Spring is finally on the way and we know this because Ash Wednesday and the beginning of Lent is February 17. If you’re a mobile Christian observing Lent this year, check out 40 Days – Lent Observance Tracker for iPhone and iPod Touch. 40 Days tracks your commitment to sacrifice, provides a calendar overview of the season, and gives good suggestions for atoning for your shortcomings by donating to selected charities or adding your own. Plus, it greets you with an inspirational quote or verse each time you launch the app.

40 Days – Lent Observance Tracker features both a daily and calendar view of the season of Lent. Prior to beginning, the app provides a list of suggested observances or allows you to choose your own. Choose to give up caffeine, alcohol, television, Twitter, or add your own specific sacrifices. Choose a value for each time you give in to temptation and 40 Days keeps a running total. You can choose a charity to donate this running total to after Easter and you can review your overall progress. Read the rest of this entry »

Catchif joins the crowded field of apps competing to share your location and keep tabs on others.

While Catchif works well, it may not be compelling enough to move you off of Loopt, Google Latitude, or any of the other more popular services that have developed a strong following. But who knows—as the booming popularity of Foursquare demonstrates, you never know where the next social media boom will be.

In terms of delivering on what it promises to do, Catchif works well. By enabling GPS it pretty seamlessly finds your location on the embedded Google map. You can then share this with friends from your iPhone contact list or Facebook friends.

Tap a friend and if they have Catchif installed, then the location games can begin. If they do not have Catchif, you don’t have an option to invite them through the app interface, unfortunately. You are simply told to, “choose another.” Read the rest of this entry »

With Valentine’s Day approaching, it’s no wonder certain kinds of apps are getting a bit more exposure than normal. Rojao Inc. is looking to get some increased downloads in the coming days by offering an updated version of  iKamaSutram, their take of the ancient illustrated guide to all things sex, for a Valentine’s Day sale price of $0.99. The newly updated version now contains pictorials that were apparently previously absent pending Apple’s approval.

Being no Indian scholar myself and no expert in the ancient “art of human sexual behavior,” I can’t be certain, but I think Vatsyayana’s Kama Sutra was originally a book of poetic text that pertained to deriving sensual pleasure from marriage and wasn’t even illustrated until a later version. Over time, it developed into an extensive guide or “how to” manual that included many different ways to get the deed done. With iKamaSutram, you get around two dozen formations categorized into five different approaches. And for those of you with voyeuristic tendencies, yes, there are now illustrations. Read the rest of this entry »

If you want to know how fast you’re traveling and for how long, whether it’s on wheels or by boat, then OK Apps’ AudibleSpeed (GPS Speed Monitor) will satisfy your need for speed with sight and sound.

It’s one of many GPS apps available for iPhone 3G and GS that enables you to track your speed and time over a specified distance. (What it won’t tell you is how to get where you’re going. For that you’ll need an app such as Navigon AG’s MobileNavigator or a similar app.)

What makes AudibleSpeed (GPS Speed Monitor) unique is you can  designate a speed range and then apply a sound effect and a color to visually and audibly alert you when you’re within that range.

Read the rest of this entry »

If sending traditional candy hearts and embossed greeting cards to your special someone is not your style, then check out this Valentine’s Day app. An App to Tell is a new iPhone app that lets you tell someone how you feel about them by creating an app just for them that expresses your sentiments in text, audio, a picture, or all three. The concept is similar to creating an electronic greeting card, except other iPhone and iPod Touch users will receive your sentiments in the form of an app that they can download.

An App to Tell is pretty simplistic. Step one is to create text (pretty self-explanatory). Step two: record an audio message. Lastly, take a picture or use one from your camera roll to complete your Valentine.

Your entire text-audio-picture message is stored on a server where anyone with an email address can retrieve it. Friends or Lovers without an iPhone or iPod Touch can use their computer to view your message via the app simulator provided on the site. Just like standard electronic greetings, recipients are provided an email containing a link to retrieve the message. Pretty standard stuff, but the most unique aspect of App to Tell comes into play for recipients with iPhones. Read the rest of this entry »

dizm SKATE – Most skateboarding aficionados regard Touchgrind as the pinnacle of apps in this category. It has an innovative interface and captures the rough and uneven nature of pulling off tricks on a skateboard.

dizm SKATE (clearly punctuation rules go out the window in the App Store) is the new kid on the block in simulated skateboard apps. The app appears to kick off with the right street cred — much of dizm SKATE’s environment really matches the alternative attitude of skateboarding with the addition of Greg Lutzka and music by the likes of Skullcandy.

The goal is to perform skateboarding tricks by tapping through the alternating light patterns that pop up on the bottom of the screen. Doing this enables your skater to pull off the killer moves that you are need to score points and advance the game. They start off pretty easy but then get progressively harder. The more tricks you perform, the higher your point total. For each gaffe, you get a letter (it’s a skateboard version of HORSE). Once you spell out S-K-A-T-E, you’re done. Read the rest of this entry »

Comedy Sidekick is a slightly goofy app that may have been designed with the intention to inspire the comic within, but comes off more like a bad night at the improv.

In order to fulfill useful suggestions like livening up an office party or conference call, Comedy Sidekick supplies what can only be assumed are examples of introductions, opening acts, and a catch phrase. It gives you the ability to record your own one-liners, jokes, and catch phrases and even pair them with cliché sounds like rim shots, applause, and groans.

If you’re inspired by cheesy humor and need a place to store comedic ideas as they come to you, then Comedy Sidekick would indeed prove useful.

Comedy Sidekick’s opening acts consist of five short routines, which I suppose provide a small variety of suggestions and styles, except that four of them are the same guy and the same style.

Whether or not the material is original, I can’t say, but I would caution against using any of them to break the ice on your next conference call unless you’re prepared to deal with some intensely awkward silence and a possible unscheduled performance review. Read the rest of this entry »