifi I opened the cardiotrainer app, went to settings, and clicked form permanent account. There is no cost for this.

Then I went to my new phone, opened the cardiotrainer app, and again went to settings and clicked to create a permanent account. It synced all of my data, so all of my cardiotrainer work out history is on my new phone. YAY!

I have made a lot of progress in my running times, I like being able to compare my times and distances to this time last year, so this is a big deal for me. :-)

Droid 3

2011-07-22T03:33:00.001-07:00

Im typing this post on my new Droid 3. So far, I love it!

Bigger screen, almost as large as the droid x2

Full keyboard, with the extra number row

Fast. Dual core.

Hdmi

It was not on display in the store, I had to ask for it. They are still trying to sell the Droid2! But the Droid3 is buy one get one free.

My only concern at the moment is call quality. I called my daughter yesterday and it sounded like she had me on speakerphone.. but that, might have been her phone, not mine. I'll check that out today.

Motoblur has not been the annoyance I expected. It doesn't look the same on my phone as on the youtube photos I googled. The social media app is sort of nice, I might like having my twitter and fb streams together. I love the social widget that allows me to update both feeds at once.

The keyboard is lighter and thinner. The larger screen size means they keyboard is larger now too, more space between the keys. Auto suggest works with the physical keyboard, as well as on the virtual one, which is nice.

Do it Tomorrow - To Do List App

2011-07-14T08:47:00.000-07:00

I am still using Mobisle notes, and love it because it syncs with googledocs.. but this one looks interesting because it's so easy to move things you didn't get done to the next days list. That's a nice feature, and it might make this the ideal to do list for my husband...

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.adylitica.android.DoItTomorrow&utm_source=androidtapp.com&utm_medium=App-Reviews-Barcode

The Droid 3 is here!

2011-07-14T08:45:00.000-07:00

http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-and-Services/Mobile-Phones/ci.DROID-3-by-MOTOROLA-US-EN.alt

"Worlds thinnest qwerty keyboard device"

"mobile hotspot for up to 5 devices"

HDMI

8mp camera

Google Music & Movies for Android

2011-05-10T09:45:00.000-07:00

Google Music Beta is up - request an invite herehttp://music.google.com/about/
Download the app here - https://market.android.com/details?id=com.google.android.music#utm_source=en-music-lp&utm_medium=music-lp&utm_campaign=en&utm_content=ftxt

Google music allows you to store all of your music in one place, then either sync, or steam it.

AND! -
Google Movie rentals coming to Android Market. $1.99 for thousands of movies to see on tablet, web, or phone.

Goodreads Android App

2011-05-04T18:09:00.001-07:00

FINALLY!!

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.goodreads&feature=search_result

DESCRIPTION

Discover, share, and review books with your friends and millions of others.

Tap into the world's largest social network for readers with the Goodreads Android app! Read thousands of book reviews by your friends and other Goodreads members, keep a virtual bookshelf of what you've read, and build your to-read list as you discover great books on the app.

Goodreads is a free service for everyone who reads. We have more than 4,700,000 members who have added more than 140,000,000 books.

What the app offers:

* Sign in to your Goodreads account, or sign up to start a new account.
* Keep track of what you've read, what you're currently reading, and what you want to read in the future by adding books to your Goodreads shelves.
* Search our catalog of more than 8 million books.
* Read friend reviews and community reviews of any book.
* View your profile and browse your shelves! Next time you are deciding what to read, your to-read list will be handy.
* Find book recommendations from friends and other readers.

More features coming soon!

Mothers Day App for mothers day

2011-05-03T11:52:00.000-07:00

Limited time offer! We are giving away the Build-a-Card app for FREE on the Android Market (originally $0.99). Help us out by writing a great review!

---

It's that one special day for the one you call Mom! Show how much you care by creating a customized card just for her! The Build-a-Card: Mothers Edition is our latest creation with a wonderful new set of features. Create Mothers Day cards with your photo and customize the card the way you like it then send it off to your Mother through e-mail, twitter, or facebook.

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.isbx.android.buildacard.mothersday

Sounding like the chipmunks!

2011-04-30T19:40:00.001-07:00

Today all of the sound, no matter which music player i used, sounded like it was playing in fast forward. Like the chipmunks! Restarting my phone fixed it, but how weird!

DroidLight in the storms

2011-04-28T13:17:00.001-07:00

http://www.appbrain.com/app/droidlight-led-flashlight/com.motorola.dlight

We got hit with the very severe storms last night. At 3am I woke up to extremely high winds slamming the house, and rain coming in sideways. All the windows were open. the power was out. I used the droidlight app on my phone (it keeps the camera flash on, for light) to come downstairs and close the windows. Very convenient!

Another fun photo app

2011-04-26T13:03:00.000-07:00

http://www.droidapps.org/photoshake-combine-different-photos-to-make-one-epic-image/

Touch Calendar

2011-04-26T13:01:00.000-07:00

The calendar is one of the functions I use the most on my phone. Currently I use the Calpad app - I love it because it shows text, not just blobs of color, so I can see what is on my calendar, not just that there is something on that day. I use a full screen, month view, widget on one of my homescreens

But today I read a review for a new app, Touch Calendar, over at AndroidTapp
http://www.androidtapp.com/touch-calendar/

It looks like this calendar has a lot of extras-

Touch Calendar is easy to use:

double-tap or pinch-zoom (on Android 2.0 or higher) to zoom in

tap an event to see its details

tap-and-hold on a date to add a new event

touch to scroll as much as you want, both forwards and backwards

jump to today, or to any date from the menu

calendar search by pressing your phone’s search button or from the menu

set the font size and default zoom level from the Settings

home screen widgets (full version only)

Calpad is free, where I'd need to pay for the full version to have the widget on this one.. but I think I will check out the free version of this app, to see if the full version is really worth the $2.30

Using my Droid for our Menu & Grocery Shopping

2011-04-24T19:51:00.000-07:00

I use two apps for my menu planning -this menu is copied into googledocs, which syncs with Mobisle Notes on my phone. Then I use OIShopping list to add in the groceries I need to make these items - I like that app best because it keeps track of my totals, I can enter in how much each item is, it remembers the prices, and adds up my totals so I know both what my entire list costs, and what the items I have in my cart as I shop, cost. I downloaded the Sam's Club app tonight, that is where I do most of my grocery shopping (4 teenagers!) but it looks like a fairly useless app for me, I will probably uninstall it.

Bionic Vs Thunderbolt

2011-04-24T19:49:00.000-07:00

Verizon 4G Phones: HTC Thunderbolt or Droid Bionic?
Good comparison - http://t.co/5A9FP2Q

I still can't decide!

I love the Atrix - I wish Verizon had it, instead of AT&T!

Facebook Adds Event Check In's

2011-04-15T17:34:00.000-07:00

http://www.insidefacebook.com/2011/03/21/check-in-events/

(I don't see mention of it added to the android app yet, just the iphone one.. but apparently you can go to the website from your phone and check in that way? I haven't tried it yet)

Doodle Jump - Free today

2011-03-24T20:26:00.000-07:00

Todays Free App

http://www.amazon.com/mobile-apps/b?ie=UTF8&node=2350149011

Amazon Appstore

2011-03-23T09:45:00.000-07:00

So what is this, and why? I'm typing this post as I figure it out. :-)

Angry Birds Rio is free today. I clicked on it, and it told me to enter my phone number to get a link to download it. I then got a text message "your message was blocked and was not delivered. Only the account holder can change your settings to allow access privelages"

Ok. Lets try another way.

Went to the Android Market on my phone. Searched for Amazon Apps. Nope, I don't see it.

Ok.. on the right hand side of the website is the icon shown above, with the option to enter my email address. I enter the gmail address I use on my phone, and a box pops up with installation instructions. That is helpful, thank you. Could have made that page an option right on the front page...

This is an unauthorized application - meaning you won't find it on the android market - so you have to make sure your phone is set to allow unauthorized apps. The instructions are clear, once you find the instructions page. This link might work. It's really not difficult though, and if you enter your email address, all the instructions will come right along with the link in the email.

Of course I went straight to the page of FREE APPS.

But I'm not seeing anything there that I can't get through the market already installed on my phone.

I don't usually play games - I downloaded the free AngryBirds though, because my son loves that game and plays it whenever we are driving and he's allowed to play on my phone.

So why?

I found an article here that sums up my thoughts -

"For my part, while I appreciate the increase in consumer choice, the fragmentation of the Android app marketplaces can cause for even more confusion. There are only 3,800 apps in the Amazon take for now, but as each side gets more exclusives, this could lead to even more fragmentation… because that’s exactly what Android users and their various OS versions need, right?"

BUT for my daughters Cruz Ereader, this might be nice? She doesn't have full access to the android market.. amazon apps may give her more options. Another plus is that I can view apps on my laptop, testing them out to see how they look and work, before downloading them.

This site has a GREAT comparison of the two markets.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/222870/smackdown_amazon_appstore_vs_android_market.html

This article is also informative, if you want to read more -

http://gizmodo.com/#!5784304/amazons-android-app-store-is-now-open-for-business-with-3800-apps

Starting to look for my Upgrade

2011-03-16T07:26:00.000-07:00

What I want -

full keyboard
dock for van (use as navigation)
dock for beside bed (alarm clock)
Large screen
port to hook into tv
ability to be a wifi hotspot
and maybe dual core processor...

I can upgrade any time now, but I just cannot find the perfect phone. I love my current, original, moto droid.. I just want it to be faster, larger, and hook into the tv.

Phones I am watching -

Droid X

at this point I think the only way I would buy an X is used - it's too old to use my upgrade on. I love how large the screen is, but again, I'm not sure I want to give up my full keyboard.

http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-and-Services/Mobile-Phones/Motorola-DROID-X-US-EN

The DroidX2 is likely to be released in a couple more months

http://www.andro-phones.com/motorola-droid-x2-440.html

But if I'm going to give up my full keyboard - I probably want the bionic

http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-and-Services/Mobile-Phones/DROID-BIONIC-US-EN

Droid 3

http://www.andro-phones.com/motorola-droid-3-455.html

Not yet released. Leaked photo.

"As for its technical details, it is rumored to feature an impressive 4-inch qHD touchscreen, probably a dual-core processor, HDMI-out port just below it on the side and running on Android OS, but no clues about the version. "

Atrix

http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/Consumer-Product-and-Services/Mobile-Phones/ci.Motorola-ATRIX-US-EN.alt

Only on ATT&T - and we are on Verizon.

(Att&t has almost no signal in this area, and their plans cost a lot more)

So why am I looking at this phone? Just to see the features and compare them to the other phones i am looking at, I guess. :-) I have no interest in a dedicated fb button, and I still want a full keyboard...

2.2.2 Update

2011-03-16T07:04:00.000-07:00

I woke up in the middle of the night, glanced at droid to see what time it was (it's docked beside my bed as my alarm clock) and there was a grey message box telling me there was a system update. I told it to go ahead, and went back to sleep.

When I woke up this morning, I checked, and nothing looked the least bit different.. so I googled the update. It's apparently just to fix sms (texting) issues.

There's a good, brief, article here on the update.

I'm disappointed that the original droid, which is what I am still using, will not get the Gingerbread update. At least it doesn't look like it will. I'm in the market for a new phone, but afraid to commit because so many new ones are coming out this summer! I'm also not wanting to give up my full keyboard - I love the keyboard on my droid.

A Day In The Life Of My Droid

2011-03-16T06:57:00.000-07:00

To say I use my droid for everything might be an overstatement. Surely there are things I do without my phone.

Like shower. No - wait, when I am in the shower my phone is on the counter, playing focus on the family podcasts via the dpod app. Well, I know there are whole hours in my day where I do not use my phone.. there must be. :-)

Just a basic idea of how I use my phone in a day.

To start my day, it's an alarm clock, perched in the dock beside my bed. Where it displays the weather thanks to the weatherbug app, one of the first things I check each morning, Living on a farm, the weather seems a whole lot more important than it ever did when we lived in town! :-)

A quick check of my text messages (handcent app) from overnight, maybe a peek at facebook(facebook app) and or twitter (official twitter app).. then I tap on the YouVersion widget that shows todays readings in the two bible reading plans I do each day - one is reading the bible in a year (M'Cheyenne), one is a very short devotional (Life Application). Often I do not read all of the bible reading, just the devotion and maybe a chapter of the bible reading.

Then down to the kitchen to start breakfast, after checking the menu on a note in the mobisle notesapp. Before I eat breakfast, I enter the items into the calorie counter app. After breakfast I work out, then I manually add the work out and how many calories I burned into the cardiotrainer app.

Then I may take a photo of my wiifit screen with the camera, and maybe update my blog using theblogaway app.

Then the aforementioned shower, where I use dpod to listen to podcasts, usually focus on the family, or Dave Ramsey, or Podcacher.

Back to mobisle notes to get started on my to do list for the day. I love that that app syncs with googledocs, it's the only app I have paid for so far - just so I could have that feature.

When it's time to start the school day, the alarm (clock app, comes loaded on the phone) on my phone plays "I don't wanta work, I wanna bang on the drums all day.

I frequently use the YouVersion bible app on my phone for the opening of our school day - we read a chapter of proverbs after saying the pledge and our memory verse each morning. We go around the table, each of us reading one verse at a time. (when in church I frequently use the note option in Youversion for taking notes on the sermon)

This morning I used the camera on my phone to snap a few pics of the kitten playing with a pencil at the school table. I then use the picsay app to resize the photos, to upload or send them. I use the K9app for our isp email, in addition to the gmail app for gmail. Also this morning, a rarity - I answered and actual phone call on my droid. I sometimes forget this is actually a phone. I text whenever possible.

The phone call meant an addition to our calendar, so I flip to the third homescreen, to the right, and add it to Calpad - my favorite calendar app. I have a full month widget taking up that entire screen.. this is one of the most used apps on my phone.

Then I sat down to my laptop to find that our internet connection is horrible today - windstream never works well for us when it rains. So using the pdanet app, I hooked my phone to my laptop, and used the 3G connection on my phone, rather than our wifi, to be online. (this is SO nice when we travel! And at scout meetings, where there is no wifi but we want to do online training)

Throughout the day, I use facebook, twitter, handcent, and mobisle notes pretty hard. I continue to use calorie counter to track everything I eat. Often I plug my phone into an external speaker and use either the Pandora, or Winamp apps to listen to music. I used to use CherryRplayer for our local radio stations (which we cannot listen to on a radio in our kitchen, they do not come in, but they play great through my phone!) but now winamp allows me to play radio stations, so I've been switching to that. I keep a phone charger by the external speaker in the kitchen, I'm obviously hard on my phones battery and plug it in as often as possible.

I notice a home repair item (there's a piece of hard plastic on the corner of the wall, to protect the wallpaper, and it's broken, falling down) and add it to OurGroceries. A shopping list app, I use it for items I may ask Dan to pick up from the store, but we also have lists for home repairs, movies we want to see, restaurants we want to try, etc. This app syncs between our droids, so as soon as I add it to the list, it's on Dh's phone too.

Come afternoon it's time for our run.. Dh and I are once again working on the C25K the c25k. We use the C25K lite app to tell us when to run and when to walk, and the Cardiotrainer app to track our distance, speed, and calories.

In the evening if we watch tv, I read books using Aldiko - I love ebooks, and no book light is needed! I have the Kindle app too, because there are often free books through amazon.. but that app annoys me, because I have to touch the screen to turn a page. With aldiko, the volume button on the side turns the page. If it's a show I am more interested in, I may use NewsRob to catch up on blogs - it syncs with googlereader.

If it is a grocery shopping day, I use OIshopping List. LOVE this app, because I can add the prices for every item on my list, and it remembers them. I know before I leave the house what my bill should be, and as I shop and check off items, I know the cost of what is in my cart.

If we are out geocaching, we use the Cgeo app. And I keep a list in google docs (gdocs app) of the clues for the series caches we are working on.

At bedtime I check our calendar for the next day (Calpad), check our menu (mobisle notes) for anything I need to take out of the freezer, my to do list (also mobisle notes), use gmail to send a quick email to Dh, who is working nights, check cardiotrainer for total calories burnt in exercise that day and add that total into calorie trainer, answer a few more texts and emails.. and place my phone back in it's dock, where it shows me how long I have until my morning alarm goes off, what the weather is, and often I use MortPlayer (with it's built in sleeptimer) to play an audiobook until I fall a sleep.

That's not even a complete list of what all I use my phone for - but those are the most used apps and features.

One of the things I love the most about it is that it can do so many things at once. Last fall I was out for a walk. Cardiotrainer was recording my distance/speed/calories burnt. I was listening to an audiobook through the headphones. I received a call, the audiobook paused so I could accept the call. I needed to check the calendar, so I switched to speakerphone, flipped to calpad to check the date while listening to the phone call, added the information, switched off speakerphone, ended the call, and my audiobook automatically resumed where it left off. Cardiotrainer never missed a beat, and I kept walking the entire time. It also updated the notification bar that I had received a text while on the phone, and new email in my gmail account.

Acc cleaner

2011-03-16T05:25:00.001-07:00

Again this morning i got the "phone storage is low" message. I wish i could figure out what is causing it?

I use SDmove to keep most apps on my sd card

I use K9 for email, so i can empty the trash email (stock app has no way to bulk delete the trash)

Still occassionally get this message.

This morning i downloaded and used acc cleaner. It cleared the apps caches. It did not remove any info from my widgets, or anything like that... and the low storage icon is off my notification bar. I guess i just wait and see if it comes back...

Skyfire Browser - Download it now while it is free! :-)

2011-03-11T11:20:00.000-08:00

http://www.androidtapp.com/better-download-skyfire-android-app-while-its-free/

an overview of the features can be seen here -

http://www.skyfire.com/product/android

I just downloaded this browser today, and it's unique! It really does play videos that were not working for me in other browsers - even though I have flash installed on my phone. There's a whole toolbar along the bottom with extra options - like these two features -

Fireplace Feed Reader
A simple but addictive tool that provides a filtered list of your Facebook feed that only includes links to browsable web pages, images, and videos posted by your Facebook friends.

Popular Pages
You just finished reading a story on one of your favorite web sites and want to quickly decide what to read next. Click on the Popular button on the Skybar and instantly see what content on the site is most popular within the 500+ million user Facebook community. Recommendations from friends are prioritized and show up at the top of the list.

Googlemaps will now reroute you to avoid traffic -

2011-03-11T11:08:00.000-08:00

"Ever been stuck in traffic, only to find out you’d have been better off going a bit out of your way to take a less congested route? If you’re like me, you probably hear the traffic report telling you what you already know: traffic is bad on the road you’re currently on, and you should have taken another. It doesn’t need to be this way, and we want to help. So we’re happy to announce that Google Maps Navigation (Beta) will now automatically route you around traffic. With more than 35 million miles driven by Navigation users every day, this should add up to quite a bit of time saved!"
Read the rest of the article here -
http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/03/youve-got-better-things-to-do-than-wait.html

Watching Tv...

2011-03-11T07:23:00.000-08:00

https://market.android.com/details?id=com.rhythmnewmedia.tvdotcom&feature=search_result

I coudn't sleep last night, so I pulled up the tv.com app and watched NCIS. Works great with the phone in the dock beside my bed. :-)

Mort Music player

2011-03-10T11:31:00.001-08:00

https://market.android.com/details?id=de.stohelit.folderplayer

It plays music by folders! Ingenious! I had just downloaded Winamp and love it as a musicplayer, but a player that plays music based on how I have it stored in folders? That's perfect. Creating a folder for music to play while I am running is just faster and easier than messing with playlists, or tagging all of the music.

Great post on why android phones are a target for trojans, & how to protect your phone

2011-03-08T14:45:00.000-08:00

http://androinica.com/2011/03/08/android-market-virus-trojans/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=twitter&utm_campaign=Feed:+androinica+(Androinica+-++A+Google+Android+Blog)

The New Aldiko - Importing Books

2011-03-03T06:43:00.000-08:00

http://www.aldiko.com/

Aldiko is still hands down my favorite ebook reader on my phone. I only have the kindle app loaded for the free amazon books, and it annoys me to use the kindle app, because on my phone I have to touch the screen to turn pages. With Aldiko, I press the volume button on the side.

Now Aldiko reads drm books! That makes it even better - although it still cannot read kindle books, as far as i know.

Importing books is a bit different now though! I still loaded the books into the Import Folder (that is no longer necessary though, it will find the files no matter where they are located on your SD card), but then when I go to the Aldiko app, I chose SD CARD, then checked the box beside everything I wanted to import, and told Aldiko to import them. Although I haven't tried it yet, I think this will make it even easier to download books straight to my phone and import them into Aldiko - right now I download everything on my computer, connect my droid to the computer using the usb cable, and transfer files over.

Here is a much more in depth review of Aldiko 2.0
http://dearauthor.com/wordpress/2011/02/13/reading-with-android-aldiko-2/

You Version Widgets

2011-03-03T06:28:00.000-08:00

http://www.youversion.com/

I loved the YouVersion widgets, I had one for each of the two reading plans I am following, on one of my screens. But they just disappeared! And when I hold down on the screen, choose widgets, to readd them - there is no option for bible anymore. :-(

So today I'll figure out how to back up my downloaded versions (the NIV is no longer available, so I don't want to lose that) then uninstall and reinstall it.. I'm hoping that will help! I did a twitter search, no one else is mentioning the problem, and a friend of mine is still using it with no problems, so it must be something with my phone, I just do not know what! All of my other widgets are working well.

To download versions of the bible to use when you do not have a connection, click on bible. Across the screen you will see the book of the bible, the chapter, and the version. Click on the version. See all the options? Any of them with the green icon to the right can be downloaded, just click on the green icon. Now you can use then when your device is offline.

When I back up today, I'll update this post with how I backed up my versions, and screen shots of my widgets, if it works again.

Shutting off foursquare notifications

2011-02-28T05:19:00.001-08:00

I like the foursquare app. It's better than yelp for us, for figuring out where to eat when we are out in a new area.

I did not, however, like getting notifications in my android notification bar, everytime a friend checks in! To turn that off-

Go to the app on your phone

Click on the menu button to choose settings

Choose pings

Uncheck the box beside checkins

All fixed!

Better email client?

2011-01-02T14:53:00.000-08:00

I'm not thrilled with the email app that comes on droid. It's ok..

Today I downloaded K9, and I like parts of it better, and parts of it not as well. My hang ups are all visual, which is the case with most apps.

The screen is too small - I can't find an option to use a larger font to display my list of messages.

And when I reply, the emoticons (I really dislike emoticons) in the original message are sent as an attachment.

But I like the folder options, the the functionality of it...

Dan uses his phone for all of his email. I still use my laptop most of the time, but am using my phone more and more.. I think for me, gmail may be my best option for on my phone, for now.

K9 Mail - http://www.androidtapp.com/k9-mail/

To Do List Apps

2010-12-30T07:08:00.000-08:00

Today's goal is to find a to do list app that works for Dan. It needs to have categories for multiple lists. It needs to be easy to cross off as completed. And I really, really would like it to sync effortlessly my laptop - maybe web based?

Right now the apps I use are -

Mobisle Notes - my favorite. If I could add to this from my computer, it would be the perfect to do list software, for me. I think mainly because of the cute little check off boxes beside the chores... but also because I can email a list, showing what is done and what is not. If Dan and I could import those emailed lists back into mobisle notes, it really would be perfect!

Our Groceries - my favorite for between our two phones, because my list syncs with Dan's almost immediately. VERY quick. We can be in opposite sides of a store, and see what the other has already got from the list. It's pretty cool! Easy to use even for lists I don't need to sync with Dan. Gives us both the ability to add to the list whenever, wherever. But no ability to type, or import, from my computer. (I may have to resign myself to typing in our long lists on my phone today.)

(oddly enough, none of the screen shots on their website do not show the best feature - the price for each item should be to the right, and at the bottom above the add line should be the total spent so far on the left, and the total for the whole list on the right)

OI Shopping - This is my favorite shopping app, because it totals up what I am buying. So I can make my list, see what my total cost should be, and as I cross things off while shopping, it tells me that total as well - how much I have spent so far, and how much my list total will cost. It's pretty quick to adjust prices for each item while in the store too, since lately groceries seem to change in price every week.
Android Tapp Review here - http://www.androidtapp.com/oi-shopping-list/

I just noticed on the androidtapp review that there are some options for importing and exporting OI Shopping, but this is not my preferred list for to do items, so I'm going to look into other options first. On my list to look at today are Astrid, and GoogleNotes, neither of which have worked well for me in the past, but I am hoping they may have improved, or I may just like them better now. I'll also see what else is on the market.

Any suggestions?

Swype is Open Beta!

2010-12-21T07:32:00.000-08:00

Read about it here - http://lifehacker.com/5715565/swype-gesture+based-android-beta-now-available-to-all

Download it here - http://beta.swype.com/

Below is a youtube demo of how it works, but to learn it, be sure to do the tutorial once you install Swype on your phone.

I still love my full keyboard on Droid, but I'm looking at upgrading to DroidX next year, so I need to look at ways to adjust to not having a full keyboard.. I think this may help? I know so many who LOVE swype, but I'm having a little trouble adjusting to it.. probably because it's new, and I type really fast on my phones real keyboard.

Christmas Live Snow Wallpaper

2010-12-16T13:43:00.000-08:00

I'll have to take a pic of my phone later, but I love this one!

http://www.appbrain.com/app/christmas-snow-live-wallpaper/com.mai.livewallpaper.christmastree

On my center home screen, it's snow covered trees, snow covered ground, and snow falling - all white.. with two green vines with red berries, one vine on each side of the screen, lightly swaying. The side screens are shown here -

but I don't think they look nearly this busy on my phone, even under all my icons.

I'm really pleased with this one. Now off to see if I can find some sleighbell ringtones...

Christmas Live Wallpapers

2010-12-16T13:27:00.000-08:00

I'm looking for a good Christmas wallpaper.. haven't found the perfect one for me yet, but I did come across these...

a very busy one..

http://www.androidzoom.com/android_themes/wallpapers/christmas-live-wallpaper-free_oqxz.html

LOTS more busy ones here - http://www.androidzoom.com/free_android_applications/christmas%20live%20wallpaper/by_matching

This one looks really nice!

http://www.appbrain.com/app/snowfall-live-wallpaper/fishnoodle.snowfall_free

see it on youtube here - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9ZfyajoDZU&NR=1

YouTube Video of Christmas Card (snowing) Live Wallpaper, and how to configure it

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yif33qrF_2o

Settings:
Christmas Tree - Standard, Happy and Frozen
Snow - quantity and speed
Lights - color, shape and number
Sparkling - type and frequency

http://www.appbrain.com/app/christmas-tree-live-wallpaper/proscio.wallpaper.christmastree

http://www.appbrain.com/app/christmas-lights-livewallpaper/com.appletturnover.christmaslights

Talking Santa App

2010-12-16T12:57:00.000-08:00

This is a large app - 24mb.. I'd suggest installing it to your sd card. If you do not know how, download movesd from the market, and use it to move apps to your sd card. :-)

I don't know what all this app does yet.. but it does the following -

speak. You'll see Santa hold his hand to his ear, then he will repeat whatever you say. You can go to settings to have him listen longer before repeating. You can then email or upload to youtube or facebook, a video of him speaking.
shake your phone. It's like a snowglobe. :-)
Click on the milk and cookies and they will arrive on a sled
Click on the gift. After it opens, click again, it will keep changing...
Fascinates my kids. :-)

My new Zagg cover...

2010-11-26T16:12:00.000-08:00

I actually ordered this because my daughter dropped my phone and scratched up the front... but it doesn't cover the front except a little on the bottom. I love it anyway - it doesn't interfere with my docks at all.

It's hard to see, but the cover is on the very bottom part of the phone here.

back of my phone

Some of the ways I used my phone this week -

2010-11-12T16:50:00.000-08:00

Aldiko app - read books (I read a LOT on my phone these days)

Kindle app - downloaded some free books, although I haven't read any of them yet...

Stopwatch app - used it to time how long to leave hair dye in my hair. :-)

dpod - to listen to focus on the family podcasts

Pandora - for music

Mobisle notes - check list format to do lists

OI Shopping - grocery list that will tally the final cost of my list

Movies - to check the local movie times for this week-end

PicSay - to resize photos for email

Black Friday Apps

2010-11-04T10:58:00.000-07:00

I've installed a couple of black friday apps, but it's too early to tell how well they work yet. :-) I love black friday!

Mirror App - a duh moment...

2010-11-04T10:56:00.000-07:00

I was in church the other week, after working in the nursery, and really wanted a pocket mirror, but did not have one. I figured I'd have an app for that, so I checked the market, then googled options to see what was best... and read in the comments on one that basically all the mirror apps did was give you a black screen.

Which you also get by shutting off the screen on your droid.

No app needed. Just turn off the screen and the phone is naturally a reflective surface.

Duh! LOL!

It worked great!

SDMove

2010-10-05T16:54:00.000-07:00

SDMove

With froyo (2.2) you can go to settings, look at each app, and choose to move some of them to the SDcard. Nice. Except you have to look at EACH application, one by one.

SDMove shows you the apps than can be move, and will move them either as you choose, or all at once. Even nicer!

http://www.appbrain.com/app/sdmove/com.beaglebros.SDMove

Mashable

2010-09-03T15:03:00.000-07:00

I highly recommend following mashable - they have some GREAT articles! They have an app for droid, they have twitter feed, they have a fb profile.. so they are easy to follow. Twitter is my favorite way to keep up with what is new. :-)

Turn your droid into a great MP3 player -
http://mashable.com/2010/04/24/android-music-mp3-player/

7 Mind Blowing Free apps
http://mashable.com/2010/02/21/free-android-apps/

Flash

2010-09-02T06:35:00.001-07:00

I got a system update yesterday (have had froyo for weeks) and then was able to install flash from the market. No idea what i will use flash for yet, but i have it! :-)

Blockbuster App on droid x

2010-08-07T05:07:00.000-07:00

http://androidheadlines.com/2010/06/blockbuster-rolls-out-android-app-with-droid-x.html

This looks awesome! Download movies to your phone, new releases, and stream them right to your tv.

What I have found in Froyo so far

2010-08-07T05:04:00.000-07:00

It's been a busy week, and I have not had a lot of time to learn what all Froyo brought to my phone, but here are a few of the things i have noticed, and love -

updates for apps. I can now choose "update all" rather than download each update in the market individually. I can also tell it to auto update apps, without asking me.
two additional home screens - I now have 5 instead of 3
Contacts can now be sorted by LAST name, instead of by first name. Just a little thing, but it makes me happy!

There is a rumor that the froyo update for droid has been pushed back to August 12th. My husband has not gotten the update yet - I do not know why I got it earlier, but I'm glad I did. :-)

http://www.androidcentral.com/droids-froyo-update-reportedly-halted-new-build-coming-next-week

Got froyo?

2010-08-04T06:35:00.001-07:00

It arrived over the air on my motorola droid this morning. Dan still has not gotten it, which seems weird since we live in the same house and have the same phone.

Carango

2010-07-31T11:43:00.000-07:00

This is one of Dan's favorite apps. It tracks fuel mileage, auto maintenance, oil changes, etc.

Gowalla & Foursquare

2010-07-03T11:56:00.000-07:00

http://gowalla.com/home

I cannot explain my fascination with this app. It's truly not rational. It's more of an app for college kids, so they can see who else is at the places they are at. It's sort of a game, you get points for "checking in" places.. and there are trips you can follow, or you can make your own trip. It's a lot like foursquare, but i like the trips option on Gowalla better.

Looking at the website on your computer will not work nearly as well as the app on your phone. To truly see how it works, just download it on your phone, use the website only to "tweak" it if you like it - add your photo, etc.

You can choose to update twitter and/or facebook when you check in places.

I like the trip suggestions - under trips, there is this one in Boston MA that I REALLY want to do someday, called the Freedom trail - http://gowalla.com/trips/103

and we'll probably check most of this one off while in Sate College this week-end?

http://gowalla.com/trips/4916 I'll be curious to see what it looks like with so many people at 4thfest in state college tomorrow.

http://foursquare.com/

I have foursquare installed too - and am watching that more for the specials and deals that they sometimes offer through blurrinesses... I'll be watching in State College to see what might be offered. (we are too rural for most of the offers in my normal area)

and if you are interested - there is an article here on foursquare vs gowalla that almost makes me think I should prefer foursquare?

a chart and another article here -

http://mashable.com/2009/12/25/foursquare-gowalla/

Disc Golf App

2010-07-01T18:26:00.001-07:00

We went to Lime Bluff Recreation Area to play Frisbee (Disc) Golf tonight, and I wanted an app to keep our score. Turned out we were way too bad (our first time out) to need to keep score... thankfully. Because I trid this app http://www.androlib.com/android.application.org-mightypenguin-discgolface-jqtnC.aspx and it was horrible. Kept popping up ads asking me to download other apps, screen kept disappearing... We had a blast and will be back to play more, so I'll be looking for a better scorecard app!

C:Geo - The Best, but banned?

2010-05-28T12:11:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago a geocaching friend sent me a text telling me to try C:Geo. I went to the market, downloaded it, and fell in love. http://cgeo.carnero.cc/

Turn by turn navigation. FAST. Logs the caches from the app. No need to download queries. I don't think the compass is quite as accurate as geobeagle, but it's certainly good enough. We were in love!

Then we go to the ASPGB. And hear that C:geo is banned by groundspeak?? Rumors of people's accounts being frozen for using it, and that you can be banned for using it? I can't find anything from groundspeak saying you cannot use it, and it's available through the market, but if you search through the forums, apparently all mention of c:geo is removed. So how you are supposed to know you can't use it, if it can't even be mentioned, I am not sure.

Very, very irritating. I love C:geo. And the "official" geocaching app that was supposed to be out earlier this year is still in beta and not being released. There are LOTS of other geocaching apps out there now... but I really do not want to keep downloading new ones and playing with them, especially not knowing if they, like c:geo, are not "allowed". I don't want a new app, I want to use C:geo. Or an official groundspeak app. So please, groundspeak, if you cannot manage to release an official app for the droid, then just buy C:geo already!

True Voice Free Dialing in 2.2

2010-05-25T18:32:00.000-07:00

http://www.androidtapp.com/true-hands-free-driving-and-bluetooth-voice-dialing-is-in-android-2-2/

2010-05-25T18:25:00.000-07:00

Find members of Congress by using your phone's location, a zipcode, a last name, or a state.
Read the latest bills and laws.
Read tweets and watch videos from members' Twitter and YouTube accounts.
Reply to a member of Congress on Twitter from within the app, using your own account.
Read the latest news about them, using the Yahoo News API.

full review at android and me - http://androidandme.com/2010/05/applications/congress-for-android-social-activism-just-got-a-bit-more-mobile/

Copy & Paste text from Gmail

2010-05-16T09:46:00.000-07:00

To copy text from an email in the gmail app, slide open the keyboard, hold shift and slide your finger across the text you want copied. It will automatically copy to the clipboard, then you can open a note taking application (I like Note Everything) and press to paste.

Different notifications for different texts -

2010-05-11T14:04:00.000-07:00

Some days I get a lot of texts. I don't feel the need to rush to my phone and read each one right away, but if Dan texts me, I'd like to know right away. With handcent, I can set up different notification sounds for different people, so I always know when it is Dan texting me. I love it!

This is the screenshot taken from the handcent webpage
See on the upper right, the person with the flower on his shoulder (I know it's supposed to be a tool, but doesn't it look like a flower?)
Click on that, and choose Notification Settings
Choose your tone, and you are all set - now that persons texts will have the tone you set for them

read the NY Times -

2010-05-11T06:53:00.000-07:00

app is available in the market today - brand new. :-)

JC Penney mobile coupons

2010-05-10T07:18:00.001-07:00

http://www.jcpenney.com/jcp/mobile1.aspx?&cmDeptReset=true&cmAMS_T=G1&cmAMS_C=B3default&cmCatID=globalnav

In a day or two you will receive a text message with a coupon for $10 off $25, and then you will occassionally receive other coupons from them. Target also offers mobile coupons - I love this trend!

shopping lists

2010-05-07T14:13:00.001-07:00

OI Shopping List - I tried so many grocery apps this past week... and most of them frustrated me. I wanted a few simple features -

multiple lists (ie - Sam's Club, Great Value, Dollar General)
A way to add prices, and have a total at the bottom of the list so I knew what each list was going to cost me before getting to the store
the ability to email the list

OI Shopping does all of that. There are three theme options, none of which I love, but I'm so happy with how well it totals the list - my biggest "want" - that I don't care. It's not a fancy app. I don't think you can use the barcode scanner (when I tried that option on other apps, it didn't work well anyway - it would recognize the item, but not add the price) It doesn't sort by aisle. BUT it adds the prices of the items, and lets me know what my total will be. Am I repeating myself? LOL! I was amazed at how difficult it was to find a good app with that very simple feature.

Apps I used this week...

2010-05-07T13:49:00.000-07:00

My Favorites -

Cardio Trainer - 8.5 mile bike ride to the library and back this week. :-)

Drive Safe.ly - fun app that will read my texts to me as I drive. I can choose to cancel to do nothing, or auto respond, which will reply with a text that I preset. Mine says "I'm driving right now, get back to you soon." TIP - you might want to shut this app off if in a vehicle full of teenagers with cell phones.. They will text you random things just to hear the software read it....

HandCent - I like this better than the default texting app

CalPad - MUCH better than the default calendar app

DPod - Podcasts - I caught up on a bunch of fantastic Focus On The Family podcasts while working around here this week.
EEBA - envelope budgeting system we use
GoogleSkyMaps - possibly my favorite all time app. I've always loved looking at the stars, spotting constellations, etc.. this just makes it so easy! :-)
GoogleDocs - This week I added a folder for crafts, and subfolders for the types - knitting, crocheting, embroidery.. and I've started uploading some of my patterns and stitch instructions in. Very nice when I am at Matt's baseball games and realize I forgot the pattern for what I was working on, or forgot how to do that stitch...

Aldiko Reader (I read Mary at the Farm this week, quite possibly my favorite book of all time)

Official Twitter Ap p - LOVE this new app

Quick Settings - I toggle my gps off a lot to save my battery

You Version Bible,

Note Everything,

NewsRob - syncs with google reader, to read rss feeds

BlogAway - for updating my blogger blogs from my phone

Gmail,

Weatherbug,

Facebook,

App Organizer and Folder Organizer

picsay - it's a two step process - first I say I want to share the photo, then choose picsay. Then click on the bottom of the screen and a menu will come up to allow me to export - then I can choose gmail. Tedious, but still the best way I have found to resize photos to share by email.

navigation

New -

GMOTE - http://www.gmote.org/ Not as extensive as the LogMeIn, this one just plays the media on my laptop, using my droid as a remote. Why? For me, I set it up so I can use it to play a slide show during children's church, without having to walk over to my laptop, which will be hooked into the sound system, to change the slides.

Historical Marker Database - an app that will show you the historical markers nearby, using your gps location. Another toy a homeschooling mom couldn't pass up... :-)

OI Shopping List - I tried so many grocery apps this past week... and most of them frustrated me. I wanted a few simple features -

multiple lists (ie - Sam's Club, Great Value, Dollar General)
A way to add prices, and have a total at the bottom of the list so I knew what each list was going to cost me before getting to the store
the ability to email the list

Skyfire - the new browser that will play flash videos. I used it a couple of times, and left it installed, but I don't watch enough flash videos on my phone for this to be a big deal for me. I'd like it to be built in so I don't have to go through steps to choose the right browser... and then it seems to take awhile for the video to load and play. Not TOO long, but I'm not known for a long attention span. :-)

State Farm Insurance App

Online Learning

2010-05-07T06:36:00.000-07:00

I've been receiving emails from Verizon, inviting me to training workshops for my droid. I think I'd go, out of curiosity, if there was one nearby at a time that worked for me.. but there is not. While looking at the information though, I saw this site - online tutorials. Doesn't look TOO informative, but would probably be great for someone who just got their phone and doesn't know too much about it?
http://learning.verizonwireless.com/learning/Droid/index.html

Official Twitter app for droid -

2010-04-30T17:15:00.000-07:00

I've been using twidroid, which I liked very much, but this looks like it might actually be better! It's the first official twitter app, from twitter.

I've had it installed for all of 5 minutes and so far I am in love! It's pretty, for one. :-) But it has a great link right to my lists, it's just easy to find everything... and it will automatically shorten my urls just like the desktop version. The format is just NICE.

Apps - the ones I used this week

2010-04-30T12:01:00.000-07:00

Quick Settings - I like that this one allows me to control the screen brightness, and see what is using my battery, quickly (click on the battery at the very top right). I use the Power widget for turning on/off gps, bluetooth, and wifi
Drive Safely - ok, so I haven't actually used this in the CAR yet, but we've played with it a lot in the house, and I love it! It reads texts while I am driving, and will even respond for me.
DC Metro App - used this in DC so I always had the metro map, and knew how long until the next train arrived.
Aldiko Book Reader - one of my favorite apps. I'm reading Mary At The Farm right now, on it.
Navigation and geocaching apps, google sky map, pandora radio (which is buggy all of a sudden today...) You Version Bible, Note Everything, NewsRob, BlogAway, Gmail, Weatherbug, Facebook, Twidroid, NoteEverything, picsay and Our Groceries

The Ones I tried and did NOT like, this week -

To Market Grocery Shopping Lite - the scanner was not adding info to the app, and I could not see the total cost for my list until the items were added to the cart... I'm looking for a good grocery shopping app that will total the prices for what I plan to buy, before I go to the store. I do not mind manually entering the prices - but i'd like it to then remember those items/prices
Free Shopping List

New, trying out -

Knocking Live Video http://www.androidtapp.com/knocking-live-video-hits-1-million-users-faster-than-gowalla-foursquare-and-twitter/
Otter - answers texts automatically http://www.freeandroidappaday.com/2010/04/24/otter-android-app/
Toshi - Mobile Expense Tracker
State Farm insurance app -http://www.androidguys.com/2010/04/29/state-farm-releases-pocket-agent-android-handsets/

Skyfire - browser with flash

2010-04-30T08:15:00.000-07:00

http://www.skyfire.com/product/skyfire-2-0-for-android/

A quick overview -

"Skyfire took my meager Windows-based browser and made it King, allowing it to access Flashed-based sites in all its glory. Now Skyfire, which I am excited to say, is releasing an Android-based application. Not only will Skyfire allow full Flash video playback, it packs the punch of pinch to zoom, copy and paste and many other mobile browsing essentials. "

http://www.androidtapp.com/skyfire-for-android/

Long detailed review

http://www.androidtapp.com/skyfire-mobile-browser/

Weather

2010-04-27T12:38:00.000-07:00

On the left is weatherbug, and on the right is the new weather channel app. (the weather channel app is not actually "new", but they have completely redone it, so it looks much better)

I still prefer weatherbug, myself. :-) I love the notifications for freeze, and frost, that appear as little red triangles in my notification bar with weatherbug. (great to know when you are worried about gardens/plants outside) It's possible weather.com has those too - I didn't leave it installed long enough to know what ll the features were. I have just the basic, free, weatherbug.

Read Books

2010-04-26T07:19:00.000-07:00

I use the Aldiko Reader app on my droid to read books. I love this app. :-)

http://www.aldiko.com/features.html

You can easily add any epub file to the library - either download the epub files on your phone, or if they are on your computer, connect, mount usb, and move the files to ebooks/import (make sure they are in the import folder)

The Aldiko Blog -

http://www.aldiko.com/blog/

TIP - google whatever subject you are interested in, with the word epub after the subject. Often you can find lots of great books free! Project Gutenburg is another great source for free ebooks.

TIP - when downloading books from project gutenburg, I always look for the option WITH images. I like the pictures included.

Other books i have on there - some are directly from the aldiko library, others I have added using the import folder. Some of these I have not yet read and have no idea if they are any good or not.

TIP - tap the settings button and choose "collections list" - there you can add topics and organize your book collections by subject. Mine are organized by bible, classics, mystery, homekeeping, and history currently.

Beeton's Book Of Needlework
Bleak House - Charles Dickens
Common Sense - Thomas Paine
Declaration of Independence
Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson
Every Step In Canning - Grace Gray
Faith's Check Book - Spurgeon
Five Weeks In A Balloon - Verne
History Of Sullivan County - George Streby
Holy Bible KJV
Kitty's Class Day and Other Stories - Louisa May Alcot
Mary at the Farm - Edith M Thomas
Roughing It - Mark Twain
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Doyle
Book Of Household Management - Beeton
The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes - Doyle
The Duties of Parents - Ryle
The Egg and I - Betty MacDonald
the NIV Matthew Henry Commentary
Pilgrims Progress - Bunyan
Valley of Fear - Doyle
Walden - Thoreau

Droid News

2010-04-26T06:51:00.000-07:00

Droid Shines as a gps -
http://blogs.cars.com/kickingtires/2010/04/as-a-gps-device-motorola-droid-shines.html

Sirius XM is coming to Droid -
http://www.siriusxm.com/android/indexd.html
offering a 7 day free trial when it does, after that it will be a monthly subscription fee. With so many great streaming radio apps out there for free, I'm not sure what the draw of this is? But then, I have never had Sirius radio, so I do not know what I am missing. LOL!

Android 2.2 is coming -
http://www.androidtapp.com/android-2-2-and-counting/

watch the draft....

2010-04-22T16:58:00.000-07:00

The NFL Draft is the biggest day in Football that's not in season. The tension as players wait to be picked is evident. Every year the draft brings surprises.

Text ( NFL to 8915) To download or go to Verizon.com and follow the links. Make sure you read the terms of the app as charges may apply starting in 2011.

13 Ways I have used my phone in the last week -

2010-04-22T10:25:00.000-07:00

pedometer - it tracked both my biking and walking. Using the cardio trainer app. (this is one of the apps I use most often)
navigation - it took me right from cemetery, to the parking area for the walking trail, to the restaurant where I met Lisa, and for the first time ever I didn't have to spend hours pouring over maps and worrying about getting around an area... I just told the phone where I wanted to go, and told it to navigate. (this was the biggest reason Dan wanted me to have this particular phone, because I panic so much about driving in areas I do not know)
geocaching - we use the geobeagle and radar apps, still waiting for the official geocaching app, which is in beta still.
calendar - I love the calendarpad app, because I like to see text, not blocks of colors like the standard calendar app. I love that this all syncs with our google calendar, so I was updating our calendar from a committee meeting, while Dan was at the same time updating it from baseball practice, and both of us knew exactly what conflicts we were facing.
Texting - which we did a TON of with kids and Dan and I being in a dozen different directions... I like handcent better than the native app.
picsay - for resizing and emailing photos from my phone.
Note everything - for taking committee meeting notes, prayer requests, and bible study notes - all of which I can then sort into proper folders. I emailed the committee meeting notes to my home computer, sorted them into a to do list for the committee members, and emailed it back out to each of them... it was so quick and efficient, because the typing was all done at the committee meeting. Without me having to drag my laptop along.
GoogleDocs. A few questions were raised at the committee mtg, regarding our bylaws. Since I keep a copy of the scout bylaws in googledocs, I was able to quickly locate and read the relevant portions.
Our Groceries - Dan drives right past Dollar General on his way home, and there were a few things I wanted there. Rather then texting him lists, I texted him to ask him to stop at the store. When he got there, he simply opened the mygroceries app on his phone, went to the list titled Dollar General, and checked off the list. Because ourgroceries syncs between phones, his list was the same as the lsit I created on my phone. Because it syncs so well, we use this for our farm to do list, and Dan's to do list, as well.
news. I use apps organizer, and folder organizer, to keep everything on my phone organized. In a folder labeled "to read", with a newspaper icon, I have shortcuts for our local newspaper, Aldiko (my ereader, I have a lot of books on my phone too) Bible (youversion app) Gmail, Newsrob (app for reading rss feeds) Twidroid (for twitter) and Weatherbug.
podcasts - I listen to James McDonald most mornings, while cleaning up after Dan leaves for work. I love it! I'm still working on convincing Dan to eliminate the tv from our bedroom. we have the sleeptimer app on our phones, and it plays music (audiobooks, any mp3 file... maybe even podscasts? Haven't looked yet) for a set amount of time at bedtime.
alarms - I use the native alarm clock for everything. Alarms to start our school day. Alarm to pick up Meg from piano. Alarm to leave the house for PSSA's. Alarm for me to get up in the morning. Alarm for me to head back to pick the kids up from PSSA's.
Internet access -
1. FindAGrave - I've been volunteering for the FindAGrave site, filling requests for photographing tombstones at local cemeteries. I used the phone's internet connection to look at the requests when I was near a cemetery - three different times this week. Then I used the phone to take the photos.
2. at our parents of teens meeting at church last week, there was a question about the date/parent in charge of the May teen outing. Thanks to the droids fast internet access, I was able to access the church calendar online, quickly, and answer the question.

I also used it to update facebook, used newsrob to read blogs, used the weather app hard (it notifies me when there is a frost alert for our area even) updated my blog using blogaway, and I used the photo of the table and chairs I bought to help me choose the fabric for the chairs. Google skymap is still my favorite app - I love being able to label the constellations, it fascinates me!

http://thursday-13.com/

Texts with personality - Handcent

2010-04-22T10:24:00.000-07:00

http://www.handcent.com/
I'm still looking for a way to customize texts a bit more. What I am looking for is a way to JUST have texts from Dan and the kids pop up. (I disabled the pop ups under settings on this app) And different ring tones for texts from different people.

But for now, this is my favorite texting apps. There is a lot of customization available, under settings. You can see more screen shots/options here - http://www.handcent.com/ScreenShot.php

our grocery and to do lists - OurGroceries

2010-04-22T10:13:00.000-07:00

This is one of our most used apps! Dan and I both have it installed, and synced. We use it not only for shopping lists, but for the farm to do list, and Dan's to do list.

"OurGroceries automatically keeps your family’s grocery list in sync with the latest changes—on every family member’s phone or web browser.

Every change to your shared shopping list is visible in seconds. See items being checked off as your partner shops."

Resize Photos - Picsay

2010-04-21T17:52:00.000-07:00

One of my biggest frustrations with this phone was my inability to quickly resize photos for emails. The first time I tried picsay, I did not like it.. but I think there have been updates? It's perfect now. This may be the first app I actually pay for - right now the "high pro" size is free on the trial - and that, to me, is the perfect size for emailing.

Be sure to go under settings and you can change what the default subject line in emails is (I made it blank) and you can change, or eliminate, the automatic signature line.

Drive Safe.ly

2010-04-21T17:49:00.000-07:00

http://www.androidtapp.com/drivesafe-ly/

Listen to SMS/Email and TXT messages. DriveSafe.ly reads your TXTs, emails and Caller ID aloud to you while driving. iSpeech Text to Speech (TTS) will speak the message and can auto respond letting the sender know you are driving and will reply once you safely reach your destination.

Podcasts

2010-04-10T07:14:00.001-07:00

Trying out Podkast today

http://www.androidtapp.com/podkast-audio-video-podcast/

Google listen stopped working for me, was not loading podcasts. Using dpod now and it's good... but podkast looks like it might be better?

Organize it's apps!

2010-04-09T13:55:00.000-07:00

I love, love, love this application.
I have a lot of apps.
Apps to keep lists, apps to track calories and exercise, apps for geocaching, apps for metal detecting, apps, apps, apps. I love apps.

But I do not like a huge menu to scroll through to find the correct app!

This app allows me to label my apps, then put shortcuts on the screen for each label. So now I have a shortcut on my screen that says listen (you can customize the icons too, so my listen group is a headphone icon) and when I tap on the headphones, a menu showing my music related apps apppears (cherry rplayer, dpod, music, and Pandora currently).

I have one screen of icons, all neat and orderly, and when I want to access an app, it's easy to find.

This is the best app ever. Really. :-)

http://sites.google.com/site/appsorganizer/

2.1 installed! (and a photo rant)

2010-04-08T16:25:00.000-07:00

Dan and both received the 2.1 update earlier this week. He didn't notice any differences at all, I'll have to show him. :-) I knew what to look for, and immediately switched to live wallpaper. The moving grass amuses me.

And then I played with the new photo gallery, which I like... but I'm so disappointed that there STILL is not a good option for resizing photos for emails. I don't like picsay, and so far that's the only app I've been able to find that does it. It seems like such a simple thing, like something that the phone should do without an app!

We used it as a level, and as a metal detector this week. Then used it for geocaching. And for a to do list, grocery list, music player... and yet I can't take and email photos, I have to send them to my laptop, resize them, and email them from there. There's got to be a better way.

Level

2010-04-05T10:15:00.001-07:00

Well, Dan's droid does, anyway. We're putting in posts for the new chicken coop run today, and Dan is using the bubble app on his droid, to tell if they are level.

Still waiting on 2.1....

2010-04-04T13:33:00.000-07:00

Neither Dan nor I have received the update yet. :-(

Here is an article on how to install it once you receive it - although I'm pretty sure the directions will be clear on the phone when it arrives - http://support.vzw.com/how_to_use/droid_upgrade.html

The announcement from verizon on the features -
http://www.berryscoop.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/moto_droid.png

And a not encouraging article on a possible problem with "major 2D slowdown" with the update -
http://blogs.zdnet.com/Burnette/?p=1895

Problems with Podcasts

2010-04-01T06:42:00.000-07:00

I can no longer get any of the focus on the family podcasts to work. :-(
http://www.focusonthefamily.com/about_us/broadcasts.aspx
In google reader on my laptop they show up as newsfeeds, no audio. In google listen on my droid, they show up with "no feed available". I'm still trying to figure it out.

Walk in the Word with James McDonald works - but that feed ends in xml. I think that might be the key?
http://www.walkintheword.com/podcast.xml

The official Adventures In Odyssey Podcast (which is about the episode, not the actual episode) is also working http://www.whitsend.org/podcast/aiopodcast.xml

But FOF links are completely different -
http://feeds.feedburner.com/FocusOnTheFamilyDailyBroadcast

More Twitter... and bible apps

2010-03-28T09:51:00.000-07:00

I'm still trying to figure out the best way to use twitter. Yesterday I deleted the app on facebook that updated my status from twitter automatically, and now I sort of regret it... but I can't reinstall it, like many others, that app (on facebook, not on my phone) will not allow me to login.

Ok - so looking at other options. I'd really like to be able to choose which tweets go to facebook - as the ones with hashtags really don't need to go there.

So today I have 14 tabs open, looking at so many options my head is spinning. I did find a nice comparison chart for twitter apps on droid -
http://androinica.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/03/April-2010-Twitter-App.jpg

and this program, for on my laptop, that allows me to update/follow both at once
http://www.yoono.com/ (but no version of this for my droid? still looking...)

And an article on 4 ways to update facebook from Twitter -
http://mashable.com/2009/05/25/twitter-to-facebook/

In case that's not enough to keep me confused today, I'm also checking out bible apps. I have YouVersion, and AcroLite... but neither have built in commentary options. I want to look in to what else is out there

Anyone have any suggestions for either the twitter or the bible apps?