apps

Even if you're not one to trust a groundhog's shadow as your weather vane, watching a pet rodent emerge from a hole before hundreds of onlookers is a fascinating North American ritual. The rest of us may not have the prognosticating meteorological savvy of a Punxsutawney Phil, Buckeye Chuck, or Shubenacadie Sam, but on February 2, we can have the next best thing--weather widgets and applications.

Here are some of our favorite ways to read the mercury on our Windows PCs.

Weather Watcher Live A full, but well-ordered display, detailed forecast, animated map, and severe weather alerts are … Read more

Apple may be planning a new section of the App Store dedicated to premium game titles that will put more cash in the pockets of developers.

The new section will supposedly cater to games that sell for about $20, according to the blog PocketGamer.biz, which first reported the rumor.

The new section will be restricted to only games of large publishers, rather than titles created by smaller gaming developers that are already offered through the main App Store, the site said.

PocketGamer believes that Apple will likely introduce the new section its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in June.

The … Read more

The iPhone developer behind Podcaster has found a way to get into Apple's App Store without invoking the wrath of iPhone Inspector No. 5.

The developer, who has a private Blogger profile but appears to go by Alex according to Uneasy Silence, has a new application called RSS Player that duplicates the basic function of Podcaster--letting you download podcasts to your iPhone or iPod Touch--but without some of the features that Apple appears to have disliked. For example, you can't search for podcasts through the app, you have to subscribe to the RSS feed for those podcasts.

Back … Read more

To critics, cloud computing can't be trusted because you aren't in control of the data outside your network.

But if that's the case, then how secure are the data and collocation centers that corporations contract with to host their data?

"It does come down to vetting the practices of the provider and making sure they meet the standards you want for your business," Phil Hochmuth, a senior analyst at Yankee Group, said Monday, the eve of Cloud Computing Innovation Day in Santa Clara, Calif.

Companies like Salesforce.com, Amazon.com, and Google have built businesses … Read more

Another day, another automaker releases an iPhone/iPod Touch app. This time, it's Mini Financial Services launching the Mini Liquid Assets game.

The game is a digital version of those water-filled handheld toys where you press a button to push a plastic trinket into a goal with a jet of water. In this case, you're firing nickels into Minis--the idea being that with Mini, you get to "keep more liquid assets." Get it? Liquid? Assets?

The game features three stages of difficulty and eight levels (one featuring the Mini-E against a backdrop of wind power generators) … Read more

Despite the fact that I finally caved and purchased a second-gen iPod Touch, history will tell you that I'm no iPod fangirl. Still, one thing the iPod has going for it that no other MP3 player can match is a seemingly endless array of third-party add-ons.

There are hordes of cases; gaggles of speakers; and a shocking supply of docks, recorders, FM transmitters, and other feature-adding devices...not to mention all those apps for the Touch and the iPhone.

Over the past several years, there have been a number of iPod accessories that tempted me to bow to the … Read more

Research In Motion will not be as tough a gatekeeper as Apple in admitting applications to its storefront, but it will reject BlackBerry apps it thinks use too much network bandwidth, the company's developer relations chief has told ZDNet UK.

Mike Kirkup said on Thursday that the Canadian handset manufacturer will welcome third-party software that replicates the functionality of native BlackBerry applications onto the BlackBerry Application Storefront--a strategy that is not followed by Apple with its iPhone App Store. However, certain types of applications, such as those offering streaming video, might be turned down.

"If somebody builds … Read more

A faux iTunes App Store has appeared Internet--and it's a fairly good facsimile of the original. The fake store was created by an ingenious developer, who has made the content of the real iTunes App Store available via any platform's web browser.

The site, app-store.appspot.com, is up and running at press time, but w're wondering how long that might last.

According to a post on ReadWriteWeb: "you can quickly browse for applications, read reviews, and see screenshots from any computer that has access to the Internet without ever having to open iTunes." The … Read more

Storage maker NetApp ranked No. 1 on Fortune magazine's list of the top 100 companies to work for, bumping Google from its perch, according to a report in the publication on Thursday.

NetApp, which employs nearly 8,000 people worldwide, was selected for its "employees enthusiasm," along with its benefits from nearly $11,400 in adoption aid to five paid days to do volunteer work.

And even better still, the company is one of the few in the hiring mode during these recessionary times, seeking to fill 55 positions as of January 13.

This year's ranking … Read more