we now join the 21st century, already in progress

[cellio]

We have joined the ranks of the smartphone-enabled. We had been Verizon customers and the Droid Bionic looked tempting on specs, but we ended up going across the street to T-Mobile (it seems safe now that AT&T is unlikely to buy them), where they're selling an all-you-can-eat plan for less than Verizon's metered plans and the staff were very helpful besides. (By comparison, I was only able to use a dummy Bionic at Verizon and the sales guy didn't seem to understand my need to use the phone before deciding.)

We were both having trouble with the touch keyboard; I assume that's something you just have to learn to do. So we both chose the MyTouch Slide (4G), which also has a physical keyboard that we were both able to use easily. I'll try to transition more to the touch keyboard, but meanwhile I can still complete a Google search or type a text message or the like on the first try when I need to.

(In case you're wondering, Dani decided that if he really really wants the iPhone 5 when it eventually comes out, he can buy an unlocked one and switch over to it.)

So what apps are must-haves? (Android 2.3.)

Edit: How do y'all post to LJ from your phones? I downloaded both "Livejournal" and "LJ Beetle"; in both cases I could figure out how to compose a post just fine, but could not find anything like a "post" or "send" button. Once I've got a buffer to send, what then?

Comments

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

I much prefer real keyboards, even if the buttons are too small for my adult fingers. It makes for a thicker phone but even haptic feedback doesn't make up for tapping on a screen. Seriously, the ancient membrane keyboards feel more comfortable to me than a screen does.

[cellio]

I've found, on both this one (with all of an hour's experience) andmy Kindle, that I seem to end up typing with fingernails (thumbnails in the case of the phone). It's less error-prone than my big fingers.

[http://users.livejournal.com/merle_/]

Exactly. Oddly enough my thumb tips seem more agile than my fingertips (or, well, nails). It might be because the fingers are trying to grasp the phone.

The Kindle keyboard layout feels weird to me, but at least the buttons are a bit futher apart. On my Pre typos are quite easy to make.

[dsrtao]

My list of largely free and mostly indispensable stuff:

Games:
Alchemy
Angry Birds
Frozen Bubble
Replica Island
Robo Defense
Rocket Bunnies
Simon Tatham's Puzzles
Torect
Twisty

Useful Stuff:
Android Agenda Widget
Barcode Scanner
ConnectBot
deciBel
FBReader
HandyCalc
K9 Mail
Listen
Maps
Multicon
OI Safe
Our Groceries
PDF Viewer
Ringdroid
StopWatch
Tone Picker
Voice Search

[alienor.livejournal.com]

We use Cozi for sharing grocery/shopping lists. I keep trying to get into the calendar function, but since Android has nice google calendar apps built in, I'll probably do a bit of work to get those set up instead. I like Cozi b/c I prefer to input info on the website (I'm terrible at phone typing) and it all syncs up.

[eub.livejournal.com]

IIRC these are all free ones:

Springpad (my favorite web-synced notepad app so far)
VidTrim (if you take videos, you can send friends just the good bit)
Rainy Days

Google apps if you use them:
Docs
Google Reader
GTasks (not written by G)
Translate (it's like living in the future)
Goggles (ditto)
Calendar, Gmail, Maps -- often preinstalled

The Google+ app has one feature that you might find useful even if you don't use G+: an easy way to back up photos you take so they're not just on your phone. If you trust Picasa to have those, you can ask it to automagically upload all the photos to a private Picasa album.

Utilities:
File Expert (do-everything)
AutoRotate Switch (quick disable autorotate)
Wifi Analyzer
GridSize (what's taking up all my SD card?)

Games:
Shortyz crossword puzzles
Robozzle

[sethg]

Resistance is futile. Welcome to the Collective.

The apps I use the most (aside from the ones that come with the phone, like Doodle Jump, and CatchTheBus, which is Boston-specific) are Aldiko, a free ebook reader (you can upload an epub file to the phone and use Aldiko to read it), Angry Birds (duh), CloudList Pro (which my wife and I are trying to use to create a common household to-do list), the B&N Nook app, OverDrive Media (which allows me to “borrow” ebooks from our local library), and Chumash Daily Portions, a Chumash-and-Rashi reader that I feel kind of meh about (the Android Hebrew font doesn’t have nikkudot in the right place, and the app makes certain assumptions about which text I want to read on which day).

[530nm330hz.livejournal.com]

MessagEase is my keyboard of choice. It takes some getting used to, but it's great. I can hold my phone with one hand and use the thumb of that same hand to accurately enter text. And it has a Hebrew keyboard built in. It's all kinds of win.

[baron-steffan.livejournal.com]

Can't advise on apps. (I have a Blackberry, which is about 98% awesome, the 2% being due to the very few things it won't do, like Flash). But I'm glad to see you got a hard keyboard. Good luck to those who like their touchscreens, but having suffered Mad Digitizer Syndrome on my last *TWO* phones, a hard keyboard is now an absolute deal-breaker for me. As for LJ...well, I usually just post from home: I have yet to have an LJ post so urgent I have to post from the phone. I suppose I'd just call it up in the browser, no?

[cellio]

I'm more interested in reading and commenting than posting (the web interface does not work well on a small device), but being able to post the occasional "just took it" photo would be handy. (Don't know; I've never had a useful camera in my pocket before.)

Oh, and LJ is blocked at work, so the wait for the browser can be long. Granted, few things are that urgent, but if the app is there and I just don't know how to use it, I'd like to correct that knowledge gap. I don't yet know the idioms of smartphones, so for all I know "it's obvious" that the way you proceed is to tap three times quickly and swipe left, or something. :-)

[dreamdancer85.livejournal.com]

Before he became part of Google, Robert did some nice, simple and SMALL apps. Look for Beekeeperlabs.

Alas, his most useful (IMO) app is now totally unsupported - WeeWeek.