3rd Party Applications - Android Community

Tagged: 3rd Party Applications

Google News Regional App on Android Market

By Samia Perkins
on 13 May, 2011

A new app has popped up on Android Market, Google News Regional. This app is somewhat limited, as you are still using the browser to see the news, but it can auto detect your location, and lets you easily jump between categories. You can also change the location manually if you'd like to see news from other regions. So is it any good?

AT&T allows sideloading apps on the Infuse 4G

By Cory Gunther
on 5 May, 2011

Whoa what do we have here, it appears that the new Samsung Infuse 4G now allows for side-loading apps. Something no Android phone on AT&T has been able to do before. From our hands on with the new Infuse 4G it looks like you are now able to select the box "Unknown Sources" and can now install non-market applications. This is huge news because until now users have had to resort to tricks and hackery to side-load applications to AT&T phones.

How Does a 95% Profit Cut for your Android App Sound, Mister Developer?

By Chris Burns
on 26 Jan, 2011

So you've developed an app for Android and you don't know what step is next. Perhaps you've registered for the Android Marketplace but you can't quite bring yourself to hit the button that'd release your app into the wild through this Google-sanctioned marketplace. What are your options? Well you can choose a different app distribution point for one, or you could sell the app yourself if you like. Which option is best? How about the one that gives you a 95% profit cut of whatever your app brings in for sales? Sounds pretty good to us.

Twidroyd Now Ad Free And Available In The Android Market

By John Ashton Edgar
on 10 Dec, 2010

The nice folks at Twidroyd have now made their Twitter app ad free. They state their desire to change their business model to provide users with a rich Twitter experience and that this is primarily in response to user requests. This action combined with their recent addition of Twidroyd Factory and other new features, gives Twidroyd a shot at claiming to be the best Twitter app for Android. Twidroyd says it best with, "You Commented. We Listened, And Responded." [Via Twidroyd on Twitter]

Content Ratings coming to Applications in the Android Market

By Dylan Bailey
on 24 Nov, 2010

Google has announced today that we will start seeing content ratings for apps listed in the Android Market in a few weeks time. In a move to provide users with additional information to help in choosing which applications would be the best for them, Google is going to provide ratings for applications on four levels.

App Inventor gets early developer thumbs-up

By Chris Davies
on 15 Jul, 2010

Google's App Inventor software for quickly creating Android smartphone apps is already pulling in positive reviews, and early concerns about the flexibility and general capabilities of the development kit look to have been relatively unfounded. Robert Oschler has been in touch to describe his experience with App Inventor: he put together a chat-bot style text to speech app with Twitter integration, and it took him little over a day of tinkering.

AppEliza is a free ELIZA style therapist chat-bot for Android phones. You talk to it and tell it your problems, and it responds via Text To Speech. It can also echo your conversation to a Twitter account. AppEliza incorporates Google's speech recognition web service and the Eyes-Free Text To Speech package, the former is part of every Android phone and the later is a free download from the Android Marketplace. The excitement here isn't the app since AppEliza is a simple pattern based chat-bot that reacts to trigger words and phrases, mainly those dealing with feelings and family, and uses the power of ambiguity to "fake it" the rest of the time. The excitement is due to AppInventor, the tool that was used to create AppEliza in a single day, except for the Twitter support that I added to it this morning and that took a little over an hour. Hyperbole is a huge problem on the web but I feel confident as a veteran developer to call AppInventor one of the best rapid development tools I have ever used and I am astonished at how fast I am able to create Android applications.

Not yet in the Android Market, you can download the AppEliza .apk file here and check out the sort of Twitter integration that's possible here. If you've tried App Inventor we'd be interested to hear from you; let us know in the comments.

Seesmic v1.3 adds widget, geotagging, more

By Chris Davies
on 20 Apr, 2010

There are plenty of Twitter apps for Android, but in our opinion Seesmic is one of the best. The team behind it may just have made it even better, however, with Seesmic for Android v1.3: the update adds geotagging and extra retweeting functionality, as well as satisfying one of the most commonly requested features, a homescreen widget. The widget allows you to scroll through new tweets in your timeline together with composing a new update of your own directly from the desktop. Meanwhile the new retweet functionality allows you to choose between traditional quote method, or Twitter's newer retweet system. Finally, geotagging can automatically or manually add location data to newly posted updates. Seesmic for Android v1.3 is available - free - from the Android Market.

Microsoft releases first app for Android platform

By Paul Fang
on 4 Mar, 2010

Things just keep on getting more interesting, as Microsoft has just announced the launch of its first-ever app for the Android platform. Yes, that’s Google’s Android platform. Dubbed Tag, it’s similar to the Microsoft’s iPhone app of the same name, and lets you use your handset as a mobile barcode reader.

Android lock screen copied by iPhone app devs

By Paul Fang
on 2 Feb, 2010

Playing second fiddle at times to iPhone apps, Android apps sometimes get criticized for attempting to imitate features found in already existing iPhone functionalities as well as applications. This iPhone app reverses that.

Android Community App Directory launches!

By Chris Davies
on 21 Jan, 2010

One of the features we get asked for most frequently here on Android Community is an applications directory, somewhere for developers to show off their hard work, users to file feedback and make suggestions, and generally a place to go to dig up new and interesting software for your Android smartphone. So we're pleased to unveil the Android Community App Directory, a simple - but full-featured - way to promote your software. Listings in the App Directory can be as simple or as info-rich as you want, and the whole thing is organized by category with user-ratings and commenting. You can also see which software is getting the most attention or the most feedback. We've got a number of new features planned that should roll out over the rest of this week, again answering some of the more common requests we've had over the past few months. Let us know what you think - we're always open to suggestions!