Tag Archives: android

We’ve documented the graffiti around Dublin to the delight of some and the foam-flecked loathing of others.

To the latter: behold our first dual platform app, Fix My Area.

It encapsulates what I love about having a small networked camera in my pocket at all times. You take a picture of something the council needs to deal with, tag it with some details and off it flies to the relevant authority.

It’s a shame you can’t track what you’ve reported in app instead of having to go to the website.

And being picky little shit, it’s letterboxed on iPhone 5. An absolute bugbear of mine.

On Google Play for Android

On the App Store for iPhone

Do you have an Irish app? Broadsheet@broadsheet.ie

No favours, cuddles, or pints were given for this post. Review based on iOS version.




As some of the commenters pointed out in our post about My Dublin Bus, it’s only available for iPhone.

Up steps Dublin based mobile developer Stephen McBride (he happens to do both iOS and Android apps) to fill the gap for Android.

While not as cutesy as My Dublin Bus, it does provide a clean interface to getting at the bus timetables. All the expected functionality is there – searching, favourites and maps. But the killer feature is the ability to add shortcuts to your home screen to a bus route so you don’t have to fiddle with menus to get at your bus home.

It’s available as an ad supported free version as well as a paid download (you do realise developers can’t just survive on crumbs from their keyboards right?).

Next Bus Dublin (free)
Next Bus Dublin (€1.99)

Do you have an Irish app? Broadsheet@broadsheet.ie

No favours, cuddles, or pints were given for this post. (Full disclosure, Karl used to work with Stephen)

Apple is falling behind Google’s Android. And if you’re bullish on Apple, these trends should raise a big red flag.

The Android gains matter because technology platform markets tend to standardize around a single dominant platform (see Windows in PCs, Facebook in social, Google in search)

Are Hedge Funds Worried About Apple’s Slipping Mobile Market Share? (Fool.com)

Joy Of Tech

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9MUg6uk5lg&feature=player_embedded

In a weirdly fitting tribute to the great science fiction writer, Phillip K. Dick, who died in 1982, a robotic version of the man behind the book that inspired Blade Runner was unveiled at the NextFest 2005 event.

The plot thickened when the android head of Philip K. Dick was lost after being left in an overhead luggage compartment on an intercontinental flight in 2006, the occurrence even inspiring a BBC radio play, Bring Me The Head Of Philip K. Dick, which turned the head into a futuristic weapon. Dark days for lovers of able-bodied autonomous dead sci-fi writers, but now the story has reached its happy ending because the head has been rebuilt (above) by Dutch company Hanson Robotics, meaning this interactive philosophical sculpture lives on.

TheCreatorsProject

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cFVlzUAZkHY&feature=player_embedded#!

We finally stumbled across something even creepier than dancing fembot HRP-4C.

Robot ‘gynoid’ Actroid F – an ultra-realistic android developed by Japanese roboticist Kokoro, was publicly unveiled in Tokyo this week. She’s dressed as a nurse who could possibly work in a hospital as an ‘observer’.

Imagine waking up to this shit after a botched appendectomy.

Actroid F also has a twin sister, Geminoid F.

More detailed creepiness here.