Obligatory “Here’s my iPhone” post

Since you should never actually touch my iPhone, I figured I’d give everyone a look into how I use it and what I use it for. The following are screenshots of my two interesting home screens accompanied by a brief rundown of their contents.

All app links direct you to the publisher’s website.

Home Screen 1

1. Cha-Ching Touch

A companion to the desktop client, used for tracking transactions and budgeting. Both platforms are still under pretty heavy development and can sometimes be buggy, but it’s a nice little piece of software. However, I still go broke far too easily. Decent icon.

2. Ego

Stats at a glance from multiple web services. Awesome little app. I mainly use it to monitor my Mint installation for this site and Google Analytics stats for several others. Extra points for this one: the website tells me I’m important. Good icon.

3. Tweetie 2

Mobile Twitter client. I have no experience with version 1, but I’m thoroughly enjoying version 2. It’s a real joy to use and takes a great approach to certain features. Good/boring icon.

4. Mint web-clip

Shortcut to the iPhone optimized layout of my Mint installation. Web stats tracking at its slickest. I made the switch from Google Analytics to Mint a month ago and I’m loving it. It fits my compulsory need for immediate self-gratification far better than GA could. Throw in the “apple-web-app-capable” meta on the index.php page and pretend it’s a native app. Good icon ruined by the default gloss setting.

5. RedLists web-clip

“What?!? RedLists has an iPhone-optimized layout?!?!” Why, yes it does! PERFECT icon.

6. Things Touch

Standalone to-do app that pairs well with the desktop client. This comes in handy when/if your life gets hectic. Or, in my case, if you’re putting off writing a paper. [A] great piece(s) of software, Great icon.

Home Screen 2

1. Myspace

Better than going to myspace.com. Ugly icon.

2. Facebook

Better than going to myspace.com. And actually, pretty well executed. Ugly icon.

3. iTunes Remote

Better than walking four feet. Good icon.

4. Last.fm

Better than the radio. Decent icon.

5. FourTrack

Better than Voice Memos. Ridiculously fully-featured multi-track recording app. 16 bit, 44.1khz, bounce to 2-track, metronome, and it acts as a web-server you can visit on a desktop browser to download tracks individually. I don’t think it has been updated seen I’ve bought it, but it’s already got enough to satisfy. Ugly icon.

6. Decibel

Better than going deaf. A simple decibel meter. Good icon.

7. Fuzzle

Better than Connect Four. A very addicting puzzle game. It’s even colorblind friendly! Icon used to be way better.

8. Rolando

Better than most games. This game used to be $10. Now it’s $3, and it has a sequel. There’s no reason you shouldn’t have this game. ! Icon makes you want to hug your neighbor.

9. Ramp Champ

Better than going to myspace.com. I bought into the hype on this one. The audio/visual is amazing in this game, I’m just not sure yet if I like playing it. I don’t even really like skee ball in real life. Regardless, it’s a very complete and well put together game. Cool looking icon. Still doesn’t make me think of skee ball.

10. Eliss

Better than what you’re doing right now. Excellent concept for a game that can truly only be played on a multi-touch device. Outstanding music and graphics. It gets incredibly hard about halfway through the game. I assume it’s about halfway through because that’s as far as I got. Icon makes me think of a nipple.

11. Canabalt

Better than actually escaping a robot alien invasion. Story, romance, fighting, awards, running, and jumping. Everything you’d ever want out of a game. Decent icon.

12. Convertbot

Better than doing math. This thing is too much fun to be used as little as it is. Good icon.

13. Chipotle

I have yet to use it, but it reminds me that I’m probably hungry. It also helps me forget that chipotle.com is ONE HUNDRED PERCENT FLASH. Ugly icon.

14. iOctocat

An open source Github front-end for the iPhone. Approximately 1.6x better than visiting github.com to check on activity. Good icon.

That’s it for now. I fancy my self as an app connoisseur¹, and I try to keep the screen count low. It’s exciting to see the iPhone grow as a development platform, even if I never get involved in it.

¹ Defined: wait until somebody else goes crazy over it, then buy.

Push Notifications

One iPhone app that I particularly like is the companion to the Mac desktop software Things. I’m not a GTD disciple, but it comes in handy for organizing tasks and the interface makes me feel good. Some users, however, feel the mobile version lacks an essential feature: push notifications.

I disagree. From my understanding, push notifications are pushed to the iPhone from a web server (or “cloud” if you like buzzwords.) Logic would tell us that it has to have that information stored on it for the whole push thing to happen. I don’t really care to have all my To-dos stored on some remote server owned by some remote person. Same with those monthly scheduled bank payments I’m supposed to make. Even if privacy isn’t an issue for you, it’s still one more registration process to go through, no matter how painless it may seem. No thanks.

Aside from that, it doesn’t seem to me like push notifications will scale well. A one-time occurrence of a pop-up dialogue for every action that you could possibly be notified of could get a little cluttered. I know I’ve instinctively swiped to unlock my phone without really looking at a notification, thinking it was a text message that I’d read in the Messages interface. Instead, some jack-in-the-box app launches and I’m left wondering what I’m supposed to be looking at. At the very least, it would be nice to have some sort of log.

As far as user interface goes, I’m a bit envious of the way the G1 and the Pre do notifications. They seem less obtrusive than their iPhone counterparts. After all, an alert for 10% remaining battery power is a little more important than someone I never talk to sending a kind “sup?” instant message to the AIM account I forgot to sign off of. Or even a text message. Point is, they all look the same. Point is, Things shouldn’t have push notifications.

Things should have users that open the app more often. Heck, even the desktop version doesn’t have pop-up reminders¹.

¹ Not directly. It can sync to an iCal calendar which can provide reminders.