Have you thought of adding a little festive cheer to your iPhone, iPod Touch, or iPad? What about a useful Christmas app to help you remember everything? Here is the official iTalk Magazine Must-Have Christmas App List for 2010:

• Christmas Countdown (iPhone/iPod Touch) and Christmas Countdown HD (iPad) will show impatient children how many nights, hours, or even seconds until Christmas. Also works for impatient adults!
• Sleeps To Christmas (iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad) is a similar application, and also allows you to broadcast your joy via Facebook or Twitter. They have an advertisement-supported Sleeps To Christmas Lite version for free too!
• Nice List (iPhone/iPod Touch) – For making a list and checking it twice. This gift manager app will help you to make sure you’ve got something for everybody, as well as helping you stick to your Christmas budget. For iPad users, Gifts HD is a do-everything gift manager app that even helps you find the lowest prices on the net!
• Fuzzle Christmas – fun and free Christmas puzzle game. This is a Christmas-themed version of the great Fuzzle game.
• Try the Christmas Tree Decorator (iPhone/iPod Touch) for some fun “practice” before you have to do the actual tree. Try dropping an ornament and see what happens!
• The Holiday Snow Globe (iPhone/iPod Touch) might not really be much like the real thing, but it’s fun nonetheless!
• In the area of Christmas book applications, the old favourites are still winners for me. At the top of my list are How The Grinch Stole Christmas (iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad) and The Night Before Christmas (iPad), both with graphics and audio, and A Christmas Carol (iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad) a professionally narrated audio version of Charles Dickens’ perennial book – remember Scrooge?
• Are The Wiggles popular with the kids at your house? We recommend the Wiggly Wiggly Christmas album for children of all ages. Their catchy songs will have you humming some new Christmas tunes in no time!

This is our list, we’ve checked it … well, only once actually – we are too busy playing our favourite games. What about you? Tell us what apps you recommend for Christmas in our comments and we’ll update the list with your additions!

- Ricky

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This article was originally published at Must-Have Christmas Apps and is copyright (C) Ricky Buchanan 2010. May be forwarded but do not republish without permission.

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Their list is quoted to include:

[...] over 8,000 United States locations and counting including dozens of popular national chains.

KidsEatFree encourages you to help update the list constantly by reporting any changes to entries and submitting new entries if you find a place with a “children eat free” period that isn’t already listed.

You can let the app use your current location as a base for searching, or search manually using a city name or zip code.

See the results of your search on a handy map to help you choose where to eat

Once you’ve found a place that looks likely you can see a map of how to get there, add it to the address book, or even automatically email yourself about the location.

This looks like a great way to find child-friendly eating venues too, as anywhere offering free meals to kids at certain times is likely to have facilities for children and be generally accepting of kids even outside those times.

Have you tried KidsEatFree, and does it show your local eateries?

- Ricky

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I discovered a flash version of the game first, named Chain Factor and got a bit addicted to it so I went looking for a version I could play on my iPod Touch and iPad. Drop7 is what I found, and I’m really enjoying it.

In this game, you drop single blocks one by one into a grid of seven by seven blocks. Unlike Tetris-like games, you have an unlimited amount of time to choose where to drop each block, and they’re dropped simply by touching the column you want to drop the block into.

Here you can see three of the 5 blocks in the process of exploding, as I just dropped the hidden block on top of them to make a column five blocks tall. The grey blocks in the bottom row are because I have just advanced to level three.

If the blocks dropping to fill the gaps after an explosion creates another valid move, the explosions repeat – this is called a chain. Scores for blocks exploding in a chain are much higher than scores for blocks that explode all at the same time:

• Initial round of blocks: 7 points per block.
• Second step of a chain: 39 points per block.
• Third step of a chain: 109 points per block.

I can’t tell you the values after that, but they keep increasing rapidly. I once (accidentally, I must admit) created a chain that was eleven moves long and scored a phenomenal amount of points with it. Setting up chains that will explode one by one like dominoes is a challenge made harder by the fact that some blocks initially have “hidden” values and will only reveal their digits after two adjacent blocks have exploded to “break them open”. After a certain number of blocks are dropped, you move up a level which introduces a row of hidden blocks at the bottom of the screen.

It’s a difficult game to describe because it doesn’t sound interesting but it’s really both interesting and one of those games that stays interesting the longer you play. I also really like that there’s an unlimited amount of time to drop each block because I really hate games that just get faster and faster until my fingers can’t keep up! I was skeptical at first because at US$2.99 it’s more than most simple games I buy, but it’s definitely been worth the price. Drop7 is a universal app which works on iPad, iPhone and iPod Touch.

I highly recommend Drop7 to anybody who likes number or shape based logic games.

- Ricky

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This article was originally published at Drop7 – Perfect for Tetris and Sodoku Lovers! and is copyright (C) Ricky Buchanan 2010. May be forwarded but do not republish without permission.

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Why? You’ll have to watch this video to find out:

In case you’d like your own to see how your cat goes, the apps you see in the video are Noby Noby Boy followed by the main icon choosing screen, and then Smule’s great Magic Piano application. The Noby Noby Boy works on the iPhone and iPod Touch as well, but you’ll need an iPad for Magic Piano.

I’ve never seen my cat watch TV or react to anything on the screen of my iPod Touch, but I’ve never tried the mixed sound/picture type apps shown here. Perhaps some experimenting is in order, do you think your cat or dog would like an iPad? What apps would they use? Leave me a comment!

Cheers,
Jeshyr

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Find the app you’re trying to find information about in the iTunes Store and bring up the page with that application on it. First I’m going to check out the Proloquo2Go communication application; here’s its page:

Proloquo2Go in the App Store

Look at the app icon on the left and then scan downwards – you’ll come to a heading labelled “Requirements” just under the age rating:

Here's the requirements that Proloquo2Go lists.

For Proloquo2Go it says “Compatible with iPhone and iPod Touch” first so you know your iPod Touch will work fine. It also says “Requires iPhone OS 2.1 or later.” If you aren’t certain what “iPhone OS” means or what version of iPhone OS you’re running, you’ll need to find out what version of iPhone OS you are running.

Apart from apps which need the telephone or camera functions of the iPhone, pretty much anything will work with the an iPod Touch as well as it will work with the iPhone. I only recall ever finding one app which required an iPhone to function and not because of the requirement for an phone or camera – it needed a built in microphone rather than one which is plugged in like the iPod Touch has.

Are there any apps that you wish you could run, but which your device won’t handle? What are they?

Cheers,
Jeshyr

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After watching that video, I want an iPad even though I don’t really need one! It’s true that I have a pretty great excuse for getting one – writing better posts for you – but I’ll be holding off for a little while until the price comes down, as it inevitably does with new Apple products.

I think the people who will find the iPad the most wonderful are people like you – people who might not even have a computer, or might have a computer but are certainly not geeks or tech people. People who call the shop or their friendly neighbourhood helper (possibly your children) if anything goes wrong. As you can see from the video, this device is going to be easy and simple to learn and use. You should be able to all but retire your friendly neighbourhood techie, and you can learn to do things with it yourself.

So, are you getting one?

Cheers,
Jeshyr

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Moms With Apps was begun by three iPhone and iPod Touch developers who connected over Twitter. They quickly recognised the family-friendly nature in each of their apps and suggested a brainstorming session on cross-marketing. The group’s founders were Alesha and Jill from MomMaps, Lynette from PicPocket Books, and Lorraine from My Busy Kit, and what started as a small conference call for brainstorming soon grew into an enthusiastic group with members collaborating over the internet in a huge variety of ways.

The purpose of the group is to brainstorm and support each other in mobile app marketing and development – most apps are for iPod Touch and iPhone although there are a few for other mobile platforms.

The apps represented within the group cover children’s books, family-friendly destinations, audio tales, magazines, communication tools, games, and interactive stories. All apps share the common purpose of providing a quality experience to help kids and families.

The group is certainly well represented on the internet in multiple ways:

• Read their Moms With Apps Blog to keep up with the main goings on.
• Follow @momswithapps on Twitter for short updates
• Become a fan of MomsWithApps on Facebook
• Any parent developer, reviewer, or industry specialist interested in family-oriented mobile apps is welcome to join the MomsWithApps Google Group where brainstorming and development happens.

The My Little Suitcase app for kids

I’d like to wish them all the best – I’ll be looking out for iPhone and iPod Touch apps from the group to review for iTalkMagazine in future.

Cheers,
Jeshyr

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Sometimes you need to know what version of iPhone OS you are running. Usually this is to make sure your version is new enough for a piece of software.

So, how do you know what iPhone OS you’re running? Luckily, there’s no special skill needed here, and there’s even two equally simple ways to do it!

Find Your iPhone OS Version With iTunes

Plug your iPod Touch or iPhone into your computer by whatever means you usually use to synchronise your device – the cable or a dock.

Now go to the iTunes program on your computer. If the screen isn’t showing your device’s information, click on the name of your device. You can see mine in the is called Touchy – it’s in the red circle I’ve drawn on the left of this picture:

Here's the device page for my iPod Touch, with the version number in the red circle.

In the red circle on the right you’ll see the heading “Software Version” and mine says “3.1.3″ – that’s my software version. Unless you have a very old iPod Touch or iPhone, yours is probably the same version.

Find Your iPhone OS Version With Your iPhone/iTouch

This takes a few more button presses but you can do it without having a computer handy. First, turn on your iPhone or iPod Touch and unlocking it so you can use it. You’ll see the screen with all your application icons, one of them will have the name “Settings” and an icon that looks like this:

This is the icon for the Settings app, it will be on the first page apps on your iTouch or iPhone.

Now select “General” settings:

Now you're in the Settings app, you need to go to the "General" section.

And now the “About” section:

This is the general settings page, now you need the "About" item.

And now you need to scroll down to the bottom of the list and you’ll see “Version”:

And now you just read off the version number - ignore the bit in brackets.

You can safely ignore the bit in brackets, so the version here is “3.1.3″.

Understanding The iPhone OS Version

So now you know your version number, how do you understand it?

Firstly, if you read it out you pronounce the “.” parts as “point”. So “3.1.3″ reads as “Three point one point three”.

Version numbers read from left to right like regular numbers, but the leftmost number is always the most important. So “3.1.3″ is a bigger version number than “2.2.4″ the way “313″ would be higher number than “224″. The only reason we need dots at all is that sometimes a single part gets higher than 9, so “2.10.1″ is a valid version number and is higher than “2.9.8″ but lower than “3.0.0″. And “2.10.1″ would be a different version to “21.0.1″ and to “2.1.01″.

Since the leftmost number in the version is the most important, you have to imagine inserting any “missing” zeroes – for example “2.1.0″ is the same as “2.1″ and “3″ is the same as “3.0.0.0.0.0.0″

And if that all sounds horribly confusing, mostly it’s just the first one or two numbers that matter. So if your version number begins with a “3″ then it’s higher than any version number beginning with “1″ or “2″. So I can look at this requirements list:

Now you can compare your own version to the required version.

It says that it requires iPhone OS “2.1 or later” and I know my version number is “3.1.3″ which starts with a “3″ so that’s higher than anything starting with a 2, including “2.1″ so it must be a later version so I know I can run this app on my device!

Practice: Look up your version number by both of these methods and leave a comment telling me how you went.

Cheers,
Jeshyr

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Welcome to the world of RIDDIM RIBBON, where you guide a spinning ball as it races and rushes down a twisting, turning ribbon that’s floating in a dynamic digital space. With the beats of The Black Eyed Peas (and downloadable levels from Tiësto, Benny Benassi and, soon, others) pumping in your ears, use the iPhone / iPod Touch’s ultra-sensitive tilt controls to stay in the groove.

Each fork in the ribbon presents a new direction for you to take the mix of the song. Jump the ramps to reach upper levels, where wild audio effects kick in and the sound becomes more uniquely yours. Roll over pebbles and hit targets to maintain your speed through the checkpoints, but watch out for beat-dropping obstacles – you’ll need to flick your phone to jump over them! If you veer off the target line too long, instruments start fading, the music slows down, and the track falls apart. Then you’ll certainly lose the crowd, which is a DJ’s worst nightmare. The better you play the game, the better the song sounds!

Playing Riddim Ribbon

The game comes with three different Black Eyed Peas songs (Boom Boom Pow, I Gotta Feeling, and Meet Me Halfway) and, like the Tap Tap series, has in-game purchases from other artists, avatars, and online scoring.

There’s three skill levels for each song and (I like this bit best) there’s multiple ways to get successfully to the finish line for each skill level. So if you’re bad at games like me, you aren’t stuck with just one thing to do at the easiest level! On the other hand if you’re really good at games, check out the Riddim Ribbon Launch Contest: Every day for 30 days, one Riddim Ribbon player wins the entire Black Eyed Peas catalog, which includes Behind the Front, Bridging the Gap, Elephunk, Monkey Business, and The E.N.D.! Then, one grand prize winner gets a pair of Beats By Dre Headphones! You win by posting the highest score (on any set) is the winner for that day. For more details, check out the Tapulous blog.

Here’s another screen shot for you:

More Riddim Ribbon playing action

So, who’s playing Riddim Ribbon and how’s it going for you?

- Jeshyr

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I’ll use a web app we just wrote about, Learn10, as the example. In the article we give the web app’s address as “http://m.learn10.com/”, but all you really need to type into Safari is the “m.learn10.com” part, like this:

Safari’s smart enough to assume the rest goes in there too, so now press “Go” to bring up the web page and see the words it’s showing today. Now we need to add the icon on our main iPhone or iPod Touch screen so instead of typing in the address you can open it like any other app. Press the plus sign at the bottom of the screen, as shown here:

It’s the same button you use to make a bookmark, except instead of selecting the “Add Bookmark” option that pops up, you’ll be selecting “Add To Home Screen”:

Now if you want, you can change the name that your web app has, in case the person who wrote it gave it a silly name. You can also see what icon it’s going to have but you can’t change the icon. Learn10 seems like a fine name to me so I’ll leave it the way it is. When you’re happy, press the “Add” button up in the top right hand corner:

And here we have it, the Learn10 web address showing up on the main screen just like all the other apps:

You can just open the app now like a regular app and, providing you’re connected to the web in some way, it will work perfectly.

Do you use any web apps? Do you know of any cool ones you’d tell others about?

Jeshyr

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