Women With Droids reader Whitney used her Android when planning her own wedding and wanted to tell you about the apps that helped her the most. Enjoy her guest post!

Wedding Plan-It Lite

Despite a thick layer of cheese—including but not limited to a heavy dose of emoticons—this is the easiest planning app I’ve found. You can include guests from your email and phone contacts and set up vendors and your budget. If you need to send an email to your caterer, simply go to the ‘actions’ tab and select their name. It will format an email for you with a subject and salutation. If you need to see if those new Louboutins will fit into the budget, check out the budget report. It will tell you your total vendor costs and then break it down further into each vendor’s cost.

WeddingWire

If you’re already a member of WeddingWire, downloading their app is a great move. You’ll be able to track your checklist, budget and vendor. The vendor reviews are cleanly formatted and easy to use. If you’re midway through planning, I would skip this app, though. Most of the items must be set up from a PC, which really diminishes the value of the phone app if you’re not interested in WeddingWire’s main website.

Living Social and Groupon

LivingSocial is the Valpak for a new generation. There are coupons for honeymoon destinations, manicures, dance lessons and wedding favors. Check it daily to make sure you don’t miss out on anything it has to offer. While you’re at it, sign up for Groupon, which includes everything but the vacations.

Etsy for Android

Etsy, the shopping mecca for brides who want the DIY look without the hassle, now has an Android app. Etsy for Android is more intuitive than the site’s web design itself. The homepage has a large text bar and a magnifying glass for a search button. Before you link to your Etsy account, the page features one other item—a large padlock that allows you to link. Once you do so, the app takes you back to the homepage, where a heart indicating your favorites appears in place of the lock.

Results are neatly listed, and images are easily expandable. You can’t purchase items from the app itself, but with one touch, you can get to the item on Etsy.com and buy from there. Another flaw is that you can’t search for individual sellers or narrow your search by vintage or homemade items.

Wedding speeches for the bride

Did you forget to write a speech at the last minute? For under two dollars, Wedding Speeches for the Bride can save you. Choose speeches based on whether they’re an ice breaker or if you want them to be funny, sentimental or a combination of both. Glance through the text before you start reading, though. There are some grammatical mix-ups (conscience replaces conscious, for example), and some of the ‘funny’ speeches are too corn-laden to use.

Wedding dresses

This simple free app is worth downloading until you find your dress. You can search by category, which has simple beach, princess, edgy, and natural labels, or by designer. Once you find one you’d like to use as an inspiration picture, you can sign up and add it to a scrapbook, which you can use to show retailers the style you’re going for when you dress shop.

Thanks for sharing your quick reviews with our readers, Whitney, and Congrats on your wedding!

Wedding dress photo “First in line” by Lori Grieg on Flickr

App Type: Fitness

Price: Free; $9.99 for premium features

Get It: If you want lots of fun features and workout data, you’re exercising for less than two hours, and you don’t need an accurate read on your pace

I love to run, and I’m addicted to information: How fast am I going? How far? How many miles have I logged this month? I rely on a GPS watch and an online training log, but when I heard about CardioTrainer, I wondered if this might be a better solution.

Feature-rich fitness app: CardioTrainer does just about everything I could ask for. It tracks time, distance, pace and elevation; gives voice notifications (key if you’re carrying your phone in an armband or a pocket); and integrates with a music playlist. It shows where you are on a map, and if you set a distance or time goal, it gives updates on how much of the workout you’ve completed. It will auto-pause when it senses you’re not moving.

For outdoor running, walking or cycling, CardioTrainer uses GPS to gauge distance; for a treadmill, it uses a pedometer. Other workouts can be input manually, or you can simply select your workout type and press Start as you begin moving. CardioTrainer tracks your time and calories burned.

If you’re a planner like I am, you can tell CardioTrainer when you intend to exercise and get an easy-to-use workout calendar and reminders. To track what you’ve done, you can view a simple history within the app or get a visual display through integration with Google Health.

CardioTrainer has some fun extras. You can choose to display “calorie medals” in your notification area, send your information to Facebook or Twitter, and set a New Year’s resolution. Premium features let you race against your own best time, set up a weight loss plan, or use interval training.

Ease of use: I was impressed with CardioTrainer’s elegance and simplicity. It’s easy to customize the basic settings,and once you’re set up, the interface is highly intuitive. It only takes a few seconds to get a workout started. Setting up workout calendars and goals is surprisingly quick and easy, and I loved how well the voice notifications integrated with my music player, which for me is a mandatory part of any workout. It worked well with Pandora, too.

Accuracy: Unfortunately, GPS accuracy seems to be CardioTrainer’s greatest weakness—and it’s an important one. I got some downright hilarious reads on my pace. While I ran at a slow but steady 12-minute pace, CardioTrainer’s pace reports ranged from a sub-6-minute mile to a 35-minute mile and back again. I tried adjusting the GPS settings for greater precision (which carries a greater risk of losing the signal), but it was still off by 1 to 2 minutes per mile. This also meant an inflated distance at the end of the workout. The company says it’s working to improve its GPS accuracy.

Improvements I’d like to see: I love CardioTrainer’s easy-to-use interface and plethora of features. But it has some shortcomings. In addition to the GPS issues, CardioTrainer wears down the phone’s battery too much for a long endurance workout. On my Samsung Moment, I estimate that it will last for about 2 hours when used with the phone’s built-in music player.

Also, I was looking forward to taking advantage of CardioTrainer’s integration with Google Health, which should make it possible to see graphs of my workout history, with automatic updates. However, I made three attempts to set up this feature, and each time, my phone froze and had to be rebooted. Too bad. Who doesn’t love a good graph?

I’ll keep using CardioTrainer for easy runs, when I’m not too concerned about knowing my pace, and when battery life isn’t an issue. But for faster training runs, as well as very long workouts, I’ll still be wearing my GPS watch so it can keep me on pace. And that means I’ll still be manually inputting my data into my online training log for now.

I hope CardioTrainer is able to improve its GPS accuracy. If it does that, it will become a fantastic app, and I’ll finally be able to stash my bulky watch in a drawer for good.

This is the 2nd in our series of guest-posts this month from ladies that would like to join on as WomenWithDroids regular contributors. If you are interested in becoming a one-time guest contributor or a regular contributor, please email renee at womenwithdroids.com.
Thank you for your entry, Sonya!
-Renee

I have been an Android user since the original Droid from VZW. When the Droid X was released I was there on release day working a deal to change my original Droid for the X. I am now a certified Android addict and I think Google should rule the world.

The only problem I have with Android is the lack of love the Disney Company shows the Android platform. Next to my Android obsession I am a Disneyphile (a person who is obsessed with all things that do with the Mouse). I have an iPod Touch and love and use many Disney apps. Including games, WDW park reference guides, park maps and wait times.

I was hoping that even though the Disney Company has Steve Jobs on their board they would be an equal opportunity company and publish their apps in the Android Market Place. This is not the case.

Don’t get me wrong I do searches for Disney related apps all the time in the Android Market. I have found a few third party apps that are cool, but for the most part I find a lot of apps that have nothing to do with Disney show up in the search.

One of the best apps I have found is WDW Lines. This app was developed by Henry Work over at touringplans.com. These are the guys responsible to the Unofficial Guide to Disney a.k.a the Disney Bible by many in the community.

The Lines app reports real time waits for all the attractions, lets you know when parades are, what the crowd level is for each of the 4 parks,  and also when fast pass times are and when the fast passes are gone for the day. Why do you need such an app you ask? Well as most people know Disney can be daunting and if you don’t have a good plan (like one from Touring Plans) it is extremely helpful to plan your attack so you can get the most out of your magical vacation. The app itself is a free download from the market place. However, in order to get all the functionality you need to subscribe to www.touringplans.com. This subscription is $10.95 for the year. This can be discounted if you own the Unofficial Guide Book. The subscription also gives you access the all of the on-line information including plans and long range crowd calendars. If you are planning a Disney Trip whether be it your first trip or fiftieth trip this is a must app.



Besides the WDW Lines app there is not a lot in the Market Place for my fellow Disney peeps. I have found some matching games, picture games, wallpaper, a couple sound boards and themes to work with DxTop, aHome and Panda Home. Nothing has been officially put out by Disney yet and I can only hope that with the increased popularity in Android we will see something sooner rather than later.

This is the first in our series of guest-posts this month from ladies that would like to join on as WomenWithDroids regular contributors. If you are interested in becoming a one-time guest contributor or a regular contributor, please email renee at womenwithdroids.com.
Thank you for being our first auditioning contributor, Jill!
-Renee

Guest-contributor Taylor from Autostraddle got her hands on Froyo early and offered to give us a sneak peek of what’s in store! Enjoy.

With Android 2.2 rolling out to more devices any day now, let’s take a look at what to expect. Thanks to HTC’s Froyo leak (whoops!), I managed to manually install the update before it officially hit, so here are a handful of my favorite changes.

1. Speed:

Froyo is zippier across the board. This is probably the centerpiece of 2.2, but it’s also the change you’ll take for granted the soonest. Apps open instantly, browsing is faster and doing just about anything results in instant gratification. Benchmarks indicate that 2.2 is at least twice as fast as 2.1.

2. Scrolling:

Stemming from my dark days with the iPhone OS, one of my only complaints about Android is the (relatively) jerky scrolling. Android 2.2 doesn’t rival the scrolling experience of the iPhone yet, but things do feel noticeably smoother. Especially when flipping between homescreens.

3. Update All Apps:

At last! You can now update all of your apps with one click in the Android market. This cuts down significantly on time and the annoyance of clicking a button over and over (and over) again.

4. Rotation:

You can now rotate many apps 270 degrees. If you’ve got one of the new mega-screens, like the Droid X, it only makes sense to stay in landscape when you can, especially in Gmail and other app mainstays. 2.2 still doesn’t support homescreen 360 degree rotation unfortunately, so you’ll have to look into a mod like Launcherpro if you’d like to rotate to the max.

5. Volume Adjustment Tone:

This may not have bugged anyone else, but the super-shrill tone that played whenever I toggle sound up or down using the volume rocker is a thing of the past. The new tone is much, much easier on the ears.

Other Android 2.2 updates:

– Flash support!

– Video recording in low-light conditions using the LED flash

– 8 most recent apps when holding down the home button (up from 6)

– Numeric pin passwords to unlock the phone (you can still trace a pattern, if you prefer!)

– Wireless and USB tethering (Note, word is that tethering won’t be supported on Droid 1 -Renee)

– Ability to store apps on SD Card

Check out even more Froyo updates over at Android Central.

Overall, while I’m loving 2.2, the update serves to enhance the Android experience without radically overhauling it. I’ve been cruising around on Froyo for two days now, and the changes seem to have already melted into the background for me. Some changes are biggies, like the ability to store apps on SD and the native tethering support, but most are pleasant little tweaks. That’s not to say 2.2 isn’t a noticeable step up: it’s a subtle upgrade that becomes second nature quickly, raising the bar for the future of Android by smoothing out the experience we know and love. Keep an eye out for Froyo on your own Android device– it might hit any minute now!

I am pleased to announce Deb from New Jersey, our latest guest-poster! She describes herself as a “nonprofit professional by day,  Android fanatic the rest of the time”. Welcome to WomenWithDroids, Deb!
~Renee

Want to work out with your Motorola Droid, but hate armbands? Try the Tune Belt Sports Belt.

I don’t like arm bands. If anything, women’s arms are smaller than your typical male’s and considering the phone’s weight and size, the last thing I want is to strap something on my arm that’s practically the same width. Also, the location itself leaves much to be desired. How easy can it be to use your phone while it’s strapped to your arm?

I spent months searching the internet and give the Tune Belt “5 out of 5 stars.” My reasons?

• A belt means both hands are free to use the phone. How handy!
• It’s made of lightweight, stretchy wetsuit material that makes it both comfortable and accommodating for most waists.
• Offers a snug fit around the phone, helping it stay in place.
• Need a place for your keys? No problem, pocket included.
• Its plastic see-through cover is large enough so I can see and use the 4 main keys at the phone’s bottom, giving me full access to everything Droid during my workout.
• Headphone jack-friendly
• And my personal multi-task favorite.. since the belt’s so stretchy, I like to strap it around the computer screens of the treadmill and bike at the gym. This gives me the perfect view for watching videos or even opening my calorie counter app and adding my meals while I workout.

The price? Currently $17 on Amazon. Check it out!

Welcome our 2nd guest-poster, Ellie, who describes herself as the “ultimate geek girl” and has a blog at thepinkc.net. Enjoy her app review! ~Renee

Android is a great platform for mobile phones – but bloatware is added to it by our phone companies to subsidize the cost of our phones. Unfortunately, there wasn’t anything we could do to stop these applications from starting at boot until Startup Auditor became available on the Market.

As its name indicates, Startup Auditor analyzes what apps start at your phone’s startup, and you can stop them from starting at boot or all together! This is incredibly useful if you’re a Sprint user (for example) and don’t use Moxier Mail but it is forever starting and running in the background, draining valuable battery life. It’s also useful for other applications, too – anything that starts automatically and you don’t want it starting automatically, like Instant Messenger programs or calendar services.

The only downfall of this $0.99 app is that all startup applications aren’t listed, but with a future release, things may improve on this front. Overall, I give this app 4 out of 5 stars.

Click on the text in the box below to download Startup Auditor to your phone or add to your list at AppBrain.com.

Startup Auditor works on Android 1.5 and above, and is $0.99. Test it and return it within 24 hours if you don’t like it or see its value!

Liz, a frequent traveler and fellow DROID-loving woman from Maryland, has written our blog’s first guest-post! Her article is the first in a series about utilizing your phone while traveling to make going out of town less hectic and more enjoyable. Keep an eye out for future posts in our WomanWithDroids Travel Series! ~Renee

1. Luggage…Check.
2. Plane Tickets…Check.
3. Apps…Wait, what?

Spring is coming soon and we cannot wait to escape the cabin fever of our homes, especially when they are snow targets (link/image by NASA). Before you go racing out the door, don’t forget your most important item to pack full of goodies – your Droid! Don’t know what to install? Keep reading!

The screenshot above is my folder of apps I’ve categorized for Travel (or, in my labeling system, GetThere). If you haven’t yet set up your first folder, check out CraftLass‘ and Renee’s posts on setup and tweaking. I’ll wait, pop right back over when you’re done.

Alright, do you have your empty folder ready to add some apps? Good! Here are my top five recommended apps to add to your Travel folder:

5. Alarm Clock (Free)

Why? I’ve run the gamut of “morning rise” utilities. Wakeup calls, alarms, buzzers, people beating on my door, you name it, I’ve “snoozed” it. I have never been a “one alert” person when it comes to waking up, I need multiple noises from multiple sources. My current travel configuration is to set a travel alarm on a night stand for 10 minutes before my target “get out of bed” time, request a wakeup call for five minutes before, and then set my last alarm on my Droid with the same noise/ringer as my important calls on a dresser or a piece of furniture that requires me to get out of bed to turn off. By the time the phone goes off, my eyes are usually already open, but it never hurts to be careful.

4. Droid Light (Free)

Why? When I travel, especially for business, I pack lightly. I try to avoid weighing myself down with stuff I know I won’t use and don’t need for a short trip. Unfortunately, this also means when I’m packing away a lot of small items (3oz. bottles, anyone?), some things will inevitably follow the draw of gravity down to the bottom of my backpack. Then I end up delaying 25 other people in a TSA security checkpoint as I dig frantically through my bag for the sneaky little tub of lip gloss or hand lotion that I am terrified will get me pegged for having naughty intentions. Thanks, but no thanks. This little gem is simple – it turns on the built-in flash for your Droid camera to act as a flashlight, and trust me, that thing packs a brightness punch. Touch the lightbulb graphic on the screen when you’re done rescuing your miscellany from the depths of your bag, the keys from under your rental car, or your favorite stuffed animal from under the bed. Just please don’t point your phone at anyone while you’re running this, the light can hurt your eyes a LOT. I also don’t recommend turning it around to see just how bright it is. You can live without this experience, I promise.

3. Google Maps (Free)

Why? The Google Maps application works the same as the Google Maps web site we know and love, complete with driving, public transit, and walking directions. Just punch in your starting and ending addresses, choose your method, and hit “Go.” If you have your Locator and GPS services turned on, you don’t even need the starting address! You can even choose to jump to Navigation mode (Beta), which acts as a GPS.*

*Note: I do not recommend, or advocate, operating your Droid in this fashion while driving. If you absolutely, completely, and utterly can not hand the Droid over to a passenger to set up (or you don’t have a passenger), pull your car over, switch to Car Home (located in the All Applications list), set everything up, and then begin following the directions. Safety first!

2. Tip Calc (Free)

Why? I love this app, mostly because it is simplicity itself to use. At the bottom is a number pad that you use to input the total for your tab, then use the “+” and “-” buttons bracketing the “Tip %” value to adjust until you hit the tip rate you’d like to select. You can use the same toggles bracketing the left-hand “People” value to choose the number of people in your party, and the app will display what an equal split amount is based on the total with tip that it calculates. Favorite part? Use the buttons in the middle – “Round Total,” “Exact,” or “Round Tip” – to even out your numbers based on your preference. Personally, I always go with the “Round Total” setting.

1. The Weather Channel (Free)

Why? I have been bounced all over the country recently – I still get giddy over the sheer oodles of Frequent Flyer miles I’ve racked up. As I’ve learned from recent experiences, the places I’m sent to can and do have extremely different weather conditions occurring at exactly the same time. There is a huge difference between seeing reports on the television as you’re curled up with a mug of tea, and having to pack for these unique and sometime harsh climates you’re about to be thrown into. The second I know my travel plans, I add the site address to the “My Places” section of The Weather Channel’s app (shown below) and switch to their 10 Day forecast. Adding it to my programmed “Places” means I can jump back and reference the weather at my destination at any time – this is particularly useful when you’re sitting, in limbo, in an airport trying to figure out how your flight got delayed two hours by the perfectly sunny weather beaming through the windows!

You may have noticed that all the apps referenced above are free. I’m not prejudiced against paid apps and there are some truly excellent ones out there. The apps I listed are the ones that I bounce back to, time and again, for great and small tasks, and are merely a small sampling of the flexibility the Droid provides when travelling. One app I didn’t mention above is the “911” app Renee mentions in her post on emergency-related apps. 911 is the “universal” emergency number in the United States per the NANP, and should always be accessible through your wireless device per FCC ruling in 2000. Also, I strongly urge you to read Renee’s post and set up something similar on your phone. I realize it may seem small or inconsequential, but any of the items she lists could end up being really helpful or possibly life-saving.

Have you found an app that you couldn’t live without while on travel? Please share in the comments!