For a long time, I have had my eyes set on getting Articles, a gorgeous app that allows you to browse Wikipedia in a little more user friendly fashion on the iPhone (and iPad). For various reasons I've never gone ahead and done it but when they had a sale a while ago I couldn't resist.

Articles let's you as I said, browse articles on Wikipedia in a better user interface. Instead of the incredibly annoying mobile version of Wikipedia you get an app which is cleverly designed just as Safari is itself. This means that you can have multiple tabs of Wikipedia searches open at the same time something which is quite useful.

Searching is very easy and the results come back in a nice display. One major gripe I have though is that the useful table of contents isn't available in Articles. Personally I use this all the time to find out where to go in an article or if the article is worth reading. If this isn't there, much of the usefulness has been lost.

On a positive note it will easily share articles via mail as well as bookmark them to its own built-in bookmarking system. Changing between different languages could also be made simpler by only showing the languages an article is available in.

While the app is gorgeous there are a few major flaws to it that stop it from becoming a true wikipedia website replacement, which is sad because it looks so nice. However, if you want an app that displays wikipedia results slightly better than the website, go for it!

If you're over the age of 30 then chances are you're going to hear a word or two from today's youth that will leave you nodding and simultaneously scratching your head. Perhaps too embarrassed to ask "what does that mean?". In these situations I'd usually turn to the UrbanDictionary.com website. While the site does work just fine on iOS (it loads a mobile version), I still like dedicated Apps in cases like this simply because they're usually faster and offer more options. The Urban Dictionary Definitions App is my App of choice for this. I like the user interface and it's fast. Also since it's an App it offers some nice sharing options too. Also since it's an App you can easily save words/definitions to your Favorites list in the App. If you're up for a laugh or two, hit the Random Word feature. As you can see above, you may get some pretty funny stuff to read. 

While the App works exactly as advertised I'd like to see a "Recents" feature that would list say the last 10 words that I looked up for quick reference.

So the next time you find yourself hearing a word that's not exactly going to be in Webster's dictionary chances are it will be in the over 4 million words in the Urban Dictionary Definitions App.

You can get the Urban Dictionary Definitions App for $0.99 here from the 

I've been on this single purpose App kick lately. It hasn't been intentional, I have just gone looking for Apps with a single purpose in mind and have found Apps that have been designed with JUST that purpose in mind. The thing is, they do it well! This is what you should expect from an App that only claims to do one thing though. It should do that one thing really, really well. Such is the case with WhatTheFont. I saw a really cool advertisement the other day and I liked the font so much that I wanted to save it in my list of fonts for future projects. The problem was, I had no idea what font it was. Too the App store! I started searching for font recognition Apps in the App store and immediately came across WhatTheFont. It had great reviews, nice looking screen captures, and was FREE. Not just a few free uses then you have to buy more in App "credits" (which is common by the way) but totally free. So read on and check out how it works.

Performing Magic…. Kind of

Ok so it's not really magic but if you've ever scoured font lists looking for that font that you saw it will sure feel like magic. To start you either take a photo from your library or take a photograph with the App of whatever word it is that you want to know the font of.  You don't have to fill the frame with the word but the bigger the better. The App then asks you to place a crop around the word that you would like to identify (in my example above you can see that there are plenty of different fonts going on in this picture so dragging a box around the word is important). Once you do this it separates the letters of that particular word into individual squares and gives you the opportunity to correct any letters that it may have guessed wrong.

As you can see it guessed that B was D. A simple correction in the box to the right and you're all set. From this point WhatTheFont uploads your letters to its database to search for a match. Usually what it comes back with is a few different options that are similar. It shows you the word in each font for you to choose.

So now you have your font list. From this point you can select one that looks right and see the entire font family,  forward it via email or select start over.

Do One Thing Well

This App does one thing, and one thing only but it does it really, really well. I haven't found a Font yet that it hasn't identified, but I'm not going to say that there isn't anything that can't fool it. Nothing is perfect. For the great price of FREE you can't go wrong with this App. If you've ever looked at an advertisement, or word and thought "what's that font" this is the perfect App for you.

You can get WhatTheFont from the iTunes store for FREE here:

While it's true that the iOS does a decent job of auto correcting common typos and even suggesting alternative words, sometimes you need a real dictionary. Since the iOS doesn't have one built-in I've been in search of the BEST one. My current pick is Merriam-Webster Dictionary HD. This is a fast, clean reference tool. You can use it off-line to look up definitions, but if you want it to pronounce the word then you'll need an internet connection. My guess is that in order to keep the size of the App relatively small they only include the text. Once you find your word's definition, you can tap on ANY word in that definition to look up that word's definition. This is a really nice touch. It took me a minute to figure out how to select text to copy it since every word is tappable. You have to double tap outside of the text area to bring up the selection rectangle. You can also do a Voice Search and there is the ever popular Word of the Day. There's even a recent History to quickly get back to words you've looked up in the past. You get Synonyms and Antonyms, but no Thesaurus. All in all it's a good Dictionary option for the iPad.

You can get Merriam-Webster Dictionary HD for Free here from the 

Get the iPhone/iPod touch version here from the 

Unfortunately I don't speak any other languages. I wish I didn't fall into the old "typical American" stereotype, but alas I have yet to learn another language. This means that I depend on translation services such as Google's Translation feature on their website. I can't believe they let you use this for free! One of my favorite Apps (iTranslate) actually uses Google's Translation engine to operate. Needless to say I was very excited to see Google release their own App! Google Translate is GREAT! I love the fact that you can either key in your phrase or actually speak it and it will almost instantly give you the phrase in the language you choose. You have the option of translating in either direction and you can mark frequently used translations with a Star to get to them quickly. This is great for common phrases so that you can use the App offline. Best of all Google Translate can even speak the translation so that you can hold up your iPhone to the person you're trying to communicate with so that they can actually hear what you're trying to say.

Not Quite The Star Trek Experience Yet

While Google Translate works exactly as its advertised, there is one problem. Let say that you speak a phrase like "Please take me to the airport" and it translates it in French as "s'il vous plaît me prendre à l'aéroport". That's great! You can then speak the phrase in French yourself or even let your iPhone read it aloud for you. The problem then is that the person responds in French and if you're like me you'll be a deer in the headlights. Two-way conversations are difficult this way. The Good news is that Google is actually beta testing a feature called "conversation mode" that allows two people to actually hold a conversation in their native languages! The bad news is that this feature is currently only available via the Android version (for testing). Not a surprise since Google makes the Android OS. Of course they would want to highlight their best stuff on their platform first. I'm hoping that they do add this feature to the iOS version as soon as they can.

See it being demonstrated here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtMfdNeGXgM

The Bottom Line

While a Star Trek like universal translator is still a ways off, I commend Google for getting as far as they have with the technology. It's amazing that I may see this become a reality in my lifetime! Google Translate does require a data connection. It's free and there is absolutely no reason not to download it immediately!

You can get Google Translate for FREE here from the 

I’m constantly looking for a good English dictionary app for my iPhone or iPod Touch. Given that English is not my first language, once in a while I will reach words that I need to look up. I imagine this to be the same with everyone, regardless of their language skill. When browsing through the new releases on the App Store, I found Discourse, an app that combines this need in functionality with an elegant interface.

Those of you who know me and have read my previous reviews here on BestAppSite, know that I am a sucker for great user interface design. To be honest, an app could have a super awesome feature, but if it doesn’t look good, I’m not getting it. Discourse has nice graphics and some nice touches to the interface, such as being able to flick between “screens” (pages) in the app.

Sadly there are bugs and missing words…

Overall, I am quite pleased with the app but it has a few bugs and lacks words that you might expect to be in a dictionary app. I have noticed that when looking up some sample words that when clicking on certain related words throws an error saying that the definition doesn’t exist. In this example however, the dictionary told me that the related word was “extraordinarly” which of course is missing an “i” and should not exist. Why it shows up is a major flow of the data that the app is using.

Speaking of it, I would love to find out and know which definition database that Discourse pulls its results from. I would prefer it to be an exact and all-encompassing one. Doing some sample lookup of words actually being mentioned in some of the example uses of other words, I have found that there are many common words missing from the app, another example: “subpoena”.

Verdict

When I saw the app, I just wanted it to be all I wished for in a dictionary. Discourse is cutting it very close too but is flawed in one, major way! Even though the user interface helps, it isn’t everything. Having a dictionary that is severely lacking common and uncommon words is of no value to you. Even if you misspell a word, you expect the dictionary to give you the proper spelling and suggest the sought-after word to you.

Right now, I would recommend Discourse since it just costs $0.99. However, when downloading it (and getting a beautiful app) you should be aware of the fact that this is not going to be your only dictionary.

click the image above to see a larger screenshot

Actually it was my daughter in college who turned me on to this App. I saw it on her iPhone and said "what's that for?". BIGWORDS.com is universal (iPhone, iPad, & iPod touch) App that allows you to turn your used books into cash by selling them and more importantly find deals on used and new books and even rentals for students. Textbooks are outrageously expensive these days and you probably only need them long enough to complete your course. So if you bought the book you need, why hang on to it after the course is over and if you're in need of a book why pay top dollar for it?

BIGWORDS.com App does all the comparison shopping for you

They don't actually sell the books directly. The app simply shows you comparison pricing and then links you to the best deals. The savings can be big. The App is pretty easy to use. You can either search by title, ISBN or author. Once you find the book you're interested in you can either tap the SELL or BUY buttons. If you like the deal you find when you tap BUY you can chose to buy it now and you'll be taken to the site offering the book at that price. If you press the SELL button you'll see a list of sites and offers to buy your book and you can then tap to sell your book on the site offering the best terms. This is an extremely useful App for anyone dealing with buying and selling books and it's FREE! That's right, the app is FREE so there's no reason not to at least give it a try to find out how much your books are worth or how much you could potentially save by shopping here first. This is a must have App for any student or parent that buys books.

You can get BIGWORDS.com here for FREE from the 

We're just one week away from Photoshop World Vegas and of course it's time to start locking down your schedule and choosing the classes you want to take. I remember using the Photoshop World App last year and saying "this is great, but It's missing one thing." That one thing was the ability to add things to your schedule that may not be on the official conference program list. For example, at 2PM I'm going to head over to the Adobe Booth and check out that Terry White guy . So while it was great being able to fill in all the classes I wanted to take, I still had to rely on my regular calendar for other meetings and activities. Well that all changes with the latest version. Shawn Welch did a FANTASTIC JOB listening to my feedback and feedback of others and updating this App to be the best conference App I've seen to date. First off it's a Universal App now, which means it's native to all iOS devices including the iPad. Secondly he added the one big thing I needed, which is the ability to put in your own custom events/meetings. That alone makes this a 5 star app for me, but Shawn didn't stop there. He added in some very cool social networking features like the ability to tweet and update your Facebook status right inside the App. He even added the ability to share your schedule with others via email or Bumping two iOS devices together running the app! Shawn thought of just about everything this time around. There's even the ability now to schedule backup classes. So if you just can't decide right now which of two classes you want to take, you can go ahead and put your first choice in a time slot and then add your second choice in so you won't have to scramble at the last minute if you change your mind. 

Classes, Instructors or Exhibitors 

You decide how you want to look up information about what you might want to see. If you like Joe McNally, then just tap his name and see all the classes he's teaching at  glance. Or if you have an empty time slot, just tap it to see all of the classes happing at that time and pick one. Of course there's an Expo floor, so you can tap Exhibitors to see who's exhibiting and where they are. Once I got my schedule built on my iPhone I was able to easily send it to a couple of friends via email (even if they don't have the App it comes over as a nicely formatted HTML email). However, I wanted to also have the same schedule on my iPad. No problem, I just used the Bump feature to share the schedule to the iPad from the iPhone wirelessly. Once it was on the iPad in the shared section, I just tapped on it to add each item into my schedule on the iPad. Very cool!

You can get the Photoshop World App for FREE here from the 

I was very interested when I saw the description of this app while browsing the app store one day. Have you ever gone to a country, finding yourself wanting to know certain cultural information about it? For me, personally, it is a clear yes.

What I am most interested in knowing about when I visit a new country is what not to say or do, the most common way to greet people, how tipping works and where/if you give tips and also any special laws you should be aware of. Here is where Cultures come into play.

Interface

Cultures is definitely not one of the best apps in terms of design but on a positive note, it mostly follows the Apple UI, which is again at least a bonus.

I am however slightly annoyed at the way they are displaying the content. After tapping and choosing your country and the type of culture you wish to view (which is sadly put on top of a background image of the world) you get a screen where you have the text, inside a fixed height box, semi-transparent on top of that same background image. Please, just stick to the UI guidelines, it looks much nicer and helps me read much faster.

A final little critique would be the fully incoherent “More” tab. Usually, and you all know this, when you click on the more tab, you expect a list of other items that you can swap out in the tab bar (like in the iPod app). In Cultures however, you get a list of other apps by the developer, in a very messy UI.

World Customs

Let’s press on to the content and the reason why you download this free app. After selecting your country, you are presented with a variety of types to view: Greetings, Communication Style, Personal Space & Touching, Eye Contact, Views of Time, Gender Issues, Gestures, Taboos and Law & Order.

Some of these I enjoy, while I still wonder why some of them are there. Perhaps that is just me? As I wrote at the top, some top ones for me, that I want to know about when I visit a country is: Tipping, Driving rules, Greetings, Laws.

If you are fast to recall, you will see that on my list, Cultures has got two out of four as of this time. Sadly, it is the two that I do not worry about just as much. Please do add tipping and driving to the app and some more useful law and order information. I do not rank the views on drugs as something I worry about.

Finally, I should note that not all of the categories actually have content in all of the countries.

Phrases

Cultures does have phrases too and I want to make a full disclosure right here, before the summary. I have not tested out this functionality of the app, simply because it is an in-app purchase of $2.99. Sorry, to me the app is not good enough to persuade me to buy this.

Conclusion

It is a free app. If you travel much or just visit the occasional new country (which I bet happens more often here in Europe than in the United States), Cultures is an app that I would definitely keep on my phone when I do, again, it is free.

There are a number of enhancements that I want to see before giving this a higher rating than I am going to give it today. First off, the user interface needs to improve and secondly, the content needs to increase in quality and amount, giving some more meaningful cultures to us readers.

Whether the realm is web, print, fashion or any medium in-between, today’s creative, designer, photographer, printer, or aspiring artist, will tell you how important color is. Color is all around us and whether vibrant or muted; color inspires us, calms us and causes us to act and behave in a certain way.

Color Expert is available at the App Store for $9.99 here: