Posts Tagged ‘Free’
There are lots of Apps that let you make calls from your iDevices. For example, with the Skype App you can make Skype-to-Skype calls for FREE and even call regular numbers (landline and cell) by using low cost Skype credits. However, this is the first time I've seen an App that lets you call any number in the US or Canada for FREE! Zip, zilch, completely free. The folks over at MagicJack that make the low cost accessory that lets you make very inexpensive calls all year long for a low flat price of $19.95-$29.95/year (depending on how many months/years you buy at once). The accessory requires you to use it with your computer and optionally a regular telephone. However, with the MagicJack App all you need is your iPad, iPod touch or iPhone and you can make all the calls you want for FREE. You of course will need either a WiFi or 3G connection to make/receive calls, but this means that it's not restricted to iPhones. You can just as easily make/receive calls using your WiFi enabled iPad or iPod touch.
How does it work?
Once you have the App installed and you setup/log in to your "optional" Free account you're ready to either direct dial any US/Canada number or dial any of your contacts. The call quality is surprisingly good. Making calls is easy! However, receiving calls is a little more challenging. In order to receive calls you do need the Free account and they will assign you a Free MagicJack phone number. This is where it's a little more challenging as your MagicJack number is not a standard phone number it's a number that looks like this: *0123456789* including the "*" on both ends. This is the number that identifies you on the MagicJack system and you can call another MagicJack user using their special number. If you want someone to call you from any other phone then they will need to first dial an access number like this one: 1-305-848-8255. Once they dial the access number they'll be prompted to enter the MagicJack number that you want to reach. I tested this by calling the access number/my MagicJack number from my iPhone and my iPad rang. Cool!
While the App works fine on iPad, it's not a universal App and therefore you'll see it in the standard iPhone size. Not sure if that's really a big deal since in most cases you're just using a keypad. However, I do have to give a it a slight ding for not being a universal App.
The Bottom Line
It's hard to go wrong with FREE! Not sure how long this will last, but it's definitely an App worth installing if you're on any kind of limited minute plan or you want to make calls from a non-iPhone iDevice. You could perhaps use MagicJack for your personal calls instead of your 'business iPhone line". Do us a favor though and use a headset to keep the call private 
You can get the MagicJack App for Free here from the 
While I do most of my shopping online there are times that I do need to pick things up in person. Anything to get me in and out of a crowded store is always appreciated. The Apple Store App has been good for purchased Apple and 3rd party products online, but now the App has been updated with features to make it more usable when you are visiting a brick and mortar Apple Store too. The first new option is "EasyPay" (self-checkout) and you can do this directly on your iDevice. All you need to do is enter the store, connect to the Apple Store WiFi and then most shelf items (accessories) can be purchased right from your device. You scan the barcode, sign-in with your Apple ID and pay for the item(s) using your saved credit card. This is great for those times when you want to run in, pick up something quick and get out. Note that Apple doesn't allow you to do this for the more expensive items such as iDevices and computers. For those high ticket items you will still need an Apple Store employee to ring you up.
The next update involves ordering items, but having them shipped to your store instead of your home/office address. I gave this a shot while traveling and had the item shipped to the Apple Store in the city that I was visiting. Once I got the email letting me know that my item was in, I headed over to pick it up. Once I got to the store and connected to the WiFi there I got a push notification letting me know that my item was ready and that Brandon would meet me near the front door to give me my item and I could leave. Very cool and convenient.
While these updates are nice to have the native iPad version of the Apple Store App is still missing in action.
You can get the Apple Store App for Free here from the
By now you've probably seen the movie Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol or at least the trailer. In one of the scenes Tom Cruise seeming barely escapes death by a flying car that crashes to the ground right behind him. We all know that these effects are often done with green screen and CGI, but what if you could do these kind of effects right on your iPhone with a few taps of your finger. That's exactly what Action Movie FX allows you to do. You fire up the App, choose your effect, record your scene in the App and then choose where in your clip's timeline you want the effect to happen. Tap a button to process the video and you're done! The saved movie will be 720p resolution even on an iPhone 4s that can record in 1080p.
Here's one that I did last night while setting up for my event
I was blown away by the quality of the overlay considering that I had to do absolutely no keying on my own. What's even more amazing is that the App is FREE! Once you have your processed video you can save it to your Camera Roll, Send it via email or post it on Facebook right from the App. Of course once it's on your Camera Roll you can upload it to just about any other service or App such as YouTube. The App comes with three scenes, "Missile Attack", "Car Smash" and "Demolition Rock". There is an option to do an in-app purchase to buy more effects. However, to date I've not been able to get the store to load in the App. Once it does I'll gladly buy some more effects at $0.99 each.
UPDATE: The FX store finally loaded in the App and there are 4 more "2 Packs" of effects to choose from (8 total effects) at $0.99 per 2 pack.
You can get Action Movie FX for FREE here from the
The concept is simple and it's not a new one. There are a few different Apps on the App Store that let you turn your iDevice photos into printed post cards that can also be mailed to just about anyone. All you have to do is build the card in the App and the service takes care of the printing and mailing. Apple has entered this arena with custom greeting Cards. The Cards App is simple you start with a category and then once you pick the card you like from a given category you are three steps away from having a custom greeting card sent to a friend, colleague or family member. If the card you choose allows for a picture on the outside or inside you'll get to choose one of the pics on your iDevice. Then you can edit the text on the inside and lastly address the envelope before placing your order. Thankfully the App let's you pull address from your Contacts to speed up the process. These Letterpress cards run $2.99 and that's complete with envelope and postage.
Nice but it could be better
First off I'm a little surprised that this isn't a Universal App for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. While it does work on all iOS devices it doesn't take advantage of the iPad's screen size. Portrait cards get no love in this App either. Everything is landscape. While landscape only cards aren't the end of the world, the designs are fairly basic too. Luckily some designs don't require a photo. While I love photos, not every card situation requires one. I'm also a bit surprised that Apple doesn't allow you to "sign" the card. After all you are on a touch device and a "handwritten" signature option would be a nice touch. Lastly, because the cards are mailed through the postal service as regular 1st Class Mail, you have no tracking info. Apple doesn't say where the cards are being mailed from, so you can't really guess about delivery times. Aside from these little things (I actually expected a little more from Apple), the App does work as advertised and it makes sending custom greeting cards pretty painless.
UPDATE – you do get a status Push Notification
I sent two cards out on two different days. The 1st one went out and got delivered yesterday and I had no idea about when it would be delivered. However, today low and behold I just got a push notification on my iPhone stating that the card arrived at the local post office and should be delivered today. Scratch that from my gripes 
You can get Cards for Free here from the
Yes, I'm one of those guys that can't walk past a crooked picture without straightening it. Luckily iHandy Level is a great App to check to make sure that things are in fact level. This Free App makes use of your iPhone or iPod touch's accelerometer to give use a visual live display of a classic bubble level. While it's pretty accurate, you'll want to increase your accuracy by calibrating it with something that is known to be level first. The calibration process only takes a few seconds and then you can go around and check the pictures or other items in your home or office to make sure that they are level. This App is part of a larger set of Carpenter Tools, but they broke this one out and now give it away for free. It seems to work well and I can't really find anything wrong with it. It even has a nice hold feature so that if you're trying to check the level of something that is perhaps to high to see your display.
You can get iHandy Level for Free here from the
I've seen all kinds of Apps that will turn your iDevice into a remote of some kind. I've reviewed a few in the past. In this case Logitech aims to turn your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch into a Universal WiFi remote. The problem is that the iPhone doesn't have an IR port and most likely your TV, Receiver, Bluray player, etc. weren't designed to be controlled via WiFi. To get around this hardware limitation Logitech sells a small piece of hardware called the Harmony Link (see my review here). The Harmony Link is the bridge between your WiFi network and your IR controlled devices. Once you have the hardware setup then you can head over to the App Store to download their Free Harmony Link App.
Harmony Link for iOS has some great features
First off this is a Universal App taking advantage of iPad and iPhone/iPod touch screen sizes. As you might expect the experience on the iPad is visually more compelling simply because there's more screen real estate. However, having a Universal WiFi Remote in your pocket is pretty cool too. One problem this App solves is one that I've had with every other Universal remote that I've tried and that is the ability to rearrange the buttons to your taste. You can even eliminate ones you never use. For example, if your TV has a Picture in Picture feature, but you never use it and don't even have it setup, then why have that button on screen taking up space? Since this solution works via WiFi there is no reason to point your iDevice at your TV setup. This also means that you can turn stuff on before entering the room or turn stuff off that someone (we won't mention their name) left on.
The Harmony Link App on the iPad provides additional benefits like a visual guide. It's pretty cool to "see" what's on TV at any given moment and then with the tap of an onscreen button your watching that show. Also since the iPad screen is larger you get almost all the buttons for all the devices of an Activity on screen at once. For example, I can control my TiVo and TV at once. While this works great, I do wish that there was some DVR integration here. I'd like to tap a "Record/Schedule" button without having to go to my TiVo App. However, unlike the experience on the iPhone and iPod touch you can't easily change the button layouts.
The Bottom Line
While this isn't an App Only solution, it is probably the best one out there for control a variety of different IR based audio and video gear. I'd like to see some additional customization features and the ability to sync the current status of the Harmony Link between mobile devices. Otherwise, the Harmony Link works as advertised and let's you put away all those remotes you've got lying around.
You can get the Harmony Link device here.
You can get the Harmony Link App for Free from the
Although my favorite all around do everything PDF App is PDF Expert, I can certainly recognize Apps that are targeted at specific tasks and especially when they're FREE for a limited time. That's where Softsign comes in Softsign is designed to allow you to annotate and digitally sign PDF documents on your iPad, iPod touch and iPhone. It's a Universal App so it plays nicely with both the iPad and iPhone/iPod touch display sizes. You can import PDFs into the App using the Open In command from Mail, Evernote or Dropbox. My Evernote lovers will enjoy the benefit of an integrated Sync with Evernote. Once you have the PDF in Softsign you can draw right on top of it with the built-in tools or insert a signature field. This is great if your PDF is not an official PDF form as you can add Text where ever you need to. You can also highlight text in the PDF document. The signature placement tool is probably one of the best I've seen and I love that it allows you to scale the signature even after you've signed. Mine was a bit too small. Once you've finished editing/signing the PDF you can then save it back to any PDF compatible App as well as Email out to anyone you want. The App has built-in password protection to keep your sensitive documents/contracts secure.
My only minor (very minor) complaint is that while it's possible to undo or clear annotations, those commands are buried in another menu. I'd like to see them on screen at the same time that I'm doing edits so that they are one tap away. Otherwise, you can't beat this App for what it does and you certainly can't beat it while it's FREE. Don't wait! Grab it today here from the
Side note: At first I couldn't get Softsign to show up in the Open In command on my iPad. I tried it on my iPhone and it was fine so I knew the App worked. I even went as far as to delete it and reinstall it. Still nothing. Then it dawned upon me that perhaps there's a limit to the number of "Open In" apps that will show up in the list. So I tired deleting one of my other Apps that can handle PDFs and another one popped in the list that wasn't there before (not Softsign). I deleted another App and Softsign then Appeared in the list. Apparently the limit is 10 Apps for any one document type. This is an iOS limit and not the fault of Softsign.
The Movie Trailers feature of Apple TV has been a long time favorite of mine. When friends come over we sometimes kill a little time just watching trailers and discussing upcoming movies. Before Apple TV you could also do this via the Apple QuickTime website. There are lots of ways to watch movie trailers, but one thing Apple has done well with this is the user interface and high quality nature of the trailers themselves with many streaming in HD. I always liked the Movie Poster way of seeing which trailers were available as well as doing searches. Apple has now brought this experience to iOS.
iTunes Movie Trailers on your iDevice
As you would expect Apple has done a good job with this App in that it looks very much like the Apple TV experience. You can scroll through the movie posters or do searches. Once you tap on a trailer you can choose to play it or in many cases see still photos in a gallery. Surprisingly the photos can be saved to your camera roll, tweeted or emailed. Beyond looking at trailers and stills the app goes further by giving you a calendar of movies that are about to hit theaters as well as what's already in theaters. You can save favorites of trailers and theaters.
This App just about does it all (almost). I'm not quite ready to give up Flixster just yet. There is no movie rating feature in Apple's App. While you can see Rotten Tomato ratings, you can't rate it yourself and share those ratings with friends. Also there is no way to buy movie tickets from within the App. I would very much like this to be the only App I need, but until Apple adds a couple more features I'll still need to keep at least one of my others. Other than that, iTunes Movie Trailers is a great App and there is no reason not to have it!
You can get iTunes Movie Trailers for Free here from the
Although iOS supports PDFs natively (just like Mac OS X) there are features in the PDF spec that aren't supported in iOS or may never be. One of the things that has made the Portable Document Format (PDF) a success is that with the Adobe Reader of Mac, Windows and other platforms you get to have a consistent experience no matter where you view them. Now that Adobe has officially released the Free Reader for iOS and Android, "rich" PDFs can now be shared across both desktop and mobile platforms with a consistent viewing experience once again!
Here's what the Adobe Reader lets you do:
View PDF files:
• Quickly open PDF files from e-mail, the Web or any application that supports “Open In…”
• View ePortfolio (PDF Portfolios), PDF Packages, annotations and drawing markups
• Read text annotations such as Sticky Notes
Access encrypted PDF files:
• Open and view password-protected PDF files
• Access files secured by Adobe LiveCycle Rights Management, which helps protect sensitive documents
• Supports the highest grade of PDF encryption, up to AES256
Interact with PDF files:
• Search text to find specific information
• Use bookmarks to jump directly to a section in your PDF file
• Select single page or continuous scroll modes
• Easily zoom in on text or images for a closer view
• Quickly navigate through large files using thumbnails
• Select and copy text from a PDF file to the clipboard
Print and Share files:
• Print wirelessly with AirPrint
• Share PDF files with other applications using “Open In…”
• Email PDF documents as attachments
Watch this video for a quick overview of the app.
Get the Adobe Reader for iOS for FREE here from the
And, Adobe released Adobe Reader 10.1 for Android, offering many of the same great features for fast, high-quality interaction with PDF files on your Android smartphones and tablets.
What You Can Do with Adobe Reader 10.1 for iOS
One thing is for sure and that is Apple is aggressively removing all obstacles from people that just want to use an iDevice and may not even have a computer. With iOS 5 you can now setup and use an iPad, iPhone or iPod touch without ever having to sync it with a computer. You can download media directly to it as well as back it up to iCloud. So let's say you buy an iPad and an AirPort Base Station to be your wireless access point. If you didn't have a computer, how would you setup your new AirPort?
AirPort Utility for iOS
With the AirPort Utility App you can now not only setup your AirPort base station, but you can manage all of the settings going forward. The App is basic without many frills. Once you launch it it will identify any AirPort Base Stations in range. You can then access and change any of the settings. The App does what it claims to do and while the graphical interface is pretty plain for an Apple App, it works! It's a universal App for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch. It does require iOS 5.
This is one more thing added to a growing list of things that I can do from my iDevices that I don't need my computer for anymore.
You can get the AirPort Utility for Free here from the
