Wednesday, April 3, 2013

My Home Screen

Kind of a departure from my regular posts but here is what my is currently on the home screen of my Nexus 4. Look it over and share with me what apps must be on your home screen.

Twitter - pretty obvious what this is used for. Today, hockey trade updates. Great new holo themed update released.

CIBC - my bank

theScore - out of all the mobile apps for quickly checking hockey scores (anyone see a pattern?) this one is my favourite. Apps like TSN and NHL GameCenter take too much time to load.

Untappd - one of my favourite apps built on top of the PhoneGap framework. It is a social beer check in app. Great to see what your friends are drinking and helps find new beers.

Gmail - All. The. Emails.

feedly - with the upcoming demise of Google Reader I've completely switched over to feedly for my RSS reading. It's a great app that syncs with Google Reader and has a great UI experience.

Google+ - I'm not completely sold on this app yet. I know Google wants it to be a Twitter/Facebook killer but until more of my friends start using it and the network effect takes over it won't be used as much as they'd hope.

Pocket Casts - after trying out a bunch of different podcast listening apps I've settled on Pocket Casts. It has a great UI and most importantly has variable rate playback which is a must for me. If I can't listen to podcasts at 2.0x speed I go crazy listening to the um's and ah's.

IMDB - I don't even think I can watch TV or Movies without this app. I'm constantly using it to look up what other shows/movies that actor was in.

TWN - The Weather Network, pretty useful app but it may be supplanted by the weather card in Google Now.

Starbucks - I'm a coffee addict. I use the Starbucks app to pay for my coffee fix whenever I can. Plus, it's one less card I have to carry around in my Costanza sized wallet.

OPL - Ottawa Public Library, I'm an avid reader who is constantly churning through books. Luckily Ottawa has a great public library system that feeds my addiction. Again, one less card is needed in my wallet.

Google Folder - this is my shortcut to all the other Google apps I use frequently but not enough to make the home screen like Play Music, YouTube, Calendar and People.

Instagram - currently testing out this photo service to see if it is a suitable replacement for the stock camera.

Instapaper - absolutely fantastic app for saving articles and reading them later, even when you are off line.

Play Store - with the new phone I find myself constantly installing new apps so the store has made it's way to the home screen.

So that's it. What are some of your favourite apps that I'm missing?

5 comments:

jax said...

What is missing is ES File Explorer... And I have replaced Twitter with Plume and Chrome with Chrome Beta :)

jax said...

Oh. And if you are using a Mac as a workstation.. you are also missing 'Droid NAS' !!

Simon MacDonald said...

@jax

I have ES File Explorer but I don't use it enough to put it on the home screen. I just use the standard Twitter client as they are going to kill everything else anyway. I'll have to look at getting Chrome Beta and thanks for the heads up on Droid NAS, downloaded it.

Anonymous said...

Flipboard is an awesome news reader.

umangkedia said...

@Simon ES file Explorer has a revamped UI now. Try it. Its really good.