Hasta La Gadget!

It’s been promised for years and was said to have gone into production before, but it looks like this time it’s for real — that’s the very first iControlPad fresh off the production line pictured above. No orders are being taken just yet, but that’s promised to be announced soon on Craig Rothwell’s Twitter feed (linked below), and the first run is said to be limited to 3,000 units, which are expected to sell out fast. It looks like that’s just the beginning for the peripheral, though — Rothwell is also promising to support additional phones in the future, which can be accommodated simply by swapping out the two side pieces. Need to get up to speed on the whole saga? Head on past the break for a brief history in video form.

Continue reading iControlPad heads into production, support for other phones promised

iControlPad heads into production, support for other phones promised originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 Aug 2010 10:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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IPADock. Its name may sound more like a place to keep your iRacehorses, but the curiously-capitalized accessory is probably the most useful desktop gadget ever. Plug it into a computer and you can charge and sync a pair of iPads, four iPhones, and various combinations thereof. A universal dock-port can be fitted with the adapter from any iPod, from Nano to Touch, and then things start to get even handier.

Stacked up around the back are slots for SD-cards, MemorySticks, CompactFlash cards and a three-port USB-hub. In short, pretty much anything you might want to dock on your desktop will be served by this surprisingly good-looking and compact device.

The price? $70, although you’ll be ordering it from Japan if you want one.

iPADock product page [Photofast via Cult of Mac’s John Brownlee. Thanks, Pedro!]

See Also:

• The $5 iPad Dock
• HDMI Dock for Sprint EVO 'Coming Soon'
• Warpia Wireless Notebook Dock Cuts Cable Clutter

When the “Check Engine” light comes on in your car, it lets you know it’s time to take it to someone who knows what that light means, if you don’t already know. What you may not know is that most mechanics and dealerships see that light and immediately connect diagnostic device to the data port under your steering console to get the error code that your car’s internal computer is sending: the one that results in that light on your dashboard. With the Kiwi from PLX Devices, you can use your iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Android device to get that code yourself. Once you have it, one quick Web search will tell you what’s wrong with your car before you even take it to the shop to have it fixed.

The Kiwi comes in two flavors: the Wi-Fi model that plugs into your car and uses your home wireless network to communicate with your iOS device, and a Bluetooth model that pairs with Android phones. Both models are designed to communicate with your device and then send data to any one of a wide variety of supported car diagnostic utilities in the iTunes App Store and Android App Market that you can download to your phone. Depending on the app you choose, you can query the Kiwi for more than just error codes: you can run diagnostics, do horsepower and torque calculations, monitor your fuel efficiency between trips, and more. The Kiwi Wi-Fi is available now for $149.99 list, and the Bluetooth model is available for $99.99 list. 

Apple and Google haven’t been BFFs lately, but the search giant still seems to care about iPhone users. Kind of, sort of. Google this week released an update for its Google Mobile app for iPhone, which introduces push notifications for Google’s calendar and a barely functional push feature for Google mail.

For iPhone users subscribed to Google calendars, the Google Mobile app can now push out an event alert in a box that appears on the home screen, just like you’d receive an SMS message. That’s useful.

But for Google mail, the new push feature is somewhat less useful. The updated app doesn’t push out a box to let you know of a new e-mail. Instead, it just updates the icon of the Google Mobile app, adding a little red bubble that shows the number of e-mails in your inbox. This “notification” doesn’t cause the iPhone to vibrate or make a sound. The result is that the Gmail notifier is essentially useless, since you can already configure Gmail to “push” into Apple’s built-in Mail app with sounds and vibrations  — the whole shebang — to actually notify you.

Frankly, we’re disappointed that the push feature for Google mail isn’t more functional. Adding the ability to push e-mails in the form of an alert box, just like Google did with calendar, would’ve been far more interesting.

If that’s what you’re looking to get from Google mail, you can download the third-party iPhone app GPush, which we covered last year.

See Also:

• Gmail Push App for iPhone Is a Workaholic’s Best Friend
• Push Gmail Comes to iPhone
• Google Beefs Up Voice Search, Mobile Sync
• Google Adds Calendar And Contact Sync to Almost Every Phone …

Simplenote, our favorite note-taking application for iPhone, iPad, Android, the web and PC or Mac, has just seen a rather important update. Simplenote version 3 adds a treasure trove of new features, but don’t worry about that: If you don’t want them, you won’t even notice them.

Simplenote’s strength is its, well, simplicity. It launches instantly, you type in your note, and it syncs to the web. Searching throughout notes is instantaneous, just like iTunes searching used to be, and the synchronization is rock-solid. Better, there are a range of applications which tie into Simplenote’s open APIs so you can sync with your desktop.

So what’s new? Here’s a quick rundown of new features, in order of how excited I am by them.

Tags. Tags act like Gmail’s labels, letting you file a note in multiple “folders” at once. Tags are assigned by tapping the pale-gray tag field at the top of the note (found by pulling down the screen on the iPhone version), and browsed by navigating up to a new master-level in the pop-over list of notes. Best of all, it is almost invisible if you don’t intend to use it.

Sharing. You can now choose to share a note. Do this and you are prompted to send its address by e-mail. Once the other Simplenote users click on the link included, they can share and edit the note, allowing for simple collaboration. You can also share a note on the web using the same mechanism, except that the mailed link leads to a read-only web-page. Once shared, the note gets a little RSS-like symbol on it to remind you, and it turns blue when somebody else has updated the note.

Versioning. This one is big. Simplenote now tracks the changes you make to a note and remembers its history. You can slide a button to go back in time and restore previous version of notes.

Word Count Hit the “i” button up in the toolbar, and Simplenote will tell you how many words and characters you have typed. Also in this box is the switch to pin a note.

Pins. You can now “pin” any number of notes to the top of the list, yet keep sorting all other notes by date created, date modified or in alphabetical order. Another addition is sorting in reverse, using any of these criteria.

This is more useful than it might seem. You could keep your flight details afloat temporarily, or permanently pin a note to the top, to use as scratchpad.

Trash. Along with versioning, you also get a trashcan that stores deleted notes. You can restore notes with one button, making this one more safety feature.

Full-screen mode. This one is iPhone-only, as the iPad’s screen is already big enough. Hit the button and all window-chrome disappears, showing just the words and a light-gray button for returning to normal.

On top of this is a lot of polish to the user interface, support for iOS4 and a brand-new web interface.

There are a few glitches, some possibly due to server stress caused by the new launch. Tags aren’t syncing properly for me yet, although notes are fine.

One real oddity is the positioning of the new Sign-Out button, which does just what it says. The button is top-left in the main settings pane, in the exact same place as the Back button when navigating other parts of the settings. It is way to easy to hit by mistake (I did it almost straight away during testing).

Despite these couple of quibbles, the new Simplenote is great, managing to keep its speed and simplicity while at the same getting a whole lot more powerful (but only if you want it to). It is also free, supported by ads. Or you can go pro, which costs $12 per year and lets you drop the ads, add notes by e-mail and get them out with RSS.

Go download it now.

Simplenote [iTunes]

Simplenote [Simplenote]

See Also:

• Simplenote and Notational Velocity Bring Document Syncing to iPad
• Simplenote Update Finally Syncs iPhone Notes With Mac
• 10 Stellar iPad Apps That Will Blow You Away
• Hands On: iPhone Note Taking Apps Improve, But Still Not Ready
• Why Are There No Decent Note-Taking Applications for the iPhone
• Elements for iPad, a Dropbox-Syncing Text Editor

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