Nonetheless, not all Android devices are consistent and easy to use at first, and many find iOS to be simpler to get accustomed to. While I don’t fully agree with this, I have compared the ease of use of my iPad with my Galaxy Note II, and it is clear that there are instances where Android could learn a bit from the simplicity of iOS.

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Keep in mind that this post was written around the time iOS 7 was announced, but since that is still in beta, the article is based on the previous versions of the platform.

Interface

With iOS, Apple introduced an easy to use interface that remains consistent across the operating system. The various tabs and sections of any application are always displayed at the bottom of the screen and the button at the top left corner is usually used to go back to the previous screen. At the top right corner, there’s either a search bar or a validation button. These interface guidelines are respected throughout the system but also by most third party developers.

The AppStore in iOS, a clear example of Apple’s consistent user interface

The user experience on Android used to be particularly inconsistent, especially before the Holo reboot with Ice Cream Sandwich. Today, Google applications are much more coherent with each other in terms of look and feel. However, some elements are still placed differently, even in the default Android applications! For instance:

• in the Contacts application, the three panes are shown at the top, with various options — Search, New Contact and Menu — displayed at the bottom.
• in the Calendar app, there is only a bar at the top, which also houses the Menu button. Gmail remains the same, with the Menu and New Email options at the top and no bar at the bottom.
• but if you look at the Google Translate app, it’s even worse, as the Menu button is at the top, while there are other options at the bottom.

I’m not saying the applications don’t look similar, but surely the different teams could have aligned their design cues for the options to be placed the same way. This would have also made it easier for developers to remain consistent and follow one set of guidelines.

3 Google apps on Android that don’t respect the same user experience

Gestures

When it comes to gestures, iOS has kept the same since the very first release of the platform. Deleting a message, an email or a file is always done by swiping from left to right and pressing the red icon. Similarly, refreshing any list is a “pull to refresh” away. These simple gestures were easy for third party developers to mimic, and users quickly learned them because they were implemented consistently in various apps — Email, Messages, Contacts…

Dropbox for iOS supports swipe to delete, but the Android version doesn’t

When it comes to Android, I realized that while I knew how to do the various gestures, many of my friends never heard of them, to my greatest surprise. My colleague triggered this revelation when he bought a Nexus 4 and asked me how to close apps. When it told him to swipe left or right on the multitasking card, he told me it wasn’t easy to guess because the gesture wasn’t implemented anywhere else. And I realized he was right. Swiping left or right in Android is usually a way to flip pages or switch tabs but not to delete or remove something — except in Chrome and, more recently, Google Now.

Google even introduced a similar gesture in Gmail to archive messages, which makes it a little more consistent, but the feature is still specific to the app. Samsung has implemented the same gesture within the Contacts app, instead of deleting a contact, it is used to call them or send a message.

The more you look at Android in an objective manner, the more it becomes clear that there should be some consistency in the platform, and clear guidelines from Google for the developers to respect. We seem to be on the correct path though, with Google releasing a very consistent design language with their latest app updates to Play Music, Play Books, Gmail, Drive, Google+ and YouTube.

Consistency Across Devices and Versions

One arguably good thing about iOS is that no matter the device it’s running on, it’ll always look the same — unless the device has been jailbroken and heavily customized, but we won’t get there. I still have an original iPhone at home, and when I put it next to my iPad, the interface, its look and feel have all been kept similar and coherent.

Android doesn’t look the same as it did in 2007 — thankfully! — but any two Android devices from different manufacturers never look or feel the same thanks to heavy customizations and skins. While the ability to personalize Android has been one of its core strengths, many manufacturer skins have taken it a step too far. HTC and Samsung, for instance, replace the default Android applications, such as the keyboard, email, messaging and calendar. This makes it very confusing for the end user, as the system apps are different even though the phones are supposed to run the same OS. There are also cases where manufacturers design applications with less features to worsen the problem. And lastly, because manufacturer skins tend to be different from the Android experience, these replacement apps will be extremely inconsistent and seem to come from another platform — I’m thinking of Samsung’s horrendous email app.

Samsung replaced Google’s beautiful email client with the most repulsive one I’ve seen

Google has tried to reduce this annoyance for end users by making some of their official apps available on the Play Store, such as the official Calendar and Keyboard apps. Nevertheless, the latter is not available in my country, which led to even more frustration on my side.

Android allows for alternative ROMs to replace to original one on your phone, but that process is almost never easy, and will most likely void your warranty. Google should therefore force manufacturers to make these interfaces easily removable, so that users can revert to stock Android seamlessly. [Editor note: while it's not exactly what Hagop is asking for, the move to offer the Galaxy S4, HTC One and Xperia Z as Google Edition devices is a step in the right direction. Users won't be able to remove skins from their current devices, but they will finally have the option to get an unadulterated version of Android on the new hardware they want to buy, instead of having to resort to hacking custom ROMs on them.]

Room for Improvement

Google has worked hard at making Android a lot more consistent and good-looking through recent releases. They definitely succeeded at turning it into an eye-candy platform that even iOS got inspired from in their latest iOS 7. Thanks to the Holo and Cards UI, many users now prefer to run stock Android on their devices, rather than a manufacturer skin. Google should continue improving the platform by making it simpler to use, but also by providing clear design and gesture cues to developers and manufacturers in order to keep things coherent across devices, screens and applications. One option could be to let users remove a manufacturer UI without having to root or change ROMS on their device.

I’m confident Google will keep making making Android more consistent and intuitive soon — Key Lime Pie anyone? It’s important for them to use Holo as a stepping stone, draft an even simpler user interface and put consistent and structured guidelines in place for developers to implement.

Fast forward three months and I’m addicted to my podcast subscriptions. I’ve gotten used to the voice, the character and the style of every person I listen to, and I now prefer getting most of my news this way. It’s more personal than reading, more raw, and more engaging and interesting.

All of my podcast needs are catered by Pocket Casts — which we reviewed a while ago, before it got its major redesign — and I’ll show you in this post how I make the most of its features to stay on top of my 28 podcast subscriptions.

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Using Smart Playlists

One of the defining features of Pocket Casts for me is its ability to maintain Smart Playlists. You won’t need this feature if you only subscribe to a handful of podcasts, but if you have more than a dozen, it becomes a necessity.

I use Smart Playlists to organize my podcasts by topic, status and type. I have a playlist for audio files and another for video files, one for unplayed items that are already downloaded, one for items to download, and one for partially played episodes so I can easily spot those I’ve already started and finish them. I also have a smart playlist for my tech-centric podcasts, one for science podcasts and one for pharmacy and medicine oriented podcasts. Other topics — which fall more or less into general knowledge — don’t have a specific playlist. While it may seem confusing that an episode can appear in several playlists, it helps me pick up Pocket Casts and start listening in two clicks, no matter what I want to catch up on.

My Smart Playlists (left) and the settings for my Partially Played playlist (right)

You can go crazy with your own Smart Playlists: create ones for starred episodes, organize them based on topics, or more. My advice would be to think of what you’re most often looking for when you open Pocket Casts and create a playlist that serves that need. Another thing to remember is that Pocket Casts allows you to manually add podcasts to a specific playlist, so you can create a tailored playlist with only a few episodes from different subscriptions.

Auto-Downloading at Night

Podcast listening isn’t time-sensitive, so you can easily afford waiting a day to listen to a new episode. That’s why I only set Pocket Casts to check for new episodes at 2:00 am. By then, I’m asleep and my phone is on the charger, connected to my home WiFi but doing nothing else. The processor, internet speed and other resources can all be used to download new episodes for me, instead of straining my phone and battery while I’m using them during the day.

But in order for automatic downloads to work, you’ll need one of your playlists to be set to “auto-download”. I have that enabled on my aptly named “To Download” playlist so basically at 2am, Pocket Casts refreshes my subscriptions, finds new episodes in the To Download playlist and fetches them. In the morning, I wake up to new episodes ready for me to listen to.

Scheduling downloads for 2:00 am (left) and setting my To Download playlist to Auto Download on WiFi when charging (right)

Finding Better Controls

The two biggest improvements to my listening habit were introduced through turning on Pocket Casts’s lockscreen controls option and using a Bluetooth headset. The first helped me control playback while driving without demanding any attention, while the second frees me up to listen to a podcast any time during the day while keeping my hands free for other chores.

My phone’s screen is off most of the time while I’m listening to audio podcasts, so having the playback controls on the lockscreen as soon as I turn it on was a major time saver. Pocket Casts also offers a widget, but I prefer not to use it as it stays on the screen even when I’m not listening to anything, whereas the lockscreen controls only appear when a podcast is playing. They also display a dimmed artwork and the podcast’s title so I always know what I’m listening to at a glance.

Enabling lockscreen controls (left) and how they display on your lockscreen (right)

As for Bluetooth headsets, I recently purchased a Sony Ericsson MW600. It’s an old stereo Bluetooth headset, but it was well rated for its price — $30 when I got it — and features on Amazon, and so far it has lived up to the expectations. I currently keep my phone inside my pocket, and wear the MW600 all day by clipping it to my clothes and hanging the earphone cable around my neck. When I need to listen to a podcast, I simply put the earphone on and click Play. Even skipping forward and backward in podcasts is handled by the headset’s controls, so I don’t have to reach for my phone every time I miss something to rewind it, or when there are ads or a topic I want to fast forward through.

This is how I wear my MW600 — though I never look this elegant doing so!

Adjusting Playback

Most podcasters speak slowly and drag on between words. That’s valuable time being wasted. I noticed that by setting all my podcasts to play at 1.5x speed, I can easily keep up and understand what’s being said without having to suffer with slow speakers through awkward pauses. The other benefit is that I can listen to more podcasts in less time! When needed, I fine-tune some individual podcasts to a different playing speed, but 1.5x is my default setting. You’ll have to find your sweet spot by testing different speeds.

You have probably also noticed that most podcasts start with a tune, an ad or a long intro… If you don’t want to hear those, Pocket Casts offers the option to start podcasts from each subscription at a specific time, basically skipping ahead to the important content. My advice would be to listen to a few episodes from each show until you’re familiar with its routine, then set that up. And even if it’s not exact, you can always skip back or ahead while listening.

Adjusting Playback Speed (left) and a specific podcast’s starting time (right)

Skipping Episodes, Starring and Deleting

Given that I follow about 28 subscriptions, some of which update every couple of days, I’ve had to force myself to let go of some episodes. Just like when I mark articles as read when I’m catching up on my RSS reading, I can look at the topic of a podcast and automatically swipe it away as done.  There’s not enough time in the world for me to listen to everything so I pick my content carefully.

Another habit I had to teach myself was deleting episodes I’ve already listened to. I’m a collector by habit — music, movies, TV series,… — but since I’m only using my phone to listen to podcasts, I’m bound by the amount of portable storage it has. That’s why I have set Pocket Casts to automatically delete each episode after I’ve finished listening to it. I have, however, been using the Star option in Pocket Casts to keep track of my favorite episodes across all of my subscriptions — I even set up a separate Smart Playlist for them — that way I can easily go back and stream or download an episode when needed.

Marking an episode as done (left) and my favorite starred episodes (right)

Syncing Across Devices

When Pocket Casts announced its ability to sync across devices with their new version, I thought it was a cool feature but I didn’t reckon I’d ever need it. However, I recently received a Nexus 4 for review and I loved the device so much that I decided to use it as my main device instead of my Galaxy S3. That’s where the sync feature came into play, as I simply created an account on my S3, let Pocket Casts get my data over to their service, then installed the app onto my Nexus 4 and signed in with the same account. Lo-and-behold, all my subscriptions came, as did my starred episodes, my Smart Playlists, and even the playback positions on all of my partially played episodes.

Setting up Sync (left) and settings to force a manual sync (right)

If you have several Android phones, or a phone and a tablet, I highly recommend you set this up. You could even do it if you only own one device — who knows, it might come in handy if you have to reset it and don’t want to lose your data.

Tailoring It to Your Needs

Despite its rather simplified UI, Pocket Casts is a very powerful podcast application full of options, tweaks and settings. In this article, I tried to go through the different settings and tricks that have optimized the app for my heavy use, but you can set it any way you want to tailor it to your needs.

Do you listen to Podcasts? If so, which app do you use, and what tips or settings have you found that help with your listening efficiency?

iOS 7 has delivered a new design with a skeuomorphic-less, flatter design somewhat resemblant of the design principles of Google’s Holo and Microsoft’s Metro. In this article, we’re going to take a look at iOS 7 and see how it stacks up to the incumbent versions of Android.

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First, a Talk About Fragmentation

As is common in any presentation by a major player in the mobile industry, things kicked off with some friendly competitive banter. Apple’s choice statistic was OS adoption, opting to highlight the still-rampant fragmentation of operating systems in use, noting that the two-year-old Gingerbread remains the most popular version of Android in use.

Android continues to suffer problems with fragmentation.

Apple’s claim is genuine and it’s still an aspect of Android that remains inferior to Apple’s update adoption. We’ve covered this topic in-depth several times before, but it’s improving. With the introduction of “Google Edition” versions of flagship handsets like the Galaxy S4 and HTC One, the path to stock Android experiences with universal systems for updating is getting stronger and stronger.

Out With Skeuomorphism

The biggest change in iOS 7 is a nearly-complete redesign of the entire operating system, opting to ditch the majority of aesthetics for a newer, cleaner design scheme. Now, iOS 7 features “flat” icons, lighter typography and redesigns of all the stock apps that offers a radically different overall look to any previous version of iOS.

The design is still very different from Android and, while some of the technical specifications of the new theme may bear resemblance to Jelly Bean or any future version of Android, to the average joe, it’s distinct enough. In full disclosure, I haven’t had hands-on with the OS but first impressions conjure opinions that the design feels slightly less polished than Android, and some apps even seem more like basic mockups versus final products. They’re not final products, of course, but rather betas, so a lot could still change.

iOS 7 sports a fresh new look.

Regardless of how you feel about iOS’s redesign, one thing is for certain. iOS 7 has injected an unprecedented freshness back into its operating system which has been notorious for feeling outdated. It might not bring many users over from Android but even the novelty factor might be enough to keep some users from jumping ship.

Closing the Gap

In addition to the significant aesthetic redesign, iOS 7′s announcement brought several new features to the platform, some that now exist as a catchup to current features of Android.

Control Center is Apple’s solution to providing quick access to a number of common settings such as WiFi and Bluetooth toggles, convienently located in a drawer accessed through an on-screen gesture. It’s a feature that exists in Android already and, while fairly minimal, is often cited as a desired feature by those switching over from iOS. Introducing this now could well contribute to more of those iOS switchers sticking with the platform rather than moving to Android, as well as inaugurating design patterns that should make any committed switchers in the future have an easier transition.

Apple’s enhanced a number of competing features, including Siri.

While there are many features that we could comment on, another that particularly stuck out was the introduction of OS X’s AirDrop feature to the mobile platform. NFC and various technologies have been used in several variants of Android to achieve similar sharing capabilities but, as Apple mockingly pointed out, require a bump whereas AirDrop provides a more straightforward method of sharing that we’d love to see replicated in Android.

With iOS 7, Apple also bettered their integration in vehicles with iOS in the Car that allows supported vehicles to be hooked up to an iPhone 5 which then powers iOS on the vehicle’s dashboard. Apple also added camera filters and improved Siri, stepping up the difference with their competition in equivalent Android features significantly.

Final Thoughts

iOS 7 seems like a pretty solid upgrade for our friends using iPhones, iPads and iPod Touch’es. What does it mean for Android? Realistically, very little. However, Apple has started to eradicate some of the concerns of iOS users considering the switch to Android, as well as injecting a fresh look that should put a stop to the widespread concerns of iOS growing stale while maintaining enough distinction with Android and Windows Phone.

The Google crew don’t have to be quaking in their boots just yet, but it seems Apple is starting to close the gaps left open by previously absent features and an ageing interface.

Sitting at my desktop or using my laptop, I’m a fairly accomplished typist — I’m probably not the fastest in the world, but I’m certainly faster than average. The same cannot really be said when I’m using my Android devices — touchscreens offer a completely different way of interacting with a device and it proves, on the most part, to be a slower form of typing. This is why I find myself on a constant mission to track down the perfect keyboard. If you’re on a similar quest, and whatever your preferred style of typing — one-handed, two-handed, gesture input, just a forefinger — this roundup of the pick of the crop should help you find a keyboard that suits you.

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SwiftKey

A keyboard may seem like something you shouldn’t have to pay for, but this was the first of its ilk to tempt me into parting with some cash. SwiftKey does not disappoint; gesture support (or Flow) is impressively accurate as is word prediction. These two features combined found me flying through long passages of text in next to no time.

Swiftkey is still one of the keyboards I keep coming back to (I switch between this and Google Keyboard at the moment) and I often find that I only have to swipe the first word and the rest is accurately predicted — obviously this only works in certain circumstances such as standard SMS replies, I’ve not been able to train the app to write full reviews for me yet!

Swiftkey supports a large number of languages and has the handy option to have up to three enabled at the same time and easily switchable. The one disappointing feat is that there are separate versions for phones and tablets so you’ll have to make two purchases if you own both types of devices.

Price: $3.99
Google Play Link: SwiftKey
Developer: SwitftKey

Swiftkey’s signature keyboard with Flow

Kii

Kii is another swipe-friendly keyboard which prides itself on the fact that it borrows ideas from many of the other keyboards featured in this roundup. Skins are supported so there’s scope for changing the look of your keyboard to suit your mood or the lighting you find yourself in. There’s also more than one keyboard layout to choose from including an interesting split option which is ideal for thumb operation on a tablet.

What is irritating is that while the app is free, many of the features are available as in-app purchases — or at least uninterrupted use requires an in-app purchase. Voice support and rows of extra buttons are nice touches, but it is in terms of speed that Kii really excels.

Price: Free
Google Play Link: Kii
Developer: Kii Dev

Kii’s split keyboard layout is useful on tablets

GO Keyboard

The GO development team are responsible for a number of extremely popular apps including the impressive GO Launcher.  It’s a shame to put a dampener on an otherwise great app, but there is a slightly beta-ish feel to GO Keyboard that is often found in many GO apps.

There are a massive number of themes to choose from to help with customization, as there are emoji, but many of them are garish, amateur-looking affairs. This feeling is not helped by badly worded descriptions and options that have clearly been poorly translated into English. However, switching between different keyboard layouts is little more than a side swipe away which is handy for anyone who works in more than one language — and there are dozens to choose from.

Price: Free
Google Play Link: GO Keyboard
Developer: GO Dev Team

Go Keyboard supports themes, emojis and several input methods

Google Keyboard

One of the latest additions to the keyboard smorgasbord is Google’s very own offering. Lifted directly from devices such as the Nexus 7, this keyboard won over huge armies of fans long before it was made available to all Android devices. It is very hard not to love this keyboard as it feels like it really belongs in Android — as well it should be — and while it may not seem all that impressive, looks can be deceptive. Lurking beneath a rather plain exterior is arguable the best gesture typing available, in both speed and accuracy.

There may not be a massive number of options in terms of layouts and extra settings, but what is present works superbly and you’ll soon wonder how you coped with any other keyboard — that’s how I felt, at least, and I’m hard to impress. There’s also a very useful hidden feature that can be used to ape the likes of Text Expander and further reduce the amount of typing you need to do. When adding new words to your personal dictionary, it’s possible to add shortcuts — this means you can opt to automatically expand ‘brb’ into ‘be right back’, but there are endless other possibilities.

Price: Free
Google Play Link: Google Keyboard
Developer: Google

Google’s own keyboard looks and feels at home on Android

Swype Keyboard

Swype is the original swiping keyboard. Where it led, countless others apps followed. Many have tried to copy it, but few have matched it and fewer still bettered it. Prediction levels here are staggeringly good and you don’t even need to be particularly accurate with your gestures as the app does a good job of interpreting what you mean based on the shape you draw. Two key strengths of Swype, and something that helps to improve its accuracy, are its ability to pick up word and names from your contacts, emails and other documents, as well as the fact that the dictionary is crowd-sourced.

The predictions dictionary is constantly updated with words that are trending around the world and this extends into next-word prediction – so you should find that you can enter the name of a brand new movie or TV programme very quickly. With voice recognition and a universal app suitable for tablets and phones — additional modes are available for tablet users — it’s difficult not to recommend Swype. If you’re yet to try it out, install it this instant to see what all the fuss is about.

Price: $0.99
Google Play Link: Swype Keyboard
Developer: Swype

Swype offers several layouts for phones and tablets

TouchPal

Gesture-based or sliding typing, as you’ve probably noticed from this roundup, is becoming the norm. TouchPal looks to up the ante with its Curve feature which aims to make typing even faster by eliminating the need to swipe words in their entirety. Another time saving feature makes it easier to access numbers and symbols. Rather than tapping and holding a key to view a list of alternative options, you can instead swipe up or down for instant access.

Despite having no cost associated with it, TouchPal’s range of supported languages is wide and varied. To help with the personalization of suggestions and auto-completes, information can be imported from our address book and online updates ensure that a new supply of words is always available. Or course, there is the usual raft of skins available, but the key thing here is speed. TouchPal is undeniably fast – even though this does come at the expense of accuracy.

Price: Free
Google Play Link: TouchPal
Developer: TouchPal

TouchPal trades accuracy for speed

Smart Keyboard Pro

As if to prove that swipe typing is not the only option for getting characters into apps, Smart Keyboard Pro takes a much more traditional approach to things. Everything is much more basic here, and the app closely resembles the look and feel of the iOS keyboard. This is by no means a bad thing but you are restricted to typing by pressing each character you want to enter.

For fans of old technology, Smart Keyboard Pro has a great feature – the resurrection of T9 prediction text input using a traditional phone pad layout! There are no fancy extras like next word prediction but it does win points for being highly customizable.

Price: $2.64
Google Play Link: Smart Keyboard Pro
Developer: Dexilog, LLC

Smart Keyboard goes old-school with its iOS look and functions

Other Unique Options

Above are some of the highlights that are to be currently found in the Play store. You’ll probably have noticed that, while there are a few subtle differences here and there, for the most part these are keyboards that look and feel fairly similar to each other.

Minuum

One project that looks to disturb the norm is Minuum, which has been funded through Indiegogo and will initially be released for Android devices, with the possibility of iOS, Blackberry and Windows Phone versions to follow. The key aim of the project is to free up screen space by shrinking the keyboard as much as possible.

The look is unique. The tiny strip you use to type looks too small and fiddly to be usable – a standard keyboard has been compressed onto a single line – but by employing a combination of letter and word prediction, in the sample videos at least, Minuum appears to fare very well indeed. It is an outlandish design that will not be to everyone’s taste, but it is going to create a storm when it hits the Play Store.

Minuum’s unique one-strip layout 

ZoomKee

If you’re looking for something a little more out of the ordinary, ZoomKee is worth a look. There’s a clue in the name here, and the key selling point — although the app is actually free — is a zoom function. Tap a word that has been typed and it will be displayed in a larger view complete with a zoomed in keyboard. This has been done to make word editing easier, but it does mean that you have to be willing to slide the keyboard from side to side as it is not entirely visible in its magnified mode.

ZoomKee’s signature zooming function

Thumb Keyboard

Another keyboard of note is Thumb Keyboard ($2.35 from Google Play) which is available for phones and tablets and, as the name suggest, allows for quick thumb driven typing. At first glance it looks like nothing out of the ordinary, but there is an intriguing split mode that make it easier and faster to type with just thumbs and a personalized shortcut bar. There are different layouts for different sized screens but this is definitely a keyboard for fans of two-handed typing.

Thumb Keyboard packs a split layout and a nifty shortcut bar

Do you have a favorite keyboard that we’ve missed? Have you found your perfect input app or do you find that you constantly switch from one to another? Share your thoughts and experiences in the comments.

Let’s jump in and take a look at what’s been going on in the world of Android this mid-June week!

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Samsung Announces Galaxy S4 Zoom

Samsung officially announced a newer iteration of the Galaxy S4, the Galaxy S4 Zoom. The Android 4.2 handset features a 16-megapixel CMOS sensor with flash that is delivered alongside a 1.5GHz dual-core processor with LTE support, powering a 4.3-inch qHD display.

The Galaxy S4 Zoom, complete with full-on rear lens.

There are no details on the availability or price of the device, but you can probably expect the Zoom to be marketed alongside high-tier handsets sometime later this year.

Lauch Date for the Galaxy S4 Active

In other Samsung-related news, AT&T has announced this week a launch date for the Galaxy S4, revealing it will offer the device starting June 21st for $199 with a contract subscription. Preorders have already begun with the carrier though, if you don’t fancy waiting those precious few days until a formal release.

The Galaxy S4 Active.

The Galaxy S4 Active sports a rugged body that is both waterproof and dustproof (up to respective limits), a feature that acts as a tradeoff with the regular S4′s OLED display, instead opting for an LCD. Otherwise, the Galaxy S4 runs a version of Android 4.2 and the same 1.9GHz quad-core processor.

Google Updates Galore

Continuing the trend of near-weekly updates of Google-centric Android apps, this week saw new versions of both Google+ and Google Play Music.

For Google+, the company enhanced notifications, making them better sync read status across devices amongst other improvements. While these changes will roll out gradually to all platforms, an immediately available update to the Google+ Android app allows for the deletion of posts in the Photos view of the app and a redesign of the internal navigation.

The upcoming changes to Google+ notifications, which should be rolling out to Android shortly.

Meanwhile, the Google Play Music app has been updated with a new setting for managing bandwidth usage over mobile networks alongside general improvements to search and data usage.

Other Updates

• A User Agent Profile posted by HTC has seemingly confirmed an HTC One mini handset, noting that it should feature a 720p display with Android 4.2.
• A new presumed-Nexus device has been revealed in FCC documents, pointing to an updated Nexus 7 tablet with 1.5GHz quad-core S4 Pro processor and a rear-facing 5-megapixel camera. As can be expected from the form of the leak, no pricing, availability or even an announcement date has been revealed.
• This week, Apple held their Worldwide Developers Conference, announcing a new version of iOS, iOS 7. Check in tomorrow for a look at what this means for Android.

And otherwise, come back next Sunday for a reflection on the upcoming week in Android.

HTC’s Sense interface has received much criticism over the years, principally because it presented a face to Android that was just a little too different to stock. This was rarely an issue for new users, many of whom grew up with Sense, but switching from a Samsung or Motorola (or Nexus) device would typically involve a lot of head scratching and set-up time. Sense 5.0, here on the HTC One, is actually something of a rewrite — so forget everything you ever knew about Sense, this is more streamlined and refined. And, indeed, arguably close enough to stock Android that few may want to spend time hacking it around.

Up front and central is the new BlinkFeed homescreen, of which more later. Integrating social feeds into Sense has always been something HTC has been keen on, and the company has knocked it out of the park here.

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Start up Sequence

Each manufacturer has come a long way in terms of guiding new users through a start up sequence that gets them a long way towards being productive, and HTC is no exception. Anyone remember the day when you were basically screwed if your data SIM wasn’t recognised — in terms of settings — immediately and you had to enlist the help of a friendly geek or twist and turn somewhat in order to get things set up on wi-fi?

A basic language selection screen (gosh, does the HTC One firmware really contain all these tongues? — Very impressive!) and it’s immediately into the Connect to Wi-Fi pane, which is perfect. With fast connectivity in place, the rest should be a doddle.

Language selection and Wi-fi selection, right up front.

‘Set up phone’ offers the chance to restore all your apps, settings and content from HTC Backup or even from the HTC Get Started system on the web. Recognising that this won’t apply to many users, HTC has also supplied an excellent all purpose import utility that will accept content from all other makes of phone and smartphone, all transferred using the magic of Wi-fi (for Android devices) or Bluetooth (for iOS, Symbian, Windows Phone and Blackberry devices). Having this as part of the start up sequence is much more friendly than expecting users to go and track down such a utility later on. Well done, HTC.

Setting up the phone – two main options…

‘Set up from scratch’ gives more scope for completely new users and for geeks looking for a totally fresh installation. HTC does keep trying to push its desktop and web tools, including HTC Transfer — in fairness, these have the potential to make optimising BlinkFeed and the application loadout painless for brand new users, but anyone who knows what they’re doing (gentle Android.Appstorm readers, for example) will want to skip all this and go straight to the next screen, Accounts & Sync. Obviously, as a bare minimum, a Google account is required here, otherwise updates and installations won’t be possible.

A wealth of transfer options from an older phone, including via ad-hoc Wi-fi if your phone is also Android-based

Each manufacturer seems to have done their own deal with a cloud storage provider — here it’s HTC and Dropbox, with a 25GB bump in your allowance for two years, all for signing in from a brand new, shiny HTC. Not bad, though I’m expecting something of a backlash in roughly a year’s time, when the first of these two-year deals expire and some people are suddenly locked out of being able to change files in a large chunk of their cloud storage. Expect a rush of ‘We’re so pleased with how things are going that we’ve decided to make everybody’s quotas permanent!’ press releases. You heard it here first….

Setting up the first account on the device (left) and the chance for extra Dropbox space for two years (right)

There follows something of a confusing dialog, offering to save copies of all photos and videos to Dropbox. Although the concept is easy to grasp, the majority of Android users will end up having auto-upload turned on as part of Google+, so why would they want the duplication of having to upload everything twice? A point which is made twenty-four times as valid, given the potential increase in photos captured if the user ventures into Zoe mode.

As for videos, even over Wi-fi, isn’t it asking for trouble having any kind of auto-upload in place for these? At 1080p, we’re talking about dozens of Megabytes per minute of footage — enough that the upload process may unnecessarily drain the phone’s battery, strain your home’s Wi-Fi connection and start clogging up your Dropbox. The friendly ‘Turn on’ button on HTC’s intro screen here is, I contend, more than a little misleading in the context of this device and of Android.

Turn on automatic uploading of media to Dropbox? Probably best not! Ditto the HTC permissions check-box…?

What’s this? Telling HTC what I’ve been up to? At least the ‘Help make HTC better’ check box is turned off by default. There are services online (Google Now is a good example) where sharing what you’re doing can improve your own future experience. This isn’t one of them though, it’s purely for HTC’s benefit and is best skipped!

We’re into standard Android start up screens next, with the standard Google location permissions dialog and time and date set-up.

At this point we’re around seven screens into the set up and I can imagine new users starting to get a bit weary. HTC Backup is offered, potentially backing up all user data to HTC’s servers. It’s a great idea but as the user data here includes applications, which might include multi-Gigabyte games, the option is again sensibly left off by default. Games aside though, I’d be tempted to turn this on, suspecting that it would do a better job of remembering everything than Android’s own back up routines.

HTC Backup for apps and settings? Hmmm….. maybe. It can’t do a worse job than Google’s servers here? (left) – Right naming my Sense phone (right)

Finally the set-up process ends, by naming the phone — I’m not sure why HTC bothers with this. Presumably it’s to avoid confusion should either the user have more than one Android smartphone (likely, though the default here is just the first part of your email address) or there be more than one ‘HTC One’ in the house?

BlinkFeed and Homescreens

The hub for all your streamed information and updates, BlinkFeed is central to the HTC Sense 5.0 experience, with social applications and the default web browser launched as needed, should the graphical snippets and mini-stories presented, Flipboard-style, not be enough.

Introducing BlinkFeed, and rather splendid it is too, with some of the default news sources

Rather cleverly, on a virgin device, the three visible BlinkFeed panels link to set-up and help screens — HTC really have thought of everything. Tapping on ‘Get started’ offers a wealth of suggested news sources – one tick for each and the user is up and running. You won’t find any specialist news web sites listed though — everything’s strictly mainstream.

Swiping left, reveals more about BlinkFeed — options for including Facebook and Twitter (via the official applications), plus Flickr and LinkedIn. Calendar entries, when applicable, will also show up in BlinkFeed.

Linking up Facebook as a BlinkFeed err…. feed(!)

The Flipboard comparison is a good one in terms of both layout and scope, though I’d argue that BlinkFeed goes further in terms of what it integrates and how it looks — it’s prettier, faster and more usable. By default it’s your ‘home’ in Sense 5.0, always sits at the left of your homescreen array and can’t be removed. Although, once you’ve worked out that pinching in on the homescreens still gives something of a linear overview, clever users will also spot that by long-pressing on a homescreen thumbnail there’s the option to set that as ‘home’ instead. 99% of Sense 5.0 users won’t get that far though and BlinkFeed will be what they see a dozen times a day.

And that’s not a bad thing. Every time I went back to BlinkFeed I found new and interesting content, beautifully presented. It’s the public face of Sense 5.0 and it’s gorgeous.

Feed filters and the combined BlinkFeed/homescreen main menu

Pulling down on the BlinkFeed vertical panorama brings up a pick list of filters, so you can (for example) just see news or social updates from a particular source. There’s also an Android 4 style menu, giving access to fine tuning your BlinkFeed ‘Topics and Services’ and to homescreen ‘Settings’.

Settings (I love that BlinkFeed can be disabled on cellular data and restricted to Wi-Fi only) and personalisation menus.

This latter finishes up with Personalize, which emphasises just how much HTC Sense has grown up. It largely comprises Wallpaper, Lockscreen style — including the tantalising No lock screen option, for ultra quick device access! — and Customise home screen, which, if you think about it, are most of the public face of HTC Sense just a few versions ago but now find themselves relegated to a setting within a setting. But that’s not a complaint, it just means that power users who really do want to fiddle have to dig a little deeper.

Two of the half dozen Lockscreen themes – choices, choices! The option to have NO lockscreen is particularly intriguing

Google Now is implemented in Sense 5.0 on the HTC One via a long press on the Home icon, with a double tap set to bring up the grid of (up to nine) recent applications. A lot was made, on the One’s release, of its use of just two Android controls rather than the traditional three (or even four), but the system works well enough here and the home button combinations work from anywhere in the interface.

Google Now (long press of home) and the Recent Apps grid (double tap)

Widgets

This wouldn’t be HTC Sense without a prominent clock and weather, would it? From the photo realism of earlier widgets, HTC has dialled this back to a more diagrammatic banner at the top of BlinkFeed, but it works well enough, with taps (left and right respectively) revealing a beautiful globe and world clock, plus an animated cloudscape indicative of the current weather. The latter is pretty but not that useful, but (thankfully) a swipe to the side then reveals hourly and daily forecasts, so all bases are covered.

Animated photorealism, full-screen or (more usefully) an actual forecast (one swipe away)

Just as Samsung did with TouchWiz, HTC have eschewed the stock Android way of adding app shortcuts and widgets to the homescreen. Google’s idea is that you go hunting for apps/widgets in the main galleries, and then think about where to put them. Whereas most real world users start with an empty homescreen and think “Hmm…, now what I can I put in here?” There’s no one right answer, though I think Samsung and HTC’s way of doing things will make sense to more people.

Sense 5.0 is relatively light on added widgets, perhaps because of the giant that is BlinkFeed, above. A People widget provides a nice graphical gallery of favourite contacts — tapping through shows the usual contact methods. There are a host of 1×1 toggle widgets, for airplane mode, auto-rotate, Bluetooth, mobile data, and so on. Interestingly, the original (more colourful) Weather Clock from previous Sense versions is also included, should you feel the need to go ‘retro’.

Browsing and selecting widgets for a homescreen (left); A typical Android drop-down notifications screen (right)

Notifications

There’s little different to report here, with notifications swiped away sideways or multi-touch expanded (remember, Sense 5.0 is running on Jelly Bean now) and with a one-touch ‘dismiss all’ icon at the top, plus a direct shortcut to the Android Settings application. It’s all a bit bare bones compared to Samsung’s TouchWiz shortcuts carousel and other embellishments, but it’s clear and to the point.

The permanent shortcut/toggle for HTC’s Power saver functions is a little offputting and can’t be disabled, sadly. I’m guessing that the company simply wanted to make all users aware of the facility at all times. And, with a sealed battery in most new HTC smartphones, being all too aware that saving power is crucial has got to be a good thing for most people.

Power saver options and battery reports

Applications

Not actually part of HTC Sense, but part of HTC’s standard loadout these days, are 7digital, a licensed music store and Watch, HTC’s attempt at a video store. The latter is set to close throughout the second half of 2013 and, to be honest, neither application is needed by the user, given the presence of Google’s Play Music and Play Movies.

Duplication is also a factor in the presence of Internet, HTC’s version of the stock Android browser and included in the dock by default, plus Chrome, Google’s next-gen browser which will surely push the old browser from device firmwares in the coming year.

Polaris Office is present on most Sense 5.0 devices, in full editing form, which is great to see, along with a custom HTC PDF Viewer utility, which works well.

One slightly confusing aspect of HTC’s application panes (which scroll vertically, as in days of Android old, rather than horizontally) is that applications which are already in the bottom-of-screen dock don’t show up in the main lists. Although this is logical, I’d rather the application list was definitive and not missing the four or so apps which have been marked as favourites in this way.

Hints and Tweaks

HTC does like to add its stamp to the core Android applications, tweaking the look and feel of People, Calendar, Gallery, and more, with some examples shown here, though there isn’t space to evaluate each against their stock counterparts here.

One thing I loved was HTC’s hints system. When you access many application screens and dialogs for the first time, mock hand-drawn pointers and comments are overlaid, to show new users what to look for. The way the original layout is dimmed to bring the hints up in relief is rather beautiful and really very effective.

Friendly hints pop-up to annotate the displays and guide new users for common actions

Finally, there’s an explicit ‘Tips & Help’ application, with a gallery of tutorial videos to download (they’re not preloaded for obvious space reasons) and a wealth of textual ‘how to’s to browse through. Combined with the hints system, HTC have eliminated the need for a paper manual or guide — all you get in the box is a slip of paper showing how to insert your microSIM card.

There are a huge number of Help topics and guides onboard a modern HTC Sense device

Wrap up

Just as with Samsung’s most recent TouchWiz, I found that HTC’s Sense 5.0 has grown up, banishing the gimmicky ultra customisations of earlier versions to the corners of Settings and introducing elements that add real value. And again to my surprise, on balance, I find myself recommending the customised, skinned Android experience here over stock Android for new users. HTC has worked hard with BlinkFeed, with the extended set-up wizard, with the hints and help systems and with the choice of lockscreen schemes, to hold a new user’s hand every step of the way.

Sense 5.0 isn’t perfect, and yes, it’s still galling that the Android experience on an HTC One differs so much from that on a Galaxy S4, but HTC has certainly done enough to keep most One owners happy and stop them contacting a knowledgeable friend and asking about new launchers or stock firmwares.

The recent update to Gmail — both its Android app and the website  — means that this seems like a good time to take a closer look at Google’s email service. This is something I use daily, and have done for years. There are aspects I love, aspects I hate, but I think it’s continuing to make moves in the right direction.

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A Confession

We may as well cut to the chase straight away; I love Google — and I’ve waxed lyrical about it over on Web.AppStorm — but I’m not devoted enough to welcome every change with open arms.

I make no secret of my love for Google – but I accept that not everything is perfect.

However, the recent introduction of tabs to the web version of Gmail knocked me off balance somewhat. The Gmail I had come to know and love looked like a mess. Rather than having all of my emails arriving in my inbox, Google was now deciding how certain emails should be categorized and automatically moving them to tabs where it felt appropriate.

Gmail’s new tabbed inbox has been met with a mixture of hatred and agreement from users.

Losing Control

I am vehemently opposed to anything automatic happening to my emails that I have not personally set up. I make extensive use of filters, but these are automated steps that I have created. So it was good to find that tabs at the main Gmail website could be easily disabled and this was something I did very quickly.

Why did this new feature get banished so quickly from my inbox? For a number of reasons. I want to be in control of my email. I don’t want Google to decide that a particular message should appear in my Primary, Social, Promotions, Updates or Forums tab. I’m quite capable of making these decisions myself.

Not a fan of tabs? You’ll be happy to learn that they are not compulsary.

The introduction of tabs also brought a new batch of inter inbox advertisements – another thing I’m not happy with. Add to this the fact that the number of unread messages in the inbox is now split across five tabs rather than being totalled up, and it did not take me long to decide that tabs were not for me.

Gmail App Update

Perhaps unsurprising, any settings that are put in place in your Gmail account are rolled over to the Gmail app. I have disabled tabs on the website, so these labels do not appear in the app either. Great! Now I can get on and enjoy the other changes Google has introduced. But of course, if you find that you are a fan of the new tabs, you can make use of these categories in the app.

The Gmail app sidebar makes it easier than ever to move between accounts and labels.

And there’s quite a lot to look at. A side navigation bar can be used to not only move between labels and folders, but also to switch inboxes if you have multiple accounts set up. It might seem like a minor change, but it’s a massive improvement over the way things used to work. Gone is the button to refresh the inbox, replaced with a gesture. Like many other apps, including Twitter, it’s now possible to refresh with a quick downward swipe.

Swiping to update your inbox soon becomes second nature, but the lettered icons are weird to start with.

Perhaps the most obvious change to the app is visible to the left hand side of the screen. Contacts for whom you have an avatar will have their image next to any of their email, while for everyone else the first letter of their name appears as a large icon. It’s a bold look. It’s not going to be to everyone’s taste, but at the very least it makes the inbox a more colourful place to be!

And the Bad News

The most recent update is quite a big change; it is not for the weak hearted. For anyone who has become used to doing things in a certain way, there is a learning curve to endure. So as much as I am a Google fan, I’ll admit to instantly hating the app update. The slide-out navigation bar seemed unresponsive to start with, and there is a key interface tweak that takes a little getting used to.

Buttons that were previously at the bottom of the screen have been moved to the top. This is not a serious problem by any means, but memory muscle means that even after several days working with the app, my thumb still wanders to the wrong portion of the screen to delete unwanted messages.

Argh! My buttons have gone! Ah no… they’ve just moved!

It is also not immediately obvious how to select multiple messages. While individual emails can be swiped to delete, if you want to delete several at once, what should you do now that there are no check boxes? It turns out that a quick tap of an avatar or icon is all it takes to select a message — but make sure you tap in the right place or you’ll open emails by accident.

There is also a rather strange change: the delete button is not enabled by default. Just as with the Gmail website, you’re encouraged to archive everything rather than remove it. Thankfully, a quick trip to the app’s settings reveals that archiving has not replaced deleting and that the two buttons can live happily side by side — or you can choose whichever you would rather use full-time.

For some reason Google continues to push archiving over deleting, but you can still enable the delete button.

Apps vs Mobile Websites

So, with this powerful dedicated app, why does Google bother to maintain a mobile website for Gmail?

To start with, it is significantly easier to create a website that can be used on older Android devices than it is to have an app that’s guaranteed to work with all versions of the OS, different screen sizes and various hardware configurations.

Android apps are great, but they require more development work to ensure device compatibility.

But this is not the only thing that Google has to consider. When new features are added to any app, developers are reliant on users updating to the latest version of the app. With a dedicated mobile website, it is possible to ensure that all visitors have the same experience and are provided with all of the latest features.

From a user’s point of view this may be less desirable. If the mobile version of Gmail introduces a feature I don’t like, and I decide to use the website, there’s nothing I can do to avoid it. If the same feature is added to the Android app, I can simply delay upgrading until I want to.

It looks a little on the simple side, but the mobile Gmail website is amazingly well-featured.

I switched back to the mobile site after trying out the new app for a while, and although it is great to have access to familiar features such as check boxes to select multiple messages, it feels positively antiquated already! The current Gmail app for Android may not be perfect — and there are few apps that could not be improved in some way — but it’s getting there.

I’d be interested to hear how you access your Gmail inbox. Do you do it through the Gmail app, or through the mobile website? Perhaps you have an alternative email app that you use. Share your experiences below, and let us know what you think of the latest changes to Google’s email app.

But there are those who are fighting back, creating sports games with uncomplicated controls, fewer obstacles to enjoyment, and more arcade-style action. Super Soccer Champs 2013 is one such effort, drawing on the legacy of Dino Dini’s Goal! and Sensible Soccer to provide a delightful, nuanced, two-button top-down soccer game.

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Pick up and Play

If you’ve played anything in the vein of 90s classics Kick Off and Sensible Soccer, Super Soccer Champs should feel instantly familiar. It even has finer details such as aftertouch and tapping a button to trap the ball, stopping it dead so you can pivot and turn or hold momentarily for a teammate’s run.

This should be a welcome sight to Sensible Soccer and Kick Off fans.

Never fear if that era of soccer gaming passed you by — Super Soccer Champs won’t take long to learn. You have just two buttons and a joystick for controls. Use the joystick to move the currently-selected player — switching between them is done automatically. The blue button is for simple passing or making a beeline to the ball; the red button is for slide tackles, shooting, and long or lofted passes.

There’s plenty of hand-holding while you learn the ropes, with assisted dribbling — whereby on the full setting the ball essentially sticks to your players’ feet, no matter how sharply they turn — and difficulty settings added to the comprehensive help screens (from the main menu, go Extras->Instructions).

There’s a fairly robust tutorial at hand to show you the ropes.

On lower difficulty it’s easy to simply dribble your way through the opposition’s defense, but Super Soccer Champs gets challenging when you ramp things up. Sudden changes of direction are perilous when the ball is at your feet, reducing the possibility of inhuman turns — expect to watch in despair as the ball goes off on a separate course whenever you try something outrageous.

Super Soccer Champs encourages you to follow the old football adage: play the way you’re facing. The best players will slip into a fast-paced one or two-touch passing game, dancing the ball up, down, and across the pitch. It’s beautiful to watch and incredibly satisfying to pull off. Especially given how hard it is to not give the ball away against strong opposition.

Sensi Soccer clones and lookalikes often have woeful AI, but here it’s far from it. Teammates will make simple runs for you, and do their utmost to hurry over to where they should be when you drag them out of position. Opposition defenders keep things tight, ever watchful of gaps in their line. Goalkeepers seldom leave you scratching your head. Non-controlled players on both teams make plenty of interceptions, and opposition strikers have a decent eye for goal.

Go for goal? Or cross? The defenders have made both tough.

Indeed, Super Soccer Champs is one of the best representations of soccer’s appeal that I’ve seen on Android — although it’s still hard to go past New Star Soccer’s charms in portraying the highs and lows of a career. It cuts to the core of the beauty of kicking a ball around a rectangular field with goals at either end and two teams battling it out. Shame the offside rule seems to be completely ignored, though.

Mode Selection

You get a managerial career mode, in which you are responsible not only for the action on the pitch but also squad management — fitness, tactics, lineups — and buying/selling players. Do well and the bigger clubs will swoop in with a job offer, accelerating your rise to the top.

Win 10 in a row with a little club like Brighton and you, too, may have mid-tier clubs from top-flight leagues sniffing around.

There are leagues from England, Scotland, Italy, Spain, Japan, and China, with two divisions offered in England. All are open to hop between in Player Manager mode or Friendly Match mode, or to play individually in a League mode. There are also challenges for historic tournaments — the 2012 or 1996 European Championships and the 1966, 86, 90, and 2010 World Cup.

Many clubs in the UK have made-up names like Islington Guns (Arsenal) or Stretford Utd (Manchester United), as do their players, but for the most part real names are featured. You can always edit the fake ones to be correct, if it bothers you.

This is all you can learn about players outside of the editor.

Players have an overall rating out of five stars, based on individual values out of 100 for eight attributes. Strangely, the current release only allows checking of those attributes in the editor — when you’re selecting a team or buying people in Player Manager mode you’re stuck with just their star rating (and maybe their market value).

This is frustrating because you might want a speed-demon winger with high control, but instead end up with someone slow and physical — all because you couldn’t see their specific skills.

In the case of Messi, it’s maybe no such an issue, but there’s no way to gauge how the overall rating matches the specific attributes without popping into the player editor.

A Few Yards Short

That isn’t the only issue I found with the game. Several other little niggles hurt what is an otherwise-polished experience. Gestures for red-button kicks — down to cancel, up to just hoik it clear right away — are hard to complete under duress, or generally in the time before the power gauge fills in its entirety, partly due to sensitivity issues but mostly because of the button position.

You have to tap a button to simulate each league match — individually — that you’re not playing. You can’t change the zoom level (the players and ball are really small at the height given). Buying players is too easy; selling is annoying because you have to back out of one screen and open another to see how an offer compares to the player’s value.

It’s a little thing, but tap that sim button 10-or-so times for each round of a 38-game season, and repeat ad lib, and you’ll get annoyed.

There are also no user-defined tactics, which severely limits the game’s potential for strategy at the highest level and hurts its longevity for when you finally master the on-field action.

This is pretty much the full extent of your tactical freedom. You can change to one of a few other formations and swap players around.

And there’s a menu option for two-player games that’s currently inactive. Presumably when that does arrive, it will be an online or local wifi mode that lives or dies on its lag-free/laggy performance, but for now it’s a big tease sure to disappoint many buyers.

Arcade Soccer Joy

Super Soccer Champs 2013 is already a fantastic, rewarding, and fun soccer game true to the spirit of the Amiga and DOS classics in the Sensible Soccer and Kick Off/Dino Dini series. It’s accessible enough for first-timers to pick it up and be scoring goals right away, while also being deep enough that veterans of the older games can bask in the challenge of leading a team of no-hopers to glory.

If you’ve been waiting for an old-school soccer game that plays to the core delights of kicking a ball about, look no further. Super Soccer Champs 2013 scores a winner.

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Your Memories in a Visual Feed

Flava does not look like the usual note-taking/journal app — it doesn’t file away your notes like pages in a book. Instead, it shows your content in a timeline. It looks very similar to Path, especially with the dates popping up when you scroll through the timeline. The minimalist menu bar is on top, showing your avatar and name on the top left and doubling as a drop down menu for more viewing options. A little red + button sits on the top right corner, ready for adding a new entry.

Flava’s impressive timeline feature

Journal entries are shown individually as they are added. Depending on the type of content, an icon or image is used. Photos show the image thumbnails, sound clips show a mic icon, and media files like songs and books show thumbnails taken from the web. These appear in the order that they were added, regardless of the time and date indicated on the entry.

Your Life in Multimedia

One of the things I really like with Flava is the variety of objects you can insert in your entries. This is not just a journal for writing, it’s also a place for keeping images, music, books, sound clips, and even moods. In a way, it reminds me of that box or tin can where we keep our most precious souvenirs, like tickets to our first concert, or birthday cards from loved ones. Almost all life experiences that can be captured, digitized and immortalized can be kept within this app.

Adding journal entries is fun with tags

When adding a new entry, you will see a row of tag icons on the bottom for extra content. You can add photos or videos from your camera, sound clips, music, movies, books, a location or a website link. The last two icons to the right are for moods and tags.

Note that adding music, movies and books requires internet access, as these connect to Amazon and iTunes for track or book information. Adding a location also needs a network connection, and either GPS or Wi-Fi, for accessing locations through Foursquare.

Although adding tags and media content on an entry is a great feature, it still comes down to whether Flava is a good app for writing and recording your thoughts. Surprisingly, it is. I found myself typing away, letting my thoughts flow freely without getting distracted by anything in the app’s interface. The objects/tags row is way below the text field, which gives you plenty of room to type and focus on your text.

Recall Feelings, Not Dates

Inserting objects and tags in your entries might seem like a random thing to do, but Flava’s sorting feature makes it all come together in a seamless way. Sliding the screen to the left reveals the Sort menu, where you can tap on an icon to filter your timeline. You can select more than one tag or icon for a more specific search.

Access sorting and search features by swiping sideways

For a faster search, you can swipe to the right (from the main menu) and use the Search bar that appears on top.

Other Options

Journals are generally private, and Flava recognizes that. There is an option to assign a four-digit password to the app, and it will always prompt the user to enter it once activated.

The Flava Settings page

Other settings include Sync Modes, which can be changed from Auto, Wi-Fi only or Manual. The app allows free syncing to its own cloud servers. Unfortunately for now, Flava provides a meager 310 MB storage space. Syncing into the cloud would require you to sign up for a free Flava account. It also has multi-platform support with a web and iOS version of the app.

Conclusion

There are a great number of things to like in Flava, but there are also some minor flaws in the app’s beta design. For one, the timeline may not be as accurate as one might hope. The app shows journal entries in the order they were added, even if you edited them to reflect an earlier time or date. This seems like a contradiction to the whole timeline concept, so I hope it gets fixed in future updates.

Although Flava is in its infancy, I already find the app fresh and different from all others. Going to its main screen is like viewing a Facebook news feed, only it’s not of my friends, but my own private thoughts and memories. This, for me, is more interesting than flipping page after page of random content. Despite some of its downfalls, I consider Flava to be one of the most interesting journal apps so far.

I’ve tried just about every Markdown-related app available on Google Play, but I never felt I had found one that suited my needs until recently with Lightpaper Pro. It isn’t perfect, but it has most of the functionality I’m looking for and then some. Read on to find out if Lightpaper Pro is for you.

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Markdown, Dropbox and Android, Oh My!

Lightpaper supports Markdown and Multimarkdown with a really nice Preview mode. I sadly can’t say that about too many Android text editors that I’ve used, so it’s important to take in that the app is as beautiful as it is functional as a text editor.

The app includes a Distraction-Free Mode (DFM) that helps de-clutter the text on your screen while you’re typing.

In the paid version of the app, there are features like optional extra keyboards for quick access to Markdown formatting. The paid version also includes a Distraction Free Mode that highlights only the paragraph you’re writing and makes everything else disappear. This is supposed to increase focus for writers who spend more time editing than they do writing.

The app integrates with Dropbox, but it creates a subdirectory in the Apps folder by default and I can’t find a way to provide access to every folder I use in Dropbox. I find this problematic with the way that I work, since this can lock me in to one app at any given time. My favourite text editors allow me access to any file I want in Dropbox, and I wish Lightpaper could offerthat as well.

Beautiful Letters

That being said, on a purely aesthetic level, Lightpaper is easy on the eyes. Regardless of whether you’re on a phone or a tablet, it really scales beautifully. In fact, the app really shines on a tablet. It’s gorgeous. There are a couple of bugs with the app’s fullscreen mode, but I suspect they don’t appear on every device. The bugs I’ve seen are all a result of Android’s fragmentation and could be out of the developer’s control.

I think the app really shines on a tablet.

Don’t let that dismay you, though: Lightpaper is largely a fantastic user experience that’s unrivalled in my experiences on the platform. The Distraction Free Mode is among the nicest I’ve seen in any text editor and I never felt a desire to change the default font (although that can be done with ease).

There isn’t much about the app that isn’t visually pleasing, and I believe that’s really important. Writers spend a lot of time writing. It’s important to us that our workplace is functional as we need it to be and as beautiful as possible. Lightpaper has us covered.

For Bloggers

Markdown is really meant for people who write on Internet-based publications like blogs or webzines. To that end, there is support for blogging built right in to Lightpaper. Because Markdown is essentially a visual markup syntax for HTML, Lightpaper is able to convert your text into HTML and upload it directly to WordPress or Tumblr. If you sign into your account on either service, all of you have to do is choose Blog from the sharing menu and choose what account you want to publish it to.

You can share your content directly from the file list.

I have a Tumblr account that I keep active to experiment with, and I saved my Lightpaper review as a Draft there. It was instantly available for me on Tumblr’s website to review.

I’ve yet to see a service like this that has been perfect, but this is the closest I’ve encountered. It works better than copying and pasting HTML code into my personal website, which is great. There are no massive formatting errors, and I think most people are going to be able to post to blogs without fear.

What Lightpaper Gets Completely Right

It’s really the blogging capability that made me realize how powerful this app really is. Lightpaper’s greatest trick is how powerful it is. It’s an extremely lightweight app. In fact, on my Nexus 7, it weighs in at 4.2mb. There are four different themes, but all of them are starkly plain and simple. In fact, simplicity seems to be Clockwork Engine’s greatest design philosophy.

The app is simple. Text editing doesn’t get much more basic and the Preview view is fantastic.

That being said, beneath that simple exterior is an extremely powerful word processor that rivals anything I’ve used on the iOS platform. The settings are easy to access and the app itself is easy to use. Tutorials don’t feel necessary, despite what’s going on beneath the hood. This is the sort of thing that every developer should strive for.

I think the Pro version is worth paying for, if only because it adds more power while keeping the app simple. You can probably get by with the free version of the app, but Pro features like the Distraction Free Mode and Markdown/Multimarkdown keyboard trays are well worth the couple dollars for any serious writer.

Room for Improvement

No app is perfect, though. Lightpaper is still a relatively new app, and there’s lots of room to grow. First of all, I think that some actions, like swiping to the left to see the Markdown preview, need to be more visible. The feature is useful, and I wish it was in the app’s menu as well.

It would also be nice if the app included a Markdown/Multimarkdown Syntax Guide. The app includes a sort of tutorial document that guides you through the app’s many features, but newcomers to Markdown with the app have no built-in cheat sheet.

The closest thing that Lightpaper includes to a cheat sheet is this document, but it’s more of an app manual than it is a Syntax guide.

This is something I think a lot of Markdown editors, not just Lightpaper, would be wise to consider. There’s a lot of potential for a really polished in-app Markdown guide, and I’d love to see how Clockwork Engines would integrate it.

Finally, the Dropbox integration needs to improve. It’s not bad right now — at least it’s there and easy to use — but I want access to everything in my Dropbox folder instead of just Lightpaper’s folder. I hope Clockwork Engines makes more use of Dropbox’s open API in the future.

My Final Thoughts

Do you need a Markdown editor on your Android device? Are you looking to post to your blog directly from your phone? Do you value smart design and ease of use? If you answered yes to any of these questions, or all of them, then you need Lightpaper. Without a doubt, it’s the most promising Markdown text editor I’ve tried on the Android platform.

It’s not perfect, but I look forward to seeing how the app grows with time. Lightpaper is taking me one step closer to not needing an iOS device on hand to make it through a workday, and I highly recommend it.