New and exciting stuff – PreApptastic.com is merging with the fast growing webOS site www.webosroundup.com. There I will be continuing my webOS application reviews for everyone to benefit. If you have any questions, you can shoot on over to that website and send me a message. You can also email me at anthony@webosroundup.com if you have any questions or comments.

This is definitely an exciting move for me, for I feel this will lead to bigger and better things. The Preapptastic.com site will be moved to a different area for portfolio and archived purposes. So without further ado, please show some love and head on over to www.webosroundup.com. (Click on the banner to be re-directed)

Anthony H.

click the above banner to view the video

April 17th 2010

Hey Everyone,

The ‘preknowledge project’ was a success, and I was able to create a small commercial video to reveal how webOS has affected people. I’m going to continue the project with a couple more tries and hopefully get some big competitors opinions too. There was one person who actually had a Palm Pre, but they didn’t want to comment on the camera – unfortunately. Plus I was able to come across a couple of iPhone users, but they insisted that they did not want to try the Palm Pre. Too bad, because my intentions were to only get their opinions, not convert them to a different phone – unless they want to.

The people that were on the video had little to no knowledge of what the Palm Pre was. They “heard” about it, but never had the opportunity to really play with it; maybe from poor salespeople. One person said she had a free upgrade coming and a Palm Pre brochure was mailed to her and she was considering buying the product. Every person asked pricing and availability and gave a good hint that they will research the phone soon.

Click the banner above to view the video reel, and please feel free to comment.

Thanks again!

Anthony H.

April 15th 2010_____________________________________________________________________________

Hey everyone,

I know a lot of you have been returning to find more blog posts, and I’ve been a little bit slow about them, because I’ve been working on a video project for the commercial contest at webOS Round Up. My project is called The Preknowledge Project and I’m finalizing some footage that I need for my commercial. It may or may not qualify before the deadline, however it’s a fun project and I feel its very beneficial one way or the other. I’ll be posting the video hopefully by this weekend if things go well.

I appreciate everyone’s comments at YouTube and there are more video reviews on the way – thanks for your patience.

-Anthony H.

Welcome to another edition of FreeApptastic, now including a new application that is (of course) free in Palm’s App Catalog – SaleZ. A small application that tries to fill in some big shoes by providing an easy to navigate user interface for EBay sales.

SaleZ is designed the developer Stephan (as found in his email), and more information can be found at http://zefanjas.de. The website is originally designed with a different language, so if you speak English, you can go to http://zefanjas.de/en/projects/salez/.  It’s listed in Palm’s App Catalog as SaleZ Lite, but there doesn’t seem to be any mention of a full version of this application. In other words, I’m not entirely sure if the “lite” suggests limited features that can only be found on the ‘full’ version. I’ve contacted the developer and I’m waiting on his reply.

The application is simple to operate and easy to setup your account.  Upon launching the application for the first time, you’ll be hand held through the process to link the application to your EBay account. The browser will be launched within the application to login in to ebay.com and authorize SaleZ to access your account.

Once the authorization steps have been completed, you will immediately have access to your common account information that is divided into two categories: Buying & Selling. The Buying section will have items that you’re watching, bidding and items you’ve already won. The Selling section will display the items you are selling, that you’ve sold or unsold.

The app also has an envelope icon at the bottom left corner, allowing you to read and delete EBay messages. Unfortunately, tapping the respond button will only launch you into ebay.com to compose and send your message. If there’s an ability to implement a reply function directly from the app, I suggest the developer looks into this. It sort of feels cumbersome to open a new browser card just to reply to a message, but at least I’m able to read up on seller’s messages about an item I want right away.

Searching for items is a hit or miss in this case. I can only perform basic searches of items I want, but I cannot categorize them by pricing, auction times and Buy-It-Now (this is probably where the Lite comes in). However viewing the item information is almost identical to the website, providing pictures, bids, user information, time left and description. If the ebay article is formatted with images and HTML, chances are they will not display in this application; therefore you will only receive a wall of text, but not all auctions are written this way. To place a bid, simply type the maximum bid in the box and tap the Place Bid button. A notification window will appear to confirm the bid and the option to cancel.

There are two icons at the bottom corners, one is a globe that will take you directly to EBay’s website and auction listing. The other is a star that will be added to your watch list and a notification with how many available auctions you can watch.

I do have a gripe about this application. Despite the limitations to filter your searches, the application does not automatically update the auction info. There’s no set timer or refresh button either, and the only way to do this is to shake the device. I’m all for fun ways to interact with your device, but I feel this is a feature that is best left out and provide a refresh button and timer to the application.

Overall the app deserves a 7 out of 10. It definitely puts convenience into your palm (pun intended) for viewing EBay auctions. But the limitation of searching and refreshing data definitely makes the app fall short from other competitors, but this could be the reason why it’s labeled as a ‘lite’ version. Maybe the full application will be released soon with solutions to these shortcomings. Other then that, if you were looking for a nice easy and lightweight tool, I would definitely recommend this application to your library.

Pros : Convenient ebay navigation, easy to bid and search, easy setup

Cons: No advanced search options, cannot sell, no automatic refresh

One of the first phones to introduce visual voice mail is the Samsung Instinct. Not really categorized as a smart phone, but it did a fine job at mimicking one and toting fun against the iPhone. This left a lot of high profile smart phones out of the loop with only the default voice mail system; this required the customer to search and install their own voice mail system. Another hurdle that had to be overcame were the call forwarding charges, which required you to activate the conditional call forward feature and direct the caller to an alternate phone number. Even with the new Palm Pre, as Sprint’s flagship smartphone, offered only the default voice mail system that really plagued a lot of minds; “Why did a THAT phone get Visual Voicemail, and the Pre didn’t?”

Voice mail services started rocking into people’s hearts and sprint heard their customer’s cries for a visual voice mail and dropped the call forwarding fee. YouMail has been in the game for a while, before Google started opening their Google Voice beta program. You Mail offer’s some strong features, with awesome text-to-speech transcriptions (with service fee), custom voicemail greetings and handling – for free.

The developer(s) over at Syntactix LLC have been working with a visual voice mail client that will assist the webOS users with easier access to their YouMail account. The application is available in Palm’s App Catalog for 3.99 and offer’s a solid user experience to handle your voice mails. Their website is funcitonal, but doesn’t really point out that they’ve developed an application for the webOS devices. You can however find their direct support page at http://gosyntactix.com/webos/youview/ which has some basic links to direct them around their default tool set and link to precentral.net forum for Syntactix LLC.

During the installation, you will be assisted with setting up your sprint number and YouMail service. Once you’ve provided your phone number and pin, YouMail will automatically dial out to activate and forward the unanswered calls to YouMail’s call center. Typically, you will only hear a short ‘beep’ and phone will immediately end – not bad & simple.

The application works in the back ground and with YMA notifications appearing in the bottom that you have ‘x’ amount of voice mails. The application has a verysimply layout that is similar to an email application. Immediately there are some drop down tools to organize your vm’s and easy access to play back the messages, flag for importance, move into a folder, call the person back, transcription notice, share the message and other features to mark as read and download to the phone. The preferences section will allow for custom behaviors and application management, such as; notification handling, automatic voice mail downloads and greeting arrangements. Hopefully with future updates, the application could assist us with creating additional greetings and pin them to contacts.

Once the voice mail has been received, the application will play the audio back through the loud speaker only, due to the SDK limitations. The developer has noted that the volume was set at a low level for privacy, or you can simply just hook up a pair of headphones and listen away. Each voice mail will have important caller data, phone number, locations, date received and vm durations. When tapping the vm, a temporary player with a scrub bar will appear at the top of the screen, allowing you to replay a certain time index if the message wasn’t clear.

YouView also tries to extend its capabilities by updating your Palm’s contacts with You Mail’s contact information. According to the developers app notations, this feature is in beta, and the user assumes responsibilities for backing up their own contact information before proceeding. Adding the contact information to YouMail’s servers will allow the app to ID the voice mail and properly provide who its from.

The application deserves a solid 9 out of 10, it offer’s easy management of your voice mails & enough options to back-up, save & share them with other people (if necessary). The app integrates well with YouMail’s services, and YouMail itself is a solid service that is offered free to consumers. The text transcriptions does require a premium fee, but my experience says it’s one of the best voice recognition services. Even with the YouView’s contacts feature in beta state, it works well enough that I believe I have THE answer for a stable Visual Voice Mail system.

Before the flood gates were opened for developers to submit their applications to palm, there’s been a few released through the homebrew community with the similar function. Get GPS coordinates, plot it on google maps, go to the dot on the screen. This particular application was developed by www.allurstuff.com, but the site showed no indication that they developed applications. However you can find the direct help page at www.allurstuff.com/static/wheresmycar.html. I haven’t had the chance to message them about this application, but you can find their email address in their help file (the same as the URL above).

The app is simple and free to download. The user interface is basic, which allows for easy navigation and understanding. W.M.C. automatically starts utilizing the GPS to find your location, which requires the user to stand by the car until the location has been verified. The app will alert you if the signal strength is week and you can tap the refresh button to try again. The app is universal when saving locations for different things & places; Car, Hotel, Metro, Campsite and Other. Clicking the disc icon at the bottom left corner will save the location under the chosen category. When you need to head back, just tap on the saved location and you’re immediately show the direction to go. Before you start pulling up your directions, the application first needs to determine your location, the same method as saving your car’s location. You can tap the green button “Take Me To It!” or “Show Me The Map.” When tapping the Green Button, an arrow will point in the direction where your vehicle is located, along with coordinates and distance information. The other button will open Google Maps and plot the location on the screen, as it would with any other location.

The application is decent enough and does exactly what it says in the description, plus its free (with advertisements). I give the application a 7 out of 10; there’s not much information provided by the website but the email is there for support. The app is easy and straight forward, and is a very useful tool if you occasionally forget where you park.

PRO : Fast, easy, does what it says, save the locations as a particular category

CON : Advertisements are bit of a turn off, website and/or support looks non-existent.

Hello readers,

I apologize for the lack of app reviews this week, I’ve been working with the video reviews for a few applications listed in this website. Unfortunately I’m house sitting for a friend, and I’m doing the editing by remote via LogMeIn. I really appreciate your patience with this and will be posting more applications soon, along with their videos.

Thank you

Anthony

Now we can really put that PDF Reader to some use. Granted I’ve been reading a lot of complaints about the reader, but at least it can be used for people who normally don’t use the app (such as myself). Now with PDFMyWeb, I can easily save a few articles on the fly and read it later without having to use any Internet service.
PDFMyWeb  is free in Palm’s App Catalog and was designed by www.it-dimension.com. The purpose of this application is to save and download a web page into a full PDF file. Just to clarify with some of the readers out there, this application will only save web PAGES, not the entire site. The procedure is extremely easy and offers a few options to optimize and share your PDF files.

First off you’ll need to pull up your favorite web page and copy its URL address. Next you’ll open up the PMW app and paste it into the URL text box and tap the green “Get PDF” button. The status bar above this button will display the progress of the download, with the option to cancel it by tapping the “X” at the right. Once the PDF has been saved, you can tap that status bar to instantly launch the stock PDF Viewer and read the article. You an always launch the PDF Viewer yourself and open the PDF manually for later viewing.

Sending the PDF is fairly simple and limited due to Palm’s SDK and OS. The limitation is the inability to send PDF’s through the messaging app, but the option exists when sending email messages as attachments. To solve this limitation, IT-D offers its sms services through http://smsmyfile.com. The application will upload the PDF to this website and provide a short URL, and will automatically paste it into a new message. The recipient will receive the message and be able to save and view the PDF document.

There are a couple of features that I would like to see implemented into this application, for example; adding an email button to automatically compose and attach the PDF. I would also like to see the option to name the PDF document too. The application automatically saves the document with the URL name, and becomes a little difficult if you’re downloading articles from the same domain.

The application deserves an 8 out of 10; it’s primary function is what makes this application worth downloading. Especially if you’re in a dead zone, pulling up the PDF makes it very convenient to read your favorite stuff without a required internet connection. The application is free to download and earns its spot in FreeApptastic.

When I was younger, I remember my parents and elders referring to my loud music being a ruckus of noise. It’s most likely just coincidence but I’ve sometimes read the name of this application as Ruckus Sound instead of Rock-Us Sound Machine. Either way, both names ironically fit the general idea of a white noise program.

White noise generators are devices that produce random noise to simulate falling rain to atmospheric sounds.  These were ideal for people who have sleeping issues, or need some type of background noise to help break the silence in a room. I usually had a TV running in the background when I work on my computer, because music can sometimes really distract you. However this application may be classified as just a sound engine, for the playback are just audio samples. Some white box machines actually uses the white noise to create real-time effects, and cheaper models will use pre-recorded audio and play with a continuous loop. Either way you look at it, its intentions is helpful, benefiting people who may need something relaxing to listen to, and its price tag most definitely beats most competitors physical devices that may range from the $100’s.

Rockus Sound Machine is developed by www.rockus-studios.com and is available for $1.99 in Palm’s App Catalog. It offers 12 different sounds that are listed in three different categories; Water, Wildlife and Man Made.  Each sound offers some quality sounds that are comfortable to listen to. Obviously the webOS handsets today do not have a hi-fi stereo system, so headphones are recommended for a clearer experience.

Each sound will seamlessly loop until you select another sound or close the app all together. When selecting a sound, the button will have a simple GIF style animation for easy recognition what is playing. Each sound can have a sleep timer from minimum of 15minutes to a maximum of 5 hours. During playback, the timer will count down to zero, but the user has the option to reset the timer and restart the countdown. For an infinite loop, set the timer to ‘no timer’.

One thing that I truly enjoy when I’m working in my room, is the sound of rain outside my house. The sounds are very hypnotic and it draws me into that zone of concentration and peace of mind. The application’s water and wildlife are my favorite, and I’m catching myself using the rain and atmospheric jungle/insect sounds. I haven’t tried sleeping with these sounds yet, but it definitely works for me when I have it playing on my headphones. The benefit here is you can take it anywhere – on the bus, waiting rooms (DMV anyone?) and work. I’m confident that many users will find this application pretty useful if they’re being overwhelmed with distractions and minor stress (if you’re having major stress problems, then your doctor should consulted). The Man Made sounds consists of electronic devices, wind chimes, hand clapping, cars driving by and the sound when riding a plane. Some of these sound I can think people will use, but one that caught my attention is the hand clapping sound. I really don’t see it as a type of ambiance like the water and wildlife, but I can picture this for people who may need a boost in their self-esteem, confidence and energy. According to the application notes in the app store, the developer removed it from the list thinking that it wasn’t taken too seriously. But by popular demand, they included the feature back into the app – pretty cool how one feature can make a difference.

As for the feature set, there aren’t many options to choose from. In some cases, less is definitely more and it works well with this application. I would probably like to see an option to add your own noises and have the app loop them as well. This would definitely offer expandability to what the application can do.

The developer was very prompt and informative. When the 1.4 update landed on my phone, it broke some features of the app, causing the looped playback to not function properly. After asking the developer about this, he explained that there were technical difficulties and even went an extra mile to explain why it was doing it. This is a definite plus in my book when an enthusiastic developer is responding to your messages clearly and quickly.

The help menu offer’s direct link to the support email and website. It also offers a direct link to the app store for all other Rockus applications too, good idea for recognition and expandability.

The app deserves a 7 out of 10; the user interface is very simple and easy to use. The sounds are clear enough to listen to and enjoy.  The application could use some new features for its price tag, but I’m positive that customers will come to appreciate the subtle atmosphere and comfort this app has to offer.

There are many methods to create a list of tasks for your day-to-day life. One method is to remember that task when you happen to be driving by a certain location and you may need to pay a bill, or pick up some items. Perhaps a detour has been put into place and you have to circle back to take an alternate route, and there’s nothing more frustrating then having to back track just to get home. GeoStrings provides location-based tasks that will alert you when you are near a particular location.

GeoStrings is developed by www.hedami.com, and is available in Palm’s App Catalog for $2.99. This developer is also best known for his Music Player (remix) application that can be found through the homebrew app catalog for free. With GeoStrings, a user can create a task and the application will run in the background and alert the user when they reach a certain radius of that location. The developer has also created a series of video guides for the application, and ‘GeoStrings Tales’ which tells a story how the app was used in the developer’s day-to-day life.

How does it work?

The application is very quick to launch and the learning curve is fair enough for someone to jump right in and start using it. It probably took me a good hour or so for me to learn the controls on my own, until I consulted the website to better understand how these features are ’supposed’ to work. Some may also wonder how this would impact the Pre or Pixi’s battery. The developer has claimed that he’s built an algorithm that will preserve battery life and not cause the phone to consume energy dramatically quicker then it normally should. The application is designed to work only if a task has been created, and if the task is set to run at a certain time. If there are no ‘active’ tasks or the task hasn’t started yet, the application will not run in the background and battery life consumption should be minimal to the user’s needs.

From the home screen, the user has options to work from their Active GeoStrings (Thumb Tack) or Favorite Locations (GS Hand Icon). The Active GeoStrings will display the tasks created by the user, as well as Inactive GeoStrings, Favorite GeoStrings and History. To create a new GeoString task, tap the ‘plus’ icon at the bottom left corner to open a new GS Task page. The first part is to name your GS Task and tap the notepad icon to add additional notes. Next is to provide the location information, and there are five ways in doing this.

Tap the…

1) Magnifying glass to do a business search

2) Envelope to specify an address

3) Bulls-eye to get your current location

4) People icon to choose a contact with an address

5) Star to choose a favorite location.

As you add information from any of these five options, the locations section will populate all your location information to your task. You can tap the Google Maps icon to reveal its location in the Google Maps Application, the image is transparent but not too hard to find.

Hidden features, well sort of…

There is additional set of options when creating GeoStrings, and I was surprised to find them when viewing the video guides. At first glance, the task editor is very plain until you scroll up to reveal the rest of the page. It would probably be a good idea to add an arrow or some type of label to remind the user that you can do more stuff to your task.

The remaining tasks allows you to set unique parameters and settings. The first section is the Alert Parameters, which allows you to make a task active or inactive, plus set the radius when the application will alert you. The next section is to set the time and date. A user can specify the task to start at a later date and time, and then end on a particular date. This can also be defined further by verifying certain days of the week. Un-checking these days will not alert the user. The last option is to mark the task as a favorite and to delete the task after reaching the location. These options will come in handy for generic tasks like picking up the cleaners, oil check, and detour reminders. After you’re done creating your task, tap the ‘floppy disk’ icon at the top left or perform the back gesture to save. As you reach the location, a large notification window will appear with sounds and text. The user has the option to hit the snooze alarm and have the application re-alert the user again of the same task. When app alert displays, I felt the text was a little small. I can see a lot of drivers will be using this application, and if they were using any car mounts, it would benefit the driver if the text were larger. Hopefully we’ll find an option to do this with future updates for this app.

My favorite places…

The Favorite Locations page allows you to add your favorite locations individually or in groups. These locations can be re-used in a new GeoString task without having to re-search a location. You can start adding locations to this page by using the four options at the bottom of the screen, similar to the icons when creating a GeoString task. To create a Location Group, tap the ‘plus’ symbol to create and name for your group, then tap the group and start adding your locations. When you create your GeoString task, tap the ’star’ icon; select a location group, and all the locations in that group will be added to the task.

You can customize the application’s overall settings by tapping preferences in the top menu. There you can select the ‘units of distance’ and ‘radius from target’ options, plus change the sound notifications and visual appearance.

Unfortunately this application does not provide a back-up method. Especially if a user is building up a database of locations and tasks, I would highly recommend the developer to implement a feature to export your settings and locations to a spreadsheet application like Google Docs or Excel. Another thing I found interesting when I was searching for a location, it didn’t provide the results in order starting from the nearest location. I’m contacting the developer about this, and hopefully its an error on my part, otherwise it will only pull up the location around the specified city.

-Update- I’ve received an email message from the developer and he is working on a new update to provide a backup solution, including the usual fixes and feature updates as well. The developer was really thorough in his explanation, and that shows a lot of promise and attention for support.

What’s the verdict?

The application has a lot of usability and enough features to do what you want, and with that said the application deserves an 8 out of 10. The application is receiving a lot of attention from my co-workers as well as the developer when updating the application. It delivers a unique experience to organize your tasks with easy navigation and detailed video guides. This isn’t an application to replace your preferred task manager, but I highly recommend this application if you’re always on the road, and the application does deliver positive results.

Pro’s : Unique task management, useful features, customizable.

Con’s : No back-up, text is a little small for the alerts, search results doesn’t pull up nearest location.

Well it all depends with the actions from your surrounding players, who can pull a card that might benefit them but that could be the dealer’s bust card to let everyone win.

Welcome to Card Ace: Blackjack, another multi-player card game developed by Self Aware Games that is free in palm’s app catalog. People who have played Word Ace will feel right at home with CA:B, the user interface is identical, as well as its features. For those of you who have not tried any of Self Aware’s games, should take this opportunity to try it out. There’s no cost to you to play and it’s free.

CA:B still offers great visuals with its user interface. Opting out the typical API buttons, all the U.I. elements are custom designed and offers some subtle animations. CA:B is designed with a casino style card table with five players all one side and the dealer on the opposite side.

Game On

When entering a game, you will need to set your bet. This amount will be used to bet for each game, and can be increased or decreased by tapping the change bet button at the bottom. This will present a flick-wheel to quickly change your betting amount. If you’re low on virtual funds, players can add to their account by purchasing playing chips where all the proceeds go to the support for the game servers.

Casino rules apply to this version of Blackjack, you need to build a score of 21 points to beat the dealer’s hand. While it’s your turn, you can double down on your first play, keep your cards or hit it. The game also recognizes splits as well as insuring your hand if the dealer receives an ace. There are some ways to play in order to successfully win a hand. For example; the dealer always hits on 16 or under, if you have a low number like 13, it’s a good idea not to hit it. Why? Because the card you receive could also be the dealers bust card. If you have 13 and you hit with a 7 – ya, you may have 20 right now, but that 7 could be used to bust the dealer by going over 21 and everyone wins! You’ll be able to read some quick tips how to play while the game is loading and connecting, but its a good idea to Google search how to play more efficiently when playing blackjack.

Earn and Learn

Players will earn achievements whether you’re winning or losing your hand. There are some random achievements that don’t involve gameplay, such as starting the game a few times, or being generous and buying gifts for everyone. It leaves room to explore the application and find out what you can do. You can view all your achievements by tapping your profile icon on the home screen. There are a lot of rewards in the game, and offers the player a challenge to receive them.

Just like the other apps offered by Self Aware Games, the emoticon system can be customized with your own images. By using images saved on your handset or taking new pictures, you can set your default, positive and negative emoticons. These images will be displayed to other players at the table by swiping your image up or down on your profile picture. This offers a fun and unique method to quickly change your status if you’re winning or losing your hands. It’s a good idea to not put offending content and keep the images G or PG rated. Stepping into unacceptable content will most likely be reported by the players – so be nice!

Using your virtual cash, players also have the ability to purchase gifts for other players, such as food (not available yet, but it’s coming soon), drinks and stuff. Interestingly the ’stuff’ category has one item, and its poison – okay then! You can purchase a gift for one individual or buy a round for the table. This will definitely increase your chances with making new friends and starting some conversations through the chat system. This can be accessed by tapping the red icon in the top right corner or tapping the chat button at the bottom right. I really much appreciate the button being placed closer to the keyboard, especially when its my turn, it’s quicker to close the window and play.

Cross Platform

The game is also offered through Facebook, allowing you to continue your gameplay stats and earnings from your desktop browser. Importing your account is pretty easy, by going into your Card Ace profile on your phone, grab your friend ID number and input it into your Facebook account. If you’ve already setup your account with other Self Aware Game’s, then the link process is not necessary. The developers created a seamless integration with all their online games, making the transition as painless as possible.  This also provides a full back-up method for both your facebook app and webOS. The game recognizes your Palm Profile and links your Card Ace account automatically. If you need to ‘doctor’ or swap your phone, Card Ace will download your images and statistics seamlessly to your phone, allowing the player to start playing right away.

The game deserves a 9 out of 10, the game feels very solid and it’s a lot of fun to play with other people online. With its attention to detail, automatic features, and multiplayer, delivers a solid game with replay value. For an application that is offered for free, with no additional playing costs, Card Ace raises the standards how an online game can be developed. I’m definitely looking forward to see what they will release next.

Pros: High replay value, full back-up, unique emoticon system, cross platform and gifts.

Cons: Not all gifts are available yet.