Kindle Review – Kindle Phone Review, Kindle Fire HD Review

A couple of app developers have gotten in touch and they have pretty interesting apps available -

1.  Kee-Ko’s Quest by A Gamz is a fun puzzle game. It’s $1.99. A Gamz also made Maze A Thon which is a really good ‘get the mouse to the cheese’ puzzle game and is rated 4.5 stars on 47 reviews. That one is just $1. Kee-Ko’s quest is very easy to use as it lets you use the keyboard and 5-way to move things around. It’s sort of like Sokoban and Pirate’s Quest and is a good puzzle game. I like how they link up all the levels by giving it an end purpose.
2. The unfortunately named Futoshiki by Braintonik Games seems to be a really good game at $1. The reviews are effusive and it seems fun. It’d be nice if app developers chose a name that was – pronouncable and memorable.
3. Fortune Teller by Sonic Boom is a fortune app. You can choose fortune cookies (only 3 a day unfortunately), have Hector the mysterious and ring-obssessed tell your fortune, and you can get the mystic pyramid to advise you. Very good graphics and who doesn’t love fortune cookies.

It is interesting to see the types of apps being released. A Fortune Teller app in particular is a very good sign that Kindle App developers are experimenting in new areas.

Filed under: kindle app review | Tagged: amazon kindle apps | 2 Comments »

Our Kindle Calculator App is now out. It’s $1.

You can find downloadable help files at the Kindle Calculator Help Page. The app itself has a comprehensive help section – Press Menu and then choose Help.

You can find a few videos at the Kindle Calculator Videos Page. Have to replace these with better ones but these do a decent job of showing the Calculator’s features and walking you through how to use the “%” function to calculate tips and discounts and totals.

Should you buy Calculator?

Well, the first thing to know is that the Kindle comes with a very basic Calculator built-in. You can just type 345*32 on the Home Page and press Enter. The first search result on the Search Results page will be the answer. So, if you can get by with this, then you don’t need Calculator.

Reasons for buying our Kindle Calculator App:

1. It’s very simple to use. You can use a NumPad layout for typing numbers OR you can use the cursor OR you can use number keys (if you have a Kindle 2). You can press Space or Enter or the ‘=’ button to calculate a result. So, no worrying about SYM and Alt+QWERTY.
   

   Keyboard Shortcuts for Numbers are in a NumPad layout:
   7 8 9        Q W E
   4 5 6        A  S D
   1 2 3        Z  X C
   0               Shift

2. It’s Fast. Calculator uses zero images so it’s small (just around 100 kb in size) and very fast.
3. It’s Flexible. Since there are no fixed images there is a lot of customization possible – Choose from 3 font sizes, go with either of 2 themes (black or white), and either display keyboard shortcuts on the buttons or hide them.
4. It’s Forgiving – We built it so it doesn’t punish mistakes. If you type in a wrong calculation or want to go back to a previous step – simply use the special Undo feature that walks you backwards through your calculations. Example: 23*25=575, then 575+200=775, and finally 775-155=620. If you want to go back and change what you added to 575, just press Undo button (U key) three times to get back ’575+’. Then you can add whatever you intended to add. You can also use DEL key to do digit by digit Undo.
5. Tired of being able to save just one number in Memory? Our simple solution is to have a Calculator History page that displays the last 10 calculation results and the last 10 numbers saved in memory. It makes things a lot simpler. Calculator History page keeps these 20 numbers available for next time if you exit the app.
6. It’s Friendly – The App itself has a Help section that explains each function and a Shortcuts List section that lists all the shortcuts. The downloadable documents at the Help Page listed above can be read on the Kindle (choose the Kindle format files) or on a PC or Mac (choose PDF or Word).
7. Full Support – Leave a comment here or at our Kindle App blog (the two links above) or email us (App has the email listed on About Page). We’ve taken pains (such as writing Help documents and shooting videos) to explain how to use Calculator features and will be glad to answer any questions.

Kindle Calculator is well worth a shot.

Things Kindle Calculator is Not

1. It’s not free. It took time to get all the little features like History and Keyboard shortcuts in, and to make it work with different fonts and themes.
2. It’s not a scientific calculator – The only functions supported are +, -, *, /, x^y, 1/x, square root, %, sine, cosine, tangent, and memory functions.
3. It’s not a graphing calculator.
4. It’s not form over function. So there are no animated page turns or wooden shelves or photos of butterflies. We had a unicorn but it ran off with a zebra.
5. It’s not infallible. It’s V1 and there might be some eccentricities and some obvious things you think a Calculator should have, that it doesn’t have. Let us know and if possible we’ll add them in a later release.

Credits for Kindle Calculator

Andriy Kanyuka - Developer & Idea of making it without Images. The speed and simplicity and ability to transform (themes, fonts, display shortcuts or not) is all because Andriy managed to make a Calculator that doesn’t use any images at all. We gave Andriy a PSD (Photoshop File) of what the Calculator should look like and he did the design without using the image – which you have to admit is pretty cool.

Maurine – Quality. Maurine made sure everything worked and worked better and was simpler. All the Help documentation and the in-app Help and Shortcuts List are also thanks to her. It’s great because it lets you get the most out of your Kindle Calculator.

Chetan Sachania & Sergey Shevchenko- Design.

Lorraine & Tony – Beta Testers. Thanks a ton to Lorraine and Tony who volunteered their time and gave us some excellent suggestions and found lots of bugs. You can thank them for us adding in a larger font size, removing a lot of extraneous things from the main view, and fixing a lot of bugs which would otherwise be swarming all over your Kindle (and maybe even all over your hands).

Amazon – Lots of Improvements including faster cursor speed, using the NumPad layout for numbers, and using intuitive keys like Enter and DEL intuitively.

Me – The idea of adding an Undo feature and a History Page and a white theme (in case you prefer vanilla ice cream). Guarding the wagons against the Vampire Apaches.

Thanks for reading through this. With Notepad and Converter and Calculator we are steadily adding the Kindle apps we think Kindle owners would find most useful - most of the big ones are still in the works so do stay tuned.

Finally, thanks a ton to the bloggers that have written about Kindle Calculator -

1. Andrys at Kindle World.
2. Steve at Kindle Nation Daily.
3. Kindle App News.

Their help is greatly appreciated.

Filed under: kindle app review | Tagged: amazon kindle apps | 6 Comments »

Kindle Converter App is now available for $1.

It’s a quick and easy-to-use Converter App for the Kindle. Here’s a Kindle Converter video:

You can find Help and downloadable Help at the Kindle Converter Help page. There’s PDF and Word for your PC, and Kindle format for your Kindle.

The Kindle Converter Video page has videos covering shortcuts and general app use. If that page doesn’t work, the videos are available at Vimeo -

1. Kindle Converter Close-Up – A close-up encounter with Kindle Converter.
2. Kindle Converter App Shortcuts - A run through the various shortcuts which make life easy when using Converter. Please note that you can still use 5 Way and clicking instead.
3. Converter Intro Video. This video is shaky but it covers the Kindle Converter from near and far.

Kindle Converter App – Main Benefits

1. You can do conversions on the Kindle itself.
2. There are 11 categories of conversions (Angle, Area, Energy, Length, Power, Pressure, Speed, Temperature, Time, Volume, Weight) and the most common units for each are included (ones that we thought made sense for Kindle owners). 
3. It’s very easy and convenient to use. You can use the 5 Way if you prefer or stick with shortcuts. You can actually get by without ever using the 5 Way. 
4. It’s quick. It loads quickly and it works quickly. We’d bet a person can do conversions quicker on this than on any smart phone or Tablet converter – no scrolling through drop down lists or hunting for buttons and units. 
5. Lots of features to make things convenient – type in a quantity and answer field updates automatically, type in numbers even when focus is not on Quantity Field (though SYM won’t work), on Kindle 3 use Q, W, etc. to type numbers (there’s also a number guide at the bottom of the screen). 
6. Lots of shortcuts – Use A and J to change the conversion type, use S and K to change the ‘From’ conversion unit, use D and L to change the ‘Toè conversion unit, use space to reset the quantity field to blank, use the B key to switch the From and To conversion units.
7. Two Font Sizes to choose from (F key) – Plus fonts are anti-aliased and go well with the images.
8. Conversions are checked and match Google Converter – except for days and months and years where we thought 1 Month = 30 Days sounded a lot better than 1 Month = 30.4368499 days.
9. There’s a high level of precision. 

We think you will like it a lot because it’s simple and easy to use and quick. If you do, please do leave a review at the Kindle Converter App Page.

Please do leave any suggestions or questions here or at KAppReview. You can also email us – our email address is at the end of the Help section of the Kindle Converter App (Menu > Help).

Things the Kindle Converter App is NOT

1. While the conversions are accurate, the range of units is limited to what we thought made sense for Kindle owners. This means Kindle Converter isn’t ideal if you’re doing a PhD in Chemistry or Scientific conversions in an advanced college course.
2. There are no currency conversions. This is to avoid usage of 3G data – which Amazon and developers have to pay for out of the cost of the app. We assumed that a $1 app without currency conversions is preferable for most people over a $5 app with currency conversions.
3. It’s not Free. Actually, all the iPhone conversion apps are paid too. So, $1 is not a bad price.

There’s also the fact that we de-prioritize graphics in favor of speed of use and quick app loading.

Please Note: This is V1 of Kindle Converter

We’re open to suggestions for features or changes. Please let us know what you think would make the Kindle Converter better/easier/more useful for you.

This is V1 and we do plan on releasing a new version if there are enough good suggestions or any important bugs. For example, we submitted a V1.1 version of Notepad in April (just a few weeks after Notepad first came out) – so we do support apps.

Converter Credits and Credit for Good Feature Suggestions

Andriy Kanyuka - Developer + Speed Chief. If you like how quick and easy the app is - most of the credit goes to Andriy. This includes cool shortcuts like ‘B’ to switch the conversion units.

Maurine – Quality Chief. Maurine helped make the Converter App better and ensured overall quality. She’s written some excellent documentation you can download and read on your Kindle (or on your PC or Mac) to better understand Kindle Converter. Also, it was her idea to add cups, teaspoons, tablespoons, etc. so that Converter becomes useful for cooking.

Sergey Reva – Quality & Beta Testing. Lots of painful testing by Sergey, Maurine, and me to make sure all the different conversions work fine. Do let us know if we missed something.

Digant Bhatt, Sergey Shevchenko - Design. We needed a simple, quick, pretty design and Digant did a great job. Sergey provided the main product image (icon+image at Amazon) which we think is retro and dashing at the same time.

Amazon – Lots of good suggestions such as adding a unique Number Legend, adding in Volume conversions and Angle conversions, adding more conversion units, and some usability features.

Forgetting Someone? Can’t shake the feeling there’s someone I’ve missed here.

Me – Program Management, Shaky Videos despite a tripod and in-built image stabilization.

Also, thanks to eReader App News which got out a post on Kindle Converter before we did.

Filed under: kindle app review | Tagged: amazon kindle apps | 3 Comments »

Kindle Notepad App is $1. Rated 4.5 stars on 102 reviews. You can check out videos at the Kindle Notepad Video page.

Kindle Converter App is $1. You can check out videos at the Kindle Converter Video page. Please take a look at our Kindle Apps.

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