I’ve been using Android for a while, and while I’m no app fiend, i do have some suggestions for friends who are new to the platform.

• Contact Owner, put contact details on lock-screen.
• Swype ($?), replacement keyboard.
• Google Voice
• Google Maps, (there are updates since the default).
• Seesmic, Twitter client.
• Gowalla, useless “Kilroy was here”.
• Shazam, look up music by its sound.
• Barcode Scanner
• Flashlight
• Pandora, play music over the net.
• Spy Satellites ($), see satellites going overhead. (I wrote this.)
• reddit is fun
• Toss It (Preview), physics game.
• aLogcat, browse and send system logs. Useful for reporting bugs in apps.
• Android IRC ($)
• Earth (from Google)
• Retro Defense, towers game.
• Flickroid, Flickr upload conduit.
• Open Table, reserve tables in restaurants.
• Places Directory, find businesses nearby by class.
• Compass
• GOdroid, play Go against the computer.

Oh, and if you have Android 2.1, then you may find it useful to go to Settings, Accounts & Sync, and add a Facebook account to get your friends’ contact info, as they style it. If they change it, it changes in your phone.

This list will probably be completely different in a few months, but this is my snapshot as of April 2010.

01 Apr 2010, 10:42 #