A friend at my law firm received a Christmas card from the Compensation and Benefits Strategies division of J.P. Morgan with a fun iPhone theme.  Kudos to them for coming up with a memorable card, at least for iPhone enthusiasts:

It’s a short week due to Christmas, but there was still some iPhone news of interest.  Here are some of the highlights:

• MacRumors reports that, according to Nielsen, the iPhone 3G is the mobile phone model with the largest percentage of users (4%).
• Dan Frakes of Macworld has an excellent list of gifts for the iPhone lover.
• Gizmodo tests 3G data on all of the U.S. networks in 12 cities and concludes that AT&T’s 3G network is the fastest.
• Are you flying for the holidays?  Do you want to get free Wi-Fi on your flight?  Lifehacker has the codes you need.  (Link via Niki Black.)
• The Financial Times has an interesting article on the iPhone App Store, noting that it was far more successful than Apple ever expected.
• The Harvard Business Review names the Top 50 CEOs.  Steve Jobs is #1.
• Dan Moren of Macworld has tips on talking to your iPhone using the Voice Control feature of the iPhone 3GS.
• The Washington Post carries a Reuters story about how Tapulous, the developer of the iPhone game Tap Tap Revenge, is bringing in almost $1 million a month.
• And finally, are you ready for the announcement of the next model of the
  
  iPhone?  Apple traditionally introduces new models in June, and
  
  AppleInsider speculates that in 2010 it will be on June 28th.  This
  
  is because the Moscone Center in San Francisco is booked for a
  
  anonymous “corporate event” June 28 to July 2, 2010, which AppleInsider
  
  believes will be the Apple Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), a
  
  natural venue to introduce the 2010 model of the iPhone.  The original
  
  iPhone was released on June 29, 2007, the iPhone 3G was announced at
  
  WWDC on June 9, 2008, and the iPhone 3GS was announced at WWDC on June 8, 2009.

Merry Christmas!

Have you ever been out of your office and realized that you need to look at a file that is sitting right on the desktop of your office or home computer but that you forgot to take with you?  Or maybe you need to access an e-mail that you have already moved to your office document management system for which there is no iPhone interface, so just having access to your Inbox in the iPhone’s Mail app won’t let you get that e-mail?  Or maybe you need to look something up in a database that cannot be accessed from an iPhone?  Or maybe you just want to use a website that doesn’t work in Safari on the iPhone, such as a website that requires Internet Explorer?  A solution to all of these problems is to view and control your PC or Mac that is sitting in your office at your home.  With the LogMeIn Ignition app, you can now do all of this from your iPhone.

To start, you need a free LogMeIn Ignition account, and you need to install software on your computer(s).  (There are also paid LogMeIn accounts available that include a few advanced features, but you don’t need one of those paid plans to use the iPhone app.)  Once you install this software, you can use any web browser on any computer to control your computer that has the LogMeIn software installed.  Making your computer accessible on the Internet raises obvious security questions, but LogMeIn appears to have thought through all of these issues, as you can see on the company’s Security page.  When you start the iPhone app and log into your account, you will see a list of all of the computers associated with your account, such as your office PC and your home iMac.  Select the computer that you want to access and enter the username and password for that computer.  (By the way — ignore all of the black boxes in these pictures; those are just my redactions to these images.)

Once connected, you will see your computer’s screen on your iPhone.  At first, it will be incredibly tiny of course, but you can pinch to zoom in which makes everything easy to read.  By the way, I’m showing these screens in portrait mode, but you can turn your iPhone on your side if you would prefer a wider, landscape mode.

The default mode is for the cursor to remain fixed in the middle of the screen.  Use your finger to scroll around to the part of the screen where you want to click, then tap once on the screen to click, or twice to double-click, or tap twice but hold down on the second tap to drag.  If you need to do a right click, just tap the third of the six icons at the bottom of the screen to change into right click mode.  (There is also a tap shortcut that lets you do the same thing, but I find that icon easier to use.)  You can even swipe with two fingers at once to scroll a window, a gesture that will be familiar to anyone who uses the same gesture on a MacBook.  If you need to type something, just tap the second icon on the bottom to bring up a keyboard.  It is not a standard iPhone keyboard so it takes a little getting use to, but this is necessary because the app gives you all of the keys that you would have with a full keyboard:

The fourth icon across the bottom, the magnifying glass, can be tapped to zoom in or out.  I find that zooming is usually easier if you just pinch your fingers, but it is nice to be able to tap one button when you are zoomed in to instantly zoom all the way out and see the entire screen at once.  The fifth icon at the bottom brings up various settings that you can adjust.  The sixth and final icon brings up a quick and easy way to Alt-Tab to switch applications or Ctrl-Alt-Del to lock your screen and perform the various other functions associated with that.  (If you are controlling a Mac, the options are Command-Tab and Command-` which allow you to switch applications or switch windows within the same application.)

Here is a video from the developer that shows the app in action:

Click here for another promotional video on the LogMeIn website.

The real question for me when I contemplated buying this app was speed.  Would it really be fast enough to make reasonable use of a computer from a tiny little iPhone?  To my utter surprise, the answer is yes.  Even on 3G, but especially on WiFi, the app is very responsive and speed was never an issue for me.  The small screen size is a limitation, and you find yourself moving around the screen a lot whenever you are zoomed in enough for text to be reasonably legible, but fortunately the app is zippy when you are moving around the screen.  You wouldn’t want to use this app to write a long brief in Microsoft Word, but it is a snap to use this app to fix a few words in a Word document on your desktop and then use an e-mail program such as Outlook to send the file around.  As a test, I even connected to my Mac and started playing a movie in half-size so that it would roughly match the size of my iPhone screen.  On the iPhone, the screen refreshed quickly enough (on WiFi) that I was able to view the video on the iPhone.  The frame rate was lower, and the app has no audio so I couldn’t hear the video, but the movie was certainly watchable.  I was amazed that it worked as well as it did.

There are a few iPhone apps out there that work very well, are incredibly useful, and really push the platform beyond anything that you thought would be possible.  These rare apps can be almost magical when you first use them.  Several of the iPhone’s built-in apps meet this test, as does the Dragon Dictation app that I recently reviewed.  LogMeIn Ignition also falls in that category.  If you are in a pinch and really need to access your computer when you are away from that computer, the iPhone now allows you to do something that was previously impossible.  And of course, you never know when that moment will arise, so you should consider getting this app set up now so that it is there for you when you need it.  This app has been out for a while but for a long time I put off trying it, thinking that it would be difficult to use and not that helpful.  I was wrong, and I wish I had purchased it earlier.

Indeed, this app has even started to change my habits.  I used to frequently bring home my work laptop, especially on weekends, just in case I needed something on it.  But now, I am starting to think it is better to default to leaving my laptop at work, because that way I can access that laptop both from home (using LogMeIn either on my iMac at home or on the iPhone) or if I am away from home.  Just the other day, I needed to get a home address for one of my colleagues while I was running errands over the weekend.  I didn’t have the address in my iPhone contacts, but I knew that I could get it from my firm’s intranet website, a website that only works on Internet Explorer so I couldn’t even use my iPhone to VPN to my law firm and get it that way.  This was no problem with LogMeIn Ignition; I just connected to my work laptop, started Internet Explorer, and then got the address.  It only took about a minute.  My experiences are consistent with study findings released in a set of LogMeIn promotional slides that “57% of [LogMeIn Ignition] users in our survey are ditching their laptop in favor of their iPhone with Ignition at least half the time.”

As good as this app is, there are reasons to consider not getting it, at least not yet.  First, if you don’t mind waiting, at some point I’m sure that LogMeIn Ignition will have some real competition.  There are other remote access programs for computers, perhaps the most famous being GoToMyPC by Citrix.  I saw reports earlier this year that an iPhone GoToMyPC app was in development, so hopefully we will see that soon.  If you use the similar WebEx PCNow, I understand that you can use the service in Safari on an iPhone, but not to control a PC; you just see a big list of the files on your PC, which depending upon your needs might be sufficient.

Also, if the $30 cost seems a bit much for you, you should know that I have seen at least two times this year when LogMeIn dropped the price to $20 for
a few days.  (I bought my copy during one of those brief sales.)  If I
see a price drop again, I’ll be sure to mention it on my Twitter feed.

Finally, if even that discounted price seems too much, note that there is at least one other iPhone app that does the same thing, a
$5.99 app called Mocha VNC, but I understand that it is difficult to
set up and I don’t know enough about security of that product to recommend it one way or the other.  LogMeIn does not require you to do any complicated configuring
on your computer or iPhone.  It just works.  For me, that ease of use makes it well worth the cost, especially considering that if you really need to access your computer in a pinch, that $30 (or $20) could pay for itself in a single use, depending upon the emergency.

Click here to get LogMeIn Ignition ($29.99): 

Earlier this month, the iTunes Store announced “Rewind 2009" identifying the best of 2009 on iTunes.  The iTunes App Store Rewind 2009 page lists the best apps of 2009 as selected by the App Store staff and the top selling apps of the year.  There are separate lists for game apps and non-game apps.  Browsing these lists is a useful way to discover some great apps.  Since I don’t really talk about games on iPhone J.D. (with one recent exception), I’ll just list here the “best” and “top selling” non-game iPhone apps.  These are in alphabetical order; Apple doesn’t rank the lists.  All prices are current, but note that many of these prices reflect holiday sales so these apps may cost more in a few days.

Best of 2009, as selected by the App Store Staff:

1. 20 Minute Meals – Jamie Oliver ($4.99)

   

2. Awesome Note (+ToDo) ($3.99)

   

3. BeejiveIM with Push ($6.99)

   

   — supports all the major instant messaging protocols, and because it uses push notifications it works even when you are not running the app
4. CBS Sports:  Live College Games ($4.99)

   

5. CNBC Real-Time (free)

   

   — the only free app that provides real-time stock quotes
6. ColorSplash ($1.99)

   

   — converts a photo to black and white and lets you add color to a specific part of the picture to create a dramatic effect
7. Convertbot ($0.99)

   

   — I use this one all the time to convert between various units
8. Credit Card Terminal ($0.99)

   

9. ESPN ScoreCenter (free)

   

   — I have several apps to track sports scores, but this is probably my favorite
10. Fandango Movies – Times & Tickets (free)

    

11. Flight Update Pro – Live Status + TripIt ($9.99)

    

12. Golfshot: Golf GPS ($29.99)

    

    — keep score, GPS rangefinder with distances, aerial views of 26,000 courses, etc.
13. I Am T-Pain ($0.99)

    

    — Auto-Tune your voice to sing along with music
14. Leaf Trombone:  World Stage ($0.99)

    

    — my review is here
15. Magellan RoadMate 2010 ($79.99)

    

16. Mathemagics – Mental Math Tricks ($1.99)

    

17. Mover+ ($1.99)

    

    — send files between two iPhones
18. Musée du Louvre (free)

    

19. NBA League Pass Mobile ($39.99)

    

    — watch live games on your iPhone
20. NearestWiki ($1.99)

    

    — requires iPhone 3GS; provides information about your surroundings
21. Pano ($1.99)

    

    — turn iPhone pictures into panoramas.  I haven’t tried Pano, but I use a similar program called AutoStitch ($1.99)

    

    which works very well.
22. ReelDirector ($7.99)

    

    — turn video clips into polished movies on the iPhone 3GS
23. (Shazam)RED ($4.99)

    

    — (PRODUCT) RED version of the popular Shazam app
24. SketchBook Mobile ($1.99)

    

25. SmackTalk! ($0.99)

    

    — a voice-altering app featuring animated animals
26. Star Walk – 5 Stars Astronomy Guide ($2.99)

    

27. Storyboard Composer ($19.99)

    

28. Tweetie 2 ($2.99)

    

    — I haven’t tried this Twitter client, but it gets great reviews.  I instead currently use and love Twitterific Premium ($4.99)

    

29. Vintage Video Maker ($2.99)

    

    — make your video look like a movie from the 1920s or the 1960s.  I haven’t tried this app, but you can see some sample videos here.  What I find interesting is that even though the iPhone 3GS takes videos of somewhat limited quality, that doesn’t matter when you apply effects like this.
30. Zipcar (free)

    

Top Selling of 2009:

1. AIM ($2.99)

   

2. AppBox Pro ($0.99)

   

   — contains 18 different utility apps
3. Camera Genius ($1.99)

   

4. Camera Zoom 2 ($0.99)

   

5. CNN Mobile ($1.99)

   

6. ColorSplash ($1.99)

   

   — converts a photo to black and white and lets you add color to a specific part of the picture to create a dramatic effect
7. Documents to Go [the version without Exchange support] ($9.99)

   

   — I’ve discussed this app many times on iPhone J.D. including:  6/22/09, 6/25/09, 8/4/09, 8/17/09
8. ESPN Radio ($2.99)

   

9. Family Guy ($1.99)

   

10. FlightTrack Pro – Live TripIt Flight Status Tracker ($9.99)

    

11. Golfshot: Golf GPS ($29.99)

    

    — keep score, GPS rangefinder with distances, aerial views of 26,000 courses, etc.
12. I Am T-Pain ($0.99)

    

    — Auto-Tune your voice to sing along with music
13. iBird Explorer PRO ($29.99)

    

14. iEmoji ($0.99)

    

15. iSoda (iWater, iCola and more) ($2.99)

    

16. MobileNavigator North America by Navigon ($59.99)

    

17. MLB.com At Bat (free)

    

    — this app is currently free because the season is over; during the 2009 season, you could use this $9.99 app to watch live games on your iPhone
18. The Moron Test ($0.99)

    

    — I haven’t tried this, but it actually gets good reviews; the app includes lots of trick questions
19. MotionX GPS Drive ($2.99)

    

    — my review is here
20. Picfree – Send Picture Messages (MMS) Free! ($5.99)

    

21. Pocket God ($0.99)

    

    — this is a game app, so I’m not sure why it is on this list
22. Proloquo2Go ($189.99)

    

    — for people who have difficulty speaking, this app lets them type text or select pictures and then the app speaks for them.  The reviews are amazing because this app lets someone just carry an iPhone or iPod touch instead of a 10 pound AAC device that can cost thousands of dollars.
23. Quickoffice Mobile Office Suite ($9.99)

    

    — I’ve discussed this app many times on iPhone J.D. including:  2/20/09, 4/22/09, 5/5/09, 7/20/09, 8/4/09
24. RedLaser ($1.99)

    

    — scan bar codes and compare prices on items
25. SlingPlayer Mobile ($29.99)

    

26. Textfree Unlimited – Send Text Messages (SMS) Free! ($5.99)

    

27. TomTom U.S. & Canada ($69.99)

    

28. ViewTi Golf ($0.99)

    

29. The Weather Channel Max ($3.99)

    

30. Wolfenstein 3D Classic Platinum ($0.99)

    

    — once again, this is a game app so I’m not sure why it is on this list

Only three apps made both lists:  (1) ColorSplash, (2) Golfshot and (3) I Am T-Pain.  I haven’t tried any of them, but now I’m starting to think that I am missing something. 

These lists reveal some disagreements on which apps are best.  For example, if you are looking to track flights, it looks like you have to choose between the “best” Flight Update Pro and the “top selling” FlightTrack Pro.  I haven’t tried either yet.  Likewise, if you want a turn-by-turn GPS app, the App Store editors pick Magellan RoadMate 2010 as the best, whereas Navigon’s MobileNavigator, TomTom and MotionX GPS Drive were apparently better sellers — the peoples’ choices, I suppose you could say — in 2009.

A lot of people will be traveling for the holidays, and if you have been waiting until now to get a GPS navigation app for your iPhone, you’ll be glad that you did because of the comprehensive reviews and deep discounts that came out over the last few days.  Here are those stories, plus the rest of the news that caught my attention this week:

• Glenn Fleishman is normally known as the guru of wireless networking, but this week he showed that he knows his way around GPS as well.  He wrote the most comprehensive review I have seen to date on the GPS navigation apps for Macworld.  As he notes, the one that is right for you depends on the features that will interest you most, but his wrap up notes:  “Overall, AT&T Navigator was the best app among those with low
  
  prices, recurring monthly fees, and small app sizes; among the large
  
  apps with pre-loaded maps, Navigon MobileNavigator scored the highest.
  
  Combining decent quality with a low price, MotionX was the best bargain
  
  among all the apps I reviewed.”  MotionX, which I reviewed here, is a great bargain, but I keep thinking about getting another app that can announce street names, a big omission in MotionX. [UPDATE:  Text to speech is planned for a future update to MotionX, as  noted below in the comment and just confirmed to me by the company, but the company isn’t saying when this feature will arrive.]
• There are also some big sales on some of the major GPS navigation apps.  TomTom has been selling a $99.99 U.S. & Canada app, but from now until December 28, TomTom is currently selling that app for only $69.99.  Better yet, TomTom has come out with a U.S. only version that only costs $49.  I know a lot of people bought the $99 version with no intention of traveling north of the border, and if you were thinking of doing the same, you can now get what you need from TomTom for essentially half the price.  Click here for TomTom U.S. & Canada ($69.99 sale): 

  

  .  Click here for TomTom U.S.A. ($49.99 sale):

  

• Similarly Navigon MobileNavigator, which Fleishman gave the highest score, used to cost $89.99 but from now until January 11th only costs $59.99.  Click here for Navigon MobileNavigator ($59.99 sale): 

  

• By the way, if you get a GPS navigation app, you might want to get a car mount as well.  If you use the TomTom app, they sell a $120 car kit that improves the GPS signal and speakers, but I hear that stock is limited.  (The Apple Store seems to have some.)  If you already have a cigarette lighter power cord for your iPhone and just want a simple mount, I hear good things about the Kensington mounts for your dashboard

  

  
  
  or your windshield

  

  that cost under $25, and I’m thinking about getting one of those.
• Macworld has picked their 20 favorite iPhone apps of the year.  Those guys really know their iPhone apps, and this is a great set of picks.
•  With Tiger Woods on everyone’s minds nowadays, Art of the iPhone reviews the Tiger Woods golf app, which apparently is excellent.  Click here for Tiger Woods PGA Tour ($4.99): 

  

• With so many games for the iPhone, it sometimes seems that attorneys need to defend the iPhone as also being a serious business tool.  Proving that the iPhone can be used for even more important tasks, Roy Furchgott reports for the New York Times on a new app by military contractor Raytheon that “tracks friends and foes, shows their positions on live, real time maps and provides secure communications.”  Raytheon sees possible applications both on the battlefield and for first responders such as police and firemen.  (Thanks to Marshall Hevron at my firm for the link.)
• It used to be that if you wanted to record video on your iPhone, you had to have the latest model, the iPhone 3GS.  Art of the iPhone reviews a cheap app called iVideoCamera that allows you to record video on the original iPhone and the iPhone 3G.  The video quality and length is limited, but at least you now have an option.  Click here for iVideoCamera ($0.99): 

  

• Do you have a stereo in your house or office?  Would you like to wirelessly send music from your iPhone to that stereo?  Macworld notes a new $50 device from Belkin that turns any stereo into a Bluetooth speaker.
• Scott Kleinberg reports on iPhone, Therefore iBlog about an iTunes problem that I have been having as well.  iTunes tells you that you have updates for an app, but then after downloading and installing the updated app on your iPhone, iTunes continues to insist that the same update is still available.  Hopefully Apple will come out with a fix soon.
• Gregg Keizer reports for Computerworld that the iPhone user base is now the second largest among smartphones in the U.S.  Nine million people use the iPhone as their primary smartphone.  RIM is still in the lead with 15 million Blackberry users.  For now, at least.
• I previously reviewed two new Take Control books relating to the iPhone, Take Control of iPhone OS 3 and Take Control of Your iPhone Apps.  For a limited time, you can get either book for half price ($6.50 or $5.00) by clicking this link.
• Randall Stross writes an interesting article in the New York Times asserting that AT&T coverage problems are due in part to iPhone design problems.  Others have written harsh rebuttals to the article, including John Gruber at Daring Fireball, Daniel Eran Dilger at Rougly Drafted and Chris Foresman at Ars Technica.  You be the judge.
• If you’ve visited the App Store in iTunes recently, you’ve seen a whole new look.  TUAW and Macworld discuss the redesign.
• At the end of 2007, U.S. Supreme Court practitioner and SCOTUSblog co-founder Tom Goldstein released a funny YouTube video playing off of the early Apple ads for the iPhone.  Click here for my post from last year containing that video and another funny one from Goldstein; both are still worth seeing today if you missed them in the past.  This year for the holidays, Goldstein released another funny video called “The Public Apology of Tom Goldstein.”  The iPhone makes only a minor appearance in the latest video, but it is worth watching.  (Thanks to Ray Ward’s Minor Wisdom for the link.)
• And finally, if you are looking for a way to avoid spending tens of thousands of dollars on a Steinway grand piano, apparently you can just purchase six iPhones instead:

During this time of giving and holiday cheer, I know that a lot of you have been thinking about what you can give to iPhone J.D. this year.  Well, maybe some of you have been thinking that.  OK, maybe just one.  (Hi, Mom!)  But if you do enjoy reading iPhone J.D. and you are interested in supporting the site, there are two easy things you can do that won’t cost you anything.

First, if you make any purchases from Amazon, just click right here before making that purchase and Amazon will provide a tiny percentage of whatever you buy to iPhone J.D.  It doesn’t cost you anything extra.

Second, even if your holiday shopping is done and you have nothing to purchase from Amazon, it would be so nice if you take the time to vote in the ABA Journal’s Blawg 100.  This year, the ABA makes you register before you can vote, and I know that is a deterrent.  But registration really is painless and only takes about a minute, and once you register you can vote for up to ten favorite blawgs among the 100 nominees.  I’d like to show the ABA Journal editors that they did the right thing by selecting this site because there is a lot of iPhone interest out there.  To vote, you can click on the link at the top right of this page, or just click on the following large, obnoxious banner helpfully provided by the ABA Journal to go directly to the “Tech” category.  Once you are there, click the links at the top for the other categories:

By the way, you really should check out some of the other nominated sites.  There are some great ones. 

For all of you who decide to support iPhone J.D. through either of the above, not to mention though your continued readership and enthusiasm, thanks so much.  It means a lot.

As the end of the year nears and the holidays catch your attention, don’t forget to get your CLE hours for the year.  West offers over 2,000 audio CLE programs in its West LegalEdcenter, and now you can take those courses on your iPhone with the new West CLE Mobile app.

To get started, download the free West CLE Mobile app to your iPhone, and then create a West LegalEdcenter account, if you don’t already have one.

The app allows you to download one free CLE, a one hour program called Ethics in Client Development.  You can also go to the LegalEdcenter and search for or browse the 2,000+ programs offered by West.  The programs that you can use with the iPhone app — which in my unscientific review appeared to be most of them — say “Mobile Compatible” next to them.  (I wish that West would let you browse, search for and purchase CLE
programs from within the app itself instead of having to use a web
browser, and hopefully this is something that can be added in a future
version.)

The prices vary, but most of the one hour courses appear to cost $135.00.  Once you have purchased a program, it will show up as being available for download on your iPhone.  Downloading a program, which includes the audio and the materials, takes just a minute or two.  Once you have a program downloaded to your iPhone, you can play the program at any time before it expires.

Once you choose to start playing a program, the audio will play over your iPhone speaker, or use your headphones for a little more privacy.  A progress bars shows you how much you have to go, and if you miss something there is a button that lets you rewind 30 seconds.  You can also use the slider at the bottom to jump to a particular spot in the program, but you cannot advance past your last verified position.  Verified position?  What that means is that at various points during the program, you will hear a bell ring.  When that happens, you need to tap the Now Playing button at the bottom of the screen and then tap the Verify button to demonstrate that you are still awake and listening to the CLE.

By tapping on the Program Materials button in the middle of the screen, you can see all of the materials for the CLE, including documents and PowerPoint slides.  I found it very easy to manually scroll through the slides while the speaker was speaking.  You can rotate the screen if you would rather view the slides or documents in landscape mode.

One nice feature is that you can stop the program at any time and then resume it later.  This makes it easy to fit in the CLE during whatever time you have available.

When you are finished with your program, the app allows you to rate the program and then you press one button to Submit for Credit.  West then e-mails you a link to obtain a Certificate of Completion, which you can provide to your bar to recognize your CLE credit.

Here is a video from West showing off the features of the West CLE Mobile app.  Feel free to silence the audio as you watch this; it consists of nothing more than stock background music:

Thanks to the West CLE Mobile app, you can now slip your iPhone in your pocket, put on some headphones, and get CLE credit while you are doing other things in your house, pausing from time to time to look at the new slides.  I encourage all attorneys to check out this app because the app itself is free and it includes a free download of the Ethics in Client Development program, so even if you never use the app again, you have the opportunity to easily get a free CLE hour.  But after using this app once for free, I’m sure that I will be paying for content in the future because West CLE Mobile on the iPhone is such a convenient way to get CLE credit.

Click here to get West CLE Mobile (free): 

 

Have you ever received a PDF file containing a form that you had to fill out or a document that you had to sign or mark up?  Typically you would print out the PDF, use a pen to make your additions or changes, and then either fax the document back or scan and email the document back to the person who sent it to you.  Zosh is a useful iPhone app from a company in Austin, Texas that lets you do all of this on your iPhone, eliminating the need to find a computer, printer, scanner or fax machine to accomplish these tasks.

When you first start the app, you are asked to create a (free) account with Zosh, which simply requires you to provide an e-mail address and a password.  Once you have an account, Zosh knows who you are based on your e-mail address.  The app also creates an entry called “Zosh” in your Contacts that has the e-mail address of mydocs@zosh.com.

When you receive a PDF file that you need to fill out or sign, just forward the e-mail that has the PDF file to “Zosh” and in about a minute the document will appear on the main screen of the Zosh app.  Tap the document in Zosh and you will see the PDF on your screen.

When you are ready to insert either text or a signature, tap the Insert button at the top right, or just tap and hold on a spot in the document.  Inserting text is very simple, just type the text that you want inserted.  There is a shortcuts button that lets you easily enter text that you have used in the past.

The text will then appear on the form, and you can re-size the text and move it around so that it appears on the correct line. You can even rotate the text, if necessary.

The app also lets you quickly insert a date in a short (12/15/09) medium (Dec. 15, 2009) or long (December 15, 2009) format.  Finally, you can easily insert a signature.  With the iPhone screen being so small, you might wonder how you can sign more than a letter or two using your finger before you hit the edge of the screen.  The app actually has an ingenious way of handling this; the screen automatically scrolls (at a speed you can adjust in settings) so that the “paper” moves under you as you are signing.  The makes it very easy to sign a name just using the tip of your finger.  When you are done, the signature is added to the document, and you can make it larger or smaller, move it to the right place and rotate it if necessary.

The signature feature of Zosh is really nice.  Unless you are an artist with a tablet connected to your computer, you may actually find it easier to sign a PDF on your iPhone with your finger using Zosh than it is to create a signature using your mouse and a drawing tool on your computer.

The Settings allow you to make your inserts blue, black, gray or red.  You can also change the default font of text with over 50 different choices, many of which are variants.  (For example, you can choose Times New Roman normal, bold, italic or bold & italic.)

 

When you are finished completing the form or adding a signature, hit the Transmit button at the bottom.  You can choose to send the revised document to you, or you can choose to e-mail to others which brings up a standard e-mail form for you to complete from within the app.

The recipient will receive a PDF file with all of the information that you added on the PDF document.

 

Here is a video from the developer of Zosh that shows the app in action:

I would like to see some more features in an update.  For example, it would be nice to be able to change the color and font of text after you enter it.  It would also be nice to have an undo button, although this omission is minor because if you don’t like the way that you placed, sized or rotated something it is pretty easy to just change it again.  It would also be nice to have some sort of “save as” function or “copy” function for documents so that you can keep a commonly used form in the Zosh app and just copy it each time you want to add new inserts, a new signature, etc.

But even in this 1.0 version, the Zosh app works great.  It never even occurred to me before that I
could use the iPhone to add text or a signature to a PDF file.  If you ever have the need to fill out or sign a PDF form while you are out of the office, this app is perfect.  And the $2.99 price is a bargain considering that the alternative may involve figuring out a way to print out, sign, and fax a document, such as finding a local Kinko’s and paying whatever they charge to fax documents.

Also, while Zosh is advertised just as a way to complete a form or sign a document, you can also use this app is to add annotations to a PDF file, perhaps adding some large red text to suggest some changes on a document or using the signature feature to draw a circle or an arrow to add emphasis to a particular part of a PDF file.  This is so much easier and faster than trying to explain in an e-mail or even on the phone what needs to be changed in a document.  (Go to the fourth page of the document, now find the second paragraph, now go to the fifth word…  Yikes!)

If you are a lawyer or anyone who works with PDF documents while you are out of your office, this reasonably priced app is one that you will definitely want to add to your arsenal of iPhone tools.

Click here to get Zosh ($2.99): 

If you are between 35 and 45 years old and played video games when you were a kid, then you will probably hear actor Michael Rye‘s voice in your head as you read these words:  “Dragon’s Lair: The fantasy adventure where you become a valiant knight, on a quest to rescue the fair princess from the clutches of an evil dragon. You control the actions of a daring adventurer finding his way through the castle of a dark wizard, who has enchanted it with treacherous monsters and obstacles. In the mysterious caverns below the castle, your odyssey continues against the awesome forces that oppose your efforts to reach the Dragon’s Lair. Lead on, adventurer. Your quest awaits!”

Dragon’s Lair was a breakthrough video game when it came out in 1983, and not just because it was the first game that I remember that cost 50¢.  The game was unique because it did not rely on the modest computer graphics of the early 1980s but instead used a laserdisc with a real cartoon beautifully drawn by former Disney animator Don Bluth.  Last week, the game came out for the iPhone, and given all of my fond memories of playing it as a teenager, I couldn’t resist buying it.  I normally don’t review games on iPhone J.D., but I decided to mention this one for those of you out there who, like me, spent quite a few quarters enjoying this game during your youth.

In fact, my iTunes App Store receipt is sort of funny from last week because it is all dragons, all the time:

The game play is simple.  There are on-screen buttons for your sword (on the left) and a four-way directional pad (on the right).  At frequent points during the animation, the button that you need to press flashes momentarily, and you need to press it at the right time to go forward in the game.

Make a mistake — and trust me, you will make plenty — and you will lose a life and see this familiar screen:

 

Fortunately, the default setting in the game is to give you infinite lives.  Boy, what I would have given to have that back when I was a teenager!  You can change that if you want to torture yourself and make the game more challenging.  The game also saves your place so you can quit the app and pick up where you left off.  Make all the right moves, and you can rescue Princess Daphne from the clutches of the evil dragon.

It occurred to me when I reached the end of the game this past weekend that I first started trying to finish Dragon’s Lair in the summer of 1983.  26 years later, thanks to the iPhone and the infinite lives feature, I was finally able to finish.  Nice to know that I can check that one off of my bucket list.

The game has two different playing modes, one which resembles the original arcade version and a “home mode” that actually makes more sense because you go through scenes in sequence.  (In the original arcade game, when you died, you did not replay the scene but instead were sent to a different scene.  This made the game more challenging but less linear.)  One nice feature is a Watch Game mode in which you can just watch the game being played perfectly.  This mode reminds me of being a kid watching someone better play the game, and this mode allows you to appreciate the wonderful animation and the funny grunts and asides of Dirk the Daring even more than is possible when you are playing the game and concentrating on what button to press next.  And by the way, the animation looks beautiful on the iPhone.  It is a very nice transfer.

After you finish the game, you can of course play it again as much as you want, but frankly it has somewhat limited replay value.  Nevertheless, if you share my nostalgia for the original game of the early 1980s, you’ll consider this one worth the twenty quarters.  Ahem, I mean worth the $4.99 price tag.  I had a lot of fun with this one.

UPDATED LINK THAT WORKS AS OF 5/27/2019:

Click here to get Dragon’s Lair 30th Anniversary ($4.99): 

A lot of exciting iPhone apps have been accepted into the App Store lately.  Earlier this week I talked about Dragon Dictation, which is really a remarkable app.  If you read my review when it first came out, go back and look at it again to see some important updates to my review, including a link to a great website containing dictation tips.  Also accepted into the App Store (after a very long wait) was the Ustream Broadcaster app which lets you stream live video from your iPhone to a website, as noted in this Macworld review.  I decided to wait to review Ustream because a similar app, Qik, is also likely to be approved by Apple now that Apple has approved Ustream, and I might do a comparison review when both apps are out.  The acceptance of Ustream, Knocking Live (which I reviewed last week) and Qik will represent a major shift by Apple in letting iPhone apps take advantage of the iPhone video camera.  This is great news for iPhone users.  And now, on to the news of the week:

• Are you a Louisiana lawyer looking to get the rest of your CLE hours for 2009?  Then join us in New Orleans on December 30th for the seminar Digital Workflow for Attorneys.  Ernie “the Attorney” Svenson and Prof. Dane Ciolino will teach you everything you need to know about becoming a better digital attorney, from how to become paperless to how to effectively conduct electronic discovery.  The six hour course will include an hour of ethics and and hour of professionalism so that you can satisfy those requirements, plus I will teach a session on Mobile Lawyering Tips with the iPhone.  I hope to see you there, and you can get more information here.
• Looking ahead to satisfying your CLE hours in 2010, I’ve mentioned before how excited I am to present two sessions on using the iPhone in the practice of law at the ABA TECHSHOW in Chicago on March 25 to 27.  The ABA has now released the full schedule for the program, and as you can see, every hour of the day you have a lot of sessions to choose from.  At several points, I’m really torn on which session to attend myself!  We’ll have a lot of fun in Chicago, and I hope to see you there.
• Time Magazine did not choose the iPhone 3GS for the gadget of the year this year (the Droid got that honor), but it probably is time to give another gadget a chance at the top spot.  (The iPhone was #4 this year.)  Nevertheless, proving the iPhone’s dominance, Time did not provide a top ten list of Android apps for 2009, but they did pick their ten favorite iPhone apps.  Also, the famous New Yorker cover that was created on an iPhone by Jorge Columbo was named the #2 Magazine Cover of the Year.  (And that isn’t the only iPhone-related cover of the year; check out #6, also from the New Yorker.)
• The Deseret News in Salt Lake City, Utah reports on a Christmas iPhone app developed by attorney Alissa Owen, now a stay-at-home mom.  The $1.99 app is called Santa’s Message and it allows you to record messages for your kids, and then the app “translates your voice into Santa’s deep, rich baritone, ready for delivery, with a picture of Old St. Nick on the phone screen.”
• AppleInsider reports that Apple removed over 1,000 apps from the App Store after learning that the developer hired people to write favorable reviews.  Macworld also has a good report.
• Oklahoma bankruptcy lawyer Dan Nunley recommends that all iPhone-using bankruptcy attorneys purchase two app published by Cliff Maier.  While bankruptcy is not my area of practice, I agree that Cliff has some great, useful iPhone apps.
• The Wall Street Journal reports (subscription required) on Apple’s recent purchase of La La, a service that allows you to stream music over the web.  The article speculates on what Apple may do with the service.  I suspect that a key reason for the purchase was to bring the smart people at La La into Apple, but I can also see a future where you don’t need to sync your music via iTunes to play it on your iPhone; you could just use the Internet to stream music that you already own.  I could also see Apple starting a subscription music service, even though Steve Jobs has said in the past that customers would rather own music than rent it.  It will be very interesting to see what comes of this next year.
• If you visit the App Store on iTunes, you can’t miss the iTunes Rewind 2009 which features the best in music, TV, movies and iPhone apps.  As the App Store notes:  “In early 2008, we were happy just to get email on our phone.  Now, we’re playing multiplayer championship racing with Real Racing, editing films with RealDirector, manipulating photos with Colorsplash, or getting completely lost in the touch screen wonder that is Spider:  The Secret of Bryce Manor.  The constant developments in technology, the sheer number of apps available, and the fun of exploring — these are all part of why apps were such an important part of our lives in 2009 and we can’t wait to see where the App Store is going in the future.”  Well said, Mr. App Store Text Writer.  Check out the App Store to see the Best of 2009 iPhone Apps.
• Yesterday, I wrote about iPhone security, an issue being raised by several security consultants.  I recently heard from another security consultant who makes a very good point.  As noted in this article (PDF link) from tech expert Cathy Brode of 3BView, lawyers should be aware that if they forward a Word document while using an iPhone, metadata remains within the document.  Many lawyers have software on their computers which can be used to strip metadata before sending a document to opposing counsel.  Don’t forget that this software isn’t on  your iPhone, so think about this before forwarding an e-mail with a file attached on your iPhone to others outside of your firm.
• If you are a lobbyist, a governmental relations attorney, or just a congressional news junkie, you’ll want to check out the new C-SPAN Radio app.  Art of the iPhone provides a quick overview of the app.
• I haven’t tried it myself yet, but I frequently hear lawyers and others give Dropbox rave reviews, a service that lets you easily share files between multiple computers.  With the Dropbox iPhone app, you can also access your files on your iPhone.  Macworld gives the app a good review.
• Gigaom has an interesting and fun graphic showing who makes money from the sale of an iPhone.
• iPhone Savior reports on the iVictrola, an iPhone speaker that combines old tech and new tech.  Very amusing.
• And finally, the New York Times provides a video report of the Stanford iPhone Orchestra.  Yes, you read that correctly.  iPhone Orchestra.  Too funny.