Cover: Context Sensitive Lock Screen

Typically speaking, I like to test drive a website or app before I write about it. But this one is super cool, and I have it on pretty good authority (TechCrunch, The Verge, engadget, and my buddy who has really enjoyed using it) that its worth checking out.

Cover uses context (like location, time of day, and what apps you use certain times) to tailor your lock screen with useful apps. The main idea is that it places different apps on your lock screen depending on when and where you are, and also learns what apps you use most frequently so they are easily accessible.

The other key element is speed and convenience. You can peek at an app by pulling it halfway across the screen, or open it all together by pulling all the way across the screen. Cover also makes it easier to switch between apps. If you hold down the upper right of the screen when an app is open, it gives you suggestions on apps typically switch to while having that app open.

P.S. This is one of those apps that is just for one platform, but instead of only being available for iOS, this is only available for Android. If that makes you happy, let me know. If that makes you sad, please take your complaints to Apple ;) jk, but please do let me know what you think!

P.S.S This app is still in Beta, but its fully functional at this point. 

Zinio: Best Magazines, Digital Format

Typically speaking, I don't read a ton of magazines. Typically speaking again, the times that I do are when I'm waiting for an appointment to start, or when I have some time to kill at the library and my book is at home or something.

But, if those magazines that I browse through at the dentist's randomly showed up in my email's inbox, I might start to read them a little more lol. Basically, that is what Zinio has been doing for about 10 years apparently, and now the Community Library Network has got a subscription to their library service.

If you bounce over to our network's Zinio browsing page, you can see all the magazines that are free through our library's subscription. If you don't see one you're after, just let us know and we'll see if adding it might be an option.

When you find one you'd like, you can register with Zinio (with an email address, username, and password), and they'll notify you by email when a new issue comes out. Like the cool service that it is, your issues don't expire, and you can view them as often as you like. Another nice piece of this service is that you can either read it online or offline on your computer, iDevice, or Android. That means you can read it whenever you want to, wherever you want to, on whatever you want to.

So the next time you need Car and Driver, Billboard, or US Weekly, sign up with Zinio and get it for free!

SleepCycle and Sleep as Android: Bio-Alarm Clocks on your Device

So does anyone else out there not have enough time to sleep? Well, that probably isn't the right question. Does anyone else out there not allow themselves enough time to sleep?

How much sleep you decide to deprive yourself of is your prerogative, but there are two apps that seem like they might help people like you and me. SleepCycle is the version for iPhone, and Sleep as Android is the one for the Android. Basically, these apps use your devices' accelerometer to track and measure your sleep cycles.

Not a big deal, right? Except that it knows when you are in your lightest sleep phase, and slowly wakes you up with soothing sounds or tunes during that time so it is easier to wake up. You might ask, "If it is going off of sleep cycles, won't it wake me up too late?" Not so much. You tell the app the absolute latest that you can get up, and it will wake you in your lightest phase as close to that time as possible.

Now, I haven't tried this app myself (as I only have a dumb phone and a Walkman), but I mentioned it to a friend who said it totally worked (and who really enjoys the wake-up sounds). I figure that I'll give it a go once I have a smart device because I wouldn't mind softly drifting into the land of the living instead of being forcefully extracted from my beauty sleep.

Fotor: Awesome Full-Feature Photo Editing for Free

As I might have mentioned before, Netted by the Webbys is pretty cool. I get a daily email from them with cool websites and things to try. Sometimes the stuff doesn't apply to me, and sometimes you can only get the cool stuff on devices I don't have. But sometimes, they mention something that I really want to try, and Fotor is one of them =D

As the name might imply, this is another photo editing system. But, the cool thing is that it is available for Windows, Windows 8, Mac, Android, iPhone, and is also absolutely free. Typically the free systems want you to sign up for an account, but I just loaded it for Windows and it didn't require any login. You can share your creations via social media, but Fotor says that it doesn't store your account information.

The other part that was cool about it is the comprehensive nature of the program. Some freebies want you to purchase the upgrade to get all the features, but Fotor seems to have everything you need absolutely free. I've just played with one photo (original on the left, Fotor version on the top), but I was impressed with the amount of things you could do.

In addition to the normal stuff like filters, frames, crop, straighten, and tilt, you can also do photo cards and collages. One other cool thing is the HDR (High Dynamic Range) feature. Basically, you take photos at different exposures and Fotor combines them into a photo that has the perfect exposure for those nasty shadows or over-exposed areas.

But don't take my word for it. Try it yourself...for free!!

E-Books: Here we Go!

Hey everybody :)
Amazingly, I'm posting a Techno Tuesday kind of post on a Tuesday. Oh ya!
This time around, I wanted to let you know that the Community Library Network at Hayden now has e-books available. That's right! The Cooperative Information Network, 23 public, school, and medical libraries that share information (the Hayden Library is a part of the network), are making e-books available to anyone with a CIN library card (for those scratching their heads, any Hayden Library card is a CIN library card).
So if you have a Kindle, Nook, iPAD, Android, Windows Phone, Blackberry, or any other number of e-book readers, you can check out your e-books today!
Go to communitylibrary.net and click on "CIN Digital Downloads" on the left hand column,
or click here.