Absolute Gadget

Top 10 Apps for Google Android G1 phone

Written by Rene Millman Wednesday, 03 December 2008 17:51

With the new mobile phone sporting Google's Android OS racing out of the shops we felt it was time to look at which applications you should have on this phone to make you mobile life easier and more interesting.

Video Player

People are still confused as to why the latest handset to the market doesn't come with a video player out of the box. Trouble not because at the Android Market you can download a video player for nowt.

It does basic video playback and you can browse the files you have on your memory card. You can choose a file, play it, even fast forward, rewind, pause, play and stop the file. That's about your lot. At the moment it supports a limited range of codecs. So until something better comes along, this is recommended.

Weather Channel app

This great free application, unsurprisingly, tells you the weather. But more than this, it does it by either text or video. The forecasts go up to 10 days in advance. Among the information supplied is wind speeds, pressure and will show up weather alerts in your area or country.

The great thing about the app is that it takes advantage of the phone's location-based services. That means if you can tell if it is wet without having to look outside, great, huh!

{mospagebreak}Cab4Me Light

This is a very simple app that shows you phone numbers of cab firms depending where you are. Simply as that and it needs to be when you are 10 pints of cider the weary.

Bonsai Blast

This strategy game is a little like Tetris - simple game-play but highly addictive. In the game you have to make a string of bubbles with three or more bubbles in them. Should you create enough strings before your strand reaches the end you can go onto the next level.

The game has been out on other platforms for a time. There are plenty of backgrounds for the individual levels as well as power-ups and increasingly difficult levels to keep things interesting.

{mospagebreak}WikiTude

This must be the ultimate website mash-up app. This location-based service will plot where you are on Google Maps and then pull in pictures from Wikipedia. It will certainly give you ideas of what to do when you are on your travels.
PacMan

While the original version just used a humble joystick, this update can take advantage of the trackball, touchscreen and accelerometer, the choice is yours.

The levels match the original ones closely both in terms of look and sound and it plays remarkable well. In addition to the original there are three levels of increasing difficulty.

ShopSavvy

Wouldn't it be great if you could go into the supermarket and check if that price is a cheap as it could be. Well with this app you can scan thebarcode using the phone's camera, send it via the app and see if the item is cheaper elsewhere. The app only works in your normal shops made out of bricks. But if it means you can drive a couple of miles and get something a tenner cheaper, it's worth it.

{mospagebreak}BreadCrumbz

Ever wanted to set up a scavenger hunt? Wanted to make it a bit web 2.0? Then this is the app for you. This program leaves "breadcrumbs" by tagging locations you are travelling in using the phone's GPS. You can even leave picture markers as well. Shazam

This is definitely one to have if you are into pub quizzes (we hold a few records in the Absolute Gadget offices for these). If you need to know the name and artist of a song being played, this takes all the grunt work out of trying to remember the song. Simply start the app, hold the phone's microphone to the air and it will analyse what it hears. It will come back with an answer in a matter of seconds. It will even point you to videos on YouTube of the song and can send you to the Amazon MP3 store where you can buy said tracks to download and listen later.

Locale

This is a great application for anyone that forgets to put there phone on silent or turn it off in certain locations. This is a location-based service that lets users tell the phone what to do in particular places.

It can even change your wallpaper from the babe from Loaded into something more business-friendly when you are in the office. It will go silent or even turn itself off when it senses it is somewhere where you've told it to do something.

{mospagebreak}SplashPlay

This teaches you how to play guitar by playing music and showing you a fret board that you can play on the screen in sync with the music (like a version of Guitar Hero but you learn something). The app is punting a tutorial device you can buy for your guitar, but it does teach you how to play.

iSkoot for Skype

This allows you use your Skype account to IM your friends, make Skype calls over the Internet, and uses the phone for SkypeOut calls.