Applications

A native application development kit has been released for Android developers, offering a way to create certain kinds of high-performing applications for handsets running the Google platform.

Android applications run through the Dalvik virtual machine, which emulates a Java virtual machine. On Thursday, the Android Native Development Kit (NDK) was released, allowing coders to create parts of their Android 1.5 applications outside Dalvik, using native-code languages such as C and C++.

This approach would not ordinarily produce a massive performance boost, but it does allow developers to reuse existing C and C++ code for Android applications.

Android engineer David … Read more

Have you ever wished you that could print files directly from your Android phone? A new application called PrinterShare uses a client on your handset and a print server on your PC to do just that. Once installed, you can print documents, contacts, and photos on your home printer from any place with cellular service or Wi-Fi. The service is free to use and available for Windows, Mac, and Linux. What's more, the mobile client is available for both the Android and the iPhone.

Set up the desktop PrinterShare software Before you can register an account with PrinterShare, you … Read more

Up until last week, Quickoffice Mobile Office Suite was the most sophisticated Microsoft document reader and editor in the App Store. When Documents To Go came out (with and without support for Microsoft Exchange attachments,) some of you asked for a head-to-head comparison.

We'll see your request and raise it to a collection of business applications for the iPhone and iPod Touch that can help keep you productive at home or on the road.

Quickoffice versus Documents To Go

The starkest differences between Quickoffice Mobile Suite and Documents To Go boil down to price, file support, and interface. Both … Read more

Have you done your good deed for the day? I understand: You're busy. You forgot. You couldn't think of anything good to do. Enter DoGood, a free app that suggests and encourages good deeds, crowdsourcing-style.

The app recommends a new "DoGood" every day: give someone a hug, turn off some lights, thank an old teacher, and so on. Once you've done the deed, just tap "done" to record it.

DoGood keeps a running tally of how many people acted on the daily deed, and lets you post and read stories about it. There'… Read more

Update (June 26, 2009): Now that the dust has settled, Jim Dalrymple has a more complete picture of how and why this app was removed.

Update: We initially reported that Apple had blocked the app, but it now appears that the developer's servers were simply overwhelmed (Apple's servers distribute the app, but the images themselves are pulled from the developer's server). We'll have further updates as the story continues to evolve.

Back when Apple first launched its App Store, Steve Jobs showed a slide with six categories of apps that would be verboten: "Porn, privacy, … Read more

Marking a departure from the world of iPhone, HTC's new Android-based Hero phone will also come with the ability to handle Flash elements that adorn many Web sites and power YouTube video.

Adobe Systems announced on Wednesday that its Flash Player will be built into the HTC phone, an important step in the company's efforts to spread Flash to mobile phones. The phone, one of several from HTC to use Google's open-source operating system, is scheduled to ship in Europe starting in July and in Asia and North America later in the year.

However, the initial version … Read more

Good news on the IM front: AIM (Free Edition) and BeejiveIM 3.0 are among the first instant-messaging apps to support push notification, meaning you'll get alerted to new messages even when the apps aren't running.

If that sounds a bit familiar, it's because we reported on AIM's use in push-notification stress-testing about a week ago.

It also follows the news that uberpopular texting app TextFree was first out of the SMS gate with push support, allowing users to get new-message notifications while the iPhone is off or doing other things.

AIM offers a fairly robust … Read more

It seems like just about everyone has a Twitter or Facebook account these days and I find myself checking the so called "status updates" for my friends and family more than I'd like to admit. I never thought when these services launched that a status update could become anything more than a simple yawn-worthy report of personal activity. But as we've seen with these services' growing popularity, and the recent explosion of activity during the aftermath of Iran's election, the idea of a status update has morphed into something much bigger. A simple sentence or … Read more

We expected a slew of turn-by-turn GPS navigation apps when Apple's iPhone 3.0 software emerged, and we'll get it--slowly. AT&T's Navigator app entered the App Store today, preceded almost a week ago by Gokivo. We're still waiting for TomTom's offering.

Gokivo is made by Networks in Motion, the same company behind AAA Mobile, Verizon's VZ Navigator, and AT&T's Yellowpages.com, so we expected a little sophistication. It has been in our testing queue since last Wednesday, but some technical difficulties impeded our progress. Mainly, a possessed in-app purchase … Read more