Smartlife

Smartphones have really changed the way that we interact with the world, because we have the Internet at our fingertips everywhere that we go. The trouble is that, with the exception of using Wi-Fi hotspots, we’re relying on wireless data. And that costs money. And we want to save money.

There are some carriers out there that offer “unlimited” data, but most of us are stuck with mobile data buckets of varying sizes. Just like the minutes we use each month, we should be keeping a keen eye…

You can probably thank Siri for this. Speech recognition isn’t exactly a new technology, but the “digital voice assistant” in the iPhone 4S has certainly encouraged us to start looking for things using our voices rather than typing with our fingers.

Not to be outdone, Google has more than its fair share of voice-based solutions, too. In fact, much of Google Voice Search was already around well before the boys and girls in Cupertino decided to outfit the latest iPhone with Siri. It doesn’t quite work the same…

I love my Android phone, but I can’t help but to be a little envious of my iFriends from time to time. While it wouldn’t be totally accurate that I wanted to have Siri on my phone, too, I thought it would be nice to have a true “voice assistant” on my smartphone.

There are other so-called Siri clones out there already, but one that holds a fair bit of promise is called Evi. Developed by True Knowledge, it is “the revolutionary artificial intelligence” that is meant to…

I don’t know about you, but the “phone” part of my smartphone is really the least important part. It’s much more like a portable computer with its ability to let me update my social networks, check my email, play games, and so on. That’s a good thing, but it also comes with its fair share of problems too, not unlike my home computer.

Just as there are PC viruses and malware, the same can be said about Android smartphones. And that’s why you may considering grabbing the Lookout…

There is an ongoing joke I have with many of my friends and colleagues. They say that I’m fueled solely by two things: coffee and WiFi…and I’ll be the first to admit that I can hardly live without either one of those necessities. While this Android app won’t help in the caffeine department, it can make sure that I’m connected to the web everywhere that I go.

It’s called the Free Wi-Fi Finder, suitably enough, and it’s provided by the good people at JiWire. On the…

My smartphone is my life. It has everything on there. It’s from that Galaxy S that I check my schedule, send my text messages, update my Twitter, and fling fowl at some thieving swine. I can’t imagine the horror of losing my phone and, more importantly, the data that it contains. That’s why it is so important to have a proper backup system in place.

Granted, most of the data that I have on my Android smartphone is automatically backed up to the Google servers, but there’s all kinds of…