Playing With My Touch

I have waxed lyrical before about my iPod Touch. It got better! Apple have released new software that allows you to add 3rd party applications to an iPod Touch or an iPhone. If you have one and have been wondering whether it is worth paying to upgrade the software ... it is! For the benefit of any readers who have one of these gadgets (or are thinking about getting one), here are some apps I have been trying out and can recommend ...

Useful Stuff

Stanza ... turns your Touch into an eBook reader. All users can download a large selection of free books from Project Gutenberg. If you have a Mac, you can also download Stanza Desktop software. Using this you can read a wide range of eBook formats, and upload them to you Touch. It will also convert .pdf files into "book" format (not always pretty, but readable). This is currently free as it is still Beta software. There will be a charge for the full version once it is out of Beta.

Instapaper ... this allows you to save web pages to read later. Add an Instapaper button to the toolbar on your computer and click whenever you want to save a page. The Instapaper application on the Touch allows you to upload all your saved pages wirelessly. Once this is done, you can read them offline anytime, anywhere. Brilliant! And free.

Fizz Weather ... I'm English. Speculating about what the weather may, or may not, do over the next few hours or days is a national past time. Fizz Weather gives daily forecasts for five days; two day forecasts split into morning, afternoon and evening; details of current weather picked up from the most local weather station; and weather maps. It allows you to save a number of different locations and flick easily from one to another. So far the forecasts seem as accurate as any, which given our unpredictable weather isn't saying much ... but short of a magic crystal ball I doubt it could do much better. This one cost me £2.99.

Remote ... this allows you to use your Touch as a remote control for iTunes on your computer. Clever! And also free.

Fun Stuff

Moonlight Mahjong Lite ... tap pairs of mahjong tiles to remove them from the screen. The free version has four different layouts, which is plenty for us. Can be played while on the exercise bike at the gym.

Labyrinth Lite ... turns your Touch into one of those games where you tilt the surface to move a ball from one side to the other, without allowing it to fall into traps. Incredibly clever and unbelievably realistic. The free version has ten levels, the paid version has five hundred.

Sudoku Unlimited ... I bought the chargeable version (£1.79) which generates unlimited puzzles. There are five levels of difficulty. I found the easy ones too easy, but the two highest levels are just the right level of challenge.