1. Battle of Pirates Bay ($0.99) Use your 3 ships to defend the base against an onslaught of pirate vessels. Each of your ships have their own unique speed and firing range. Supply ships will either refill your ship’s ammo or restore health to your base. Hint: use the base cannon as much and as strategically as possible. Good luck with those pirates!
   
2. Toki Tori ($0.99) A platformer puzzle game with great graphics and controls. Beware: some of the levels get very challenging. There is also a LITE version of this game but at just 99 cents, go for the full version.
   





3. Warpack Grunts ($0.99) I really like the ‘potential’ of a game like this and while I’m definitely enjoying playing it, I dislike the control scheme somewhat. In the game you move your finger around and your grunts will follow and then a double tap on a target will cause them to fire. This results in your finger always having to be on the screen while navigating thus likely blocking your view of the terrain. I’d prefer a single tap to place a “way-point” which the grunts would then follow and then press and hold to cause the grunts to fire in that direction. But that is just me, it’s a fun game anyway.
   
4. Harbor Master ($0.99) A Flight Control (FC) clone but with ships and a small twist. Like FC you must guide your vessels (in this case, ships) to a safe landing point (in this case, harbors). The twist comes from the fact that you must then guide the ships away from the port/s once they have unloaded their cargo. Oh, and watch out for the hurricanes …
   

These iPhone apps have been added to the “A List of Great iPhone and iPod Touch Applications” post. Hope you enjoy the list!

Enable IMAP Access

Before we begin you will need to enable IMAP access from inside your Gmail Settings ⇒ Forwarding and POP/IMAP panel.

Setup Gmail IMAP in the iPhone

Follow these instructions to configure the iPhone to access Gmail. In short, your settings should look something like the following.

• Incoming server: imap.gmail.com
• Outgoing server: smtp.gmail.com
• Authentication: USERNAME (from USERNAME@gmail.com) + your password

Enable Advanced IMAP Settings in Gmail

Within Gmail’s web interface, go to Settings ⇒ Labs and enable the Advanced IMAP Controls:

Now open ‘Edit Labels’ and make sure that the Sent, Drafts, and Trash mailbox show up in IMAP (see below):

Modify iPhone Mail Settings

Now open Settings ⇒ Mail, Contacts, Calendars ⇒ Gmail (or whatever you named it) ⇒ Advanced, and configure mailbox behaviors. In short, you want to change the folders for Drafts, Sent, and Deleted Mail to the corresponding folders located below [Gmail] (see below):

Flagging Messages

Unfortunately there is still no way to flag messages within the iPhone interface. You can, however, view flagged messages in the [Gmail]/Starred folder.

Leave me a comment if you know of a good Gmail/iPhone tip that I haven’t mentioned.

1. Evernote ($0.00) I’ve started relying on evernote more and more recently. This free service provides much more than just a text based note taking service. Its ability to recognize text in images makes it super useful for storing information taken from many different sources. The new Evernote for iPhone 3.0 will even show you where you took your notes on google maps. Awesome!
   
2. Blimp ($0.99) Blimp is a beatifully implemented flying game complete with a great sound track. You assume the role as blimp pilot who must dodge enemies, collect/transport passengers and collect/transport cargo.
   





3. Car Jack Streets ($0.99) Car Jack Streets is a high octane action/driving game for iPhone and iPod Touch. Think old school grand theft auto. This fun game features a huge living city to explore, real time game-play, day and night cycles, a limitless number of missions, stunning visuals, lots of vehicles, an 80 minute soundtrack, global rankings, felonies and much more!
   
4. StoneLoops! ($0.99) Hands down best Zuma clone in the app store. In fact, this game goes beyond Zuma with a diverse game-play and 75 beautiful levels to try. This game is a steal at 99 cents! If you don’t believe me, then just give the LITE version a try.
   
5. Let’s Golf ($0.99) I picked up this game on sale at 99 cents to tide me over while I wait for Tiger Woods PGA Tour game to drop below $5. I was surprised to find out how great this simple golf game really was. The controls are well done and the graphics are better than I expected.
   

These iPhone apps have been added to the “A List of Great iPhone and iPod Touch Applications” post. Hope you enjoy the list!

Click on any of the application titles to visit the iTunes store. Be sure to check back for future editions, and if you know of any good iPhone applications that I should try leave me a comment, twitter me, or delicious me the link via for:franklindavis.

1. WeatherBug Elite ($0.99): I used the free version since it came out and I recently decided to upgrade to the paid version for two main reasons. Firstly, to get rid of the space-hogging ads and secondly, to be able to animate the weather radar. Overall WeatherBug is a great app in either the paid or free format.
   
2. Park Maps ($0.99): This simple app allows one to download maps of the National Parks for offline use. The app will even place an arrow on the map where your GPS signal is located. Note that some of the maps aren’t high enough quality for this to be used for one’s sole means of navigation (for that you’ll want the more expensive TopoPointUSA). I hike a great deal and I know many ‘purists’ would scoff at using an iPhone while in the woods and I even tend to agree. However, I’ve started enjoying using the iPhone for reading in the tent at night as well as taking quick trail pics (GPS tagging is a bonus). In fact, this little app saved me from a long detour when my topo map became too wet to read and I wasn’t sure which trail to take next.
   





3. myWireless ($0.00):This app allows the one to check one’s AT&T account status (minutes,data,sms, etc). Enjoying this app might be a bit of a leap but it is certainly handy and frankly should of been released earlier. One annoyance is that the app forces you to enter your password each and every time. This doesn’t make sense for someone like myself who has the iPhone password protected already.
4. iFighter Lite ($0.00):This seems to be a free preview of an upcoming paid version. If the preview is any indication the full version should be a lot of fun. This game uses the accelerometer to allow you to pilot your plane in 2D space. Note that you don’t have to stay at the bottom of the screen but you can fly ‘forward’ and pick up bonuses.
   

These iPhone apps have been added to the “A List of Great iPhone and iPod Touch Applications” post. Hope you enjoy the list!

Click on any of the application titles to visit the iTunes store. Be sure to check back for future editions, and if you know of any good iPhone applications that I should try leave me a comment, twitter me, or delicious me the link via for:franklindavis.

1. Flight Control ($0.99): Flight control is a simple yet incredibly addictive action/strategy game. The objective is to guide various planes and helicopters to their respective landing strips. Sound easy right? Well it isn’t, as more and more planes arrive you will need smart strategy, quick fingers and keen eyes to succeed!
   
2. Elemental Monster TD ($3.99): “Elemental Monster TD combines trading cards with tower defense into an amazing new style of game! Deploy the capabilities of these distinctive cards to defend your base against the attacking enemy monsters.” The ability to build up points and buy new units greatly adds to the replay value of this game.
   
3. UniWar ($2.99):
   UniWar is a turn-based strategy game that features online multiplayer or solo play. Your goal is to take control of the enemy bases. Think “Command and Conquer” meets “Risk”.
   
4. Blocked ($0.99):Blocked is a puzzle game where you move blocks around with the goal of sliding the blue block out the gap in the side. Simple yet addictive. Features 100 levels of ever-increasing difficulty. Watch out for level 64 — it is a tough one.
   

These iPhone apps have been added to the “A List of Great iPhone and iPod Touch Applications” post. Hope you enjoy the list!

Fresh on the heels of introducing its Games Downloads store, Amazon has created a Video Games Trade-In Store. This move will likely take a bite out of Gamestop’s lucrative trade-in business. In my tests, trade-in values seem to be somewhat on the low side but I suppose you can expect to sacrifice some trade-in value for ease of exchange. So while you can almost certainly get more money for your used games via Ebay or Craigslist this method is almost certainly more convenient. Does anyone know how these values compare to what Gamestop offers in their stores? If so, leave me a comment below.





Customers can also receive 10% off a single game or accessory purchase in the Video Games store if they trade in a game through Amazon.com’s Video Games Trade-In store before March 19, 2009.

iStat menus inserts a new pane in the System Preferences Pane Item which allows you configure the program’s eight system monitoring tools:

• CPU: 7 display modes, multiple core support.
• Memory: 4 display modes, page ins/outs and swap usage display.
• Drives: 6 display modes and the ability to hide disks you don’t want to see.
• Network: Current and total bandwidth, peak bandwidth and IP addresses. Also monitors Bluetooth traffic.
• Temps: Monitor the temperature of your Mac with 2 display modes and the ability to hide sensors you don’t want to see.
• Fans & Power: Monitor the fan speeds in your Mac with 2 display modes and the ability to hide sensors you don’t want to see.
• Bluetooth: Control bluetooth status plus monitor the battery level of your Apple wireless keyboard or mouse.
• Date & Time: Date, time, a calendar, and a world clock in your menubar.

You can turn on all of these menus, or you can pick and choose which processes you want to monitor. As you can see below, I’ve chosen to use the Network, Bluetooth, Drives, Memory, Temperature, and CPU displays.

By clicking on any entry you can examine the information in more detail. For example, when clicking on the CPU entry you might see something like this:

iSlayer also makes a Dashboard widget (iStat Pro) that performs many of the same tasks as iStat menus, but I like iStat menus because it is always visible and I don’t have to open any windows or hit any buttons. iStat Menus is easily customizable and you can adjust it to your desired appearance and/or configuration. I prefer the all black option as I like to keep my menubar as low-impact as possible.

Overall, iStat menus is a great way to find out what’s going on behind the scenes with your Mac.