It's widely believe that Steve Jobs will announce the "iPhone 4G" at his keynote speech Apple's World Wide Developers Conference on June 7. This is exciting for a number of reasons, but for me, it couldn't come soon enough.

My trusty iPhone 3G is still working as well as can be expected, but I'm noticing more and more that it struggles to keep up with some of the  resource-heavy games I download. Beyond performance, there's a crack from the base of my iPhone that goes up its back that has definitely grown larger, and the Vibrate Silence Switch is less likely to stay locked in position. I even have a large speck of dust that seems to be on the inside of the screen (maybe from me keeping it in my pocket) that I've mostly trained myself to ignore. What I'm saying is, as long as the lines aren't too long, I'll be waiting just like everybody else soon after the launch.

I'm curious about other iPhone 3G users. How's your old iPhone 3G holding up? Let me know in the comments!

This week's apps include a full-featured alternative Web browser and a new physics puzzle game that gets its claws into you and won't let go.

Atomic Web Browser (99 cents) is a full featured replacement for Safari on the iPhone that has added features to make it worthy of checking out. Its features include the capability to create an infinite number of tabs, use ad-block to get rid of ads while you surf, and turn on private mode to disable history tracking and clear cookies when you exit the browser. Its customizable search lets you add or remove search engines so you can pick the ones you like to use most. You also can choose from several colored themes, lock the iPhone screen rotation, and run in full-screen mode for unfettered browsing.

Historically, I haven't paid much attention to alternative Web browsers because Safari does a fine job on its own. But Atomic Web Browser is fast, and the tabbed browsing and ad blocking make it a worthy download. The app has a huge list of settings you can play around with such as multitouch options to set up gestures for various actions; the capability to switch from tab to list view; bookmark scripts you can add that let you jump around a page according to your specifications and much more. If you find Safari a little light on features or if you like the idea of tabbed surfing and several ways to customize your Web experience, Atomic Web Browser is an excellent choice.

Cat Physics is a puzzle game that challenges you to pass a ball from one cat to another past obstacles and items that effect the trajectory of the ball. It has cute cartoon-like graphics and easy touch-screen controls that make this puzzler a fun diversion that's easy to pick-up and play. Though Cat Physics is very easy to understand initially, it gets challenging quickly.  It has levels that require you to use a number of tools to get the ball past complex obstacles and land right at the feet of the receiving cat. There are 50 levels to play through that become more challenging the farther up you play and it has a 3-star system to rate how efficiently you pass the ball using the straightest route possible.

Cat Physics seems simple for the first several levels, but you'll quickly realize there are a number of ways to reach your goal. You use movable little round icons with arrows to shoot the ball in the direction the arrow is pointing, and some levels have teleports that put the ball in a different area to help you reach the other cat. Some levels require you to press buttons to open doors and still others will have spinning objects you'll use to maneuver the ball through to the goal. You're not penalized for each turn you take, so trial and error becomes the norm as you figure out each level. Overall, if you like physics based games with challenging puzzles and plenty of replay value in a setting that's suitable for the whole family, Cat Physics is the perfect time waster.

What's your favorite iPhone app? Is your iPhone 3G on its last legs? Do you see yourself using Atomic Browser instead of Safari? What do you think of Cat Physics? Let me know in the comments.

Alternative free PDF readers have become something of a cottage industry in software, and Nitro just rewrote the instruction manual. A company known for its trialware-only versions of PDF readers, the new Nitro PDF Reader (32-bit | 64-bit) does just about everything the consumer could want in a free reader.

The company not only includes essential PDF reading and editing features at no cost to users, but there are no hidden tricks. There's no watermarking, no toolbars to install to get added functionality, no restricted saving. Combine the lack of limitations with Nitro's smart interface and smooth performance, and there's no reason not to give the PDF reader an Editors' Choice award.

Nitro PDF Reader boasts five main features: tabbed PDF reading; PDF editing including highlight tools for commenting and sticky notes for freeform comments; adding text to PDFs, which means that you can fill out forms easily; a signature stamp for digitally adding your imprimatur to documents; and PDF creation using drag-and-drop or the in-program PDF creating tool.

Tabbed PDF reading is nothing new, but the ease with which you can navigate through the PDF is what you'd previously expect only in paid programs. PDFs open into a ribbon interface that sounds cluttered from the description, but is actually well-organized and uncomplicated. At the top left corner is a Quick Access bar with button for key functions: open, save, print, undo, redo, and a customization option. Below that is the default ribbon, which can be hidden.

The extra features are what makes Nitro so usable, so it's not a coincidence that the ribbon opens to the Tasks menu. From there you can adjust how the PDF is displayed, swap the editing tools, create a PDF, and extract text or images. There's no way around the ribbon, but users who don't like it can hide it with an arrow next to the search field on the right.

The highlight tool will switch automatically from box highlighting to character highlighting, depending on whether you start highlighting in an empty space or over some text. It also lets you replace the yellow highlight with strike-through or underline. The sticky notes feature would be better served by allowing a single-click to bring up an existing note instead of a double-click, but creating one is dead easy. It also will record the computer's user name and add a timestamp to the note, making it an ideal tool for keeping track of ideas when collaborating.

The text tool is for adding freeform text to a PDF. Users who want to fill out a PDF-based form are better served by the form-filler tool that helps you locate fields needing input. This is a much simpler procedure, especially on government forms like an I-9, and ensures that the text is always properly aligned. You can also add your signature digitally, if you've got it saved as a file, through the stamp signature tool.

A less obvious option in Nitro is the secure digital signature management, accessible from the File menu under Digital IDs. This allows users to manage and edit certificate-based secured PDFs, which means that Nitro can be used to some degree in sensitive business situations.

Nitro PDF Reader sports a ribbon-style interface borrowed from the previously released paid version of Nitro. This may still frustrate some users, but it feels slick and connected to Microsoft Office. If you don't like or need the ribbon, you can hide it with an arrow that lives to the left of the search engine. You can also customize the ribbon, placing your most commonly accessed tools where you need them.

There's also a solid Help environment, not only including links to the knowledge base and user forum, but also links for submitting bugs and suggesting new features.

In testing, Nitro's functionality kept pace with its comprehensive toolset. When you install it, it will ask if you want to contribute anonymous usage data. Users are opted in automatically, so if you don't like contributing don't install on autopilot. When it comes to performance, Nitro feels as fast as its major competitors such as Foxit in opening PDFs cold. Converting larger files from their original format to PDF does take a while, but that seems to depend more on your hardware and the document's contents than any problems in Nitro. The drag-and-drop took a few seconds to begin once initiated, but overall converting a four-page Word document took about 2 minutes. Loading even lengthy PDFs felt nearly instantaneous and responsive.

Nitro isn't perfect, but none of the problems were deal-breakers. For one thing, it's officially still in beta, which may account for some of the issues that follow. The program installed without fail on two x86 Windows 7 computers and one x64 Windows machine, but a small minority of users have reported crashes on start-up, preventing them from using the program at all. Converting documents on the fly into PDFs is a cool feature, but canceling PDF conversion did not stop the conversion process at all, and there appeared to be occasional text and word-wrap conversion conflicts when the source file was a MS Word DOC. In these rare instances, the text was imported as a low-quality image, rendering it unsearchable.

Speaking of search, the search utility in the top right corner of the interface isn't bad, although it would be nice to see Windows 7-style federated searching. Lastly, there are no current plans for a Mac version.

Nitro PDF Reader Free does more by default than any free PDF reader currently available, does precisely what it advertises, and does it unobtrusively, rocketing it to the top of the PDF pack and making it definitely worthy of an Editors' Choice award.

Related podcast: Free PDF reader boasts advanced features with Larry Magid and Nitro PDF Chief Product Officer Lonn Lorenz.

Quieter yet more effective, the latest ZoneAlarm Firewall Free should be considered an excellent tool for replacing the otherwise adequate default Windows firewall.

It's a stronger option that includes quieter outbound protection, behavioral detection from the ZoneAlarm Internet security suite, automatic Wi-Fi security setting activation, antiphishing protection, an overhauled ZoneAlarm toolbar that will protect you even when hidden, six months free identity theft protection, and 2GB of free online storage.

It was with delight that I read these words on Thursday: "The proposed IndexedDB standard, which provides a local database store for Web applications, will be supported by Firefox 4."

The statement appears on Mozilla's new Firefox 4 for developers site, boding well for those of us who use the Web a lot: the IndexedDB interface gives Web applications a way to work even without a network connection.

The proposed IndexedDB addition to the HTML standard is one of a collection of technologies opening new horizons for Web programmers and putting competitive pressure on Adobe Systems' Flash Player plug-in. The main reason I'm interested in it in particular: the restoration and, I'd hope, improvement of Google Docs offline access and editing features. But I could see it as improving performance for some Web sites, too, through more sophisticated caching, for example.

When earlier this month Mozilla detailed Firefox 4 plans, including a desire to release the new version by November, the organization left IndexedDB support as a grayed-out item, meaning it wasn't committing. When I asked if things had changed since then, Mozilla displayed some optimism but left itself some IndexedDB wiggle room.

"Our team continues to work on both the implementation of IndexedDB as well as on the specification in collaboration with Microsoft and others," said Director of Firefox Mike Beltzner. "This work is moving fast; over the past two weeks there has been a lot of progress on the specification. We're still aiming to ship it with Firefox 4, assuming the quality of the specification and implementation meet the needs of Web developers looking to build applications that use client side storage."

Firefox faces new competition from Google Chrome in particular, but its usage continues to grow, and at least for newer Web sites, being something other than Internet Explorer isn't the liability it once was.

IndexedDB is one of a number of technologies developers should be aware of. Mozilla mentioned some earlier, but the developer page has a full list that's still under development. Some highlights:

• WebM. Google hadn't announced its royalty-free, open-source Web video project when Mozilla gave its May 11 list. It's no surprise, but WebM has indeed arrived on the Firefox 4 to-do list. Some raw developer-oriented builds of the software have support already.

• Multitouch. Apple's iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad don't run Firefox, but an increasing number of touch- and multitouch-operated devices will, including Google Android phones.

• WebGL. This technology for bringing 3D graphics to the Web uses the OpenGL ES 2.0 graphics interface, but Google is working on a technology to bridge to computers that only have Windows Direct3D drivers installed. Google's also working on a higher-level 3D graphics interface based on its O3D plug-in.

• WebSockets. This HTML feature is for better communications between a browser and a server.

• HTML5 parser. The HTML5 specification, while not finalized, brings some improvements to the rules for how to interpret Web pages, and Mozilla is moving to a new parser to handle that task. The HTML5 parser is faster than its predecessor and can display SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) amid other elements on a Web page.

• SMIL. The Synchronized Multimedia Integration Languagecan be used for some animation chores, encroaching somewhat on the toes of Adobe Systems' Flash.

This story was corrected at 9:51 a.m. PDT to correct Mike Beltzner's title. His title is director of Firefox.

Originally posted at Deep Tech

Opera, ever scrappy in its effort to promote its browser over larger rivals, is poking fun at Google's recent video boasting about the speed of its Chrome browser.

"The Opera browser is much faster than a potato," concludes Opera's low-budget video, which features herring-obsessed caricatured Scandinavians rolling the tubers into a pot of water at the same time Opera loads a Web page.

The video is a not-so-subtle dig at Google, which promoted Chrome's speed using elaborately staged stunts recorded with high-speed videography. The first example: involved shooting a potato through a grid to make french fries, with a Web page loading in scene as the sliced potato pieces whizzed by.

Joking aside, browser speed is important: people use Web pages more when the pages load and respond faster. All five of the top browser makers--Microsoft, Apple, Mozilla, Google, and Opera--are working as hard as possible on minimum launch times and page-load times and on fast execution of Web-based JavaScript programs.

Originally posted at Deep Tech

Your monthly iPhone bill is high enough without tacking on another $5, $15, or $20 for a text-messaging plan. That's why free-SMS apps are so popular: They let you text to your heart's content without putting a single extra penny in AT&T's pocket.

One of the most popular free-SMS apps, Textfree Unlimited, costs $5.99. That's pretty cheap considering the money it can save you in the long run. Well, now it's cheaper still: For a limited time, you can get Textfree Unlimited absolutely free. (After clicking that link, just click Download Now to get to the app's iTunes page.)

How limited a time is "a limited time"? The app is today's deal from Free App a Day--one of several Web sites that help you score free iPhone apps--so at the very least you have until the clock strikes midnight. But I've noticed that many of FAAD's freebies stay free for several days after the initial promotion, so who knows? This could go through the weekend.

I've tried most of the popular free-SMS apps, and while they're all pretty good, Textfree Unlimited is my favorite. It loads quickly, supports push notifications, and even lets you pick your own phone number to use for sending and receiving texts. (Ideally, texts from Textfree would appear to come from your actual phone number, but this is the next best thing.)

What's more, there's no longer an annual $5.99 fee to use Textfree. It's now free for life, though you do have to put up with a few ads. (Actually, you can "buy out" the ads if you want, but I can't locate the price tag for doing so.)

Bottom line: If you want to save yourself six bucks now and upward of $240 per year on SMS fees, grab Textfree Unlimited while it's free.

Originally posted at iPhone Atlas

Pop quiz: which company introduced a browser last September that Google now considers "antiquated"?

Answer: Google itself.

Version 3 of the Chrome browser is one of the browsers for which, starting June 1, Google is phasing out support on its Reader site. The site is used for reading Web pages whose updates are broadcast to subscribers through RSS or Atom feed technology.

"Reader is a cutting-edge Web application, and this will allow us to spend our time improving Reader instead of fixing issues with antiquated browsers," Mihai Parparita, a technical leader for Google Reader, said in a blog post this week. Reader kept Chrome 3 support longer than some sites: Google Docs dropped support for it and other older browsers on March 1.

In days of yore, browsers changed relatively slowly and were used to browse largely static Web pages. These days, however, browsers and the Web standards they employ are changing fast, developers want to be able to take advantage of newer technology such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) for formatting, and advanced programmers are building full-fledged Web applications that can be impossible to run on old browsers.

The Chrome 3 phase-out is a revealing contrast in product longevity compared with another browser on the hit list, Microsoft's Internet Explorer 6, introduced in 2001 and the scourge of Web developers who want support for modern Web standards. Even Microsoft wants to people to upgrade from IE6.

But Chrome is automatically updated in the background, without user intervention by default, and old versions fade rapidly into oblivion. Chrome 5 is the current stable version, and Chrome 3 accounted for just 0.11 percent of browser usage in April 2010, according to Net Applications statistics.

Other browsers losing Reader support are Firefox 1.0 and 2.0 and Safari 2.0 and 3.0, Google said.

Another change coming: Google is dropping Reader support for its Gears technology that among other things let a browser store Web data locally on a computer so it was available offline. "We launched offline support three years ago, but only a minority of Reader users actively use it today," Parparita said.

Browser makers are working on building Gears' offline storage abilities into nascent HTML standards, and Google has scrapped further Gears work in favor of HTML.

Originally posted at Deep Tech