Your Smartphone May Be the Best Weight Loss Tool You Own

That’s what we set out to prove with our latest guide, “Top Diet & Fitness Mobile Apps.” With the help of fitness expert Wesley Virgin, we highlight the most popular and cutting-edge apps for getting in shape.

In this era of tablets, smartphones and 24/7 online connectivity, we now have a new class of fitness tools not available to us just a few years ago. Many people don’t realize that iPhones and Android devices are powerful tools in the battle to stay fit and healthy.

Like most people, you probably have your phone with you at all times, every day. This “always-on” connectivity presents a huge opportunity for health and fitness information wherever and whenever you need it. You can make informed, healthy choices at a restaurant or when shopping at the grocery store.

You can download workout routines for the gym or your home designed by fitness professionals. You can learn how to properly perform exercises if you’re a beginner, or improve the efficiency of your workouts if you’re a fitness veteran. Try new exercises by watching video demos, design and schedule your own custom workout plan, analyze your progress and make adjustments, all from your phone. Today’s apps provide everything you need to reach your fitness goals.

Nutrition and diet apps can be your best friend when you’re alone. At the office wondering what you should eat for lunch, when out running errands and getting hungry, on business trips away from home; these are times when you’re most vulnerable. When trying to keep your diet on track, apps can keep you focused on what you should be eating.

Many of the apps also have social features that plug you into a community of like-minded fitness peers for support, inspiration and to challenge each other.

Aside from the great apps in featured in our guide, your phone can be part of your own support team, keeping you connected to family, friends or personal trainers so you stay motivated and progressing when away from home. Mobile devices can also keep you energized with your workout music and inspired with motivational messages and stories.

Too busy to workout? Can’t afford a gym membership or personal trainer? No support? Lack of information to make healthy food choices? Not anymore. There really are no excuses to getting in shape these days!

The guide will be on sale on Amazon.com next week, but our subscribers can get a copy for free by visiting this page: Top Diet & Fitness Apps

Top Weight Loss and Fitness Apps for 2013

Getting 2013 off to a healthy and fit start, we’re delighted to announce our compelling new mobile app guide, “Top Diet & Fitness Apps Guide: For Android & Apple Mobile Devices.” Our latest publication provides a unique take on diet and fitness in the smartphone and tablet era, perhaps revealing that technology may hold the key to overcoming weight loss struggles.

For most of us, getting in shape requires all the help and assistance we can get our hands on. In today’s day and age of mobile devices and 24/7 online connectivity, we now have a new breed of fitness tools not available to us just a few years ago. Our new guide features ten of the most effective health and fitness apps currently on the market for Apple iOS and Android devices.

However, a geek’s advice on weight loss may not go very far for some. That is why we teamed up with fitness guru Wesley Virgin to produce a guide that literally puts the power of better health in the palm of our hands.

Due to his highly acclaimed ‘7DayFitness’ weight loss program, Wesley Virgin has shot to fame as one of the most in-demand fitness celebrities in the U.S.

We’re thrilled to be partnering with Wesley for this guide. It teaches people that, with the right apps, you can download workouts for the gym or home designed by fitness professionals. You can learn how to properly perform exercises if you’re a beginner, or improve the efficiency of your workouts if you’re a fitness veteran. Try new exercises by watching video demos, design and schedule your own custom workout plan, analyze your progress and make adjustments, all from your phone.

The new guide will go on sale in the coming days on Amazon.com, however, for a short time readers of TechieDIY.com can get a copy of the guide for free by visiting this page:

Top Diet & Fitness Apps Guide

 

 

Are We Seeing The New And Improved Apple?

Is Apple showing empathy to customer frustrations?

The large number of problems with the latest release of the iPhone 5 and iOS 6 is unprecedented at Apple and something never seen on this scale before with all the problems. The Apple Maps has come to show that Apple is not perfect and does make mistakes, but this one could have been avoided. And we hope that it will never be repeated again in the history of the company. The one thing that Apple did was to respond to the map problems with an open letter to consumers from Tim Cook apologizing for the lack of quality and that they will do better. And they must do better.

While there is a lot of focus on the Apple Maps problems, it seems that some have missed the point of what has happened here. When Steve Jobs was at the helm, he would have never admitted they made a mistake. We know that he would never have released the product as we are seeing it. But, when there were problems, such as AntennaGate, he would not issue any statement about the problem. Tim Cook has opened a new page at Apple and it could be a really great change for the company.

Apple has such a loyal base of fans and for years, they have been taken for granted it seems. When there are problems, such as the continuing battery life issues, Apple would not publicly admit there was a problem. You might see something in the release notes for iOS where they were trying to "improve" battery life, but never to fix it. That was the Steve Jobs way of doing things.

With Tim Cock running the company, we may be seeing a company which wants to connect with their customers in ways that they have never done before. The open letter admitting they made a mistake goes a long ways to connect with customers. And they should continue to connect with customers in this way. Their customers are what makes Apple a really great company which has very high value. They must re-connect with them.

One of the ways to do that might be for Tim Cook to offer an open letter to consumers talking about Apple and their products. That has not been the Apple of the past, but the Apple of the future really must do something like that. People want to feel that a company is reaching out to them. An open letter 2 or 3 times a year from the CEO might generate more interest in the company.

The current open letter has generated a huge amount of interest and definitely shows the value that this kind of thing might hold for Apple. The idea of a new and improved Apple really needs to come through as it seems things have floundered with the latest releases. There must be steps to show that this is a brand new day for Apple and how they are going to move forward. There needs to be redemption so that customers continue to have great pride for owning Apple products.

For Tim Cook, I applaud the example he has set at Apple. It is one that needs to be repeated over and over again to show they are an even better company than before.

Android Apps Downloaded Are Generally The Free Ones

iOS downloads are more frequently for paid apps.

In doing development for smart phones, those creating the apps want to make money. But it is quite often that those apps downloaded for Android devices are the free ones more often than not. In the chart here, provided by Statista.com, you can see the disparity between the Android OS and Apple's iOS. The numbers are startling, especially if you are trying to make a living selling apps for the Android OS. From the chart, 66% of the downloaded Android apps are the free ones. That is not a good number to see. For Apple's iOS, the number is down at 30%, more than 50% less.

Given that trend, it is interesting that smart phone users are willing to pay for getting content on their smart phones. This information is based on an OPA survey reported in a Folio article. Smart phone owners show that 24% of them are willing to pay for the content they receive on their smart phones. And while that number may translate to apps as well, it is not a balanced view between Android and iOS apps.

We have been hearing from some as to just how hard it is to create and sell an app. Many do not make much money, especially in the Android world. Given the chart, it would appear to be the case and one wonders how this will impact the future for quality Android apps. If some of those are on Amazon's Android Store, they also have to contend with being selected as the free Android app of the day.

iOS developers are more likely to make more money and we have been hearing that for a few years now. Some of that came up as Microsoft worked to attract developers to the Windows Phone 7 OS. This looks to be a clear dividing line between the type of people who purchase Apple products versus those who purchase Android OS products. Does that mean that iOS apps have a higher quality? It could. Or it could be the willingness of that group to spend money.

Either way, it spells trouble in getting Android app developers to produce quality apps when the percentage of paid downloads is so low. Given the total number of Android phones out in the world, there is hope for the future for paid Android apps.

Mobile Phone Malware Is A Growing Problem

Malware on Android phones has now spread to the iPhone.

Malware for mobile devices has been a big problem, but it is expected to become an even bigger problem this year with the proliferation of smart phones. This has been the big problem for Android devices as the app store, Google Play, continues to serve up apps that are infected with Malware. Some of it is intentional and some is accidental. But what ever the case, the end result is the same for those who are infected as a result. All of this is becoming a much bigger problem as those who are doing this have a growing target market as the number of smart phones running Android continues to grow. It seems that the Android Malware problem just keeps rolling along.

According to a Tend Micro report, we can expect to see the growth of infected apps growing and they are predicting a "pandemic" by the end of year. And it is not just Google Play who is delivering these. Amazon's App Store for Android is another location where this happens, so you have to be very selective on what you pick to download. Even some reputable apps have been infected, but not by the developer, but others. It is making it tough to be downloading apps.

And if you think this is limited only to the Android OS, guess again. Apple is getting this problem as well. There are reports of a Trojan horse in the downloads from the app store. This was reported by well known security firm Kaspersky and was tied to an SMS app which has since been removed. Apple in the past has been known for not having malware and virus problems, but with this, it appears they have joined the rest of the world in having to deal with malware.

So, where does that leave you? The issues with mobile devices are not much different than with a computer. Know your sources of downloads. In the case of Google Play, that makes it very difficult because Google is supposed to be filtering out all the bad apps before the public downloads them. At the moment, they are still working to improve that situation. Things which are free to download are generally the ones where you might get malware on your mobile device. Purchased apps are generally far safer and are less likely to cause your problems. Note the "less likely" as developer apps sometimes get infected without the developers knowledge.

Give that Apple has suffered a Trojan horse issue from the app store, we can expect them to step up efforts to protect their customers even more. Google is going to have to really step up efforts. For that matter, any centralized app store which provides downloads is going to have to make them safe. Do not download apps from web sites that you are not confident in. Some are set up quickly solely for the purpose of infecting mobile devices.

Given events this year, we should start to see far more effort put into providing antivirus and malware software which can run on mobile devices. Once these are out in greater numbers, it will be up to the individual to download and install from reputable sources. Go with the well known names and not some company you have never heard of because it is cheap. Remember, you are protecting your information and with smart phones, more of it is being saved there. The Cloud is now coming into play to store your information from your mobile devices.

Things are changing fast, but malware is going to be around for a long time. Be prepared to protect yourself and your mobile device.

Android Fragmentation Growing Worse With ICS

Expectations for Android 4.0 to ease fragmentation are not working

Fragmentation for Android has been a much discussed topic in recent years as Google continues to roll out newer versions of their mobile OS and quite often leaving existing mobile device owners behind with no upgrade path. Not all of the problem is directly tied to Google as they must rely on wireless carriers and manufacturers to update their recent versions to operate correctly on the devices and on the networks. Manufacturers want to put their interface on top of what Google has developed and wireless carriers want to add their customization as well. This delays the entire process by a few months to not happening at all. Yet, Apple's iOS and Microsoft's Windows Phone OS seem to have overcome most if not all of those delays.



While some may believe Android fragmentation is not all that bad, the reality is that it makes it very difficult for consumers and developers a like. In the above chart from Google showing a 14 day period ending on March 5th, you can see the big fragmentation which Android is facing. Android 2.3 is commanding a huge 61.5% of the Android market as showing in the related listing below. Given that Gingerbread has been out for more than a year, this is disturbing information. The fact that Ice Cream Sandwich has only 1.6% makes things even worse.

Google has been releasing SDK versions to developers rather frequently so that they can be developing apps for mobile devices and then released to manufacturing companies. While some believe that apps are not critical to a mobile device OS release, it keeps being demonstrated as developers get copies of the OS months prior to its release so they can develop up to date versions of their apps. Here is a list of the SDK releases to developers over the years for major Android versions and the information comes from WikiPedia with release of the latest OS to the public a few months later:

• Android 1.0 (Beta) - Sept. 2008


• Android 1.1 - Feb. 2009


• Android 1.5 (Cupcake) - April 2009


• Android 1.6 (Donut) - Sept. 2009


• Android 2.0 (Eclair) - Oct. 2009


• Android 2.2 (Froyo) = May 2010


• Android 2.3 (Gingerbread - December 2010


• Android 3.0 (Honeycomb) - Feb. 2011


• Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich - Oct. 2011


• Android 5.0 (Jelly Bean) - Estimated Q2/Q3 2012

As you can see, they are putting out new versions at the rate of 2 per year. Ice Cream Sandwich arrived on the Galaxy Nexus in December 2011 at Verizon, but the upgrade of existing smart phones and tablets has been extremely slow to be done. The new Galaxy Note was rumored to arrive with ICS, but ended up with Gingerbread (Android 2.3.5) in February. It is supposed to have gotten Android 4.0 in Q1, but now that has been delayed until some time in Q2. The same situation exists for many other phone and tablet manufacturers over 90 days after the first device received ICS. While there are some receiving it this month, that list is rather small as compared to the Android market.



There are growing rumors that Google is going to be releasing Jelly Bean (Android 5.0) in Q3 which is going to further muddy the water and make things even more less clear as to what the upgrade paths are for mobile device owners. As an owner, it makes it far more difficult in 2012 to know whether an Android device is the way to go because of all the fragmentation and upgrade limitations. While Android can be considered a much better OS than others, the current ICS upgrade path and delays brings that into question.

There are other reports showing the adoption rate of iOS 5.1 from MacRumors indicating a quick pick up in upgrades. Based on the general information, adoption of iOS 5.1 seems to be at 50% within the first 5 days that it was out and available. Part of that is due to Apple's ability to control the marketplace and not let wireless carriers make changes to Apple's iOS. Apple also has end to end control of the entire process which Android does not have. That is a big advantage and why they can provide backward compatibility to the iPhone 3GS. Android OS upgrade paths do not even come close to that backward compatibility.

Even Microsoft is having a far better time with fragmentation than Google is with their Android OS. Windows Phone 7 updates are not happening near as fast as Apple's iOS, but are far better than Google's Android OS. With their upgrade to Mango, 30% of Windows Phone 7 devices had Mango installed within 16 days after it was made available to owners. Since Microsoft has not been in the market that long, this is a great number.

Google needs to start making changes as to how things are done for handling updates to their OS on all the mobile devices which are out there. The adoption rate for Ice Cream Sandwich can be considered as horrible by just about any standard you want to apply. If Microsoft is able to get a good adoption rate in less than 30 days, why is it that Google can not?