Luey's Lab - Blogging from the iPhone

Fring - Skype Is Officially On The iPhone

Jailbroken iPhones have been able to use Skype for months but now everyone can thanks to Fring. Fring was made available in the App Store today and it’s already creating a lot of excitement in the iPhone community. The Fring app not only let’s you use Skype In and Skype Out, it also supports MSN,Google Talk,Yahoo,Twitter,ICQ, and several SIP providers. The app is very easy to set up, you have to create an account with Fring and then add your usernames and passwords for the various supported services. Skype and SIP calls are the key to this app because there are better apps for using the IM services and Fring doesn’t compare to Twinkle or Twitterific for Twitter.

So how does it work for Skype? The answer is it works but not good enough. Keep in mind it only launched today so I’m sure it will get better. The good news is the calls are quite clear but suffer from lag. Of course this is only based on my first and limited time using the app, based on the Fring forum it seems I’m not the only one experiencing this. I’ve been using Skype out, Skype to Skype seems to be working well for most users. Another problem tripping up users is the lack of an option to set your country code up so you have to add it in front of every number you dial. I’ll be back with more info about this and other iPhone apps.

Check out the screen shots below.

Posted with LifeCast

Podcaster - The Rejected Podcast App

The iPhone app Podcaster received a lot of attention when it was rejected from the Apple App store, it was briefly available via a loophole in the beta testing mechanism. The good news is it is now available for jailbroken iPhones. The app allows you to search for podcasts and add them manually. It also allows you to choose to use the built in player or the iPhone QuickTime player. The thing that sets this app apart from the other podcast apps is it allows you to search and subscribe to podcasts via the Podcaster website and then sync your selections to your phone. See the screenshots below.

Posted with LifeCast

MobileCast - iPhone Podcasts App

Below are some screen shots of MobileCast which is an iPhone app that allows you to download podcasts directly to your phone without syncing to iTunes. The best thing about this app is it allows you to add any feed by typing it in but it also has a search function to quickly find and add your favorite podcast. It supports both audio and video podcasts.

Posted with LifeCast