App Of The Day - Glympse

"WRU?"

"How do I get there?"

"Am I going the right way?"

"Where are we all meeting?"

Sound familiar? Usual messages we send or receive when meeting up with colleagues, friends, or family (or clingy girlfriends/spouses? hahahaha). But sometimes, it's not very safe or convenient to text or message a location. And some tracking services aren't very good, don't offer a lot of privacy, and worst of all require the creation of an account and everyone you want to give your location to, to sign up as well. So why bother with GPS tracking apps?

Well, there are some very valid reasons to allow certain people to track you. Safety, navigation, travel logs just to name a few. But you don't want to leave this open to the public, nor do you want certain people to track you anytime THEY want. Give them a glimpse of where you are, using Glympse!

This is an app designed to give your GPS location and movement to a specific person (or persons) for a specific amount of time.

In use, it's quite practical for out of town trips, and safety.

I'm part of a car club, and we frequently go on out of town trips. Meet up points are useful but sometimes, others may be late or just choose to follow. What happens if someone doesn't know the way? Sending a Glympse to that person allows the app to create a route to your location. No need to input a destination, just click on the link and a route to that person is calculated automatically.

Alternately, it will allow that person to send you their location, so you can track their movements and verify that they are going in the right direction or are on the right track. "Am I going the right way? Or did I already pass it?"

It's also quite useful for travel safety. Specially in unfamiliar areas, you may want to send a Glympse to a friend or relative so they will know exactly where you are should you need help or if it's critical for people to find you. Like if you're on a long road trip, and your car breaks down or need to be fetched, having sent a link to someone before you head out will make it easier for help to find you.

It's quite an efficient app as well, people you send your location to do not need to have the app, just an email address and web browser. If they have the app, it just allows more options, but isn't critical to receive your location. It doesn't drain your battery much, nor does it chew up that much data so don't worry so much about long trips.

Give it a try! Available for Android, iOS, WP7 or BB!

**Disclaimer, this blog does not take ANY responsibility for the impact this app will have on your relationships! Hahahaha! Use at your own risk!**

kik me!

A while back, I wrote about kik Messenger, one of my fav IMs for iOS and Android.  Initially offered on Blackberry as well, RIM got scared and decided to pull it out of App World.

Well, kik has been trying its best to get back into BB... FINALLY, the wait it over!!!

kik is back on Blackberry!!!!!

For everyone out there affected by RIMs BBM outage, download kik and sign up now!!!!

Pwn2Own 2011 : Blackberry 9800 and iOS Hacked

Pwn2own, an annual hacking contest conducted by TippingPoint as a challenge to hack into their newest systems.

Results for 2011 are in and the Blackberry 9800 and iOS 4.2.1 and the new 4.3 fell to hacking exploits via their respective browsers.

What this means is that a hacker can gain access to your address book if you simply visit a website (made by the hacker) designed to take advantage of the vulnerabilities found on the Blackberry 9800 and all iOS 4.2.1 and 4.3 devices.

Vulnerability reports are then given to their respective manufacturers that can use the information to patch and fix glitches in their security.

Although Windows Phone and Android devices were not compromised, it was only by disqualification as the teams that were supposed to hack them never showed up.

Surf's Up!

Celfones are no longer just for calls.  The idea of voice-only mobile phones died out back in the early 90's. Today's mobile devices are officially called communicators.  Voice functions are slowly being replaced by data services all together.

How does this affect us as end-users?  Simple.  A while back, we would pay for each service... voice, text, fax (the tech weed that doesn't want to die), MMS, and data.  Now, devices have become so powerful, that all these services can pass through internet channels, thus can be handled by just the data services all together.  This can lower your monthly bill if unlimited data services can be maximized.

Here in the Philippines, unlimited data plans still have low penetration in the mobile market, but they are picking up and becoming way more affordable.  And I would highly recommend to anyone on an Android, Blackberry, or iPhone to subscribe to one of the many mobile data plans available from your provider.

Sun Cellular has the cheapest unlimited data plan at P799 (approx US$16)

Smart and Globe offer unlimited data at P999 (approx US$20) *Globe just recently lowered their SuperSurf, down from P1200

How much is unlimited data in your country?

RIM: Do Not Pull Kik From BlackBerry – An Open Letter to Kik Users

Shortly after going viral (1 million users in 2 weeks - Facebook took almost a year to reach their first million), Kik Messenger was pulled from the Blackberry Appworld.  This is a sad day for Blackberry users, since it seems that RIM is feeling threatened by Kik.  For those that don't know, Kik is a cross-platform messenger that allows instant, real-time chat between Blackberry, Android, and iOS (both the iPhone and iPod Touch) devices.

RIM: Do Not Pull Kik From BlackBerry – An Open Letter to Kik Users

I'm not fond of having so many messengers.  I have MSN and YM... then there's Google Talk, and Facebook Chat.  I'm hoping for the next big messaging app to come so I can ditch the rest.

Maybe Kik can merge or sell their tech to Facebook.  Considering how lame Facebook chat is, maybe a Kik merger would help stabilize Facebook's system and allow a much cooler Facebook Mobile experience!

Mobi Wars (android vs. iOS vs. RIM)

Today's Tech Gospel is on the on-going Mobi Wars.  I've been getting a lot of inquiries on which is the "best" phone to get... unfortunately, the answer is, like always, 'it depends'.

This is just my personal take on the mobile wars.  For the sake of simplicity, I'm just going to focus on the 3 most popular ones... iOS, Android, and RIM. They all have their strengths and weaknesses. I wouldn't be able to recommend ONE of them for everyone. Simply because not everyone has the same needs.  I'm not including Symbian since they dropped UIQ.  Their Series 40/60 feels more like a feature-phone than a PDA-OS.  UIQ was my favorite (honestly, more than Android), and I used it exclusively for the last 7 years and I really liked it.  S^3 is still to new, and I have no personal experience with it yet.

The oldest of the 3 is RIM. The Blackberry has been around for a while. It has (had?) a great idea. A global messaging system... kinda like AIM/YM for phones. And the ever famous push e-mail. The problem with RIM was that they stuck to a proprietary system... locked to proprietary hardware (which isn't that great to begin with) the strengths of this system, however, shine in an enterprise setting. Where business people can communicate globally via the BBM service. It's great at what it was designed to do..keep business people connected... anytime...anywhere. Now, whether or not this is a good thing for your boss to be able to find you anywhere in the world, at anytime... that's entirely up to you to decide.

Next up... the loudest of the bunch... iOS (the iPhone) ... with people lining up at 3am in the rain to get one... Apple has done what it does best... SELL. Now, a lot of my friends are surprised that I never kept an iPhone. Tried the 1st and 3G one... was never impressed. I'm not against it. I just think it falls short as a phone and SMS device. Hence, I've owned and used an iPod Touch as my primary PDA since it first came out.   I love iOS.   The refinement of the execution is just ... well.. Apple. Simple, easy, sleek. Tons of apps for almost anything you need. "There's an app for that!".  And although the iPhone falls short as a phone. It is improving. A lot of basic functions (multi-tasking, MMS, cut and paste, and Bluetooth) were just recently introduced... so it is evolving.

I would recommend an iPhone for anyone has outgrown the functionality out of a regular phone, but doesn't really want to take the time to tweak and fiddle with the OS.

Enter the new kid in town... Android. Google's FREE mobile OS. Now how does this benefit the consumer? You can have branded (HTC, LG, Samsung, Sony Ericsson) Android devices for about $200, SIM-free! No 2-year contract, no BS... with pretty much the same features as their larger, more expensive siblings. (I say pretty much because you still do get what you pay for in terms of hardware... even if Google is giving the software away)

Android... picked up where Symbian's UIQ dropped the ball. Because it syncs with Google's online services, it pretty much is compatible with any computer that can view Gmail. That is also Android weakness. Although cloud computing is the near-future, it's not quite here yet... so if you don't have an unlimited data plan, or don't intend to get one... I really wouldn't see the point of getting an Android device. It's still a great phone... but you feel like you're running the thing in 2nd gear if your not online 24/7.

Widgets also increase the over-all functionality of Android devices.  Something iOS doesn't have yet.  Not having to launch your calendar app just to see your appointments for the day is incredibly useful.  As is being able to have your phone automatically switch modes depending on the time of day, or day of the week.  Wireless iTunes syncing is also a nice feature to have...something iOS (oddly) doesn't have yet.

Even with no official app for something, a lot of Android apps can be strung together to do more complex tasks than they were designed to do.

Being the youngest of the 3, Android is still not as refined as iOS or BB.  Not quite ready for prime time, Android is still the weapon of choice for early adopters.

To sum it all up:

Blackberry: Great for corporate communications, specially the global BBM service.  Without BBM, it's kinda useless.  Best way to keep in touch with colleagues, friends and family around the world.  Apps are limited.  Easiest to deploy and secure in a corporate fleet setting.

iPhone: Fun, sleek.  There's an app for almost anything you wanna do on it.  (Except download dive computer data straight from your dive computer... if someone from Suunto or Mac Dive Log is reading this... please make a dock that interfaces directly with an iPad or iPhone!)  Great games.  Mature and stable OS and Apps.  The inability to hide all icons from the desktop is still something that personally bugs me about iOS (iPhone, Touch or iPad)  Apps controlled by Apple, this minimizes security and virus risks, but also limits apps to developers that Apple wants.  Apple operates on a white-list system.  Only apps Apple wants get approved.

Android: Fully customizable.  True multi-tasking.  Tweakable.  Widgets.  Higher learning curve, but more advanced communication capabilities are possible.  Next best thing to having a phone OS built just for you (this is already custom Linux territory, people at this level do not bother reading my blog to get help on which phone to buy... hahahaha)  Google operates on a black-list system.  All apps are welcome until reported malicious or illegal by end-users.

**Personal note, ELSE looks like the most promising mobile OS... if backed properly, this is a new company that has the potential to overtake all 3 if they play things right... **

PS: I'm not mentioning Windows Mobile because that would just be sad (sorry MS, but you know it's true) ... hahahaha... let's see if they can raise the dead with Windows Phone...

This is far from over... with iOS 4, Android 2.2, and BB6 just coming out... this is only the beginning.

MORE space... the final frontier...

In relation to an earlier post I had regarding online storage... I just wanted to add a third new fav of mine, Dropbox.

Although my personal favorite is still Wuala, Dropbox works on mobile devices as well... Android, iOS, and very soon, Blackberry as well.

But even as is, online storage is very handy to have (regardless of the service you choose)... commonly used files such as brochures, sales presentations, blank forms, etc... can all be stored, retrieved, and emailed from almost anywhere... even without your computer.

Click on this link to get Dropbox!

BB 6!

I'm neither a supporter of the iPhone, nor the BB (I'm an Android, Symbian guy)... but for you BB users... fear not, RIM, unlike Palm, isn't leaving users in the past...