Five Free Alternatives of MS Office

Talk about office productivity tools and invariably most of the people will instantly talk about Microsoft Office. While the penetration that MS Office enjoys is nowhere close to its free and open source counterparts, it makes all the more sense for small and medium businesses to atleast explore alternatives to MS Office to enhance office productivity.

Contrary to the popular belief, you actually don’t compromise on any feature when you make the shift from MS Office to open source office software. The options today are feature-rich and offer access to online documentation and large communities of users and developers. Much to your delight, today they also support common document types.

So rise above the purchase fee and pay per user model, and make the switch to these options:

1. LibreOffice
LibreOffice is the power-packed free, libre and open source personal productivity suite for Windows, Macintosh and GNU/Linux, which offers six feature-rich applications for all your document production and data processing needs: Writer, Calc, Impress, Draw, Math and Base. Not only this, you also get support and documentation free from their large, dedicated community of users, contributors and developers.

Moreover, LibreOffice is seen as more actively developed than OpenOffice, and it offers standard package like PDF import, a presentation minimizer and a Wiki publisher.

2. Apache OpenOffice
 Apache is one of the most commonly known free and open office software. It offers tools for word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics and databases. It lets you save documents in the OpenDocument format, which means you can read Microsoft Word documents and also store your work in Microsoft Word format.

Apache includes six basic tools: Writer, the word processor; Calc, the spreadsheet application; Impress, for multimedia presentations; Draw, an image application; Base, the database tool and Math, which can help make complex calculations easy to handle.

3. Google Docs
Google Docs is an office productivity suite for anyone with a Gmail account. Users can create, share and collaborate on the Web. It offers documents, spreadsheets, presentations, drawings and forms, that are all centrally stored and accessed via the cloud-based storage service Google Drive. The Google Docs apps are named Google Documents, Google Spreadsheets, Google Presentations, Google Drawing and Google Forms.

You can access these files from anywhere, as long as you have an Internet connection.

4. NeoOffice
 NeoOffice was developed before OpenOffice and LibreOffice supported Mac OS. It has almost all the features of OpenOffice.org but, in focusing on the unique needs of Mac users, offers a Mac-like installation process and better support for Mac features, including integration into the OS X interface and use of Mac OS X fonts and printing services, PC World reports.

The latest version of the NeoOffice, v3.3, offers support for high-resolution text drawing on Retina displays, is compatible with Mac OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion and Gatekeeper, and native Mac OS X text highlighting. Users can also securely share NeoOffice files with other users, computers and devices.

5. KOffice
KOffice provides three tools of an office suite, i.e. a word processor, a spreadsheet and a presentation application. KWord is the word processing and desktop publishing application. It features styles, word count, page count, easy zooming and print preview. KCells calculation and spreadsheet tool is used to create business-related spreadsheets listing, for example, income and expenditure or employee working hours. KOffice’s Showcase is a presentation application that supports elements such as graphics, text, charts and images.

Guidelines for Mobile Web Development

Good thing about mobile web development is that as a developer or a designer, you won’t have to make an extra effort to learn something out of the blue as far as technology is concerned, in order to develop a mobile website design. All you need to have is a whole new perspective regarding designing of the mobile website. Today, in this article I am aiming to sum up the most important guidelines for mobile web development in a simpler way. So here goes:

1. Initiate with Analytics:

It is extremely important to analyze a certain points regarding your mobile users’. To start off with, review the stats of your OS. This will help you in analyzing the important and most visited web pages of your website. You will also get to know the country/city you are driving the most traffic from. Apart from analyzing the top pages visited by users’, make sure you check the keywords being used in order to get an access to your site. These analytics will help you a lot in your mobile development and will definitely bring positive results.

2. Visitors profiling:

Mobile users are bound to have different needs altogether in comparison with desktop users. While developing and designing your mobile website, make sure you put yourself in the mobile user’s shoes. If your target audience is teenager, they will always be on the go so your website should be easy enough to use while driving, shopping or any other activity. Analyzing audience profile is indeed helpful in mobile web development.

3. Minimize the usage of images: 

In general, images take a lot of time to load because of their large sizes. As a developer and designer, you must keep in mind that mobile users are often using slow internet connections and their connections cannot handle download of heavy images. So, this is one good reason to avoid usage of images.

Each image will require a new HTTP connection and because of the latency it has, it will further slow down the loading of the page.
 

Sizing of the images for all kinds of devices can be very difficult due to the different resolutions. You are inviting a whole new lot of effort by including a lot of imagery in your mobile website.
 

Still, if you really desire to use images in your website, make sure you use CSS Sprite because it helps in time reduction of loading.

4. Do not rely on JavaScript:

Different mobiles will support different browsers and if you are developing a website to accommodate all of the browsers, you should not rely on JavaScript because mobile browsers are not very good with supporting JavaScript. Apart from this, mini browsers such as opera mini, also provide poor support to JavaScript resulting into a poor outcome. This issue is expected to get resolved in coming years thanks to Apple, Android and Blackberry devices.

While you are developing/designing a mobile website, make sure you avoid fly-outs and drop-downs in your website. This is a good thing but only for desktop websites since a user is able to move the cursor over any tab to view the drop down.  It would be a good idea if you do not use this thing at all.

5. Optimizing Download Speed:

As mentioned earlier, JavaScript is not a reliable thing and if you want to increase the downloading speed of your website minify the JavaScript and CSS and it will automatically improve the downloading speed of your website. Also, minifying JavaScript and CSS should not be a difficult task so there should be no excuses for doing this.

6. Horizontal and Vertical Layouts:

These days we see a lot of mobile websites supporting both horizontal and vertical layouts for the websites.  Yes, they work well for iPhone and Android devices but this is not practical for all Smartphone’s. While developing your website, you should go for a single column form. This will allow your users to scroll and that too in a single direction. By default, the single direction should be vertical because this is what is natural and a user expects this as well. If any images are being used, they too should support vertical scrolling. Opting for both vertical and horizontal scrolling is not a good idea.

7. An option to visit your regular website:
Mobile website is bound to have very limited information and in case a user requires more information, you can always provide a link of your regular website on the main page of your mobile web site.


8. Website Speed:

While developing your website, this is the most important thing to consider. Your site’s speed should be good enough to deliver website’s content quickly. If you want to achieve this, apart from avoiding JavaScript you need to avoid usage of flash as well. The most important guideline for mobile web development is to focus more on functionality and speed.

Important Elements of Making a Good Web Site

It is important to add all of the ingredients to a recipe in order for the end result to come out how it should, the same goes for making a website. It is important to have all of your elements in place, i.e. navigation, content, promos etc

There are several ‘ingredients’ to making a ‘good’ website, Following are the Most Important Elements of Making a Good Web Site:

1. Easy Navigation and Easy to Read:

Poor organization is a dead give away of a poor site. Have you ever noticed when you read the news paper, all the ‘juicy’ stories are at the top, you know, above where the fold is? Well, this is how you have to think when you are presenting information on your site, you want the most important info to be right there, up top, front and center to the viewers eye. Navigation should be user friendly and visitors should find it easy to get around your site. Let’s not make them dig for that important information they are looking for.

2. Fresh Content:
You wouldn’t serve stale food at a party would you? Well, not if you wanted your friends to come back to the next gathering. It is important to keep your site fresh for your visitors, and for engines actually, but on my note, it again, gives them reason to come back to your site, if you are offering quality content, then they will be eager to come back and see what’s new in your world. This is where a newsletter might come into consideration also, but again, that is not my topic at hand.


3. Smart use of Graphics:
The average surfer wont wait more than 20 seconds, if that, for your page to load, so yes, images are nice, but if used excessively, or in large file size, by the time it loads, the viewer will be gone. This doesn’t mean you have to have an essay of text, I mean, yes, we want to keep them at the site, but not by result of them falling asleep from boredom. You want to add images, just enough to catch attention, keep them interested. Yet, not over done to the point that that message you are trying to get out is being blind sided.


4. Interactivity Encourages viewer participation:
Whether its filling in a simple contact form, or having a weekly poll. You could certainly go into more depth, like forums and the like, but even the small simple things work. You want your visitors to feel they are ‘part’ of the site; they have a purpose to being there.


5. Your own Content No parrots or carbon copies:
Always craft original and embracing content. It is YOU and your personality that will build the brand of your website.

Spend a lot of time trying to learn how to capture you're audience, what is it that will make them remember you and more importantly, want to return to your site. Don't present your site as you would a business idea to one of your buddies at the water cooler, you need to really stop and think how the customer is looking at it. This is one of those times you need to think outside the box.

Auto Redirecting What It Is and How to Use It?

Many web designers are using auto redirecting techniques lately for a number of reasons. Auto redirecting occurs when a visitor to your website is automatically sent to another page when he or she has landed on a given page. This other page is frequently located on the same website but can also be located on an entirely different website.

This technique has become extremely popular as a part of search engine optimization strategies. When a website has been created entirely for the purposes of search engine optimization then webmasters will often apply auto redirection to its web pages to send visitors to the main site automatically. This is because the search engine optimized site may not have any real value to visitors. It has been designed to obtain a very high ranking. Therefore the auto redirecting takes the visitor to the correct part of the website which is meant for the visitors themselves.

This technique while commonly quite effective is extremely frowned upon by all of the major search engines. Commonly websites discovered to have auto redirectors will be penalized for this activity. However search engines are not set up in a way that they can automatically detect the majority of redirecting techniques. It is primarily the human indexed search engines and directories that catch such webmasters in the act.

This being said search engines are not against all uses of auto redirecting. In fact there are many reasons that search engines will consider quite valid for auto redirection. For example when a message has been posted on a posting board the contributor is frequently sent to a confirmation page. On many sites this confirmation page displays only for a few seconds and then it auto redirects to the main posting board once more.

There are a number of different methods that are used for auto redirecting. These include

1. The Meta Refresh Tag Technique:

This method can be detected automatically by search engines so it must be used for a reason that they consider to be valid or you risk being penalized. There must be a reasonable delay (at least 5 seconds) used for a search engine to approve of the use of this auto redirection.

2. The JavaScript Technique:
This method cannot be detected automatically by search engines as they are currently unable to parse JavaScript. Though this script may be positioned anywhere on the page it is best placed in the head section so that it is capable of starting as soon as the webpage loads.

3. The Form Technique:

Since search engine spiders are currently unable to complete website forms and they do not try to submit any forms they cannot automatically detect when forms are utilized for auto redirecting. Forms are often overlooked by webmasters for auto redirecting purposes because they do not realize that the URL of a forms action details is simply a URL that is requested by the browser to the server. The form however can be given special treatment by a visitors browser if new name value pairs are added to the designated URL. However if no name value pairs exist the browser will still make the same request for the URL. Once the page begins to load JavaScript can be used for submitting the form right away.

Be very careful with the uses of your auto redirecting if you dont want to risk having all of your hard work penalized by the search engines that will be indexing you. Just make sure that you are using auto redirection for the right reasons in their books. Furthermore make sure that you are allowing a long enough delay before the auto redirection kicks in. Anything less than five seconds will be considered suspicious by search engines and they may object.

As long as you give a long enough delay then the Meta Tag Technique is perfectly acceptable and provides perfect results. However if you require an instant auto redirection because you dont want visitors to see the page that they have initially accessed then you will need to use other methods such as the JavaScript technique.

Youll find that auto redirect can give your website a very professional appearance and will help you to provide your visitors with precisely what they were looking for.

Apple iPhone 5 Vs Samsung Galaxy S III

So, the event has finally been and gone, and before I get started on comparing the two biggest smartphones on the market, it’s pretty funny how such a long-winded spell of rumor and speculation can be put to rest in less than two hours, isn’t it? If you’ve been anxious for Apple to come out and pay heed to all the leaks then I can most certainly empathize, and barely does the iPhone 5 get to rub its eyes for the first time than it is swiftly thrown in at the deep end with the Samsung Galaxy S III.

It’s the unavoidable battle of the two most popular mobile device series of recent years, and although the Galaxy S III was, in hardware terms, far superior to the iPhone 4S, the iPhone 5 is certainly more adept to compete with the Korean company’s flagship smartphone.

With a much powerful A6 processor, and a much-improved, taller 4-inch display, Apple’s iPhone is no longer blown out of the woods by its larger-than-life rival, and here, we compare the vital statistics of each device:

iPhone 5 tech specs:

• Display: 4-inch (diagonal) with a resolution of 1136 by 640 pixels.
• Memory capacity: 16, 32 or 64 gigabytes, depending on price. There's no way to expand it with memory cards.
• Price: Starting at $199, for 16 gigabytes of memory.
• Size: height: 4.87 inches; width: 2.31 inches; depth: 0.30 inch (124 x 59 x 7.6 mm)
• Weight: 3.95 ounces (112 grams)
• Cameras: 8-megapixel camera on back, 1.2-megapixel on front.
• Video recording: high-definition (1080p -- comparable to the resolution of a 40-inch flat panel TV) up to 30 frames per second with audio
• Battery life: talk time is up to 8 hours on 3G. Internet works for up to 8 hours on LTE and up to 10 hours on Wi-Fi. Up to 10 hours of video playback. Battery can be replaced by service personnel only.
• U.S. wireless carriers: Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel and others.
• Network compatibility: 3G networks worldwide, plus 4G LTE networks in the U.S., Canada, Japan, Germany, U.K., Australia, South Korea, Hong Kong and Singapore.
• Operating system: Apple's iOS 6 (will also be available for download to older iPhone models)
• Near-field communications: None.

Samsung Galaxy S III tech specs

• Display: 4.8 inches (diagonal) with a resolution of 1280 by 720 pixels.
• Memory capacity: 16 or 32 gigabytes. Can be expanded by up to 64 gigabytes with a memory card.
• Price: As low as $99 for basic model
• Size: height: 5.4 inches; width: 2.8 inches; depth: 0.34 inch (137 x 71 x 8.6mm) 
• Weight: 4.7 ounces. (133 grams)
• Cameras: 8-megapixel camera on back, 1.9-megapixel on front.
• Video recording: high-definition (1080p -- comparable to the resolution of a 40-inch flat panel TV) up to 30 frames per second with audio.
• Battery life: Up to 9 hours of talk time (depends on network). Battery replaceable by user.
• U.S. wireless carriers: Verizon Wireless, AT&T, Sprint Nextel, T-Mobile and others.
• Network compatibility: 3G networks worldwide, plus 4G LTE networks in the U.S., Canada, South Korea and some other countries.
• Operating system: Ice Cream Sandwich version of Google's Android
• Near-field communications: A chip lets the phone act as a credit card at some payment terminals and share data wirelessly when tapped against some other phones.
  
  

So that’s our short analysis, but what do you guys think? Is Apple’s latest device a more/less favorable option than the S III? Or do you still remain on the fence?

Activate Google Voice Search on Your iPhone

Voice activation is surely going to be an important addition in future versions of iOS. Apple is also working hard to enhance the functions of Siri and make it more useful from a consumer perspective. For activating voice searches using Siri, users usually have to tap on a text field and tap on the microphone key.

This process is further shortened and enhanced by a new jailbreak tweak called Voice Search. Voice Search tweak allows users to execute Google voice search from anywhere on your iPhone. The tweak functions by adding an extra feature to the iPhone’s setting called ‘Activator’.

Voice Search does not come along with icons or settings and is completely set up through the Activator. A gesture for activation has to be provided which can be used to invoke the listening mechanism. When a search has to be performed, Voice search is activated through the gesture and you will have two options once you have spoken the query. You can either accept the query and do its search by clicking on ‘Done’ or you can choose to ‘Cancel’ the query and provide a new one.  

The gesture by default is a double tap on the status bar. When you perform that action, a pop up window titled ‘Speak now’ with a microphone icon will appear. You will provide the search query on this window. If you are using BrowserChooser package, the searches could be opened in Google Chrome by choosing it as the default browser. If you are not using the BrowserChooser package, the searches will be opened in Safari by default. 

Voice Search is available for free download from the Bigboss repository

5 Messaging apps for Mobile Phone:

The recent ban on bulk SMS has left many furious, especially youngsters who rely on it to stay connected with friends and family. If you are into heavy texting and chatting with friends and family, then the recent extension of 20 SMS cap may also not be sufficient. In this mobile-age, there are several messaging applications and software that would come to your rescue. We’ve listed some such apps. Needless to say, popular mobile platforms have their App Stores inundated with apps, but owners of feature phones running on Java also have a couple of options. Let's take a look at some of the options available:

1. Nimbuzz:The Nimbuzz messenger is a great alternative to your usual SMS. It allows sending messages, photos, music and even videos. It helps keep expensive (SMS) text messaging or multimedia (MMS) charges at bay. Moreover, it supports all leading mobile brands and even the lesser known ones, which means it is compatible with smartphones as well as feature phones from Samsung, Nokia, HTC, Lemon, Alcatel and more. Nimbuzz users can also join chat rooms to make new friends. Furthermore, Nimbuzz can also be used on your PC or Mac.

This app is Available for Android, BlackBerry,iOS, Java/MiDP/J2ME, Nokia

2. eBuddy:

eBuddy is yet another web and mobile messenger service that could come to your rescue. eBuddy XMS could easily replace your exorbitantly priced SMSes. It allows users to send texts, fun-filled emoticons, pictures, videos and more. The web client supports all browsers. Besides, the app aggregates all your IM networks like AIM, Facebook Chat, Gtalk, ICQ, MySpace, Windows Live Messenger and Yahoo! in one place. This service is available in more than 30 languages.

This app is Available for Android, BlackBerry, iOS,  Meego, Windows Phone 7

3. Pinch:
This app may not be very popular but it’s quite effective. Users can send and receive SMS like text messages to anyone in their address book from Pinch. Moreover, your friends don't even need to have the Pinch app to get your message. The app supports group messaging functionality and can be used on almost all platforms, including Java and Symbian. It takes off the limitation of exchanging messages with only those buddies who have the application installed.

This app is Available for Android, BlackBerry,  iOS,Java, Symbian

4. WhatsApp:

This messaging service needs no introduction. It has become quite a rage among mobile friends. WhatsApp is a trending messaging service that lets you keep in touch with a neat chat-like interface and allows sharing images, audio and video files instantly. Users can form groups and stay in touch with pals all along.

This app is Available for Android, iOS, Blackberry, Symbian (S40 and S60) and Windows Phone (Windows Phone 7.5 and above)

5. Fring:

Fring is a popular alternative to your usual SMS. Just like most of the messaging apps, it supports on-the-go live chatting and also video chats. Interestingly, it also supports group video chats, allowing up to four users to video chat. Besides, it also supports free voice calls and cheap international calls.

This app is Available for Android,  iOS, Symbian

5 Security apps for Android devices

The Android smartphone market caters to every budget segment with its range of low-end budget-phones, mid-level feature-loaded smartphones and high-end power packed smartphones. Now, you wouldn’t want your expensive phone to be stolen or data to be misused either. Needless to say, if you own an Android, it better be safeguarded against the growing number of vulnerabilities in the Android Market aka Google Play too, which have almost quadrupled in the past one year. To safeguard your device against such threats, there are a plethora of apps for Android. We’ve picked 5 such apps for our readers:

1. TrustGo Antivirus & Mobile Security

The TrustGo Antivirus Mobile security is capable of scanning your phone and SD card to remove all the malicious content – viruses, malware, spyware and trojans. Its capabilities extend beyond scanning for viruses as it can alert users about malicious websites and also monitor and manage the phone’s data/memory usage, and battery consumption. It also lets you take backup of all the data on the cloud. The device is infused with some security features too, which can lock or wipe off data remotely in case of theft.

2. Webroot Security & Antivirus:

The Webroot app has all the security features that one may look for to protect their smartphone, be it scanning for viruses, blocking unwanted calls/texts, locating a stolen/lost phone, remotely locking a device or block phishing websites. But what we liked even more is its ability to lock the device automatically if the SIM card of your phone is removed. However, this feature comes for a price and you will need to upgrade to the Pro version. The Pro version also brings in features like remotely wiping data of a lost or stolen device, battery status and power usage monitoring, and keeping a tab on prying apps.

3. Where’s My Droid:

This app is like old wine; it just gets better with each year. Open the application and you will see a neat interface with a list of setup options namely, Ring Setup, GPS Setup, Security settings, Commander and Advanced Menu. The app will let you ring your phone (even using a loud siren) incase you have misplaced or lost it, and will do so even if you have kept your phone on the silent mode. Then there is GPS setup to track and find the location of the phone. All this just needs the user to send an SMS with the ‘attention words’ (you need to setup ‘attention words’) from another phone. For instance – by default you can text ‘wmd ring’ on your misplaced phone and it will implement the Ring feature and your misplaced/stolen device will start ringing loudly. The Commander feature has been crafted to offer users complete control of the device from WheresMyDroid.com.

4. Anti-theft Droid:

Here’s another app geared to save your dainty droid. This can be called one of the best free anti-theft softwares and controls the actions of your device via text messages. It can track location of your device on net (approx) and GPS (exact). It can even automatically activate the GPS and does not have a large impact on the battery life. The phone can be viewed on the map and has a fire alarm audile anti-theft device which can be disabled only with a password. It can even identify the exchange of phone chip and sends the phone's location at the time of exchange of information in the new Chip (Carrier, IMEI, phone number (if supported by the new chip). It doesn’t require internet connection and one can even hide the antitheft Droid list of applications.

5. Trend Micro Mobile Security:

We had recently got our hands on the Trend Micro Mobile Security suite – Personal Edition for Android. In our verdict, we found it to offer good value. It locates your lost phone and displays the exact location on the map, allowing you to scream, wipe off data and lock the phone remotely. It also scans your phone for rogue apps. The premium features include the Surf, Call and Text security, which lets you toggle safe surfing, parental controls, call blocking and text blocking. All these options can be further customized.

Official uTorrent App For Android

As far as file sharing goes, BitTorrent is one of the most frequently-utilized platforms, and in terms of clients, uTorrent (stylized µTorrent), is easily the most popular. Its clean, minimalistic interface and resourceful nature are the two key reasons for the application becoming the most popular around, and for the some 480 million Android users, that ease-of-use can now be enjoyed on Google’s market-leading platform.

Torrenting hasn’t really had its day on mobile devices, and although there are plenty of promising apps doing the rounds on all the big ecosystems, most .torrent file downloaders and uploaders stick with the bread-and-butter familiarity of the desktop iteration. Yes, a minority download their torrents using specially-crafted apps, but the farthest most have gone to torrenting on a smartphone or tablet is using one of the many remote-based apps – allowing one to control, pause, or delete files on-the-fly.

Like VLC, which very recently released to the Google Play Store as a beta, the uTorrent Android app will likely be met with a warm welcome from mobile device-toting file sharers. Of course, it’s more than likely Apple will never, ever let such an app grace its stringently-moderated App Store, so if you do indeed wish to download your content on the move, you will either have to jailbreak your iOS device, or consider migrating over to Android.

The uTorrent app, seems pretty stable, although the beta moniker suggests you should not rely on it for heavy-duty, important file transfers. It works for most Android versions (compatibility runs all the way back to Éclair would you believe), and can be downloaded right now from the Google Play Store – linked at the foot of this post.

You might expect – given the obvious restrictions of using a smartphone or tablet compared with, say, a desktop – that the app would be crippled by caps on download file size or bandwidth, but as long as your device has the capacity and the means to download or upload, you’re good to go.

Although the uTorrent desktop client has always been free, the Play Store description notes it’s only "currently free", so it’s definitely worth grabbing, if only for safe-keeping.

(Source: uTorrent for Android on Google Play)

Best Mobile App Development Tools

Mobile app development is a really interesting and creative task which can help you make money. Many useful tools for helping you create mobile apps are present out there, and the number is increasing day by day. Any developer, be him an experienced on or amateur, will find these tools quite helpful. These tools not only make the task of developing apps easy, but also quick.

So today we have a list of some Awesome Tools to Create Cross-Platform Mobile Apps. Using these tools you would be able to create really efficient cross-platform mobile apps. We hope that you will find this list useful. So check the list out and pick the tools that you like the best.

1. AppMakr:

This one is a great online tool that allows creating content-centered mobile apps. They also boast a great service that lets you distribute the app you created in various app stores. Importing RSS feeds which AppMakr package into a mobile-optimized app is also possible. You do not require any advance programming knowledge for creating apps while using this tool, but still having some knowledge of HTML and CSS would prove to be useful. You can also add custom HTML in your app.

2. MobileNation:

MobileNation is an easy to use online tool with drag-and-drop feature which makes designing mobile apps quite handy.  It is compatible with almost all the modern browsers. Experts and amateur developers will both find this tool really useful. After you are done creating your app, MobileNation will also help you publish it to different app stores, Google Play Marketplace, or any other website of your choice.

3. Sencha Touch 2:

Do you have the basic knowledge of HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript? If so, then you would find this tool really handy for creating apps for iOS, Android and Blackberry. This tool is required to be installed on your PC (Windows/Mac/Linux). It also requires a web server that runs locally on your PC.

4. PhoneGap:

It is an awesome open source tool that acts as a bridge between individual mobile OS SDKs and the common development practices. This tool can support multiple mobile OS, such as iOS, Android, Blackberry, Windows, WebOS and Symbian. It allows creating mobile apps with HTML5, CSS3 and JavaScript; and has the ability of packaging your work for specific mobile OS. The best part is that this tool has direct integration with Dreamweaver, and this thing makes mobile app development even handier and quicker.

5. Widgetbox:

If you wish to create simple content based mobile apps easily and quickly, then this handy online tool would be perfect for you. This tool is compatible with almost all modern browsers and has a really easy to use interface which allows creating pages for your app having RSS feeds from blogs or social media sites. You also have the choice of adding custom content with HTML and CSS.

6. Magmito:

Magmito makes creating apps extremely easy and quick. It allows building really cool apps without requiring any programming knowledge whatsoever – thanks to their user-friendly interface. They boast a nice collection of templates. It also offers free promotion of your app via Facebook, Twitter; or distribution of various app stores.

7. foneFrame:

This one is a really cool mobile HTML5/CSS3 framework for building mobile-optimized web pages. This tool is compatible with almost all the modern browser and platforms. Although using this tool needs some knowledge of HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript; but still this tool is a great method of wireframing a mobile site easily and quickly. You can also use PhoneGap or appMobi XDK for the backend.

8. appMobi XDK:

It is a nice free cloud-based tool and is available as a Google Chrome plug-in. It allows developing and hosting your mobile app, as well as distributing it in various app stores. This tool also has some extra features such as push notifications and e-commerce solutions which can be used for enhancing your mobile app.

9. iBuildApp:

As the name suggests, this tool lets you build mobile apps. It features a really nice collection of templates for various types of apps. It has many amazing features that you will find helpful while creating app, including e-commerce options and a method of embedding web pages inside your app. This tool also boasts a SOAP web service that makes creating, retrieving, updating or deleting content possible. You can also get your app featured in iBuildApp gallery.

10. DragonRAD:

DragonRAD designer is a fabulous tool for creating mobile enterprise apps for the Blackberry PlayBook, iPad and Android Tablets etc. This tool makes app creation, as well as its deployment, a breeze. Maintaining your apps is also made extremely easy using this tool.

Lets You Send Out Tweets Using Your Voice

It seems that tweeting is the new form of texting these days, and if you aren’t a part of the Twitter using clan, then I would highly recommend you register yourself and see what all the fuss is about. The popularity of Twitter is increasingly obvious due to the massive array of third-party apps and clients popping up everyday for different desktop and mobile platforms. One of the latest to find it’s way into the mobile world is the Voice Tweet app that does pretty much as the name suggests.

First of all, let’s discuss the basics of the app;it is a universal creation for the iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. The ability to tweet with audible commands is definitely something that is of benefit to users. Some app owners may find themselves in a vehicle and therefore can’t use their hands, or may just prefer the speed which speaking brings over having to physically type it in. Voice Tweet does have efficiency on its side, with claims that audibly dictating a tweet is up to five times faster than actually typing it out using the on-screen keyboard.

A number of globally recognized languages are also supported by the app, meaning that a lot of users can send their tweets out in their native language rather than having to force out some English. Grammar correction is also a part of the app’s make-up, as well as being able to learn and improve upon its own speech recognition over time. An extremely simple user-interface that consists of one simple tweet button to invoke the speech listening completes the $0.99 app.

When taking all of those things into considering and conjuring up the images of how the app works in your head, you might be presented with a mental image of something that already exists along these lines. Ah yes, Apple’s digital assistant Siri. The ability to send tweets through Siri commands will be with us in a couple of weeks thanks to iOS 6, meaning this app will be pretty much redundant to those who upgrade their firmware to get all of the new goodness that is packed into the new OS. Nevertheless, some people may find Voice Tweet useful, if only to support third-party development.

Download Voice Tweet for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad [iTunes Link].

iPhone To Come With Redesigned Headphones

On top of the slew of recent alleged leaks of the next-generation iPhone, another tidbit has surfaced claiming that the infamous earbuds that come with the iPhone will be redesigned. Many have criticized the existing Apple headphones for being ill-fitted and under performing, especially considering their standalone price of roughly $30. Clearly aware of the criticisms present, Apple is rumored to be addressing these issues with the release of the new headphones.

The news came from a Vietnamese website Tinhte, in the form of photos and videos that revealed possibly better fitting earbuds. As you can see, the video below gives a thorough walkthrough of the new aesthetics of the earbuds. As of right now, Apple offers two different earbuds, and these – aesthetically, at least – appear to be a combination of both. They are a bit more rounded than the ones that currently come bundled with the iPhone, and I can already tell that they are much better fitting. As an owner of Apple earbuds, I can tell that if they just fit a bit more snugly in my ears, audio quality would be significantly better.

Since the launch of the original iPhone back in 2007, there have been little to no changes made to the headphones that are bundled with each device. And, in many cases, people end up purchasing other headphones anyways due to the quality of the Apple-bundled ones.

Recent leaks have suggested that the company is planning to launch a 4-inch screen, thinner, lighter iPhone with a slightly revamped design. It is rumored to have a new, smaller adapter, new material in the back in place of complete glass to prevent the device from easily shattering, and other minute changes, such as the relocation of the headphone jack from the top of the device to the very bottom. Of course, all of this is still rumored, but given the sheer amount of leaks suggesting the same device from multiple different sources, we can assume that we’ve been given a decent glimpse at the upcoming iPhone.