My Favorite iPhone 3G Applications
For those of you who don’t know, iPhone received a significant update last week that allows the user to download various applications.
This is pretty cool because up until then, iPhone users were left using “web apps” that relied on the internet to work. With the phone’s slow connection, the process wasn’t the greatest solution.
With Apple releasing a 3G (with GPS) version of its phone, it means more capabilities, including location-based services. I updated my phone on July 11th, so I’ve had a over a week to play around with it and experiment with different apps. The following are some of the apps that I use and find useful. Some of them can still be improved upon, but it’s a great start. 
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I was originally excited about this application, since I am a heavy Facebook user. Unfortunately it’s not as good as its web counterpart at iphone.facebook.com. The good news is that Facebook can always improve on this. My personal complaints are: the inability to view photo albums, inability to write on people’s walls, inbox doesn’t display full messages. I’m sure there are more “quirks” that bother me, but I’d say that those are the biggest ones. Facebook has promised to fix up the application in future updates… let’s hope so. |
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Since I’m still using the first generation of the iPhone, I haven’t played with this app too much. But using it on Wifi, I was extremely impressed. For those of you that don’t know, Pandora is a project that takes what you like and finds similar music. So if I like Coldplay, I can tell Pandora that and it will find music that is similar in style to Coldplay. So far, the Pandora app has shown itself to be one of the more popular apps on the iPhone. |
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I LOVE this app. When using iTunes on my wireless network, I am able to connect my phone to iTunes and control iTunes from anywhere within range of my wireless network. This comes especially handy when cooking in the kitchen and not having to walk into the room and switch up the songs. If you’re used to the iPod Touch interface, you’ll feel comfortable controlling iTunes using this app. |
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I used to carry a small notebook in my laptop bag to record my debit card transactions… not anymore! Now I record the transaction and throw the reciept away! I am hoping that they’ll eventually build some budget functionality into the program so I can keep track of my bi-weekly budget. |
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The AIM app works pretty good, I’m not a heavy AIM user anymore. But I would definitely use this app more if it could “push” notifications to my phone. For those of you that don’t know, some phones have to login and check for new notifications (pull). But with “push,” the server “pushes” the new notifications to you right away. In the case of AIM, I could leave AIM running and would only have to open the program when someone sends me an IM. |
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My friend J.D. got me using Loopt. If you remember those cell phone commercials back in the day, “Where you at dog?” This application is the perfect answer to that. When you log into Loopt, it finds your location and puts it on a map. So in essence, it’s like a status message with your location. For example, J.D. hit up Perkins last night for 99 cent pie night. If I wanted, I could join him, since it shows his location on the map. It’s just one of the many features of Loopt that I have yet to explore, but it’s definitely worth a look! |
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Looking for a place to eat? UrbanSpoon is a great way to find a place to eat. It can locate your position or you can tell it what area you want it to look into. Basically the program works like a slot machine. You shake the phone and it finds a restaurant for you. Of course, you can “lock” certain things. So let’s say I wanted an “Italian” restaurant in “Palo Alto”, I could lock “Italian” and “Palo Alto” and shake the device and it will find an Italian restaurant close by in Palo Alto. Has great potential! |
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I’m a weather buff. And when driving up to Michigan last week I ran into a storm. It was tremendously helpful to load up this program, have it find the nearest city, and show me the radar. It could be more traveler-friendly though. I would love it if I could tell it to locate me and find the nearest radar for me. Right now you have to have it locate you, then the user selects the nearest weather station, and then has to add it to their list. It’s a pain! Especially since it only allows the user to save three locations. But overall it’s a great application and a must-have. |
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I’m a nerd, as you can tell by this list. I had been making groceries using a to-do service called “Remember the Milk.” However, the online app for Remember the Milk was slow on edge and a native app has yet to be developed for iPhone. So for grocery shopping, I have downloaded Shopper. It’s extremely easy to add products to the list and you can customize it… adding products and categories. I’m loving it so far. |
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Have you ever heard on a song on the radio and wondered, “what song am I listening to?” All you have to do is click on the “Tag Now” button while the music is playing, Shazam will listen to the song and send the data to their servers and the song you’re listening to will show up on your iPhone! Here’s a video: |
