Best Android Apps

Ever wanted to identify the title and artist of a song you hear playing on someone else's radio? What about finding your car in the parking lot after a long day of shopping? Android downloadable applications (Shazam and Car Locator, in this case) enable you to do both. There's even an app that helps you locate the nearest bathroom and an app that helps you compose guitar music. With more than 25,000 apps ready to download at the touch of a finger, //Best Android Apps// is an invaluable resource. Authors Mike Hendrickson and Brian Sawyer have done the app research work for you, scouring thousands of apps to bring you only the very best and most unique in their categories. The authors arranged the apps in the book into functional areas: business, communication, lifestyle, entertainment, games, utilities and tools, and reference. There is also a chapter at the beginning of the book that displays the 32 winners of Google's 2009 Android Developers Challenge. Several of the apps are smart phone versions of Web sites and tools you already use (Facebook, to-do lists, Weather Bug, Zagat, stock market watching, package tracking, etc.), but most are innovations that are sure to impress. One of the best features of the book is the QR code index for instantly downloading your favorite of Henderson and Sawyer's apps. Reviewed by Megan Just