We first showed you screenshots of  Minigore way, way back in early June.  The wait has literally been unbearable since that time, but today we can finally relax and enjoy the adorableness that is Minigore because it is now available in the App Store. Minigore is a 3D survival shooter that places you in the tiny shoes of the one and only John Gore.  John finds himself surrounded by furries, which are vicious, hairy little creatures with particularly sharp teeth, and you must protect yourself from them by utilizing the various weapons at your disposal. The game features gameplay mechanics that are very similar to iDracula .  Your left on-screen joystick controls your direction of movement, while the right joystick controls your direction of fire.  The furries, your evil enemies, come in four different shapes and sizes: a small Minifurry, a regular Furry, a Giant Furry, and the most dangerous of them all, the Firefurry.  If that isn’t bad enough, the larger furries will split into several smaller furries when destroyed, so it’s basically a never-ending battle. Minigore also features some adorable yet gruesome graphics, and a unique art style. The developer, Mountain Sheep, has also promised many future updates, so your money should be well spent. “We simply want to make games people want to play. Not only will Minigore get better and better with each update, we want the gamers to have a say in what they get! We are building a community around the game to make Minigore more than a single game—we want it to come alive and grow with the people who play it.” said Kimmo Vihola, CEO of Mountain Sheep. Minigore is now available in the App Store for only $.99. Embedded below is a gameplay trailer for Minigore , which was released a little while back, but at least you get the idea. Related Posts Bike Or Die 2 On Sale For $.99, A Whopping $6 Off The Regular Price Chillingo’s Touch KO Released, Update Already In The Works Two Quality Games On Sale This Weekend: Clue And Defender Chronicles Chillingo Announces Crystal - A Social Gaming Network Toki Tori Now On Sale For $.99

We first showed you screenshots of  Minigore way, way back in early June.  The wait has literally been unbearable since that time, but today we can finally relax and enjoy the adorableness that is Minigore because it is now available in the App Store. Minigore is a 3D survival shooter that places you in the tiny shoes of the one and only John Gore.  John finds himself surrounded by furries, which are vicious, hairy little creatures with particularly sharp teeth, and you must protect yourself from them by utilizing the various weapons at your disposal. The game features gameplay mechanics that are very similar to iDracula .  Your left on-screen joystick controls your direction of movement, while the right joystick controls your direction of fire.  The furries, your evil enemies, come in four different shapes and sizes: a small Minifurry, a regular Furry, a Giant Furry, and the most dangerous of them all, the Firefurry.  If that isn’t bad enough, the larger furries will split into several smaller furries when destroyed, so it’s basically a never-ending battle. Minigore also features some adorable yet gruesome graphics, and a unique art style. The developer, Mountain Sheep, has also promised many future updates, so your money should be well spent. “We simply want to make games people want to play. Not only will Minigore get better and better with each update, we want the gamers to have a say in what they get! We are building a community around the game to make Minigore more than a single game—we want it to come alive and grow with the people who play it.” said Kimmo Vihola, CEO of Mountain Sheep. Minigore is now available in the App Store for only $.99. Embedded below is a gameplay trailer for Minigore , which was released a little while back, but at least you get the idea. Related Posts Bike Or Die 2 On Sale For $.99, A Whopping $6 Off The Regular Price Chillingo’s Touch KO Released, Update Already In The Works Two Quality Games On Sale This Weekend: Clue And Defender Chronicles Chillingo Announces Crystal - A Social Gaming Network Toki Tori Now On Sale For $.99

If you are sensing a little deja vu, there is a good reason for that.  Yes, we already did a “final” AppAwards download code giveaway winners list , but it really wasn’t all that final.  This list of winners will absolutely, officially be our last AppAwards giveaway list.  We will have more giveaways in the future, but this is the last of our AppAwards 2009 giveaways.  Alright? Since there were so many winners from yesterday, we have compiled a short list below.  Here are our winners: Kas Matt B Ryan K Nick Rinaldi Lisa Jason Facebook fanpage winner: Shane Congratulations to all of you!  If you see your name on the list and haven’t received an email yet, check your junkmail.  Also, some of you have the same names, of course, so don’t get too feisty if you see your name on the list and haven’t received an email.  It could be a different person! Our winners basically received whatever was left of our codes since they were on the verge of expiring.  If you are one of the winners and received some codes that have expired, just go on to the next code because that’s all we have left! Thanks again everyone for participating, and stay tuned for more great giveaways! Related Posts AppAwards Giveaway Winners List, Check To See If You Won AppAwards Winners Announced, Check To See If Your Favorite App Won Our Sky Burger Giveaway Winners Are… We (Finally) Have A Winner! AppAwards Grand Prize Winner Chosen AppAward Winners: Gaming Perspective

If you are sensing a little deja vu, there is a good reason for that.  Yes, we already did a “final” AppAwards download code giveaway winners list , but it really wasn’t all that final.  This list of winners will absolutely, officially be our last AppAwards giveaway list.  We will have more giveaways in the future, but this is the last of our AppAwards 2009 giveaways.  Alright? Since there were so many winners from yesterday, we have compiled a short list below.  Here are our winners: Kas Matt B Ryan K Nick Rinaldi Lisa Jason Facebook fanpage winner: Shane Congratulations to all of you!  If you see your name on the list and haven’t received an email yet, check your junkmail.  Also, some of you have the same names, of course, so don’t get too feisty if you see your name on the list and haven’t received an email.  It could be a different person! Our winners basically received whatever was left of our codes since they were on the verge of expiring.  If you are one of the winners and received some codes that have expired, just go on to the next code because that’s all we have left! Thanks again everyone for participating, and stay tuned for more great giveaways! Related Posts AppAwards Giveaway Winners List, Check To See If You Won AppAwards Winners Announced, Check To See If Your Favorite App Won Our Sky Burger Giveaway Winners Are… We (Finally) Have A Winner! AppAwards Grand Prize Winner Chosen AppAward Winners: Gaming Perspective

It feels great to be back with AppAdvice. If you were wondering what had happened to me, take a look at my review for TravelTracker; but in a nutshell, I took a Hobbit’s journey. I had been invited this summer to talk in New Zealand on Social Media matters, so at the end of May I packed my bags and took off on Air New Zealand Flight 5 for Auckland. Seeing as I had never traveled this far before, I was working hard my “Travel Planning Fu” in trying to make all of my bags and carry-on’s maximized in what they could hold. Prepping and packing for a trip like this also made me tap into the full potential of the very apps you’ll see me reviewing in my next few posts. Your iPhone, with the right tools and the right approach, can serve as the ultimate carry-on luggage; so before setting on that road or casting off on a sea cruise, take a moment to consider how your iPhone can help you make the most of your trip. The first thing you should do is start shopping for solid travel applications. You will want to track your flight and while there are widgets available for your computer’s desktop, it is a good idea to find one for your iPhone. There are two applications that offer an all-in-one flight planner and To Do list, Trips with TripIt (from Unitconvertr) and TravelTracker with TripIt (from Silverware Software, which I have reviewed). These apps will import your itinerary and provide any flight updates and (most importantly) weather changes directly to your iPhone. Much like car salesmen, politicians, and Social Media experts, weathermen are not to be trusted blindly. Atmospheric patterns can change on a dime. With up-to-date information accessible anywhere, you might find your stress levels exponentially lower with these apps on call. You can keep an eye on your flight as you travel between home and airport. You can also plan for unexpected mad dashes to connecting flights if a delay turns a one-hour layover into a five-minute sprint. Another fantastic attribute of both Trips and TravelTracker is that both will give you the ability to input more than just your air travel itinerary. Heading to Vegas? Maybe you’ve got tickets already in hand for Penn & Teller or Cirque du Soleil? (I recommend “O” — that’s a great show!) If this is a business trip (because in Vegas it’s always “business time”…), you might have a meeting scheduled, a presentation to give, or a client that insists the best place to talk is on the back nine. Trips and TravelTracker allow you to organize your out-of-town events, and even send reminders to you (either via email or from the app itself) of when it’s close to “Go” time. You can also keep your hotel and car reservations on call, just in case you’re told on arrival “I’m sorry, but we don’t have you listed staying with us.” These apps will have in a few taps your reservation, confirmation number, and your Preferred Member status, so you are covered on all fronts. You will also want to shop for some good games or maybe a pleasant distraction in the way of television or movies. On my flight from Washington to L.A., I was given the choice of either Bride Wars or…well, that was it. Fortunately on my iPhone I had downloaded and synced up a few video gems, one of them being “Mirror, Mirror” from the digitally-remastered Star Trek: The Original Series. It not only looked great on my iPhone, it also saved me from United Airlines’ Chick Flick for the Flight. Now that you have the apps you need, you will want to prep the phone for your actual travel. If you’re road tripping, there will be little to no preparation involved. Air travel is another matter all together. Before stepping on board your flight to destinations coast-to-coast or abroad, pull up the Settings of your iPhone and run down this quick checklist: Under WiFi, is your iPhone’s WiFi on or off? Under Mail, Contacts, Calendars, is “Fetch New Data” set to “Push” or is it off? Before the flight, is Airplane Mode on or off? The final item on this checklist — Airplane Mode — is an important one. This is the mode you hear flight crew refer to just before takeoff. Airplane Mode tends to disable all your call and data push features, but my own checklist is more precautionary than necessary. By turning Airplane Mode on, you are assuring that your iPhone will not interfere with the plane’s operations. Before anyone says it, yes, I’ve seen the Mythbusters where Kari, Tori, and Grant disprove mobile phones cause interference with aeronautical instruments . However, FAA regulations are FAA regulations. Even the Build Team say so. Traveling internationally, like I did with my New Zealand adventure, makes my three-item checklist not so much precautionary, but more mandatory. Outrageous bills for data transfers tend to happen often to internationally-traveling AT&T customers ( including a Mythbuster ). In fact, it happens so often, I wonder if anyone is really paying attention and asking questions before traveling. What exactly does AT&T define as data? How do you find out what your average data rate is for a week? What are your options for data transfer when traveling international, be it Canada or New Caledonia? Many of these questions can be answered with AT&T’s myWireless , a free app dedicated to Customer Service for iPhone users. (In some cases, myWireless is a lot easier to work with than AT&T’s actual Customer Service, but I digress.) The best option when abroad, though, is to disable data pushing, disable wifi, and limit data exchanges to SMS messages. Then on activating international calling plans offered from myWireless, your iPhone is ready for international travel. These simple steps will avoid you facing outrageous phone bills such as the whopping $62,000 bill one user accrued when downloading a movie while in Mexico. These may sound like boneheaded catastrophes, but these horror stories usually involve people who are intelligent, savvy computer users that make simple mistakes and skip precautions. Getting into a rush and forgetting things like your iPhone Settings is a human thing to do, especially when you’re running down your To Do list and making sure you are all set and ready to go. Before stepping on board your flight to destinations abroad, stop and take a few minutes to check if you have prepped your iPhone for travel. If you’re not certain, then pull up your Settings and run down my recommended checklist. These few adjustments may be all that is needed to prep your phone for travel, making the overall experience for you and your companions a better organized, safer, and saner trip to destinations elsewhere. Related Posts Review: Travel Tracker with TripIt Review: Disneyland CA Planner AT&T Unveils New International Service Plans Just for iPhone Developer Fights Back, GV Mobile Already Available Via Cydia Apple Pulls Google Voice-Enabled Apps, Rejects Official Google Voice App

It feels great to be back with AppAdvice. If you were wondering what had happened to me, take a look at my review for TravelTracker; but in a nutshell, I took a Hobbit’s journey. I had been invited this summer to talk in New Zealand on Social Media matters, so at the end of May I packed my bags and took off on Air New Zealand Flight 5 for Auckland. Seeing as I had never traveled this far before, I was working hard my “Travel Planning Fu” in trying to make all of my bags and carry-on’s maximized in what they could hold. Prepping and packing for a trip like this also made me tap into the full potential of the very apps you’ll see me reviewing in my next few posts. Your iPhone, with the right tools and the right approach, can serve as the ultimate carry-on luggage; so before setting on that road or casting off on a sea cruise, take a moment to consider how your iPhone can help you make the most of your trip. The first thing you should do is start shopping for solid travel applications. You will want to track your flight and while there are widgets available for your computer’s desktop, it is a good idea to find one for your iPhone. There are two applications that offer an all-in-one flight planner and To Do list, Trips with TripIt (from Unitconvertr) and TravelTracker with TripIt (from Silverware Software, which I have reviewed). These apps will import your itinerary and provide any flight updates and (most importantly) weather changes directly to your iPhone. Much like car salesmen, politicians, and Social Media experts, weathermen are not to be trusted blindly. Atmospheric patterns can change on a dime. With up-to-date information accessible anywhere, you might find your stress levels exponentially lower with these apps on call. You can keep an eye on your flight as you travel between home and airport. You can also plan for unexpected mad dashes to connecting flights if a delay turns a one-hour layover into a five-minute sprint. Another fantastic attribute of both Trips and TravelTracker is that both will give you the ability to input more than just your air travel itinerary. Heading to Vegas? Maybe you’ve got tickets already in hand for Penn & Teller or Cirque du Soleil? (I recommend “O” — that’s a great show!) If this is a business trip (because in Vegas it’s always “business time”…), you might have a meeting scheduled, a presentation to give, or a client that insists the best place to talk is on the back nine. Trips and TravelTracker allow you to organize your out-of-town events, and even send reminders to you (either via email or from the app itself) of when it’s close to “Go” time. You can also keep your hotel and car reservations on call, just in case you’re told on arrival “I’m sorry, but we don’t have you listed staying with us.” These apps will have in a few taps your reservation, confirmation number, and your Preferred Member status, so you are covered on all fronts. You will also want to shop for some good games or maybe a pleasant distraction in the way of television or movies. On my flight from Washington to L.A., I was given the choice of either Bride Wars or…well, that was it. Fortunately on my iPhone I had downloaded and synced up a few video gems, one of them being “Mirror, Mirror” from the digitally-remastered Star Trek: The Original Series. It not only looked great on my iPhone, it also saved me from United Airlines’ Chick Flick for the Flight. Now that you have the apps you need, you will want to prep the phone for your actual travel. If you’re road tripping, there will be little to no preparation involved. Air travel is another matter all together. Before stepping on board your flight to destinations coast-to-coast or abroad, pull up the Settings of your iPhone and run down this quick checklist: Under WiFi, is your iPhone’s WiFi on or off? Under Mail, Contacts, Calendars, is “Fetch New Data” set to “Push” or is it off? Before the flight, is Airplane Mode on or off? The final item on this checklist — Airplane Mode — is an important one. This is the mode you hear flight crew refer to just before takeoff. Airplane Mode tends to disable all your call and data push features, but my own checklist is more precautionary than necessary. By turning Airplane Mode on, you are assuring that your iPhone will not interfere with the plane’s operations. Before anyone says it, yes, I’ve seen the Mythbusters where Kari, Tori, and Grant disprove mobile phones cause interference with aeronautical instruments . However, FAA regulations are FAA regulations. Even the Build Team say so. Traveling internationally, like I did with my New Zealand adventure, makes my three-item checklist not so much precautionary, but more mandatory. Outrageous bills for data transfers tend to happen often to internationally-traveling AT&T customers ( including a Mythbuster ). In fact, it happens so often, I wonder if anyone is really paying attention and asking questions before traveling. What exactly does AT&T define as data? How do you find out what your average data rate is for a week? What are your options for data transfer when traveling international, be it Canada or New Caledonia? Many of these questions can be answered with AT&T’s myWireless , a free app dedicated to Customer Service for iPhone users. (In some cases, myWireless is a lot easier to work with than AT&T’s actual Customer Service, but I digress.) The best option when abroad, though, is to disable data pushing, disable wifi, and limit data exchanges to SMS messages. Then on activating international calling plans offered from myWireless, your iPhone is ready for international travel. These simple steps will avoid you facing outrageous phone bills such as the whopping $62,000 bill one user accrued when downloading a movie while in Mexico. These may sound like boneheaded catastrophes, but these horror stories usually involve people who are intelligent, savvy computer users that make simple mistakes and skip precautions. Getting into a rush and forgetting things like your iPhone Settings is a human thing to do, especially when you’re running down your To Do list and making sure you are all set and ready to go. Before stepping on board your flight to destinations abroad, stop and take a few minutes to check if you have prepped your iPhone for travel. If you’re not certain, then pull up your Settings and run down my recommended checklist. These few adjustments may be all that is needed to prep your phone for travel, making the overall experience for you and your companions a better organized, safer, and saner trip to destinations elsewhere. Related Posts Review: Travel Tracker with TripIt Review: Disneyland CA Planner AT&T Unveils New International Service Plans Just for iPhone Developer Fights Back, GV Mobile Already Available Via Cydia Apple Pulls Google Voice-Enabled Apps, Rejects Official Google Voice App

Overview As a writer, speaker, and all around “Too-Busy-to-Get-Intro-Trouble-but-I-Try” kind of guy, I find it funny that I am charged by AppAdvice to talk about organization and productivity. I would have never seen myself working with such apps on my iPhone like the ones I’ve been reviewing here, and while many of them are variations on a theme you will find one of those gems that thinks every way around a concept and makes it better. When you do that with something like To Do lists, that’s pretty impressive. Take a Note (by Readdle Software and priced at $4.99), from the moment you boot it up, promises to make something as mundane as daily time management and organization of To Do list far less boring and far more efficient. Sporting a highly visual, varied media interface, Take a Note breaks away from the pack of iPhone organizers and helps you keep everything together. Features User-Friendly Interface Perhaps my biggest gripe with many of the Organizer apps out there has been the learning curve involved in how they work. While you assign deadlines, there are projects that serve as a parent category for these individual items; but when both have separate deadlines and you cannot organize either deadlines, items, or projects intuitively (or even by your own quirky system), then the organizer becomes somewhat frustrating. It becomes doubly so, when you need to download a second application to “unlock the app’s potential.” Take a Note makes mastering of their interface and managing of your categories a snap. Simply launch Take a Note, tap Add a Note and do just that: take a note. Once you type in your reminder or To Do item, immediately tap the Category tab, tap Add New Category, and create it. From here, the Category can either be used in the future or you can repeat this step and make new one. When you are done, tap Done in the top left corner and return to the main Add Note interface. Simple. Elegant. Logical. Take a Note developers also know how much iPhone users love landscape which is why the application supports Landscape Orientation. This is a real joy for me, especially when typing in the detailed goals for the day. What if Inspiration Hits Me Behind the Wheel? That’s what happened to me when I got the idea for The Case of the Singing Sword: A Billibub Baddings Mystery . I tried to write down both the title and the opening line while in rush hour traffic. I would describe the experience as “Analog Texting 1.0” and was lucky I didn’t sideswipe someone on the D.C. Beltway. Take a Note would have been really handy here as you can simply tap on “Audio Note” to access its audio recording feature. Even before iPhone 3.0’s Voice Memos feature, Take a Note offered this option to turn your iPhone into a sharp, little digital recorder. The app’s recorder has terrific pickups so there’s no need to raise your voice. Speak normally, use the headset with your iPhone, and capture your inspiration. Once you park the car, tap the “Stop” button and then add in any relevant notes and categories by tapping the tabs accompanying the audio note. If the inspiration is more visual, Take a Note offers Photo Note. What’s that? When you tap on the feature, the interface suggests you either take a picture or use one from your gallery. Whichever one you choose, the image will appear as if it has been scotch-taped into this journal running on your iPhone. As with the Audio Notes, you can also assign notes and categories with the image. WiFi Integration If you take advantage of your Audio Notes, you might find yourself filling up your iPhone with a lot of AIF files. Keep in mind that 20-30 seconds of audio can take up a megabyte. Not a lot when you have a few gigabytes available, but you can easily burn through that data space if you have apps, movies, music, and other necessities loaded. Fortunately, Take a Note makes wireless integration with your desktop or laptop a breeze. Simply tap on the “WiFi Access” option in the menu, enter the offered IP Address into your computer, and your iPhone appears. (If you’re having difficulties, access Help by tapping on the question mark.) Your iPhone, once mounting on your computer, will show you your categories. Your notes will be TXT files, audio will appear as AIF files, and images will also be there as JPG files. You can set up an Archive on your computer and “clean house” if needed. Breakdown The Good: Visually, Take a Note is the sweetest of eye candy. I appreciate that something so tedious as putting together and maintaining To Do lists has been given this kind of slick look and intuitive interface. I am finding the Audio and Photo Notes a real blessing, and have been filling my iPhone with future projects and ideas for podcasts and blog postings. I’ve even dropped in a reoccurring note for myself to blog, an image of one of my favorite mugs serving as inspiration. It is worth mentioning that when you transfer photos from your iPhone to the computer and “Delete Originals” you do not lose the Photo Note. A copy of the image remains in Take a Note, and can be retrieved (or removed entirely from your iPhone) with a WiFi transfer. And for Take a Note’s Landscape Orientation support — two words: Thank you! The app’s own organization of your categories, found under the “Notes” option, is also sensible and aesthetic. The top portion features all items listed by format while the lower portion organizes items by Category. The “Settings” (the gears icon in the upper-left corner) also allow you to fine tune your notes, ranging from a variety of typefaces you can use to an alphabetical sort for even more tidiness. The Bad: As far as To Do lists and organizers go, this app has raised the bar both from a visual and an interactive perspective. I do love that. However, I am disappointed with everything Take a Note takes into account, it does not offer assignments or alerts for To Do’s Due Dates. Along with this, there are no real ways to tick off an item as “Completed.” It’s either there or in the trash. This is a slick app and features like these I’d love to see in the future. Another detail not offered is allowing for one To Do item to appear across multiple categories. The app’s ability to create categories is reminiscent of working with WordPress , both on the desktop and the iPhone . WordPress does allow “multiple category” assignments for one item, though. I wish Take a Note did the same. Verdict For right-brained people like me, Take a Note takes away some of the pain of organizing To Do lists and important things needing attention with its beautiful graphics and ease-of-use. Of all the various organizers I’ve been toying and tinkering with, I vote this one as my favorite, and find it a worthwhile investment for the iPhone. It may lack a few features that should be standard for Productivity apps like a “Status” of specific items and the ability to assign one item in multiple categories; but when you need to get an idea down and get it down fast, or if you want to record an inspiration that you catch with your iPhone’s camera, this is the application for you. That, and if you just want an organizer with a touch of class, is reason enough to pick up Take a Note. Go on and fire it up — you can practically smell the leather of its cover and feel the parchment of its interface. Related Posts Column: The Secret to Getting Things Done — Keeping It Simple ReaddleDocs - iPhone Document Viewer Now On Sale All It Takes Is a Little Discipline Review: RjDj Album Review: Travel Tracker with TripIt

Overview As a writer, speaker, and all around “Too-Busy-to-Get-Intro-Trouble-but-I-Try” kind of guy, I find it funny that I am charged by AppAdvice to talk about organization and productivity. I would have never seen myself working with such apps on my iPhone like the ones I’ve been reviewing here, and while many of them are variations on a theme you will find one of those gems that thinks every way around a concept and makes it better. When you do that with something like To Do lists, that’s pretty impressive. Take a Note (by Readdle Software and priced at $4.99), from the moment you boot it up, promises to make something as mundane as daily time management and organization of To Do list far less boring and far more efficient. Sporting a highly visual, varied media interface, Take a Note breaks away from the pack of iPhone organizers and helps you keep everything together. Features User-Friendly Interface Perhaps my biggest gripe with many of the Organizer apps out there has been the learning curve involved in how they work. While you assign deadlines, there are projects that serve as a parent category for these individual items; but when both have separate deadlines and you cannot organize either deadlines, items, or projects intuitively (or even by your own quirky system), then the organizer becomes somewhat frustrating. It becomes doubly so, when you need to download a second application to “unlock the app’s potential.” Take a Note makes mastering of their interface and managing of your categories a snap. Simply launch Take a Note, tap Add a Note and do just that: take a note. Once you type in your reminder or To Do item, immediately tap the Category tab, tap Add New Category, and create it. From here, the Category can either be used in the future or you can repeat this step and make new one. When you are done, tap Done in the top left corner and return to the main Add Note interface. Simple. Elegant. Logical. Take a Note developers also know how much iPhone users love landscape which is why the application supports Landscape Orientation. This is a real joy for me, especially when typing in the detailed goals for the day. What if Inspiration Hits Me Behind the Wheel? That’s what happened to me when I got the idea for The Case of the Singing Sword: A Billibub Baddings Mystery . I tried to write down both the title and the opening line while in rush hour traffic. I would describe the experience as “Analog Texting 1.0” and was lucky I didn’t sideswipe someone on the D.C. Beltway. Take a Note would have been really handy here as you can simply tap on “Audio Note” to access its audio recording feature. Even before iPhone 3.0’s Voice Memos feature, Take a Note offered this option to turn your iPhone into a sharp, little digital recorder. The app’s recorder has terrific pickups so there’s no need to raise your voice. Speak normally, use the headset with your iPhone, and capture your inspiration. Once you park the car, tap the “Stop” button and then add in any relevant notes and categories by tapping the tabs accompanying the audio note. If the inspiration is more visual, Take a Note offers Photo Note. What’s that? When you tap on the feature, the interface suggests you either take a picture or use one from your gallery. Whichever one you choose, the image will appear as if it has been scotch-taped into this journal running on your iPhone. As with the Audio Notes, you can also assign notes and categories with the image. WiFi Integration If you take advantage of your Audio Notes, you might find yourself filling up your iPhone with a lot of AIF files. Keep in mind that 20-30 seconds of audio can take up a megabyte. Not a lot when you have a few gigabytes available, but you can easily burn through that data space if you have apps, movies, music, and other necessities loaded. Fortunately, Take a Note makes wireless integration with your desktop or laptop a breeze. Simply tap on the “WiFi Access” option in the menu, enter the offered IP Address into your computer, and your iPhone appears. (If you’re having difficulties, access Help by tapping on the question mark.) Your iPhone, once mounting on your computer, will show you your categories. Your notes will be TXT files, audio will appear as AIF files, and images will also be there as JPG files. You can set up an Archive on your computer and “clean house” if needed. Breakdown The Good: Visually, Take a Note is the sweetest of eye candy. I appreciate that something so tedious as putting together and maintaining To Do lists has been given this kind of slick look and intuitive interface. I am finding the Audio and Photo Notes a real blessing, and have been filling my iPhone with future projects and ideas for podcasts and blog postings. I’ve even dropped in a reoccurring note for myself to blog, an image of one of my favorite mugs serving as inspiration. It is worth mentioning that when you transfer photos from your iPhone to the computer and “Delete Originals” you do not lose the Photo Note. A copy of the image remains in Take a Note, and can be retrieved (or removed entirely from your iPhone) with a WiFi transfer. And for Take a Note’s Landscape Orientation support — two words: Thank you! The app’s own organization of your categories, found under the “Notes” option, is also sensible and aesthetic. The top portion features all items listed by format while the lower portion organizes items by Category. The “Settings” (the gears icon in the upper-left corner) also allow you to fine tune your notes, ranging from a variety of typefaces you can use to an alphabetical sort for even more tidiness. The Bad: As far as To Do lists and organizers go, this app has raised the bar both from a visual and an interactive perspective. I do love that. However, I am disappointed with everything Take a Note takes into account, it does not offer assignments or alerts for To Do’s Due Dates. Along with this, there are no real ways to tick off an item as “Completed.” It’s either there or in the trash. This is a slick app and features like these I’d love to see in the future. Another detail not offered is allowing for one To Do item to appear across multiple categories. The app’s ability to create categories is reminiscent of working with WordPress , both on the desktop and the iPhone . WordPress does allow “multiple category” assignments for one item, though. I wish Take a Note did the same. Verdict For right-brained people like me, Take a Note takes away some of the pain of organizing To Do lists and important things needing attention with its beautiful graphics and ease-of-use. Of all the various organizers I’ve been toying and tinkering with, I vote this one as my favorite, and find it a worthwhile investment for the iPhone. It may lack a few features that should be standard for Productivity apps like a “Status” of specific items and the ability to assign one item in multiple categories; but when you need to get an idea down and get it down fast, or if you want to record an inspiration that you catch with your iPhone’s camera, this is the application for you. That, and if you just want an organizer with a touch of class, is reason enough to pick up Take a Note. Go on and fire it up — you can practically smell the leather of its cover and feel the parchment of its interface. 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According to a recent AppleInsider posting, keywords have come to the App Store. It seems that Apple has finally realized that certain apps were not all that easy to find, and in an effort to improve upon that, they are now asking developers to submit a list of keywords with their apps. “developers are now asked

The free MobileMe iDisk app that Apple promised us back in June is now available in the App Store. As expected the app is available for free, of course a MobileMe account (which is not free) is required for use. Honestly, the app does just what you would expect in ways that you would expect. In