The android app has become a pillar in mobile media all over the world. Developers have learned to harness the power of smart phones and infuse technology with daily consumer needs.
Cell phone apps or applications connect users to the features of their smart phones to create new or convenient experience. Apps are a staple in the way we live our everyday lives. Whether you are editing a photo to add to your portfolio, video chatting a friend in another country or making last minute changes to a power point presentation, you’re able to accomplish these things through apps. Apps have made it possible to do things on the go once thought to be impossible or too inconvenient to further develop.
Though the brilliance of these apps have enveloped consumers there are far too many to examine each one for what it offers. For the music producer you may enjoy SoundCloud, for the photographer you might like Instagram and for the gamer you may enjoy Gun Brothers.
What I’ve done is list my top ten android apps.These are must-haves for the app enthusiast and casual user alike. Running a small t-shirt company I use these apps to accomplish all my business and personal needs.
Here are the top ten apps for Urban Knowledge Tees,
#10/ Google Analytix HD
This app is great at analyzing data from traffic thru your website. It breaks down traffic with the same data native to Google Analytics, page views, mobile traffic, top key words, etc. but with a more colorful visual experience especially on tablets. There is a trial version but the app is just $2 in the Play Market.
#9/Google+
For the social media user who wants a lot more networking and a little less well social bravado, this is the app for you. This app is perfect for the Google user and those fully absorbed with Google media like, Gmail, Google Voice, YouTube, it has it all. You can set up a profile and create “circles” of contacts, personal, business or otherwise. You can share pictures or message friends and even video message other users through the integrated “Hangout” feature from phones or tablets on the go. You can get news and info on whatever “circle” you choose or all of them at once so it’s a great news feed. What I like most about it is how the circles separate your associate and the way you communicate and not just lump them all up as “friends”. It’s currently free in the Play Market.
#8/Pulse News
If you’re like me you don’t like to keep opening your bookmarks and searching for that great site for kicks or be the last to know about a not so new song. The Pulse News app can help with
that. This app allows you to add and categorize all the sites you enjoy and create a great visual display of sites you enjoy. All you do is add the rss feeds of your favorite sites you follow and Pulse does the rest. The sites are categorized and stacked so you can view topics from each one. The pictures give you a brief description of the article and you can read it just by touching the picture. You can set the update interval to up to the hour and even add a scrollable widget to your phone or tablet if you choose to. It’s currently free in the Play Market.
#7/Plume for Twitter
Everyone you know, met, will meet, friended, unfriended, is probably on twitter and they probably use this app. Plume is a twitter client app that uses an intuitive UI to create a seamless and engaging twitter experience. It features a fully customizable home screen that lets you change the color and style of your timeline feed and mentions. It caches and populates your followers so you aren’t bumbling around with crazy twitter names. It has a pull-to-refresh screen and has pretty snappy updates so you don’t miss a tweet. It lets you share photos through all the major clients YFrog, Plixi, Lockerz, etc…It also features scrollable widgets which is great for tablets as well. It’s currently free with ads but there is a premium version with no ads for $5. Get them both in the Play Market.
#6/MX Player
Don’t you hate when you go to watch a video or a clip and you get that message cannot read file or does not support this video format, this is app gets it done. The MX player will play any file in any format whether music or video. It comes with a multitude of codecs and separates the files by folders so you don’t have to go looking for them. It has great user interface and provides either touch controls or standard buttons. It’s currently free in the Play Market.
#5/Play Music
For music lovers looking for variety, organization, convenience, usability, and overall dopeness, this is the app for you. Google Play Music has all the features that music enthusiast enjoy all in one place. It’s a music player that uses offline syncing across all devices, plus adds the use of online storage so you’re never without your music collection. Music purchases from Google play automatically appear in the app. You can add up to 20,000 of the songs from your personal library plus you can share songs with the people in your “circles’ already on Google+. The app has a carousel affect and the tablet version is as visually stunning. Create a playlist on one device and that playlist appears on all devices and the laptop. You can add a widget player to the screen and play songs straight from your playlist. It is currently free in the Play Market.
#4/Kingsoft Office
If you’re a student or run your own business this is a great app to have. Kingsoft gives you all the abilities of you standard Microsoft Office and its “offices” but FREE. As most of us have discovered, there are many document reading apps but very few which allow you to edit all documents or even open them. You can only view and share documents which makes them pretty useless. This app allows you to make significant changes to word documents, excel spreadsheets, and even PowerPoint slides. One of the cool features is the ability to edit your business documents like billing invoices. The file manager automatically organizes your documents and it does work well with mail applications. It’s currently free in the Play Market.
#3/Drop box
This is easily one of my favorite apps of all-time as I use this one nearly as frequently as the next two. Drop box is a cloud storage app which allows you to store music movies, documents, photos and pretty much any kind of file you can think of. When you sign up online you get 2GB of storage for free and 500 GB for ever person you refer. When you add the app to your phone laptop and tablet, you can upload access and share any file from all three devices ON THE GO. It even has applications for Mac and Linux. It lets you free up any file you wanted to keep but just not on your laptop. You can organize your files into folders edit documents, and it even lets you pass code your apps so your files cannot be accessed from you devices. It’s secure and it’s great for photo and music sharing. It’s currently free in the Play Market but can be upgraded for more space.
#2/Astro File Manager
This is one of the apps that truly define mobile access and organization. Astro finds all the files on your mobile device, organizes and opens them for you smoothly. What makes this app so important is you can literally open, close, edit or delete it on your phone. If you download a photo but can’t find it in the gallery, Astro caches it in the download folder and lets you open it straight from the app. One of the key features is it lets you backup your apps so if you change phones or lose your phone you’ll still have them. It supports networking Bluetooth, and also lets you stop processes that are battery hogs. I use this app to manage my music folders and organize my documents from emails of companies and customers to invoices and other business documents. It’s a must have app for small business owners or droiders just getting started. It’s currently free in the Play Market.
The number one app recommended by URBAN KNOWLEDGE TEES IS….
ZIPWHIP!
This is THEE absolute best app for mobile users who rely on communication to stay in tune with everything. Zipwhip uses what’s called cloud texting to relay texts sent to your phone across all of your devices at the same time. Registration is super easy and all you need is your cell phone. I do lot of work on my laptop which is usually when my phone is charging but I’m still receiving texts and texts for alerts the whole time. The thing that makes this my favorite is if I’m working on the laptop and listening to music or watching a movie on my tablet I can’t always hear my phone, I can send and receive messages and picture mail through the pop up window and leave my phone on the charger. When you receive a text message, a small window appears on your laptop, sort of like a chat box, which also appears on your tablet. You can reply, open and view picture mail, and it even syncs your contacts from your phones native message app. It works for Macs and Linux and uses your existing data plan. So if you have unlimited, your aces but if not it’s the same as if you were texting directly from your phone. If your tablet does not have a data plan then it will sync when you get in a open wifi area. It is currently free in the Play Market and I hope you choose this one if you’re as busy as I am.
I hope this helps with wading through the sea of apps for our devices and bring you a little bit of convenience too. Feel free to comment if you know of any useful, convenient or fun apps to download. The links are posted and as always PUSH IT FORWARD!!
