Tuesday, April 27, 2010

My Top 5 N900 Applications

Apps, apps, apps! They make or break an operating system (mobile or otherwise). I've had my N900 for over four months now, and I use it at least four or more hours per day. The following are my top five application picks that are not included on the N900 by default.

#1 Firefox - Easily my favorite way to surf the web, on the N900 or otherwise. If you want more of my thoughts on this one check out my Firefox Mobile Review.

#2 fMMS - This application steps up to fill one of the biggest mess-ups Nokia made when they released the N900: lack of MMS support. fMMS currently supports sending pictures and receiving all types of media messages. Since I discovered this wonderful application I no longer have to hear my friends say "your phone does all that, but can't get a picture message?"

#3 TweeGo - Easily one of the most professional looking applications in the repositories that was created just for the N900. The UI is pleasing to the eye, easy to navigate, and provides everything you need to fully use twitter.

#4 FaceBrick - Currently still in development, FaceBrick just recently released its 0.3 version. It supports viewing your news feed, posting/viewing comments on posts, and posting your own status updates. This is for sure one to keep your eye on and I have no doubt that within a couple of months it will be just as polished and feature rich as TweeGo.

#5 Conky - Ever wonder what application is eating up all your system resources? Or maybe want to quickly check exactly how much rootfs space your device has left without having to crack open a terminal? Conky is your one stop application for all system monitoring related tasks.

And finally, because I want to include a good N900 game on this list, I'd like to include my girlfriend's pick for best N900 application: Angry Birds. Seriously, if you own an N900 and haven't downloaded and tried this one yet, stop reading this and go get it now. At least an hour of classic video game fun in that one there :)

What are your favorite N900/Maemo applications that you use everyday on your device? Looking for some other useful applications for the N900?

~Jeff Hoogland

14 comments:

  1. Browsing through what I've got installed, here's my favourites in more or less alphabetical order:

    Extra Decoders Support - Play more file formats.

    ForecaWeather widget - Seems reasonably accurate compared to some.

    Leafpad - My text editor of choice on PCs too.

    OpenSSH client & server - Opens up so many possibilities...

    Personal IP Address - Just in case I need to know quickly.

    rootsh - Same comment as OpenSSH

    systeminfowidget - Not a conky fan.

    vim - Because I'm a bit of a geek...

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  2. I need to get a N900, my current linux based phone that is in the palm of my hand keeps the power of linux away from me :(

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  3. Great list, Jeff. It's hard to overstate how awesome fMMS is - glad it made your list.

    Have you used Hermes? Facebook contact integration is a killer feature IMO. I also agree with Richard's mention of Extra Decoders Support and ForecaWeather.

    TouchSearch is another favorite. I find myself using it more than any other widget.

    The N900 has some great (free!) games. Tuxrace shows off a nice mix of 3D and accelerometer usage, Gweled for Bejeweled fans, and PrBoom if you like classic FPS titles. For those into the emulator scene, the N900 is hard to beat (PSX, SNES, NES, GBA, Sega, ScummVM, many others).

    Simple FMTX desktop widget + FM Boost makes the FM transmitter way more useful (if you use that feature).

    Headphone daemon automatically silences the media player if the headphones are pulled out - love that at work.

    Flashlight lets you use the camera LEDs as a flashlight. Surprisingly handy!

    Easy Debian is fun for demonstrating full Linux apps running on a phone (OpenOffice.org, GIMP, etc).

    WifiEye is a must-have if you use a lot of wifi.

    I could go on for awhile... :) Love the N900. Thanks for the great post!

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  4. @Tanner I have most of those applications installed actually - there are many good ones, thus why I listed my top 5 :)

    Hermes almost made the list but I felt the others I used a bit more. As for facebook chat support - while I use it, it irks me to no end that due to the FB IMs having different ID numbers each sign on I cannot properly merge a person's facebook IM with their phone # contact and have it stick.

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  5. No love for Prismic Wallpaper Manager? Really?

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  6. Prismis wallpaper manger isn't free. Having to pay for 1 program out of hundreds... just doesn't make it reach the list.

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  7. That does look like a nifty application (and I am not against paying for applications, I own sygic for GPS) I was just not aware of it before your mentioning of it and after looking it over I still doubt it would have made my top 5 ;)

    Thanks for reading.

    ~Jeff

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  8. Prismic isn't expensive at all and is by far the best wallpaper manager. In fact I can't recommend it enough.

    Back to the topic at hand - I've had the N900 for over 3 months now and I can't possibly list my top 21, if I don't count the obvious beauties (camera, conversations, email, phone etc):

    1) PokerTH - Awesome poker game online!
    2) Vagalume - LastFM player - Awesome choice!
    3) MediaBox - Music/Video/Photos
    4) Prismic - Wallpaper Manager
    5) MussOrgsky - MP3 tag editor
    6) gPodder - Podcasting player
    7) Firefox / Default Browser
    8) Facebrick - facebook built in - Awesome!
    9) Feed Circuit - RSS Reader
    10) Macuco - Twitter, Gmail are amazing.
    11) Wordpress - blogging tool.
    12) Xchat IRC - because I like old school chat.
    13) Notes - notepad editor
    14) Evernote - online sharing of notes anywhere
    15) Tunewiki - lyrics to songs
    16) Angry Birds - Game
    17) Transition Control
    18) BlueMaemo - Bluetooth tool works brilliantly with PS3, mouse, keyboard etc.
    19) F1 - Live timings.
    20) CuteExplorer - vrilliant file manager
    21) Hermes - Facebook / twitter

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  9. My imperative apps are:

    01 Rootsh
    and in an alphabetic order:

    02 3G/2G Dual mode selection applet
    03 Desktop Command Execution Widget
    04 joikuspot
    05 Fuelpad
    06 Personal Dataplan Monitor
    07 Phone Speakers Switcher
    08 pokerth
    09 pysafe
    10 recaller
    11 Sharing picasaweb
    12 Simple Brightness Applet
    13 sleeper
    14 StockThis
    15 TouchSearch (google desktop icon)
    16 tweego
    17 zoutube

    and what I miss a lot: a map with voice orientation (Sygic already launch some but not for my country)

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  10. i am using N900 i had buy from dubai but i am getting problem i cant check balance enquiry i am dialling *123# but it shows incorrect no can anyone tell how to overcome from this problem

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  11. Hi Mustafa,

    You need to update your N900 with latest version (V 10.2010.19-1)

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  12. I just got a n900! This post was very usefull.
    Thak You.

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  13. I just want to mention the U-Done Todo Manager (Lite). My colleagues created it and I believe it should be there on your top apps list - if you are a busy person at least.

    Link to it:
    http://store.ovi.com/content/121065

    What do you think about it?

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  14. I am amazed to see no one mentioning Opera browser in there list.Generally for browsing around it is really really fast.Maybe i am wrong but i LOVE ITTT

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