Appy 2015 - A look at 10 of the most useful mobile apps in the year that was
Money Lover Android, iOS,
Windows, Browsers
Money Lover is an excellent mobile personal finance app that lets you manage expenses, create budgets and track savings from your smartphone. It allows multiple expense categories and multiple accounts here. You can also sync your account across multiple devices via the cloud. Apart from automatic backup, you can maintain your account using any or all the gadgets you own. The app also has tools like a calculator, ATM/bank finder, tip calculator and currency rates built in.
SwiftKey Android, iOS
SwiftKey is a software keyboard that mitigates the pain of typing on glassy touchscreens like no other. Using swipe-to-type (tracing words out on the keyboard) along with predictive text (employing artificial intelligence to anticipate the next word you intend to type), it serves to vastly speed up keyboard input. While SwiftKey doesn’t work well for Indian names, it supports Hinglish as well as 13 Indian languages and constantly learns your articulations as you use it and you can add (and remove) words from its dynamic dictionary.
Drupe Android
Drupe is an excellent always-on launcher for your contacts that speeds up your text as well as voice interactions across a number popular communication apps. With Drupe you don’t have to first open Whatsapp/ mail/ contacts etc. every time you want to message or call with folks in your favourites list — or those with whom you’ve communicated recently. You can call, message or mail these people with Drupe in exactly two taps. And not just from the home screen but any screen — even while using another app.
ShutApp Android
ShutApp is no-fuss, uncomplicated app that finds and flushes apps ticking in the background and kills them if required. This not only prolongs battery juice but also cuts unnecessary background data usage. The background cleaner is as fast and as furious as it gets. One tap upon launch lists the apps running in the background and the percentage of battery and data being consumed by the apps. Another tap shuts down all of them. This also helps you clear unused apps from memory and mitigates the chances of unknown apps from gnawing at your internet pipe.
Truecaller Android, iPhone,
Windows Phone, BlackBerry 10
Plagued by unsolicited calls, spam callers and telestalkers? Apprehen-sive of answering unknown numbers? Want to identify the person behind a missed call before calling back? With over 100 million users on the the app and service, Truecaller makes it easy to see who’s calling even when a number isn’t among your contacts. You can block telemarketeers and spam calls instantly. Once several people have ticked that number a spam, Truecaller dogears it as a spammer. It maintains a crowd-sourced bank of hundreds of “suspicious” numbers.
Periscope Android, iOS
Periscope lets you to use your Android and iOS mobile devices to live-stream video of whatever you’re doing to the world via Twitter. Your followers are notified the minute you start broadcasting. They can view, comment and send you ‘hearts’ in real time if they like what they see. The videos can replayed for up to 24 hours.
Likewise as a viewer, you can use Periscope to “explore the world through someone else’s eyes.” Periscope teleports you into other people’s locations for watching events and incidents as they happen in realtime.
Orby Widgets iOS
Orby is an all-in-one bundle that packs several extremely useful shortcut widgets into Apple’s iOS notification centre. These include a conversation widget to help you speed chat with your favourites —in whatever native app you message them — be it Whatsapp or iMessage. A speed call shortcut dials people without going the tap-phone-tap-favourites-tap-name route. An configurable app launcher keeps a pre-selected set of oft-used apps here as well. If you always want a calculator handy, you can opt to have it as a widget hither.
Copy Bubble Android
Copy-pasting text on mobile is always a rather tedious affair if you’re trying to juggle between multiple apps. Copy Bubble is a very useful lightweight clipboard manager that stores everything you ctrl-c in its free floating bubble that is accessible across all apps. You can use it to collate texts, images and links. Then paste items lodged in the copy history into any app at any point — even if it is several days later. You can also use it as a mini notebook of sorts to keep scraps of info.
MediSafe Android, iOS
MediaSafe is mobile medication management and pill reminder app. If you can’t remember to take your meds, want to keep track of tabs and tinctures, or need to closely monitor someone else’s medications, this is it. You can use it to record and remind you of medications for family, pets and friends. The reminder notifications are visual and difficult to miss. A convenient refill alerts you when it’s time to restock.
Microsoft Parchi Android
Sired by Microsoft Garage, Parchi is a lightweight note-taking app perfect for hurried jotting. You can use it to key-in small bits of text, reminders, lists and even to capture a quick photo note or two — all without unlocking your phone. So where Parchi scores over its better known competition is ease of access. A nifty feature allows you to jot down anything (or click pictures) in a jiffy right from the lockscreen. Parchi lets you assign tags, add reminders, mark favourites and pin a note for the lockscreen. Zz
Regards
Pralhad Jadhav
Senior Librarian
Khaitan & Co
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