iphone useful Apps

Did you dump your dumb phone in 2011 and got smart ones, as in iPhones. Now that you have ‘em, you can’t believe why you waited so long. Besides being able to check directions, look up phone numbers, research databases and more on the fly, you also found a few apps.

For the iPhone Flashlight. There’s a number of flashlight apps. The one we use is simply called “Flashlight.” Big off/on button that fills the screen, easy to switch it on. You’ve carried flashlights with you since you could walk, yea many years ago, but your always losing flashlights, plus they’re cumbersome to carry, and if you’re not on top of the battery situation you can find — surprise! — you’re stuck in the dark with a weak-lighted or dead flashlight. But with this handy app, which was .99, you can now light up at any time.

TurboScan. Again, there’s a bunch of scan apps. Some chose this one because reviews were good. And it is good. After taking a pix of a document, you can adjust the parameters (shorten, lengthen, add width) to encompass the entire doc. Haven’t figured out how to email the doc directly yet, but it’s easy to store a doc scan on the iPhone “Camera Roll” and email that image. We used to feel smart carting a remote scanner, which was heavy and clunky, into courthouses to scan file docs…now we just use TurboScan on our iPhones. $1.99.

VoiceRecorderHD. With this app, we can record witness interviews with our iPhones, link it to Dropbox (another app we’re fond of) for file transfer or instead connect the iPhone to our Mac and download the voice file that way. $1.99.

Lumin. Sometimes you gotta read the fine print…and sometimes you gotta read the fine print in the dark. Lumin works like a magnifying glass…lets you read the fine print, even capture the image so you can zoom in on a part of it for closer inspection, and if you’re in dim or no lighting, Lumin also provides a light for viewing. Cool. $1.99.

For the iPad

Evernote. We’re digging Evernote on our iPad, but still learning how to manipulate it on our iPhones (some apps just seem too large for an iPhone, y’know?). But on the iPad, this app is a winner. One of the Guns, Gams, and Gumshoes PIs (visit their web site) now carries her iPad to all witness interviews and uses Evernote to take notes, pictures, voice recordings…then sends the report immediately afterward to the attorney-client. You can use the free version or upgrade for a nominal fee (something like $1.99). We went for the upgrade.