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The selection of flash cards and other education tools for infants and toddlers on the App Store is extremely large. There are thousands of apps that promise finely-tuned learning experiences for very young children, and for good reason -- the iPad and iPhone are perfect for this age group. But not all apps follow through on their promises. Baby Brain Flash Cards Series 1 manages to fall somewhere between both extremes, offering a wealth of options but a poorly-crafted interface and lack of direction that makes it hard to manage as a parent.

When you open the app you are … Read more

The camera built into the iPhone is a powerful tool, but the software it comes with is fairly limited. Point and shoot -- simple enough. So there are plenty of apps on the App Store that provide additional tools and features that make it possible to get more out of your device. For those that need to tag their images with GPS coordinates, there is Eagle View Photo Capture, a new app that makes it very easy to do so.

The app is easy enough. There are four buttons on the bottom bar when you open the app: Camera, Save … Read more

Android photo editing apps come in all shapes and sizes, but few can call themselves "all-in-one." Fotor Photo Effect Studio tries to hold that title, but comes up a little short in one category. The photo-editing and filtering features are fine, but the app's camera is too unstable to be used.

This app lets you take, edit, and filter photos in the same app. Sadly, the app's camera produces some shockingly bad images. Despite having a cool zoom feature, the photos come out as a pixelated mess more often than not. You don't have to … Read more

As popular as it is, Facebook's default app is still fairly slow and buggy. Unfortunately, the same can be said for most of the replacement Facebook apps you'll find in the Play Store. FB Touch for Facebook isn't any faster or easier to use than any of those. If anything, it's less fun than using Facebook's default app.

This app is actually one of a pack of apps that offer the same mediocre experience under different names. Like all of those, FB Touch for Facebook sports a Facebook layout circa 2011 with a few added … Read more

The name caught our attention: Android Defrag Free. Defrag Android? How? More to the point, why? Defragging doesn't benefit Android and can degrade flash memory. Some digging uncovered a partial explanation: The app doesn't actually defragment your Android device's flash memory and cards, although it suggests just that and even uses defrag-style graphics to drive the point home. But Android Defrag also claims to clear your caches and kill unnecessary apps and to delete and/or repair corrupted files. Unfortunately, so-called task killers usually aren't any more beneficial in Linux-based Android than file defragging. Android Defrag … Read more

Another amazing game from the makers of the very popular game series Angry Birds, Bad Piggies is the same story viewed from the perspective of the ingenious little green pigs, originally featured in Angry Birds. However, this game takes a very different approach to the experience by immersing the player in an interactive sandbox. Players must use creativity and engineering to get through each quest.

For those without a high-speed Internet connection, Bad Piggies may take a while to download. It is 42MB, but the size is due to the game's incredible details and physics engine. The game opens … Read more

Designed to deliver an entertaining learning experience to small children and enhance their hand-eye coordination, this app also promises hours of fun. Baby Shapes and Animals does deliver on some of these promises, but it has far too many drawbacks for the everyday user to include it in their application collection.

At 26MB, Baby Shapes and Animals seems to be one of the largest applications of its kind. Given its simple graphics and extremely limited functionality, there is no reason it should occupy so much space. Download time can be horrendous and the application also lags considerably. It opens painfully … Read more

For teachers and students alike, the iPad is a perfect timekeeper. With its robust suite of built-in tools and endless supply of options and apps, it can easily keep track of your projects, classes, exams, and teachers in a single space. Of course, most apps are not designed for this type of tracking, so a tool like Lessons Schedule is much needed. But does this app perform as needed in that role? For the most part it does, with a few minor exceptions.

Upon opening, if you have a Dropbox account (and the app installed), Lessons Schedule will attempt to … Read more

DotMemo is as basic as any app can get. The problem, however -- and this crops up a lot in apps developed to take on that "simplicity before functionality" mantle -- is that DotMemo is too simple, at least for most people jotting down notes while on the go.

The idea behind the app is very simple. Open DotMemo and you are greeted with a white screen that says "note here." You tap the white space and can start typing. That's it. There are arrows to move your cursor back and forth on the screen (… Read more