Motorola Droid in the Plane

Jay Honeck

Jay Honeck

Touchdown! Greaser!
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Jun 6, 2008
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Ingleside, TX
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Jay Honeck
What an amazing tool this "smart-phone" is! I've owned it for five days, and am STILL learning all of what it can do.

I've already downloaded and installed over 50 apps on this "phone" (it's really a full-blown computer that fits in your pocket) -- several that are terrific in the cockpit. The best flying app so far has been AirWX Aviation Weather, put out by Mobile Dev Group LLC. It's got everything -- METARs, TAFs, Prog Charts, live radar, icing, turbulence, even approach plates! Best of all, the Droid uses its built-in GPS to automatically show the closest airports, any of which you can select to see current weather. There's no dinking around typing in airport identifiers. (Although you can also add favorites, so you can see what's going on at your destination.)

I've never been so jazzed about a new gadget since I first flew with GPS (a Magellan nautical unit, back in the early 90s). Not only is it an outstanding phone, text, email, and web browser, it's large color screen is just made for all things aviation.

Anyone else using the Droid? Found any other cool apps to recommend? With tens of thousands of them available, it's hard to know which ones to download! :)
 
ForeFlight's product is good; I hope they have plans to extend its functionality to match what they have on the iPhone; thanks for the tip on AirWx.

Try Google's Sky Map if you like nighttime viewing of stars... fire it up, hold it overhead, and watch it use your location and the compass to accurately identify objects in the night sky. It's got great "wow" factor.

Shazam is amazing--it will listen to a 20 second clip of music playing on the radio or your player, and tell you who it is, what album it's from, a link to buy the song, etc.

Movies, a free app by Flixter, is my favorite for movie showtimes, reviews, upcoming movies and DVD releases, viewing trailers, etc.

And, if you have a plan with unlimited data, Pandora, of course.
 
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I send mine into airplane mode and plug it into the 340. Have about 12GB of mp3s on it. Made the flight down less boring.
 
My son has one and gets a kick out of the app that allows it to read the bar code on a product, then go out on the web and tell you where you can get it for less money. Stores must hate that one.
 
Ghery said:
My son has one and gets a kick out of the app that allows it to read the bar code on a product, then go out on the web and tell you where you can get it for less money. Stores must hate that one.
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I used that in B&N the other day to determine which of two books to buy based on the reviews. The Bricks and Mortar store still got the sale.

As for Apps,
something like Awake Stay, which allows you to wake the phone without having to slide the button across the screen.
Astrid to close applications or jump to them.
RealCalc scientific calculator, which is a lot more full-featured than the default one. (Haven't found an E6B yet, though)
Documents to Go to allow you to read all(?) the Office and PDF documents
PdaNet to allow you to tether your laptop
SunriseFree to calculate sunrise and sunset on particular days.
QueueMan to manage your Netflix queue

Okay, so many aren't really aviation related.
 
AirWx does not say they have live radar. Dont want to d/l and pay for something I already have. I don't have live radar, would I be able to get updates while in flight?
 
gprellwitz said:
RealCalc scientific calculator, which is a lot more full-featured than the default one. (Haven't found an E6B yet, though)
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For the engineers out there, there's an app called Droid48, which is a HP48 calculator for those of us who can't stand calculators without RPN!:D
 
gprellwitz said:
I used that in B&N the other day to determine which of two books to buy based on the reviews. The Bricks and Mortar store still got the sale.

As for Apps,
something like Awake Stay, which allows you to wake the phone without having to slide the button across the screen.
Astrid to close applications or jump to them.
RealCalc scientific calculator, which is a lot more full-featured than the default one. (Haven't found an E6B yet, though)
Documents to Go to allow you to read all(?) the Office and PDF documents
PdaNet to allow you to tether your laptop
SunriseFree to calculate sunrise and sunset on particular days.
QueueMan to manage your Netflix queue

Okay, so many aren't really aviation related.
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How does Awake Stay work?

I'd like to find one that lets me quickly change the MEDIA volume using the volume controls, without having to play media or go into Settings. The buttons normally only handle ringer volume. But if you were listening to music turned up loud, then suddenly every tap or click is LOUD too.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
How does Awake Stay work?
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I gave the wrong name for it, sorry. The correct name from the Market is "Screen Mode Widget" by Sam Chiu. www.ooha-sam.blogspot.com. It runs as an applet and basically allows you to put the phone in a mode where the screen goes blank, but doesn't lock. So just pressing the power button brings you back to where you were, instead of having to use the slide.

a quickly widget tool to Switch three screen mode:
1.Sleep Auto: device will screen off and lock screen.
2.Awake Stay: device will not lock screen but will screen off.
3.Screen Stay: device will not lock screen and never screen off. You can use your phone as flashlight in this mode
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I downloaded Shazam and under the privileges it wants is acess to the phone and identity anybody know why?

Oh and I got the bar code reader that is pretty cool.
 
gprellwitz said:
I gave the wrong name for it, sorry. The correct name from the Market is "Screen Mode Widget" by Sam Chiu. www.ooha-sam.blogspot.com. It runs as an applet and basically allows you to put the phone in a mode where the screen goes blank, but doesn't lock. So just pressing the power button brings you back to where you were, instead of having to use the slide.
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Thanks for the tip. I *hate* the "slide to unlock" thing, so I'll be downloading that shortly.

"Advanced Task Killer" is a must-have app, IMHO. To be able to zap all running apps with two key strokes is awesome.
 
Jay Honeck said:
Thanks for the tip. I *hate* the "slide to unlock" thing, so I'll be downloading that shortly.

"Advanced Task Killer" is a must-have app, IMHO. To be able to zap all running apps with two key strokes is awesome.
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Oh, yeah, I forgot to list ATK; I use that all the time. My "cue" to use it is when I notice the soft keyboard takes too long to load when I go to type a message. Go run ATK, kill the apps it auto-selects (it does a good job!) and system becomes super-responsive again.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Oh, yeah, I forgot to list ATK; I use that all the time. My "cue" to use it is when I notice the soft keyboard takes too long to load when I go to type a message. Go run ATK, kill the apps it auto-selects (it does a good job!) and system becomes super-responsive again.
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Yeah, a slow-down with multiple applications running is the trade-off. Apple chose to allow only one app to run at a time; no multi-tasking. Personally, I prefer being able to make that decision myself.
 
This thread is well timed and appreciated - I just moved to a Droid this week. So glad to be back to Verizon for the coverage.

Weekend project is getting set up with Sipdroid (and Google Voice, PBXes, and an SIP service) for VOIP calling.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Agreed!!
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Apple's philosophy is to appease the average user, not the geek. Even being a geek, I appreciate that - I really want my phone to work, despite my best efforts to kill it. ;)

There have been VERY few instances where I have actually wanted multitasking. The Push system actually works quite well - I don't have to leave Facebook open, I get an alert whenever I get a friend request, or someone makes a comment on one of my posts, or whatever you'd get a notification for on the Facebook web site. I don't have to leave AIM open, I get a push if someone says something to me. I don't have to leave Trapster open, I get a push when a trap is reported near me.

Actually, I only remember one instance where I really wanted multitasking - I remember that I was in Wyoming, but I can't for the life of me remember what two apps I wanted to run at the same time! :rofl:

I am confident that when Apple does finally allow multitasking (it'll come eventually) that it will be done in such a way that it does NOT require a third-party app to manage tasks, and it will be done in a way that the user experience is all-around positive.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
Actually, I only remember one instance where I really wanted multitasking - I remember that I was in Wyoming, but I can't for the life of me remember what two apps I wanted to run at the same time! :rofl:
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The main thing I use it for is listening to Pandora or a podcast while playing a game or browsing the web or reading email. In that case, I'm using the multitasking ability to do an auditory thing with one program, and a visual thing with another.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
The main thing I use it for is listening to Pandora or a podcast while playing a game or browsing the web or reading email. In that case, I'm using the multitasking ability to do an auditory thing with one program, and a visual thing with another.
Click to expand...

Bingo, that's it! I wanted to listen to LiveATC and look at FlightAware at the same time.

Actually, it'd be cool to have both of those in the SAME app... Hmmm. :idea:
 
Just ordered two of them this afternoon on the buy one, get one program. Should arrive on Tuesday while I'm in Germany. We'll set them up when I get back next weekend.
 
Crossing the Appalachains/ Smokies I was able get 3G service at about 6500' and used the Aviation Weather app to punch in various airports up ahead and get updated METARs. A few of you also got texts indicating where I was. Oh yeah, and I took some pictures with it too, while listening to MP3s on it.
 
Try Bubble by Brian Zibble; uses the accelerometers to give you a true "bubble" level either for vertical / horizontal surfaces using any side of the phone, or a round 3-way bubble if you lay it flat.

Screen shots here: http://www.ktk.bz/search/label/bubble

OK, how'd he tie the barcode at the bottom of the page linked above to take you to the app in the Market when you use the Droid Barcode Scanner to take a picture of the barcode with your phone? That's cool.
 
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EdFred said:
Crossing the Appalachains/ Smokies I was able get 3G service at about 6500' and used the Aviation Weather app to punch in various airports up ahead and get updated METARs. A few of you also got texts indicating where I was. Oh yeah, and I took some pictures with it too, while listening to MP3s on it.
Click to expand...

So you could tether it as the internet link to your Skypad EFB and have live weather on the EFB.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
OK, how'd he tie the barcode at the bottom of the page linked above to take you to the app in the Market when you use the Droid Barcode Scanner to take a picture of the barcode with your phone? That's cool.
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They embedded the URI in the barcode. Now, how that's done, I don't know, but I doubt it's too difficult if you know how to create 2D barcodes.

Edit: Ah, I got it. The app to do that appears to be called "Share by QRCode."
 
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gprellwitz said:
They embedded the URI in the barcode. Now, how that's done, I don't know, but I doubt it's too difficult if you know how to create 2D barcodes.

Edit: Ah, I got it. The app to do that appears to be called "Share by QRCode."
Click to expand...

Cool, thanks! The code is open source, too, if anybody who has the Droid SDK wants to see how it works:

http://code.google.com/p/sharebyqrcode/
 
I like this site: http://www.qrstuff.com/ it generates the 2d bar code and lets you save it as a png.

Point your barcode reader at:
attachment.php

Now I just have to think of a use for it.

Joe
 

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gprellwitz said:
I gave the wrong name for it, sorry. The correct name from the Market is "Screen Mode Widget" by Sam Chiu. www.ooha-sam.blogspot.com. It runs as an applet and basically allows you to put the phone in a mode where the screen goes blank, but doesn't lock. So just pressing the power button brings you back to where you were, instead of having to use the slide.
Click to expand...

I tried it, and it never worked properly. "Awake stay" did work for a while, but it soon stopped functioning for no apparent reason... :(
 
Jay Honeck said:
I tried it, and it never worked properly. "Awake stay" did work for a while, but it soon stopped functioning for no apparent reason... :(
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I do find that after a power off or sometimes in the morning I need to go back into it and tell it I want "Awake Stay" mode.
 
EdFred said:
Crossing the Appalachains/ Smokies I was able get 3G service at about 6500' and used the Aviation Weather app to punch in various airports up ahead and get updated METARs. A few of you also got texts indicating where I was. Oh yeah, and I took some pictures with it too, while listening to MP3s on it.
Click to expand...

Yeah, the 3G network worked for me at 5500 feet over Iowa, which I thought was pretty darned impressive...
 
Areeda said:
I like this site: http://www.qrstuff.com/ it generates the 2d bar code and lets you save it as a png.

Point your barcode reader at:
attachment.php

Now I just have to think of a use for it.

Joe
Click to expand...

Very cool. :yesnod:

Took a picture of the screen with my Droid, using Barcode Scanner.

"Found URL: http://www.pilotsofamerica.com"

Three choices presented: Open Browser | Share via Email | Share via SMS
 
Jay Honeck said:
I tried it, and it never worked properly. "Awake stay" did work for a while, but it soon stopped functioning for no apparent reason... :(
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Awake Stay's comments (dated 2/22) have lots of complaints that the latest "update" from the author has issues. I didn't install it for that reason.
 
Got mine up and running on Saturday. Wow!

Aviation Weather from NOAA... is great. Free, too.

Palmary Weather is great if you need to track a number of places and want information on airport delays, etc.

"Where" is great if you need to find various services in a new location. It reads the GPS in the Droid and then shows you the local options.

And, of course, I can't live without my "Daily Dilbert". :D
 
Jay Honeck said:
The best flying app so far has been AirWX Aviation Weather, put out by Mobile Dev Group LLC. It's got everything -- METARs, TAFs, Prog Charts, live radar, icing, turbulence, even approach plates! Best of all, the Droid uses its built-in GPS to automatically show the closest airports, any of which you can select to see current weather. There's no dinking around typing in airport identifiers. (Although you can also add favorites, so you can see what's going on at your destination.)
Click to expand...

I just downloaded that one this evening. Wow! That is really well done. Well worth the $4.99 charge.
 
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