Handmark brings a satisfying Twitter environment to the Android operating system with its new TweetCaster Pro application. Now available in the Android Market and on Handmark's site for $4.99, TweetCaster Pro offers everything you'd expect from Twitter in a user-friendly design. We have just a couple of suggestions to make it better, though we think it's worth the price. You also can get an ad-supported free version that has the same features.

The download process was quick and incident-free. TweetCaster Pro takes up 850KB of memory; though that's not a lot of space, keep in mind that the Android OS limits app storage to your handset's internal memory. We tested the app with a Motorola Cliq, which has 512MB ROM and 256MB RAM.

On the whole, TweetCaster Pro runs smoothly. We didn't experience any crashes and it doesn't appear to slow down the phone's other functions. Our only complaint was that the app can take almost 10 seconds to load when you activate it after powering the phone on. On the upside, the process was quicker on subsequent launches, but you'll be forced back to the longer start screen the next time you turn off your handset.

The interface is simple and easy to follow. After signing in (also a quick process) you'll see the most recent tweets from those you follow in a list form. Your tweets will appear as well, but they'll be marked in dark green. At the top of the list are five tabs for your full tweet list, tweets that just mention you, direct messages, your favorites, and any lists that you follow. You can change the background to a light or dark color and you can alter the font size.

Small yellow dots on the first two tabs let you know you have new tweets or mentions. That's helpful, but we'd prefer seeing the number of tweets as well. Fortunately, Handmark promises that a release scheduled for the next few weeks will correct that problem.

You should see about four tweets at one time on your display, but the number will vary according to your handset's display size and just how verbose your friends are. It would be nice to see a truncated version of longer tweets, but that's a minor point. A separate screen shows your full list of followers and users whom you follow.

The app is available in landscape mode as well, but we didn't use it since only two tweets are visible at a time. On the other hand, the landscape mode can be handy for writing your own tweets. To get there, just tap the pencil icon at the top right corner of the display (on the Cliq you can use the physical or virtual keyboard). The menu button takes you to various commands and settings plus an option to jump to the top of your tweet list. That's a nice touch.

TweetCaster Pro supports multiple accounts. That's a must for any Twitter app, though we have to click a few times to switch between accounts. Perhaps in a future release we'll be able to jump between accounts with a horizontal finger swipe.

The real appeal of TweetCaster is its solid feature set. You can view and create lists right on the phone, set up filters, reply to and retweet updates, view threads, block users or report them as spam, scan trends, choose favorite tweets, follow and unfollow users, and see full profiles. You also can upload photos and share links right on the phone. In the setting menu you have the option for using either bit.ly or is.gd for URLs and either twitpic or yfrog for photos. And thankfully, you can turn off the alerts for new tweets and direct messages.

To find new friends you can search by name or Twitter ID. If you know an ID the handy Quick Follow feature lets you find users and follow them with one press. Alternatively, you can search for nearby using your ZIP code or GPS location.

Even with our interface gripes, we think TweetCaster Pro is at the top of the Android pile of Twitter apps. Its intuitive interface design, loaded feature set, and quick performance make it a must for any Tweet-happy Android user

Originally posted at Android Atlas

Alarm clock. Metronome. Guitar tuner. TV remote. The list of real-world items the iPhone can replace just keeps getting longer. The latest entry: wireless headset.

Shape Services' Mobiola Headset app turns your iPhone or iPod Touch into a wireless headset, suitable for use with Skype, MagicJack, or any other VoIP-powered applications. (I'm assuming it would work with games as well, though I haven't tried this myself.)

The 99-cent app works with all iPhone models and second-gen Touches (though the latter will need a plug-in headset, as it would for any kind of telephony).

On the PC side (Windows only, I'm afraid), you'll need to install the free Mobiola Headset utility, which connects your device to your PC over your home Wi-Fi network.

I tested Headset on an iPhone 3GS and a PC running Windows 7. The two apps recognized each other immediately (following a couple of firewall approvals), and from there it was smooth sailing.

The idea here, of course, is to avoid having to buy a wired headset for use with, say, Skype or Google Talk. And Headset gives you the freedom to mosey around the house while on a call--no need to stay tethered to your PC.

Now, you may ask yourself: Why bother with Headset when I could just run the infinitely-more-convenient Skype iPhone app? To which I would answer: Um, I don't know, that's a good point.

However, Headset does have one ace up its sleeve: call recording. The tap of an icon is all it takes to record your conversation (to your PC, in WAV format). The Skype app can't do that.

Furthermore, fire up iTunes (or your music player of choice) and Headset can turn your iPhone into wireless stereo headphones. (Just one wrinkle: On my system, I had to open Windows' audio settings and choose Mobiola as my default playback device. It's too bad the utility can't do that for you automatically.)

I even tried watching a movie this way, though there was just a hint of lag between the video and audio. Still, as a poor-man's wireless headphones, this is not a bad way to go.

Headset is a simple, effective app that works as advertised. It's way cheaper than any wired (or, for that matter, wireless) headset, and its option to record calls could prove very handy. Heck, you could even use it as a wireless microphone, if that's all you need.

Bonus item: Today only, Oceanhouse Media is offering all six of its stellar Dr. Seuss iPhone apps for 99 cents apiece. That includes the interactive e-book "The Cat in the Hat" and the fun, clever Dr. Seuss Camera. These usually sell for $2.99 or $3.99, so don't pass up this deal.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Goodbye Futhark, hello Carakan.

With Tuesday's release of Opera 10.5 for Windows, it's time for a new JavaScript engine. Opera's new Carakan engine is much faster than Futhark, an important consideration given the increasing demands Web applications put on the Web-based programming language.

My earlier tests on a dual-core Windows XP machine showed Google's V8 JavaScript engine still ahead of the Opera 10.5 beta, but Opera won out in several others' testing. Other rivals in JavaScript are Safari's Nitro, nee Squirrel Extreme, and Firefox's new JaegerMonkey, which combines Nitro with its earlier TraceMonkey JavaScript Engine.

Internet Explorer has long been the slowest of the five browsers at JavaScript, but Microsoft has pledged to improve scripting speed in Internet Explorer 9. So far, I've been unable to discover any amusing code names for its work.

JavaScript is just one attribute of a browser, of course. Other performance characteristics are how fast a browser can arrange all the elements of a Web page and handle the increasingly important CSS (Cascading Style Sheets) technology used in page design. Also new in Opera 10.5 is a graphics system called Vega that should improve performance, Opera said.

And of course there are features. One important one is HTML5 video. Opera supports the Ogg Theora technology favored by Mozilla in Firefox but not by Apple in Safari; Chrome supports both Ogg Theora and the format Apple prefers, H.264.

My personal favorite Opera feature is Turbo mode, which uses the company's servers to deliver lightweight versions of Web pages to those suffering slow Net connections. Generally I find Opera fairly snappy to use, including my tests today with the final version of 10.5.

Others include visual previews of tabs, which I switch off since it find it harder to keep my place when shuffling between tabs; Opera Link to synchronize data such as bookmarks and history among different computers; mouse gestures to control the browser navigation with swipes and sweeps rather than clicks and button presses; Speed Dial to populate otherwise empty new-tab pages with useful material such as favorite Web pages; built-in BitTorrent support; private browsing to keep traces of where you've been off your computer; and the newer Unite service to share video, audio, or other information directly from your computer.

The Windows beta preceded the Mac OS X and Linux versions, and it appears Opera is using the same timing for the final release of 10.5

Opera accounted for about 2.4 percent of the browser usage in February, fifth among browsers, according to data from Net Applications.

Originally posted at Deep Tech

I've been enjoying a Chrome feature that shows a pop-up bar suggesting translations of foreign Web pages into English--except for a single error yesterday when it erroneously thought a page was in Polish--so Windows users who visit pages not in their native tongues should note the arrival of the new 4.1 beta of Google's new browser.

Chrome 4.1.249.1021, for Windows only, adds the translation feature that already was in the developer-preview version of the browser I use.

It's particularly notable given Google's desire to lower the barriers to information access. Web pages already could be translated, but as with providing translated Web pages in search results, the automation makes other languages that much less an issue.

Also new is an updated privacy control panel that permits finer controls. "From these settings, you can control how browser cookies, images, JavaScript, plug-ins, and pop-ups are handled on a site-by-site basis. For example, you can set up cookie rules to allow cookies specifically only for sites that you trust, and block cookies from untrusted sites," said Wieland Holfelder, engineering director of Google Munich, in a blog post Monday.

Chrome programming efforts diverged for Windows on the one hand and Mac OS X and Linux on the other. In January, the Google released Chrome 4 in final form Windows only, with the notable feature being a framework for customizing the browser through extensions, and since then the team has been working on the 4.1 update.

The Mac OS X and Linux work, on the other hand, reached beta with a beta version released in February based on the 5.0 version of the code base. Much of the recent Windows development has also on the 5.0 branch of the Chrome code, though, so the teams are now more in sync.

One development direction are new abilities for Chrome extensions beyond the interfaces allowed in Chrome 4.0 and 4.1. But some new experimental Chrome extension interfaces are coming that programmers can test now, said Google programmer Erik Kay said in a Monday blog post.

One experimental interface lets programmers get access to a users' browsing history and modify the information. It also eventually will let programmers create their own browser history pages, rather requiring browser users to use the one built into Chrome. Another lets programmers get access to information about Chrome computing processes, such as how much memory each tab is using.

Chrome's biggest competitive target is Internet Explorer, which lacks some high-performance features such as speedy execution of JavaScript programs that Google desires in its effort to speed up the Web overall. But in practical terms, its greatest competition is likely Firefox, which like Chrome is an open-source project with cachet among technophiles and early adopters.

According to Net Applications' new market February statistics, Chrome edged up from 5.2 percent usage to 5.6 percent from January, while IE slipped from 62.1 percent to 61.6 percent and Firefox dropped from 24.4 percent to 24.2 percent.

However, Mozilla is working to keep Firefox relevant with new features. One is the new Jetpack extensions framework, which is conceptually similar to Chrome's in that both employ Web technologies such as HTML (Hypertext Markup Language) and CSS (Cascading Style Sheets).

Originally posted at Deep Tech