iWipe is a utility that zeros out free space on iDevices.
A common misconception about storage devices is when a file is deleted, it’s permanently deleted. This is not correct. Only the reference to that space on the storage device is removed preserving the real data on the sectors of the drive. The same concept applies when you restore your iDevice. This is called a low level format.
Last year, I heard reports that Apple was issuing refurbished 3GS devices with data of the previous owner still preserved. Whether this was rumor or fact, I didn’t want to risk selling my devices with the risk of my personal data still preserved… Read More
Developer: Riverfold Software
Price: $9.99
Version Reviewed: 1.0
Device Reviewed On: iPad
iPad Integration Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
User Interface Rating: 3.25 out of 5 stars
Re-use Value Rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
Overall Rating: 3.42 out of 5 stars
Tweet Library is a powerful client capable of more than just accessing Twitter. The app provides a lot of features that users won’t be able to find anywhere else, but the price tag will likely block more than a few potential customers. It’s an app that may actually only appeal to a niche of its potential clientele, hampering its own potential for wide-scale success.
The best quality of this client is the fact that, true to its name, Twitter Library acts as an archive for Tweets. Your conversations and the things you follow won’t disappear into thin air over time. Everything you access is stored locally on your iPad. In addition, the content on Twitter can actually be downloaded to your computer for local storage or published to the web for longterm, remote access. That’s probably a blessing for people that depend on Twitter for business and other highly important conversations.
Users can view Tweets by a specific day, rather than sifting through timelines while trying to find something that was said last week. What’s even cooler is the ability to grab Tweets and copy them to specific collections. These collections, just like other Tweets, can then be saved as a local file that can be downloaded on your computer, or they can be published to the Tweet Library website for remote viewing. So, if an event is happening and Twitter users are responding, all of those Tweets can been lumped up into one list and then saved for later viewing.
Being able to manage multiple Twitter accounts is an added bonus. Anyone who works in Community Development or operates a Twitter account for their company will find being able to hop between their personal and business accounts extremely useful. Couple that with the ability to collect Tweets and publish them, and things like customer support conversations and Twitter contests become much easier to manage.
The app makes good use of the screen space offered by the iPad, presenting users with a large feed on the right and a menu of sorting options on the left. Tweet Library, like the newest version of Twitter, actually uses this real estate to let you preview links and images in small, floating windows. Tap a tweet and the link within pops up and can be explored individually. Aesthetically, however, this app is bland. Those that like nice textures and strong uses of the great display on the iPad will actually be disappointed by the gray and lackluster visuals.
Some elements here simply don’t make sense. When taping on a single tweet, you’re able to reply, retweet, favorite, show the conversation, copy the link or copy the tweet to a collection. Fine and dandy. It takes a few taps to actually select the user and then another tap to see their timeline. But, rather than seeing their timeline, the client actually performs a search with the terms “from:USER” and “to:USER.” That means you’re getting every message sent to the account your searching for, rather than just their messages. In order to see just their messages, you’ll need to enter the search bar and get rid of the “to:USER” term.
Other features are missing from, or are poorly approached in this application as well. The clever method of refreshing by pulling the feed downward, as in the official Twitter app, is absent. Accessing user names and hash-tagged items within Tweets can be a pain. It takes several taps to actually be able to select a hash-tag within a message, which, obviously, is pretty frustrating.
Tweet Library is a strong application that introduces several unique features to the Twitter platform. Being able to publish collections online and filter Tweets for individual elements like pictures and links makes it powerful. But the price tag suggests that there should be more separation from the official, free Twitter client already in the App Store. In fact, it’s because of the price that the only people that will get their money’s worth here are power users that make a living off of the service. Everyone else will likely be just as happy with the free alternative. Especially since the alternative already does a lot of what this app has to offer.
What’s strange about Tweet Library is that it feels like it’s targeting the wrong audience. Perhaps that’s a misstatement. It’s not that this app is targeting the wrong audience, it’s that Tweet Library isn’t aiming directly at the right audience. The bland aesthetics lead the charge, but the entire app feels extremely professional. And professionalism, oddly enough, seems to oppose the foundation of social networking for the majority of users out there. It needs to be emphasized that Tweet Library would probably work well for power users that are seeking professional success on Twitter. In fact, for professionals, Tweet Library may be the best Twitter resource in the App Store.
Just about every big name cell phone that hits the streets gets a huge amount of hype behind it. Of course, seeing how some companies get much more publicity than other, it should come as no surprise that some handsets have much more successful launches. One such example of this is with the Apple iPhone.
If you’ve been paying attention you’ll know that the iPhone 4’s release was quite highly publicized in just about media outlet in the book. Of course, not all of this was good press as the infamous iPhone 4 antenna gate issue was made very well know but we’ll save that for another time.
Another problem that plagued the iPhone 4 was the absence of the white model. At the time of the device’s announcement, Apple CEO Steve Jobs let us know that the white model would not be shipping along with the white. However, depsite this, some companies have been selling replacement front and back panels to transform your iPhone 4 into a white model.
What you see above was a white iPhone 4 spotted in New York City. According to the owner, this iPhone 4 is real and was given to him by someone within Apple. Also according ot the owner, the reason Apple has yet to release the white iPhone 4 is because the part manufacturers have been unable to match the home button’s white shade with the front panels.
Is this be believed? We aren’t quite sure but lets hope the white iPhone 4 makes it around sooner rather than later as before we know it the iPhone 5 will be rolling around.
Design Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Features Rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
Integration Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Overall Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Redshift is an astronomy tool for your iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch, allowing you to “bring the night sky to your desktop” through a “3D-model of the nearby part of our galaxy” (USM) – sounds impressive. As a long time user of Solar Walk and Pocket Universe, I was excited to see another astronomy application hit the App Store. Redshift’s lengthy list of features, which includes everything from 100,000 stars to 10 well-known comets, as well as red-mode, certainly makes it a contender against the aforementioned applications, the former of which I awarded 4 stars for its “impressive amount of workmanship … for [design] alone, it’s worth the price tag.” Let’s see how Redshift compares.
It didn’t take long for my first “wow” moment to occur. Whenever you open the application, it pans through the stars above before entering the earth’s atmosphere, providing you with a ground-up view of the heavens above. Each constellation is marked, named and diagrammed, allowing you to see exactly why each constellation is shaped the way it is, and where it is. Through GPS, Redshift was able to accurately determine my present location and show me the actual view that I saw above.
The design of the in-earth view is smart. To make things a little less dry, Redshift has implemented a number of panoramas (with the option to have none) to provide a backdrop to your viewing. This ranges from City to Fields to Mountains and, my personal favourite, Sea, as well as a number of others. In addition, almost all of the design is user customizable, with options to turn off constellation patterns, images, labels, guides and even an option to change the sky into daylight. An in-built crosshair allows you to accurately go wherever you want to go.
Outside of the Earth is where things get even better. Full access to every planet in the Solar System, a number of dauntingly large stars as well as access to the Deep Sky certainly do not leave Redshift short of information. Amongst all of this, information like type and magnitude, as well as altitude and azimuth, are present. Wikipedia is built right in for further reading also.
Overall, Redshift is very impressive for its content. However, I did find it somewhat difficult to navigate through the solar system and get a feel for the beauty and complexity of the planets rotating on both their axes and around the sun. Unlike Solar Walk, Redshift just doesn’t seem as solid. However, Redshift’s vast array of content, coupled with unique features like red-mode, make it feel more astronomer orientated – like it was built for astronomers to go out into the night (for reference, the colour red allows you to evoke the full night sky without light distraction – perfect for the iPad).
It’s the little features like these, coupled with good build quality, that make the iPad seem that little bit better. Redshift is impressive and content-filled, and that’s exactly what a space application needs.
When it comes to sounds that tickle the eardrums, I would consider myself a mass consumer. Whether it be local talk radio, sports, podcast, numerous music stations or even my 28GB+ of mp3s, it is safe to assume that I have my auditory nerves tingling as often as humanly possible. One way that I have found to mass consume both new and old music that I like is through a little website that many have become familiar with by the name of last.fm. The problem, as you can tell, is that I like to listen to far more than just music.
So what is a podcast, talk radio, news and music fiend to do? Why not download the new app AudioPress and let your entire media world be transformed. Combining feeds of everything that you like from all mediums, along with the latest news that is custom fit to you, might be a recipe for success. But what else does this new game-changing software bring to the table?
“AUDIOPRESS brings you the spoken word in all its forms—old and new—so you can hear all the news, entertainment, and information you want while on-the-go.
And with AUDIOPRESS, discovering content and creating sync-free playlists is easy, and intelligent playback can automatically play current episodes only and skip content you’ve already heard, so listening is ‘start-and-go!’” — VIA AudioPress description in App Store
If there were such a thing as custom designed applications, I believe that this would be the one made for me. I spend hours every week listening to numerous different forms of content that I love. The problem is that finding the type of information and entertainment can take months to line-up. This is where AudioPress could be the personal savior of my free time. Now the trick will be living up to the promises that they make in the trailer below. Give the app a download, because I can assure you that the sticker price of absolutely nothing is not going to break any bank.
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