These speakers could have easily been designed by MacGyver but it's designer Dmitry Zagga who came out with this brilliant, yet simple idea. Made out of 2 cups, 2 toothpicks and a set of earplugs, these DIY iPhone speakers won't compete with your real speakers but it will certainly increase the volume of your earbuds; the sound being magnified due to the shape of the cup. More pictures after the break.
Month: November 2008
iPhone Bacon Case. Yes, I Said Bacon Case
I am always amazed at how creative people can be. I mean, there are some people out there saying "I'm gonna create the first iPhone bacon case", and they actually do it. That's what German website Dawanda came up with and the good news is it can be yours for the price of 25 Euros.
Doesn't it look real? More pictures after the jump.
The Best Free iPhone Weather App
The weather app that comes with your iPhone is usable, but it doesn't provide much information. Sometimes an icon doesn't tell you exactly what you can expect weather-wise. Heading into these autumn and, eventually, winter months we'll need more information about the weather.
Even with the advent of the App Store, there hasn't been a free weather app that just knocked my socks off. Perhaps I am a bit tougher to please than the average iPhone user because I have been a weather producer at the television station I work at.
Well, the must-have free weather app is finally here and it's no surprise that it was created by The Weather Channel [iTunes link]. It features the current conditions, an hourly forecast, a 36-hour forecast and a 10-day forecast. I really like the hourly forecast. Today, I see that the rain is going to start to pick up at around 6 p.m. Very useful.
The "Explore Map" option (pictured, above) features doppler radar, which shows you exactly where it is raining, snowing or both. Another extremely useful feature.
There's also an updated video of the forecast for the major city near your area. And finally, there's a "Severe Weather Alerts" tab. "The Weather Channel" can detect your location using your GPS if you allow it.
So, if you haven't bought a full-featured weather app already, get "The Weather Channel." It's free, and I highly recommend it.
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A quick post to suggest that you subscribe to our RSS feed either via a reader (such as Google Reader) or via email.
I personally use NewsGator as my RSS reader. To me it is much better than Google Reader which looks messy. The mobile version of Newsgator is just perfect too as it was designed to fit your iPhone screen. To date, I am subscribed to 99 feeds.
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TheMonkeysBall.com shut down for good. Website now up for sale
It took a while to Apple's lawyers to find out and do something about TheMonkeysBall.com but they finally did it. They finally got this site shut down for uber massive copyright infringement.
For those of you who don't know, TheMonkeysBall.com was the reference in matter of cracked iPhone apps. The website offered a gigantic library of cracked ipa files, making it the preferred destination for anyone who didn't want to spend a dime on iPhone apps.
Wyze, the owner, explains:
Well, Apple, it took you long enough to find us. We're sure Mr. Haklab will take credit for this and all we have to say to that is that it took you long enough. We had a good run and honestly we are surprised we lasted this long. We don't want to move servers again to another country to avoid DMCA as we've lost interest since the site first launched.
The site is now up for sale. I doubt you can do anything with such a URL but who knows...
American Airlines Introduces Mobile Boarding Passes. Amen!
It took a long time to the airlines to figure out that you can use your iPhone (or any mobile device for that matter) as a boarding pass. American Airlines is now the first airline to officially offer mobile boarding passes at a few airports but it shouldn't take long for this to be available at all airports, across all airlines.
I tried several times to show my iPhone as a boarding pass at the gate and it never worked. They always told me that was not approved so I had to show them the paper version. I'm always annoyed at having to print all these boarding passes and itineraries (note: I travel quite a bit, both domestically and internationally). I mean, I have my iPhone in my pocket and it is so much more convenient to show your iPhone screen rather than looking in your backpack for the right piece of paper.
Is this hassle going to be over soon? Yes! American Airlines started to make this mobile boarding pass option available to people who travel from Chicago O'Hare Airport, LAX, and John Wayne Airport, and it is leading the way for all other airlines.
From American Airlines website:
When you are traveling on select itineraries from Chicago O'Hare (ORD), Los Angeles International (LAX) and Santa Ana John Wayne/Orange County (SNA) airports, you now have the option to have your boarding pass sent directly to your mobile phone or other mobile device – saving paper and time. Eligible itineraries include non-stop flights with only one passenger listed in the record locator*. Follow the easy steps below for your next applicable flight from ORD, LAX or SNA:
How to use the new Mobile Boarding Pass
1. Check in on AA.com (or AA.com Mobile). Choose "Email for use on Cell Phone or other Mobile Device" option and include the e-mail address for your web-enabled mobile phone and/or mobile device.
2. Check your email from your mobile device. Follow the link on the email to retrieve your Mobile Boarding Pass.
3. Save the boarding pass to your device. Click the "Save Boarding Pass" button directly below the barcode to save it to your phone for easy access at the security checkpoint (check your phone/PDA manual to locate where the Boarding Pass will save).
4. Proceed to Security. When you arrive at security, make sure the entire barcode is visible on the screen of your mobile phone or mobile device and have the backlight setting set to the brightest mode possible. If you have any problems, you will be given the opportunity to print a paper boarding pass at the self-service machines.
The new boarding passes are now available for Chicago O'Hare outbound flights and will become available for Los Angeles and John Wayne outbound flights starting on November 17.
I do believe this is just the beginning. Soon, all airlines will offer this feature and to be honnest, I am surprised that SouthWest or Virgin America haven't figured this one out yet...
I also believe that more places will let you use your iPhone as a "pass", such as hotels, restaurants, car rentals and much more.
Props to American Airlines!
Via Mobility Site
Tatomic: an original action puzzle game for your iPhone
VGViews, an independent games development company, has released its first title for the iPhone – Tatomic [iTunes Link].
Tatomic is an original action puzzle game that is fun, addictive and really hard to put down once you start playing.
The basic premise of Tatomic is simple. Connect pairs of atoms into colored chains to make them explode and disappear. You earn point bonuses by clearing multiple chains at once. The amount of atoms to clear a chain changes with each level, and so does the game speed.
The game features original music, and state of the art graphics and animation.
Tatomic is available from the App Store for $4.99 | Download
How People Really Use The iPhone
Strategic design and research firm Create With Context published a very interesting survey about how people use the iPhone. Originally created for developers, the survey reveals a lot on how we interact with our favorite device.
Here is a brief overview of what the survey reveals:
Understand how people interact with the iPhone platform What works, what doesn’t work, and why? Are there mismatches between expectations and platform? Where are there usability and/or usefulness issues? Where does the iPhone UI excel, and where doesn’t it? Observe how the mass market - not the experts - uses the iPhoneClick here to read the full survey.
Transformer app makes your iPod Touch look like an iPhone
Do you want to push the customization of your iPod Touch a bit further? Then the new Transformer application might be what you're looking for.
Available for free in Cydia, this app will make your iPod Touch look like an iPhone by adding various icons to your springboard. It will for example add the signal bars, the phone and the camera icon.
I don't have an iPod Touch so I was not able to try this app but if you do, please let us know in the comments.
Installer 4.0b9 update
The RIP Dev Team posted today on their blog about new updates they brought to Installer. Here is what you can find in the new package:
Added user-driven ratings. We encourage you to submit your votes for various packages. Once more data will be collected (in a few days), that will be reflected on the Featured page. SpringBoard is no longer terminated after the software was installed or removed. Proxies are (again) supported. The support was broken after we moved to libcurl. Introduced download timeouts (again) that were disabled after the move to libcurl. Reworked many parts of the engine in an effort to get rid of the occasional GUI stalls. If a particular source fails to update, it will be moved to "disabled" state for 6 hours and will not be included in the all sources refresh process. The disabled state is listed as the source icon with a red "stop" sign over it. This is done to prevent unnecessary stalls at the sources refresh if one of the sources goes offline for whatever reason. If you'd like to retry it before 12 hour interval, open its info and hit Refresh button there. Removed custom Info support as it was mostly used for unnecessary ads that were disturbing many people. These pages are normally reachable from the "More Info" link. Much better error reporting. Forget these "error 3"s and such. The descriptions are much more human readable now. And for script errors, it will show an actual script command that caused an error. Installer will prevent iPhone/iPod touch from sleeping when it's downloading or installing something. The app icon badge should behave better now. Lots of smaller fixes and optimizations I won't list.With the popularity of Cydia, I really wonder if there is still room for Installer. I guess time will tell.
Cipher Takes Me Back and Keeps Me Playing
When I was a kid, I loved doing the cryptogram puzzles in the puzzle magazines. My mom would buy them for me chock full of crosswords and word searches and other types of puzzles and I would always do all the cryptograms and hand the magazine off to my little sister.
For those of you who don't know what I am talking about, cryptograms are word puzzles where they give you an encoded phrase, idiom or quote. Then using a simple substitution cipher, you, letter by letter, translate the quote.
When I saw the new game, Cipher [iTunes Link] I thought cool. I downloaded it and couldn't stop playing for an hour.
The app starts you off with a tutorial where it gives you an easy two word phrase to start off with and gives you tips, like look for contractions, double letters, one letter words, etc.
They also supply Hints if you get stuck (I would never use them, honestly :)
The game supplies you with a six categories of phrases from Arts & Literature, Famous Quotes, History, Science and Technology, Sports, and Religion.
iPhone Firmware 2.2 on November 21st?
According to a rumor by iPhoneHellas, the new iPhone 2.2 firmware will be released on November 21st.
Some of the new features will include:
- New look for the Safari with the Google search bar now occupying its own space on the title bar (iPhone v2.2 beta1) - Add toggle On / Off to disable the auto-correction (iPhone v2.2 beta1). - 461 Japanese emoji icons (iPhone v2.2 beta1). - Support for new languages. - The Line-in audio is activated and can be used through the headphone jack. - Google Street View (iPhone v2.2 beta1). - Google Transit information - Routes public transport (iPhone v2.2 beta2). - Walking directions (iPhone v2.2 beta2). - Location sharing. - The sector ‘Categories’ now shows the icons of the applications instead of the list. - In each page of the application has been added by a button ‘Tell A Friend’ & ‘Report A Problem’. - Added the possibility of scoring the application when the user chooses to delete from the device (iPhone v2.2 beta2). - Added the possibility for direct downloading of podcasts from the iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store (iPhone v2.2 beta2).
Now if only they would put a copy and paste feature in!