It seems like every day, I get to learn about some new technology that has the possibility to reshape how I see the world, work with data, or get something done much more easily. As a web developer, I’m very familiar with geofences and have applied them in working applications, but I wanted to introduce the concept to those of you who are unfamiliar with it.
What Is A Geofence?
Wikipedia has this to say about geofences:
A Geofence is a virtual perimeter on a geographic area using a location-based service, so that when the geofencing device enters or exits the area a notification is generated. The notification can contain information about the location of the device and might be sent to a mobile telephone or an email account.
Although I think they’re pretty close, I’d like to add that a geofence is really just the area that is defined for a notification trigger (or other event) and the notification isn’t exactly part of the geofence. As an example, you might have a device in your car that is linked to a service and that service has a geofence (that you defined) around your neighborhood. On your way to work the service detects that you’ve exited the geofence (your neighborhood), and shuts off specific devices in your home through a home automation system. When you re-enter the geofence after work, it sends a text message to your wife that reads, “Honey, I’m (almost) home!” or turns on your laptop.
Practical Uses For Geofences
I know the above example may seem a little Jetsons-like, but the technology is actually here today and already in use.
One real-world example is the annual Iron Dog® snowmobile race in Alaska. It wasn’t long after the race began that the first team entered a checkpoint and like many other people, I received a text message on my phone letting me know about it. Making this happen was software developed by Ontec Technologies, the company that has provided real-time tracking and mapping of each racer for the past few years. In the software, every checkpoint was defined as a geofence and each racer was outfitted with hardware from Applied Satellite Engineering that sent data over the Iridium satellite network to Ontec where it gets mapped and triggers alerts for geofences. In this example, friends, families, and fans were able to know very rapidly as their racer hit each checkpoint.
The article, Searching for Real Estate Made Easy: Geo-Fences Plus Mobile Phones from SoftwareAdvice.com describes, in detail, a scenario in which a young couple on a leisurely stroll is alerted that they’re near a home for sale that they may like. It seems the couple’s tech-savvy realtor entered their search criteria and cell phone number into a system that has geofences around properties and when their phone’s GPS location entered the geofence, it triggered an alert. The story is just a made-up scenario, but the reality of such a service is just over the horizon. We already have the technology in the phones and all it will take is for someone to build an app for the iPhone, Android, and Windows Mobile 7 and the web service to pair it with.
The practical uses for geofences are numerous and I’m certain we’ll see them in use more and more. Imagine an alert on your phone when your young child wanders off your property, or a friend is near the coffee house you’re sitting at. A system that turns on a couple lights when I get within 50 yards of my house is entirely possible right now with a little hardware and some programming.
Possible problems
Any really good technology that makes use of your personal location information brings with it concerns about misuse of that information. However, if used with consent and in the proper applications with these concerns in mind, the advantages far outweigh the unlikely possibilities of misuse.
If you could geofences for anything, what would it be?
One of the things most cell phones lack is optical zoom for the embedded camera. Sure, many of them provide digital zoom, but that’s mostly just enlarging a portion of the existing image and results in a lower quality photo or video. The people over at usbfever.com were kind enough to send me one of their products that aims to deliver the optical zoom we’ve been missing (for the iPhone, anyway).
The iPhone Zoom Lens
The product usbfever.com sent me is a 6X optical zoom lens for the iPhone. It came with the lens, the snap-on case, a neck strap, a user manual and a microfiber cleaning cloth. I love when companies include the microfiber cloth because you can never have too many.
Although I found the user manual to not be all that helpful and ended up putting it aside, it really isn’t necessary for this product, in my opinion. The application of the case is pretty obvious and the lens just slides into the case. I will probably never use the neck strap. The lens does not have protective covers for either end, so it’s best stored in the box it came in which is small enough to keep in the car without being in the way.
Photo And Video Zoom On The iPhone
The best test of a product like this is to snap a regular photo and then one with the lens from the same spot, so that’s just what I did. In my conference room, I snapped the first photo without the lens and the second with it attached. Both photos were taken from about 4-5 feet from the subject, although this lens kit would be most useful outdoors.
As you can see, the lens did a great job of bringing my subject a lot closer in the shot, but it came with some fuzzy edges. I think I could have adjusted the focus a little more, but it was a little awkward to do because the lens has a just a tiny little bit of room to move in it’s connector. I had slightly better results as shown in the video below.
Initially, I also had a hard time removing the case from my phone, but I had less trouble with it after I found that it’s easier to start from the side edges and work your way around. I think the case design could be better if the lens connector wasn’t glued on. If it was, instead, part of the molded case, I’d just keep the case on the phone all the time. With caps for both ends of the lens, I could then carry the lens around more freely and slap it on the phone in an instant for a quick zoom photo.
In any case, as is, the product does as advertised and is a pretty cool addition to your iPhone accessory collection.
Conclusion
This product really feels a little more like a cool novelty than a practical accessory, but it’s also under $20, which makes it a very affordable novelty item. That said, it is a pretty cool thing to have handy when you want to get a photo or video with your iphone and need to zoom in. The low price is certainly a selling point for anyone who needs a little convincing that they actually need a zoom lens on their iPhone.
On the heels of my DROID review Verizon brought me a Droid ERIS to review. As you may have guessed from the title of this review, I liked it a lot, and so did everyone I showed it to.
It’s Like DROID’s Little Sister
You’ve heard of the DROID, of course, and if you haven’t, click above to read the review. While DROID is a top phone choice for those in need of constant communication and all the bells and whistles, it can be overkill for others. The ERIS is like a smaller, curvier, little sister with a few of DROID’s key features missing. Since I’m comparing it to the DROID, I might as well point out what I couldn’t find on the ERIS.
The first is obvious. There’s no hardware keyboard. In iPhone user, I didn’t find this to be of much concern, especially since the software keyboard was pretty responsive and accurate. For some, this takes the ERIS out of the running when choosing a phone, though, so it’s important to note. The other main thing I found missing from the ERIS was voice control. DROID has it and I’ve gotten used to it in the iPhone. This is a software feature and I really don’t understand why it wasn’t included. It’s forgivable, but an unnecessary loss.
Otherwise, the ERIS runs on Android just like it’s big brother, so the environment was nearly the same.
In Its Own Class
As much as the ERIS makes me think of DROID, it really stands apart from a lot of the phones on the market. It embodies many of the features I find in the pricier smart phones but at around $100 less when bought from Verizon online (around $80 with a 2 year contract). That’s not a bad trade-off for the couple missing features previously mentioned.
Beyond having all the features that come with the Android OS, the ERIS is just really nice to look at. It’s not too flashy, but it has very smooth rounded corners and buttons that are pretty flush with the phone’s surface.
The front of the phone has Call and End Call/Power buttons that sit on either side of the combination roller ball/action button. This roller ball lights up when in use, which adds to the aesthetics of the phone, but I find myself not using this for navigation. It’s just not a natural feel for me, although it may make navigation a little easier. Above all this is a row of four navigation buttons. The buttons, which take you home, back, to a menu, or to a quick search are sensitive to the slightest touch and are completely flush for a smooth feel. Of course, there’s volume control buttons on the side and a standard headphone jack on the top.
Mass Appeal
The fact that I was a little more eager to take this phone with me to gatherings with friends says something, but what spoke volumes was how much other people wanted to play with it. At a friend’s birthday party, I think I spent a half hour talking about the phone and people were eager to play with it. These same people (one of them a DROID owner) noticed and made mention of the missing voice control and physical keyboard, but still had lots of good things to say about it as well.
Conclusions
I was excited before I ever put my hands on this phone and was more excited after I got to play with it. I was excited enough, in fact, to overlook the lack of headphones that I think every smart phone should include. Holding its own with some more expensive phones, this is a more affordable way to get your hands on a good-looking smart phone with all the benefits of the Android platform. Not only would I recommend this phone, but I tried to convince my wife to buy one (though it just wasn’t for her). This phone is an easy winner, provided you don’t need voice control or a physical keyboard.
When I was told a Pantech Impact was on its way to me for a review, I admit I didn’t have my hopes too high. Compared to their own Matrix, the Impact looked like a lesser phone and if there’s one thing this phone has reminded me of, it’s that looks can be deceiving.
To be fair, the Impact isn’t ugly, but when closed and off, it doesn’t really flaunt all it has to offer, either.
What the Impact Has to Offer
As I mentioned above, this phone didn’t stand right out of the pack to me. When I got the phone, I changed my opinion. It’s still not the sexiest phone I’ve reviewed, but it definitely has plenty of geek appeal, which became apparent once I turned it on. While off, the phone is dark and hides its front-facing external key pad. Once activated, however, the keys are all lit up, making the phone look like something a character in the movie Tron might have used. The whole face if the Impact is solid and smooth, so you wouldn’t know they keys are even there when they’re not lit up.
Conversely, when opened up, the internal keyboard is easily visible and physically well-defined. A good physical keyboard on a phone should always be easy to type on and that means feeling your way around. The Impact does a pretty good job of this with its raised keys and raised portions of the F and J keys to help you find your way around in the dark.
Besides the Tron-like look, the front of the phone makes the Impact easy to navigate without ever opening it up. The navigation is slightly hindered by only showing two lines of menu items at a time, but still makes answering and making phone calls, sending texts, etc a one-handed possibility.
The Lithium-Ion battery offers 3-5 hours of talk time with up to a couple weeks of stand-by. Opened up, the Impact provides a colorful 2.6″ 400×240 display and a system that is pretty easy to navigate once you get the feel for it. The outside of the phone contains a microSD slot for up to 32GB of storage, volume and Hold buttons, and the ear/mic/charging jack. This phone also offers just about everything you might expect from your typical smart phone, including mobile access to email, navigation, etc.
What’s Lacking
After the initial shock of what it offers, I took a step back to look for what the Impact was missing. While 2.0 megapixel camera is nice, I see a lot of phones shipping with 3.0 or more megapixels, so I thought Pantech could have squeezed at least that into this phone. Additionally, I love to use my choice of headphones with a cell phone and the Impact doesn’t provide this option. Beyond these two drawbacks, I didn’t see much missing with the Impact.
Conclusions
The Impact isn’t the prettiest phone I’ve seen at first glance, but a single touch brings it to life with a redeeming blue glow and opened up, it looks and acts even more like a smart phone. Although it wouldn’t be my personal first choice for a smart phone, Pantech packed a lot of functionality into a small package for a fair price (after 2 year agreement and rebate).
A couple weeks ago, Robert Scoble tweeted out a link to an interview with a couple entrepreneurs who did something I haven’t seen others perfect. They came up with a way to let anyone create an iPhone application without developer knowledge or a lot of cash. Of course, I was thrilled about the idea and a little apprehensive about the results, but I just had to try it out.
Their company, Genwi, recently launched iSites.us, a site that enables people to easily create an application for the iPhone and Android platforms with little effort, and little cash outlay. The whole process involves $25 (or $99 – see below), some image preparation, and about 10 to 15 minutes of your day. This is followed by a week or two of waiting, depending on demand.
Preparation and Planning
iSites offers a couple different pricing options. The more expensive option gives you full control over advertising, allowing you to have your own ads embedded in your app or none at all. The cheaper option (the one I chose) is $25 and includes their own ads in your application. The ads really aren’t in the way, so for me, this was not a problem. If you want your own ads, you’ll need to make sure you have an account with the ad network you choose, but either way, give it a little thought and determine what will work best for you and your budget.
Another thing you need to worry about is your brand management. Before starting, think about your application’s title and description as well as keywords. Additionally, there are a few images you have to have ahead of time. You need an icon, an iTunes display image, a banner and a splash screen image (see the iSites Learn More page to get a peek of the image size and file type requirements. It’s best to have these images all ready to go to streamline the creation process.
Finally, you should grab the category feeds for your blog or site so you can have categories in place when the app launches. The more frequent your content, the more categories you may want to have set up.
Creation and Approval
The creation process and completed application is better seen than described, so I’ve included a video showing the process. For the most part, it’s about 10 minutes of filling out web forms and uploading some images. After that, it’s just a game of waiting for an email announcing the completion of your application.
There may be the rare case in which your application is not approved. In this case, you’ll need to revise text, images, title, etc until it’s approved. When the whole process has been completed, you can just search for your app and download it.
Completed Application
Once completed, the application doesn’t have a lot of features, but it does have some of the important ones. When you start up the application, the first thing you see is the splash screen. I saw at least one other company creating iPhone apps while inserting their own brand here, so I really liked that iSites helps you insert your own branded spash screen here. The app then loads up to the Home screen which shows a listing of your recent posts with thumbnails where available. Each post can be selected to view and read. While reading a post, you can jump up or down a post, favorite it or share it via email, Facebook, or Twitter. The sharing options are a must for an application like this.
Over all, the application is really smooth and brings my blog to a whole new audience pretty seamlessly. Better still is the ability to manage it from the iSites web site control panel. From the control panel, I can change my images, description, etc. Additionally, I can add or change categories and other feeds. This really does feel like a pretty decent blend of control and simplicity.
Application Analytics
I love numbers. More than just any numbers, I love numbers that tell me people are reading what I write. Even before purchasing my app creation, I was a little excited about the prospect of seeing how many people downloaded my iJoeTech iPhone application. Once the app has hit the app store, you have analytics at your fingertips via the iSites web site control panel.
Amazingly, I had a nice bunch of downloads of my app before I even knew it was in the App Store. Pretty exciting. While it’s fun to watch, the numbers are important as a barometer for how your keywords and other criteria work to get someone to look at your app and then to download it.
What’s Missing?
I’m not sure if the analytics pages cover just the iPhone downloads or both iPhone and Android. I’d love to see analytics for both on the same graph. It would also be nice if the application had an option to open a post in Safari. Most of all, though, I’d love if there was some way for the application to hook into my Wordpress and let the user submit a comment right from the app.
Conclusions
I’ve been wanting to create a JoeTech.com app for the iPhone for a while now and although I had seen other offerings, this one resonated with my mostly due to the ease of setup and the low cost. It truly is pretty amazing that I can give JoeTech.com readers a customized iPhone application so easily for only $25. I think every blog should have such an app and iSites.us is the place to get it done.
