Android IT Apps - Part 5: Disk Space

Image via WikipediaAlthough not strictly an IT app, I felt this was appropriate to include here. It is generally the IT people who end up using or recommending apps like this. These apps help you look at and manage the space on your Android phone and SDCard.

DiskUsage - I like this first app probably more because it is like WinDirStat than because of its' own benefits. DiskUsage provides a graphical view of your storage on phone or card. Within the app you can zoom in and delete files if you wish. I like being able to keep track of what is taking up space.

ES File Explorer - This is a really nice app. It lets you see the structure of your phone/SDCard. The GUI is very nice. EStrongs puts out components that work with this app - a bookmark app, a task manager, and a security app. They are all free. ES gives you the opportunity to backup your phone to your card - very handy! There is a tab for LANs and one for FTP (also very nice and integrated well). You can customize the app easily with wallpaper, custom folder icons, etc.

All in all, I would recommend using ES File Explorer

Twitter - Startup #7 - Searches

Once you start using twitter you won't feel the full power until you try some searches. You can use searches, either within a client, or outside of twitter, to find out almost anything about what is being said about you or your institution. It doesn't matter whether you are on twitter or not - your business will still be spoken about and wouldn't you rather be there to answer questions?

Here are just a few of the powerful search tools that will let you keep an "eye in the sky":

• searches within your twitter client
• search.twitter.com
• google blog search
• tweepsearch
• tweetalerts
• geo search
  

Twitter - Startup #6 - Using Feeds

Some twitter accounts, you will learn to recognize them, use RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feeds to automatically tweet new information from designated sources as it becomes available. Beware, there are several pitfalls to using this as your sole approach to tweeting.

• Social Media is meant to be Social, so if you aren't going to interact, maybe your best bet is to go elsewhere, or change how you are approaching this
• The more you fill someone's stream (the replies they see in twitter) with possibly irrelevant information, the less likely they are to be interested in following and interacting with you
• You might get marked as SPAM and your account could be discontinued by twitter.

Any number of tools can be use to do this and new ones are popping up all the time. Here are just a few:

• Yahoo Pipes - This tool lets you aggregate infomation from various sources filter what you want and create an RSS feed from it. This is a powerful tool.
• Feedburner - part of google this tool is a great tool for organizing your feeds
• Twitterfeed - With an account on this site you can name your feeds (best to use feedburner feeds) assign when you want them to search for new information (how often), even assign a twitter account to tweet from and a bit.ly account to shorten links and track from.

Next: Searches