Quick Look: Santa Strike

Quick Look posts are paid submissions offering only a brief overview of an app. Vote in the polls below if you think this app is worth an in-depth AppStorm review!

In this Quick Look, we’re highlighting Santa Strike. The developer describes Santa Strike as a holiday bowling game that’s fun for the whole family. It’s a classic reborn (new take on the original Elf Bowling game), where Santa puts the elves in the lane to teach them a lesson.

Features real bowling simulation, festive music, and funny sound effects.

Read on for more information and screenshots!

Screenshots

screenshot

Santa Strike

About the App

Here are the top five features you can expect to see in the latest version:

  • Addicting holiday music.
  • Beautiful holiday scenery, sure to get you in the spirit.
  • Silly elves, trying to make Santa miss.
  • Gamecenter integration. Track scores and achievements.

Requirements: iOS 4

Price: 0.99

Developer: Catharsis

Vote for a Review

Would you like to see us write a full review of Santa Strike? Have your say in our poll:

Would you like to see Santa Strike reviewed in-depth on AppStorm?online survey

Quick Look posts are paid submissions offering only a brief overview of an app. Vote in the poll if you think this app is worth an in-depth AppStorm review! If you’re a developer and would like to have your app profiled, you can submit it here.

Cloudette for CloudApp: Access Your Cloud Storage On Your iPhone

There are a few different options for online storage, and one option that’s not only easy to use but free (with a few limits), is CloudApp. Now there’s a free app for the iPhone named Cloudette for CloudApp, which allows you to access your CloudApp account on your iPhone, making it handy to get at your stored files when you’re on the go.

Sure it’s free, but is the app worth the download? Let’s find out.

Starting at the Source

Let’s begin with talking a little bit about CloudApp, the web app that you need to use Cloudette for CloudApp to begin with. Simply put, CloudApp is cloud storage for your computer. You install an app on your Mac and a little cloud appears in the menu bar. Then you simply drag a file up to the cloud icon and it uploads to the CloudApp website. A link to the file is then placed on your clipboard. You can then send the link via e-mail, instant message, or any other way you wish.

The CloudApp home page shows all of your files in one spot.

The CloudApp home page shows all of your files in one spot.

This is a free service for basic use, which gives you unlimited bookmarks, allows you to upload 10 files daily (up to 25MB total), keeps the files for three months, and uses the cl.ly domain name. If you want to upgrade and pay 4 Euros a month (approximately $5.35 US), you get to use your own domain name, upload as many files as you want up to 250MB, and use your own domain name. It’s not the perfect service for everybody, but if you need a way to quickly upload files to a server and send the links to friends, then this is well done and finely crafted way to go.

How Cloudette for CloudApp Works

Cloudette for CloudApp is a third party piece of software, created to do one thing and do it well: access your CloudApp files. Once you’ve logged into the app on your iPhone, the first thing that shows up is a list of the files you have on CloudApp. From there you can look at each file individually, or get a link for one of them that goes onto your clipboard. If that’s all that the App did, it would be sufficient. After all, CloudApp is a pretty basic system, so what else do you need?

View, Share, and Send Links to Your CloudApp Files

View, Share, and Send Links to Your CloudApp Files

Fortunately, there’s a bit more to this app than just that. Let’s say that you have a link that you want to shorten for one reason or another. Simply hit the (+) symbol in the corner of the screen, click on “Shorten Link,” and enter the URL into the box. It then spits out a shortened URL and puts it onto your clipboard. Using the plus symbol again you can also take a picture to upload to CloudApp, or go to your Photo Library to pull a file as well. It’s pretty handy if you want to take a shot and share the link on your Tumblr, blog, or Twitter.

The Competition

There’s a lot of competition for cloud-based storage, two of them which are very popular on the Mac and have both iPhone and desktop versions. The first is iDisk, which comes as a part of the MobileMe service. It costs $99 per year for MobileMe ($69 with the purchase of a new Apple device), so it’s not free. Plus, it only holds 20GB worth of storage, so if you’re not using any of MobileMe’s other features, then it’s not really worth the money. Apple does have an iPhone and iPad version of iDisk as well.

Shorten Links or Share Pics with Cloudette for CloudApp

Shorten Links or Share Pics with Cloudette for CloudApp

The big contender here though, is Dropbox. The popular service holds up to 2GB worth of data on its servers for free, with upgraded plans going up to 100GB for $199 a year. Dropbox has apps for both the iPad and iPhone, and also has a desktop version. The downside to Dropbox is that it stores all of your files on your hard drive as well, and syncs with the Dropbox servers automatically. Although this makes transferring files pretty quick, it does take up local storage, so if you’re running on an 11-inch MacBook Air with a small hard drive, that might be a consideration. That said, it still has more available storage than CloudApp, and no limitations on daily uploads.

The Verdict

So what’s the end result? CloudApp is a great free service that’s perfect for shortening URLs, linking quick notes or websites to friends, or keeping small files online similar to a small USB key.

Cloudette for CloudApp provides all of the same functions as the website itself, and makes it easy to move around your files via your iPhone. It’s one of those apps that does one thing and does it very well. What more can you really ask for?

Weekly Poll: Which Apple Device Tops Your Holiday Wish List?

It’s that time of year again. You know, the one where you hope to find awesome Apple gifts under the tree only to be disappointed with yet another shirt that doesn’t fit.

Sure, some say it’s all about giving but here at AppStorm we want to know what you’re greedily hoping to receive this year (or perhaps purchase for yourself). Are you finally going to toss out that iPhone 3G in favor of an iPhone 4? Or maybe you have your eye on that new watch-centric nano.

If you’re hoping for one of these devices, vote in the poll on the right.

Know Where Your Money’s Going With Expenditure

It can often be difficult to keep up with all of your purchases and really see where your money is going each week. Even if you take time to balance your bank account, you’ll often not notice where small amounts of money are going to coffee, apps, and more.

Expenditure is an app that aims to help alleviate this problem by making it simple to record all of your cash flows on the go. Whether you make money from selling some used books or spend $5 on lunch, you can keep track of where your money’s going. Let’s dive in and see if this app is what your budget needs to keep you on track.

Getting Started

Expenditure makes it easy to get started with an informative Getting Started guide that opens when you first run the app. Step through the quick tutorial to see how to use each of the major features, or press the x button in the corner to close the tutorial and get started entering your expenses.

Get started quickly with the informative intro guide

Get started quickly with the informative intro guide

If you’ve held off on getting an app to keep track of finances for fear that it would be too complex, you’ll be pleased to see that Expenditure is very simple to use. The main screen on the left shows your current balance with expenses from top categories listed underneath. There’s not much to see yet since we haven’t added any transactions, so tap the New Transaction button here to get started. Now just enter the amount you spent, or if you’re recording an income, tap the green Income button to make it a positive amount of money. Press Ok when you’re finished.

Enter new transactions quickly

Enter new transactions quickly

Your new transaction will now be ready for your to add extra information.  Expenditure lets you categorize your expenses; if you can’t find a category that sounds correct for your expense, scroll down to the bottom of the list to add a new one.  You can also add a photo of your purchase and enter a note so you can quickly remember what you bought.  Alternately, if you’re in a hurry, just press Save transaction and you can add more info later.

Categorize expenses and add a note or image to make it easy to remember

Categorize expenses and add a note or image to make it easy to remember

Keep up With Your Transactions

Now that you’ve added an expense, you’ll see a negative value on your home screen, along with the expense listed under the top categories.  As you add more expenses and payments over time, you’ll see a better picture of where your money’s going.  Tab the button under the top amount to switch between Top categories, Top months, and Recent transactions.

See all your transactions in a glance

See all your transactions in a glance

Tap a category name to open all expenses in that category.  These will be displayed by month, with the total amount for the category listed on the bottom.  Select a transaction to see more info about it in a picture-perfect receipt.

Look back at your transactions

Look back at your transactions

The transaction screen lets you see all the info you’ve added to a note.  Just swipe left over the receipt to see any notes or photos you added to a transaction, and you can edit any of the information as you need.  Or, if you’ve made a mistake and want to remove a transaction, just pull down on the receipt to delete it.  This app makes great use of a photo-realistic environment to make it easy and delightful to use with little touches like this.

See all of a transaction's details, or pull the receipt down to delete it

See all of a transaction's details, or pull the receipt down to delete it

Adding Special Transactions

All of your daily transactions won’t be static Dollar or Euro amounts.  Sometimes you may want to add a repeating expense, such as a mobile phone charge, or you may need to add an expense in a foreign currency.  Expenditure makes it easy to keep up with all of these types of transactions.

When you need to add an expense in a foreign currency, press the double arrow button on the top right of the input screen.  Select the currency you need from the list, and Expenditure will then show the expense in the new currency with the conversion into your native currency underneath. You can update your exchange rates online from the settings page so you’ll always see the correct conversions.  Then, you can add a repeating charge right from an expense’s overview page; just press the Not Repeating button, and select how often the charge should be repeated.

Expenditure works great with international transactions

Expenditure works great with international transactions

Importing and Exporting Data

One problem with many iOS apps is that they’re often not designed to share data with your desktop applications or other apps on your device.  Expenditure, however, makes it easy to move your financial data to any app you need.  From the settings page, just press the Export transactions button.  Select any transactions you wish to export, or tap Select all on the top, then press Attach to mail.  This will let you email yourself a .csv formatted copy of your transactions, as well as an .exptr file that you can use to import data directly back into Expenditure.

Export all of your data and change your settings easily

Export all of your data and change your settings easily

You can then open the CSV file in any standard spreadsheet app, or even import it into your favorite desktop finance tool such as Quicken.  Or, if you need to re-import your financial data into Expenditure, select the .exptr file and open it in Expenditure.  This will import all of your transactions, including images, notes, and categories you may have added.  With these options, you’ll be sure to never lose the financial data you’ve put into Expenditure.

Open your CSV formatted data in any spreadsheet, or import transactions to Expenditure

Open your CSV formatted data in any spreadsheet, or import transactions to Expenditure

Conclusion

We were very impressed with Expenditure’s polish and strong feature set.  It manages to handle a wide variety of transactions while still remaining very simple to use.  The only problem we experienced were occasional crashes when adding a photo to a transaction; otherwise, Expenditure worked great.  Plus, since you can always export your financial data, you don’t feel trapped with your data stuck in one app.  The only thing more we could want would be a Mac and PC program that made it this easy to manage our expenses!

iPhone Game Friday: New Releases

An interesting selection for you this week, just in time to help stuff some virtual stockings!

Last week we saw iOS gaming take a quantum leap forward when we suddenly found ourselves playing a game powered by the Unreal3 engine on our smartphones, but it wasn’t the only great title to emerge recently…

Spirits

Spirits

Spirits

Here’s to you, Lemmings fans! Spirits is a relatively fresh game from Spaces of Play that takes the concept of indirect control and pathfinding and polishes it into a charismatic little gem.

Each level consists of a series of obstacles that your walking mushroom/jellyfish “spirits” must navigate in order to reach the ending swirl. Unlike many other games, you don’t directly control the little guys though. Instead, you tap the spirits as they approach an obstacle and ask them to perform an action like growing into a platform, or blowing air so that their companions behind them can safely overcome the obstruction.

The mood is peaceful and the artwork and animations are very well produced, which in combination with the pleasant ambient soundtrack makes this an excellent title for getting some relaxation in.

Price: $2.99
Developer: Spaces of Play
Download: App Store

Infinity Blade

Infinity Blade

Infinity Blade

Okay, enough stalling: here’s Infinity Blade. I can’t possibly avoid mentioning this game and the only reason I haven’t highlighted it before was because I wanted to spend some time with it. For those who’ve managed to stay unaware of the news, Infinity Blade is the game follow-up to Epic Games’ previous proof-of-concept title Epic Citadel. Its big claim to fame is that it manages to run the Unreal3 engine on your iPhone. Which is ridiculous.

First of all, be prepared for a wow moment when you first see this thing running on your phone. We’ve come a long way since cellphone snake games. This high fidelity visual system comes at the expense of performance on lower-end devices, so be aware that if you’re running anything older than a 3GS you’re probably going to be looking at a slideshow. In terms of gameplay, Infinity Blade is actually quite boring if I’m being honest — it’s little more than an on-rails action RPG where you move from battle to battle via short cutscenes — but it’s just so impressive looking that it’s hard to fault it.

The question is whether or not it’s cool enough to merit its steep price tag, and that will be up to you to decide. If you want the most technically and visually impressive gaming experience on the iOS though, then you’re looking at it.

Price: $5.99
Developer: Chair Entertainment Group (Epic Games)
Download: App Store

Biofrenzy

Biofrenzy

Biofrenzy

Well, we’re back to zombies. Biofrenzy is a side-scroller, and an excellent one at that.

An interesting difference in this title is that you’re very close to the action — the sprites are large and vibrantly detailed, so you really get a sense of being right up close to the action. There are 20 weapons that you can collect as you shoot zombies for money, and a couple of interesting special abilities including bullet time will help get you out of sticky situations.

The Game Center support and adjustable difficulty levels are good additions, so while it may not be the most innovative title out there, it’s not a forgettable entry in the genre and anyone who’s into side-scrolling shooters will find a lot of entertainment value wrapped up in a good presentation.

Price: $0.99
Developer: ZOZO Game Studio
Download: App Store

Gravity Guy

Gravity Guy

Gravity Guy

Gravity Guy follows in the footsteps of GravBot in the sense that its main mechanic is giving you control over the direction of gravity.

Instead of a puzzle game though, Gravity Guy is a side-scrolling runner. Once again, you only indirectly control Gravity Guy — he keeps running and your only job is to tap the screen to flip gravity when necessary to keep him from bashing into blocks, falling off platforms, or getting caught by the agents that are constantly chasing him. The game is paced well so you ease into the difficulty, and once things pick up and get harder, you’ll find yourself quite challenged despite only having one task to perform.

Retina-ready graphics and Game Center achievements and leaderboards make Gravity Guy an easy title to return to whenever you need some fun.

Price: $0.99
Developer: Miniclip.com
Download: App Store

Adventure Bay

Adventure Bay

Adventure Bay

It’s always nice to end on a freebie, so let’s have a look at ngmoco’s latest offering in its series of free-ish (supported by in-game purchases) title, Adventure Bay.

Similar to its “we…” series of games, Adventure Bay puts you in charge of creating and managing something — in this case a tropical pirate island. The usual level of graphical and musical quality is on display here, with the kind of presentation that makes it hard to resist getting all the new in-game goodies just so you can marvel at the colourful and brilliant sprite design. Quests have also returned, though you are now able to explore a bit more freely by following treasure maps with your crew in search of buried treasure.

It’s a formulaic title, but the formula keeps getting more and more polished. This is easily the finest iteration yet, and fans of any of the previous similar titles will find themselves right at home.

Price: Free
Developer: ngmoco, Inc.
Download: App Store

What Have You Been Playing?

Folks gearing up for Christmas will no doubt also be playing the new holiday version of Cut The Rope, but there are enough Christmas roundups floating around that it seemed unnecessary to join the bandwagon. Besides, AppStorm caters to all crowds — grinches included!

Seriously though, if you’ve got some awesome Christmassy games you’ve been playing for the holidays, drop them into the comments for the rest of us!

WikiLeaks On iPhone

There is now a new app available on the App Store which gives you full access to WikiLeaks’ old and new archives. Dubbed as WikiLeaks App, it delivers recent and old updates along with tweets, all presented in a nice and clean interface. The app allows you to check on the latest WikiLeaks updates from Twitter or the organization’s website. The tweets and the website are formatted for both iPhone and iPad.

Available on iTunes App Store for $1.99

Its important to note that the WikiLeaks App and it’s developers work independently and have nothing to do with the official WikiLeaks team. So this is an unofficial app and you will continue to receive updates via the app regardless of WikiLeaks site or server being down or not.

This app is compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad and it requires iOS 3.0 or later.

Download WikiLeaks App for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch [iTunes Link]

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How to Unlock Your iPhone 4.2.1 with UltraSn0w

The Dev Team has updated their UltraSn0w iPhone unlock for iOS 4.2.1. UltraSn0w 1.2 will unlock iPhone 4 baseband 01.59.00 and iPhone 3G/3GS basebands 04.26.08, 05.11.07, 05.12.01, 05.13.04 and now 06.15.00.

If your iPhone 4 is not on baseband 01.59.00, you will not be able to unlock it. If your iPhone 3G or 3GS is on one of the baseband version mentioned above, then you can follow the instructions below…

If your iPhone 3G or 3GS is not on one of the baseband version mentioned above, you will have to first update your baseband to 06.15.00. See our PwnageTool

Step 1: Make sure your iPhone is jailbroken using PwnageTool

Step 2: Launch Cydia, and search for UltraSn0w.

Step 3: Download UltraSn0w.

Step 4: Reboot your iPhone.

Your iPhone is now unlocked. There is no real way to test it until you pop a different SIM card in.

Related posts:

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Untethered iOS 4.2.1 Jailbreak Confirmed!

Dev-team and Comex has confirmed that untethered iOS 4.2.1 jailbreak will be out before Christmas 2010. First MuscleNerd came up with a video demonstrating untethered iOS 4.2.1 jailbreak on iPod Touch 4G.

Video:

Related posts:

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Real Racing 2 for iPhone and iPod Touch Hits the App Store

Real Racing 2 for iPhone and iPod Touch is now available for download in the App Store for $9.99. Real Racing 2 for iOS features 30 officially licensed cars, each with unique performance characteristics.

Official Description

Get ready for the most exhilarating handheld racing experience! Take control of 30 officially licensed cars, each with unique performance characteristics. Feel the thrill of authentic pack racing action in an incredible 16-car grid – the first on iOS!

  • Get to know meticulously detailed cars including the 2010 Ford Shelby Mustang GT500, 2010 Nissan GT-R (R35) and 2011 McLaren MP4-12C. See the full list at http://firemint.com/r2.
  • Enjoy well over 10 hours of gameplay in the massive career mode with time trials, head-to-head races, eliminations, single ‘cup’ races, qualifiers and championships. Win races to purchase new cars and feel the difference with performance upgrades that affect handling. Work your way up from rookie to pro, or just jump into a Quick Race for instant fun.
  • Find out who the real champion is! Enter auto-matched 16 player online races. Meet up with friends for 8 player local WiFi races. Compete on global leaderboards in Time Trials.
  • Race in 15 beautiful locations, with 40 miles of highly detailed race tracks, speedways and city circuits including twilight and night races.
  • Choose control options to suit your personal style. Earn the checkered flag with our intuitive and easy to master controls or take things up a notch by disabling all driving assists. Set anti-skid, steering assist and sensitivity, automatic or manual acceleration and brake assist level. Touch or tilt to steer.
  • Cutting edge graphics and physics powered by Firemint’s exclusive high performance Mint3D™ engine – optimized to push OpenGL ES2 and retina display technology to the limit, and fine tuned for the best experience on older devices.

Download Real Racing 2

You can purchase and download Real Racing 2 from the App Store for $9.99. [iTunes Link]

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PhatPad: a Newton-like note-taking app for iPad

There are so many good note-taking apps out for the iPad that it’s hard to believe that someone just came out with one that will probably take the place of the ones we’ve already installed.

That’s the case, though, with PhatPad (US$4.99). From PhatWare, a long-time developer of apps for handhelds and smartphones, PhatPad brings the best of Newton MessagePad note-taking to the iPad. That’s right — I just compared the ahead-of-its-time Apple Newton MessagePad of the 90’s with the sleek and powerful iPad.

Two things that the later models of the Newton did very well were to convert handwriting to editable text, and to provide a way to sketch diagrams freehand and have them “cleaned up.” By that, I mean that the built-in Newton software was able to take a scrawled circular shape and turn it magically into a perfect circle. It did the same for squares, rectangles, and triangles.

PhatPad provides the same capabilities, and then adds in the sharing capabilities that weren’t available even in 1998 when the Newton product line was canceled by Apple. You can take handwritten notes and convert them to text later on, enter text via handwriting into text boxes placed in specific places on a blank page, and annotate photos or other images with text or drawings. PhatWare’s long experience in the handheld arena definitely shows in PhatPad. The app has many features that haven’t been added in other note-taking apps.

Continue reading PhatPad: a Newton-like note-taking app for iPad

PhatPad: a Newton-like note-taking app for iPad originally appeared on TUAW on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Screens: an easy and elegant VNC app for iOS

VNC (virtual network computing) has been around for a long time, but lately there seems to be more and more interest in it, perhaps because of all the iPad and iPhone owners who want to connect to their computers back home or at the office.

Screens, from Edovia, is a new entrant in the VNC app race. It is on sale at US $14.99 for a limited time, after which the price will go up to $24.99. The app is universal, so your purchase allows you to install it on both an iPad and iPhone, or an iPod touch.

Like many other similar apps, Screens has support for many multi-touch gestures, as well as squeeze motions to enlarge or shrink the screen back down. The main difference is that with the other apps, you use those gestures to move a cursor around the screen or in some cases, move the screen around a stationary cursor. Screens allows you to control the remote computer using your finger as a virtual mouse or trackpad.

Of course, you have to run a VNC server app on the machine you want to connect to, and you can find those for Windows and Linux. OS X has VNC built in; you just activate screen sharing in the Mac Sharing preference pane. If you have multiple PCs set up to connect to, you flick between those screens on your iPad, iPod touch or iPhone.

I’ve tried it at home and was easily able to connect to my desktop Mac and a Windows XP PC. Using the app was a pleasure, and because of the way touch is integrated it felt like a pure multi-touch app, rather than a screen emulator. There is a dedicated keyboard, and a second one with keys that relate to the type of computer you are connecting to. For example, you can invoke a Spotlight search with a tap when connected to a Mac.

Continue reading Screens: an easy and elegant VNC app for iOS

Screens: an easy and elegant VNC app for iOS originally appeared on TUAW on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Elgato EyeTV HD: A review of the Mac DVR for cable and satellite HDTV

Elgato has been in the Mac video market for quite some time, developing and marketing such popular products as the Turbo.264 HD USB video compression device and various varieties of EyeTV, a tuner and digital video recorder for Mac.

Eariler this year, TUAW reviewed the EyeTV Hybrid, a US$149.95 USB dongle that serves as a tuner and recorder for over-the-air digital TV. Since that time, Elgato has released the EyeTV HD ($199.95 and available for less through online outlets), which the company touts as “the ultimate DVR for HD cable and satellite TV.”

Both devices work with Elgato’s EyeTV software for Mac, which features a program guide, smart guides for recording a season of any show to your Mac or an external disk automatically, easy export of video to iTunes for syncing to iDevices, and even streaming to the EyeTV iOS app. The big difference? EyeTV HD works with the HD cable or satellite boxes that many people use to pump that high-quality digital signal to their HDTVs. Click the Read More link below for a full review of this unique video hardware.

Continue reading Elgato EyeTV HD: A review of the Mac DVR for cable and satellite HDTV

Elgato EyeTV HD: A review of the Mac DVR for cable and satellite HDTV originally appeared on TUAW on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 19:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Jenga for iPhone has great graphics, frustrating gameplay

Jenga. Jenga. J-J-J-Jenga. Now that you’ve got that Jenga song stuck in your head, you’re ready for a review of Jenga on the iPhone.

The original Jenga was about as simple as games get. As the song goes, you take a block from the bottom, and you put it on top. Or, you can take a block from the middle, then put it on top. Once the tower of wooden blocks falls over, the game ends. When two or more players play, the one who caused the tower to topple is the loser.

The basic gameplay works exactly the same way on the iPhone, with graphics that seem almost excessively beautiful for a game of this type. But there’s one very critical “gotcha” that made the game incredibly frustrating for me — without any sort physical feedback, I found the game almost impossibly difficult compared to the real-world version of the game.

Read on to discover how Jenga proved to be both an unexpected delight and an exercise in frustration.

Continue reading Jenga for iPhone has great graphics, frustrating gameplay

Jenga for iPhone has great graphics, frustrating gameplay originally appeared on TUAW on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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SmartPush iPhone app dead, reminds us apps are not forever

SmartPush was a neat iPhone app from a small startup, Syphir, which allowed the configuration of clever filters for Gmail push notifications. For example, the user could configure rules like “always send me a push notification for all emails from my wife,” “don’t send notifications between 11pm and 7am” or “don’t sent me a notification if the email was sent to more than three people.” Our own TJ Luoma was very positive when he reviewed it back in July, and said it’s a good way to for people with busy inboxes to calm down the incessant beep-beeping of their iPhones.

Sadly, one of the founders of the company has confirmed on a post to their customer service forum that the iPhone app is no more. He’s attempting to keep part of the company going but the other two founders have left and he can no longer afford the infrastructure costs for the push notification service. He has had to turn it off and remove the app from sale. This means that people who paid for the app during its nine month lifespan (between $1 and $3) are now out of luck — it will no longer work for them.

The sums of money involved in this case may be small, but the principles are large. The explosive popularity of the App Store, as well as its accessibility to small startups, has drawn many new companies into the fold, and we all know that a lot of apps use the iPhone’s wireless networking to hook into always-on web services. Let’s be frank: not all of these companies are going to have reliable revenue streams, and when they fold, people who bought their product are going to be left with broken apps and no compensation.

This is particularly problematic for apps that offer Push Notifications. Because of how Apple structured them, any developer adding notification support to their app has to commit to keeping servers alive to send the notifications through — even if the app doesn’t have any other need for hosting. Once the app sales saturate the developer is left with dwindling income but a significant fixed ongoing cost hosting and maintaining the servers.

Continue reading SmartPush iPhone app dead, reminds us apps are not forever

SmartPush iPhone app dead, reminds us apps are not forever originally appeared on TUAW on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Daily Deals for December 18, 2010

Again brought to you by dealnews.com. These won’t last forever, but what does? Christmas is just seven days away, after all.

  • iTunes Store: iPhone App Price Drops: PolyTune, Crayon Physics Deluxe, Bruce Lee, more
  • iTunes Store: Battlefield: Bad Company 2 for iPhone and iPod touch downloads for $1
  • Apple Store: Refurbished Apple iPads: Up to $100 off, from $429 + free shipping
  • Meritline: Mini DisplayPort to HDMI Adapter and 6-Foot HDMI Cable for $7 + free shipping
  • Small Dog Electronics: Apple iMac 3.33GHz 27″ Desktop w/ 12GB RAM, AppleCare for $1,600 + $5 s&h
  • JR: Audio-Technica Stereo Headphones for $13 + free shipping
  • BuyDig: Canon EOS Rebel T2i 18MP DSLR Bundle for $817 after rebate + free shipping
  • TigerDirect: Samsung HZ50W 14MP 26x Zoom Digital Camera for $200 + $4 s&h
  • MegaMacs: V-Moda Faze Nero Headphones for $20 + $9 s&h, more
  • Best Buy: Canon PIXMA Wireless Multifunction Photo Inkjet Printer for $50 + pickup
  • SquareTrade: SquareTrade coupon: 30% off warranties
  • Buy.com: Genica Mini USB LED Digital Projector for $90 + free shipping

Daily Deals for December 18, 2010 originally appeared on TUAW on Sat, 18 Dec 2010 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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