I know there's already an android thread, but that one focuses on rooted devices, and I don't plan to do that. So here's where we can review our favorite android apps and whatnot.
Incidentally, if anyone has texts on an old iphone they want to have for posterity, http://www.iphone-sms.com/ did the trick. Texting has become so frequent that I'm excited to have most of the history of my relationship with the gf saved now.
Anyway, I've found the following apps helpful (they're all free):
Astro file manager - allows viewing and organizing of files on your phone, perhaps most useful for me in that it allows the storage and viewing of pdf files and photos in an organized way.
dropbox - I haven't tried to add anything to my dropbox, but it's been great being able to view the files in there.
Google Voice - a nice visual voicemail app, since the Galaxy Nexus didn't come with one. I like that it attempts to transcribe voicemails so I can get a sense of what it's about if I can't listen to it right away, but the transcripts are unreliable to say the least.
Weatherbug - similar to the weather channel app I had on the iphone, but I like it a bit better.
SoundHound - same as Shazam without the spam.
Where's My Droid? - if you send a text or email to your phone containing a certain phrase, the phone ring at the loudest setting so you can find it, or upon receipt of another certain phrase, it will text you back with lat/long and nearest address.
Llama - knows where you are and switches your phone's settings (ring volume, ring tone, etc.) depending on whether you are home or at work or time of day.
Yelp, Flixter, Google Shopper, Facebook, Al-Jazeera, Pandora, ESPN Scorecenter - for the usual reasons.
Colornote - a simple note program for when I want to write something down. I suppose voice memos
Google Music - works fine as an itunes replacement, but it's annoying that it doesn't seem to be as optimized for use with the headphone button. I can stop playback, but starting it up again works only occasionally. Also, it goes back to the menu when you stop, rather than assuming you would want to keep listening to whatever you were in the middle of, which seems really dumb. Since I don't store any of my music in the cloud, I'll probably end up finding a different music player soon.
I still need to find an audiobook solution. The 2x playback speed on iphone was really nice, and it seems that there isn't a great way to do that on android. I was really surprised by this. Akimbo seems like a decent audiobook player, although it costs 2.50 for the full version, and apparently it can do faster playback speeds if you also have a separate utility called Presto, which costs 4 bucks. I'll probably give that a try, although it seems the implementation isn't terribly slick and it only works for a couple file formats. The lack of this feature on android seems like an awfully big error, if the number of people complaining about it online is any indication. Surely Apple doesn't have a patent on this technology?
Anyone have android apps they've found especially useful?
Incidentally, if anyone has texts on an old iphone they want to have for posterity, http://www.iphone-sms.com/ did the trick. Texting has become so frequent that I'm excited to have most of the history of my relationship with the gf saved now.
Anyway, I've found the following apps helpful (they're all free):
Astro file manager - allows viewing and organizing of files on your phone, perhaps most useful for me in that it allows the storage and viewing of pdf files and photos in an organized way.
dropbox - I haven't tried to add anything to my dropbox, but it's been great being able to view the files in there.
Google Voice - a nice visual voicemail app, since the Galaxy Nexus didn't come with one. I like that it attempts to transcribe voicemails so I can get a sense of what it's about if I can't listen to it right away, but the transcripts are unreliable to say the least.
Weatherbug - similar to the weather channel app I had on the iphone, but I like it a bit better.
SoundHound - same as Shazam without the spam.
Where's My Droid? - if you send a text or email to your phone containing a certain phrase, the phone ring at the loudest setting so you can find it, or upon receipt of another certain phrase, it will text you back with lat/long and nearest address.
Llama - knows where you are and switches your phone's settings (ring volume, ring tone, etc.) depending on whether you are home or at work or time of day.
Yelp, Flixter, Google Shopper, Facebook, Al-Jazeera, Pandora, ESPN Scorecenter - for the usual reasons.
Colornote - a simple note program for when I want to write something down. I suppose voice memos
Google Music - works fine as an itunes replacement, but it's annoying that it doesn't seem to be as optimized for use with the headphone button. I can stop playback, but starting it up again works only occasionally. Also, it goes back to the menu when you stop, rather than assuming you would want to keep listening to whatever you were in the middle of, which seems really dumb. Since I don't store any of my music in the cloud, I'll probably end up finding a different music player soon.
I still need to find an audiobook solution. The 2x playback speed on iphone was really nice, and it seems that there isn't a great way to do that on android. I was really surprised by this. Akimbo seems like a decent audiobook player, although it costs 2.50 for the full version, and apparently it can do faster playback speeds if you also have a separate utility called Presto, which costs 4 bucks. I'll probably give that a try, although it seems the implementation isn't terribly slick and it only works for a couple file formats. The lack of this feature on android seems like an awfully big error, if the number of people complaining about it online is any indication. Surely Apple doesn't have a patent on this technology?
Anyone have android apps they've found especially useful?
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