I used Opera mini 4 or whatever the previous version was and I didn’t like it. I then tried Dolphin browser. I did like it, but I quit using it since it was buggy at times. I had to fall back on the default browser, which though I like, was missing something. I downloded the new beta of Opera mini 5 and I love it. It’s easy to work with multiple tabs and it loads pages pretty fast. The only disappointment for me is, there is no option to share pages. Oh! I forgot to add pinch to zoom to the disappointment. If they add those two, then it’s rock solid browser.
Posts Tagged ‘Android’
Microsoft Tag for Android
Posted 04 Mar 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
I finally downloaded a Microsoft apps onto my Droid. Microsoft Tag is now available for Android. Microsoft Tag is more like a barcode reader. According to Microsoft, From your mobile phone, simply snap or scan a Tag image anywhere you see it – in editorials, advertisements, product packaging, signs and storefronts – and gain instant access to Websites, videos, reviews, schedules, contact information, social networks, discounts, promotions and more! All you need to do is download the free Tag reader on your web enabled camera phone and when you see a Tag, snap or scan it to interact with the world around you in new ways!
You can download Microsoft Tag by searching Microsoft Tag in the Android market. I installed it today, but haven’t gotten a chance to scan anything. Will try it soon.
Technorati Tags: Microsoft Tag, Android, Droid, Barcode, Scanner
Gesture Search for Android from Google
Posted 04 Mar 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
Google Lab has introduced a new feature called Gesture Search for Android. Once you install the application from Android Market (search for Gesture search), Start it and it’ll inform you how to activate the search. I installed it and tried few options and it worked great. It showed the search results from contacts, bookmark, applications, music tracks etc.
You can search by entering multiple characters and you can delete the last character by swiping from right to left at the bottom of the screen and you can delete the entire search query by swiping from left to right. It’s pretty cool. Give it a try. The only issue is, it works only with devices running Android 2.0 or later, so majority of Android phones are ruled out.
Credit: Google Labs.
Technorati Tags: Gesture Search, Google Lab, Android
Kwaak3 – Quake 3 for Android
Posted 25 Feb 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
Kwaak3 is a project that ports the famous Quake 3d to Android. Most of the code were written in C. Kwaak3 is currently not available in Android market, but the developer said it should be there soon. You can still install Kwaak3 from the developer site. Some of the Kwaak3 features include
- Audio
- Hardware floating-point on Neon-capable devices
- Input: keyboard, touchscreen and trackball
- OpenGL 3D rendering
- Game uses ARM optimized libcgamearm.so / libqaarm.so / libuiarm.so
- Networking
Kwaak3 was tested by the developer on Motorola Milestone, but the game is optimized for any Android device running Android >= 1.6 and has a physical keyboard. This eliminates Nexus One and other phones which are purely touch based. To install and run the program, check the information here.
- Movement: a/s/w/d, up/down arrows
- Look: touch screen, trackball and left/right arrows
- Shooting: Alt / D-pad center / tap on screen / trackball
- Tilde (quake3 console): search button
- Escape: back button
For more information, visit kwaak3 site.
Credit: Kwaak3.
Technorati Tags: Kwaak3, Quake 3d, Android, Motorola, Milestone, Android Market, Nexus One
Google Shopper for Android released
Posted 19 Feb 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
Google has released Google Shopper for Android, which helps you find prices, reviews, specs etc. Google shopper is powered by Google product search. Here are some of the features of Google Shopper:
- Scan the barcode of products to get more information about it.
- Shopper saves your history and lets you star your favorites for later.
- Find a product by simply pointing your camera phone at the cover art of a book, CD, DVD, or video game.
- Voice search – Say the name of a product and find it easily in Shopper.
- Find something you want to share? Click on the share link to post to Gmail, Facebook, Twitter, Instant Messaging, etc..
You can install Google Shopper by searching for Google Shopper in Android market.
Technorati Tags: Google Shopper, Android, Barcode
Use your Android phone as remote control for Ubuntu Linux PCs
Tesla is a open source media player remote control App for Android phones that can interact and control music and video players on Linux distributions like Ubuntu. Tesla needs wifi connection to work. It currently supports Rythmbox, Totem, VLC and Banshee. With Tesla you can
- Control the volume for just the media player, or the whole system
- Ability to shut-down your PC by remote control
- Pause your music/video automatically for incoming calls
Tesla requires OpenSSH server installed on your PC. The remote control apps uses the SSH to interact with the PC over the wifi connection.
Tesla is currently not available in Android Market, but the developer is planning to add it to Android Market once version 1.0 is released. The program is also not compatible with Windows or Apple.
Follow the instructions here to install Tesla. You have to enable “installing apps from unknown sources” on your phone. You can disable this once you install Tesla. You also need to have OpenSSH server installed in your PC and started.
Technorati Tags: Tesla, Android, Rythmbox, Banshee, VLC, Ubuntu, Windows, Apple, OpenSSH
Firefox for Android coming this year
Posted 17 Feb 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
Firefox mobile will make the Android debut sometime late this year, according to TechRadar. Sullivan, Mozilla’s VP of mobiles, pointed out that the reason for the delay was based on the underlying code:
“Android has been built on a Java platform, whereas [Firefix Mobile] is based on C and C++ code. Until last year when [the Open Handset Alliance] released the NDK (native development kit) which allowed native code as part of the app, it was simply impossible.”
I’m waiting to give Firefox a try. I tried Opera for Android and I wasn’t impressed. I also tried Dolphin Browser for Android. I was impressed with it, but it was kind of buggy for me. especially while opening links from other applications. If you are within the browser, then it works great, especially with the hand gestures. I hope when Firefox is released, they would support pinch-to-zoom functionality like Dolphin Browser.
Technorati Tags: Firefox Mobile, Android, Dolphin Browser, Opera, Java
Android 2.1 from Verizon leaked – HTC Incredible
Posted 08 Feb 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
Pocketnow has released the photos of a new HTC handset named Incredible from Verizon that’s in the making. The phone features Android 2.1 & dual flash LED. It’s running with a Snapdragon CPU with 256MB of RAM, and has a 3.5-3.7″ WVGA screen. The screen might be AMOLED. The Incredible features an optical mouse pointer towards the bottom of the device.
Here is the link to the video.
Technorati Tags: Verizon, Android, HTC, Incredible, AMOLED
Test post from WordPress for Android
Posted 03 Feb 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
It works it’s cool. I’m sending this post from my Droid.
Update: One issue I found was (may be I’m missing something?), when I created the post, I checked the Publish check box and then clicked save. The post was saved in the draft and didn’t get published until I long pressed the post and selected Publish.
WordPress for Android released
Posted 03 Feb 2010 — by Arun
Category Droid
Category Droid
WordPress team has released WordPress for Android apps yesterday. I have been waiting for this for quite sometime and it’s finally here. I was using Postbot, but wasn’t quite pleased with that since it lacked features. I installed WordPress for Android and it’s cool.
The features in this release includes:
- Configure and manage multiple blogs
- Comment moderation including the ability to reply to comments
- Create and Edit Posts including categories, tags and photos
- Create and Edit Pages
- Get notified of new comments in the Android notification bar
WordPress for Android is based on the source code from wpToGo Android apps. With this release, wpToGo will be discontinued.
