uTorrent Remote: Control torrent remotely

uTorrent is a pretty popular BitTorrent client for computers. With the remote app, you can control the activity of your file sharing on the move. You can check progress of your current downloads, stop or resume them. You can even add new downloads remotely. This is ease the pain of accessing target machine again and again.

What is uTorrent Remote?

According to uTorrent.com, “μTorrent (uTorrent) Remote is a remote control that lets you access μTorrent running on your home computer– from anywhere on the internet, including most mobile phones and tablets.”

screenshot-2screenshot-1

So how it is done?

First of all, you need to open Preferences in uTorrent on target machine, click on ‘Remote‘, and enable remote access by checking “Enable uTorrent Remote Access”. Give your computer a name and associated password and you’re ready to go. Now put these credentials in uTorrent Remote app to start using in Real Time!

preferences-utorrent-remote

Unfortunately, there isn’t an app for iOS but they have a mobile-friendly website which can let iPhone and iPad users have the same functionality as the apps for other platforms. You can even create a shortcut on your home screen by opening the page in Safari and clicking the “Add to home screen” button in the Share menu. Link for remote uTorrent can be found here: https://remote.utorrent.com.

The uTorrent Remote interface is very user friendly and how it works will be clear to anyone who uses uTorrent. It’s not quite as polished as the desktop apps, but it is almost as complete, letting you do pretty much anything you can do on your computer. Just remember that to use it, your computer needs to be on and uTorrent needs to be running.

Price: Free

Platforms: Android, Windows

Play Store link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.utorrent.web&hl=en

Android: Easiest way to type in Hindi with Google

Google-hindi-input-title

Have you ever wanted to send a text message to someone in Hindi but was unable because your cell phone didn’t comes with a Hindi layout keyboard, and suppose even if it comes with it then it will surely consume a lot of time and effort to write a single paragraph.

Google recently introduced his new app Google Hindi Input which let users to type in Hinglish(Hindi in English alphabets) and it will convert it to Hindi for you. If you have an Android smartphone or tablet, Google Hindi Input is the quickest and easiest way to compose emails, send messages and post on social networks using Devanagari script. There are alternatives also available on Google Play enabling typing in Hindi and other Indian Languages : PaniniKeypad and Lipikaar are two such apps. But we will focus on Google Hindi Input first.

Google Hindi Input has two methods for writing Hindi text. In transliteration mode, you simply type a Hindi word in English (like namaste), and the app will automatically convert the word to Devanagari script (नमस्ते). And you can get suggested words in Hindi language when you type some letters only. This will save your time and no need to type full Hindi words. Switching between English to Translator to Full Devnagari Keyboard is super smooth and just a button away.

device-2013-04-22-103148 device-2013-04-22-103632device-2013-04-22-103824

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hitting the globe button switches to a full Devanagari script keyboard, with Hindi consonants ordered alphabetically on two pages. In this mode, you can long press at any time to select various forms of a consonant.

How to enable keyboard Input method?

Open Settings -> Language & Input, under “KEYBOARD & INPUT METHODS” section, check Google Hindi Input, then click Default and select “Hindi transliteration/Google Hindi Input” in the “Choose input method” dialog.

Don’t forget that it will not going to support if your android device does not have Hindi fonts installed. If so then you have to install it first but most of the Indian manufactured devices are pre-installed with it.

Bad Sides:

  • No voice or handwriting input: The keyboard gives no option to help the user input text using voice or handwriting.
  • No Gesture Support: There are plenty of android keyboards now who have started gestures a major thing to emphasize on and let user feel comfortable but Google Hindi input still needs to work on it.

 

Real time prediction while typing with devnagiri keyboard

Real time prediction while typing with devanagiri keyboard

Over all, Google Hindi Input offers an excellent option to those who would wish to use Hindi text while communicating through their Android devices. It’s simple and intuitive and makes typing in Hindi very easy.

Play Store Link : Google Hindi Input

Android : The best music player out there

This music player unlocks a whole new world for mobile audiophiles, including a 10 band equalizer, greatly expanded file support, and a somewhat customizable interface. Ever since Gingerbread days till now, Poweramp continues to be the most powerful music player for Android and has a huge fan following.

What works well on Poweramp

The interface is somewhat similar to the stock music app, but it unlocks several new features for advanced playback that should meet just about any need you might have on your phone or tablet. For example, instead of just using a long, nested set of commands, you can give quick commands like swiping to navigate playlists quickly.

Title Screen

Oh how wonderful the file support is. While listening to FLAC files on your mobile device is a little silly when you think about it (as most phones don’t have a good digital to analog converter chip), being able to equalize your music while listening on the go is fantastic if your music tastes vary. If you have great headphones to match, this is a fantastic way to bring out the best in your music when you’re on the go. As another plus, this app doesn’t seem to chew through as much battery as other music players do.

lockscreen

Lock Screen

Interface and Features

Once installed, you’re presented with a clean and easy to use interface. The UI is extremely novice-friendly giving you oversized media . Your music can be sorted according to the usual artist, album categories or you can choose folder view, which shows you all your music the way you have copied it on your phone. Tapping on this takes you to the playlist from where you can switch folders. The album art area also houses the shuffle and repeat toggle buttons along with a five star rating system.

Library

What makes Poweramp one of the most sought after music player is the long list of audio formats supported. The list includes mp3, mp4/m4a (including alac), ogg, wma, flac, wav, ape, wv, tta, mpc, aiff, which covers pretty much every format you can find audio in these days. The ability to customise the sound is also very extensive. We start off with a 10-band graphic equaliser that can be used to fine tune your music depending on what genre of songs you listen to the most. There are plenty of presets as well and you can also use the sound enhancements (like Dolby or HTC FX) that come with some phones in Poweramp. Besides that, you also have the option to adjust the bass and treble separately along with a volume limiter. You can also add extra effects like Stereo eXpansion, mono mixing and adjust the balance. Every change you make is noticeable provided you have a good pair of headphones. Other features include support for crossfading, gapless playback, queuing system, ability to update missing album art and even download lyrics of the song through the musiXmatch plugin.

Pros & Cons:

Pros

  • One of the best fully featured Android music players
  • Features equalizer for custom or premade presets
  • Super slick user interface with themes

Cons

  • Cannot play Podcasts

Performance

With the right pair of headphones, the audio quality is really good and beats any other player in the market. The equaliser and or audio effects make a huge impact on the audio quality and you can actually make out the difference between mp3 and flac files. One neat feature is the ability to parse .cue and m3u files. If you download radio shows, especially trance music, you’ll often come across one single file that’s an hour long. Cue and m3u files help breakdown this singular file into individual tracks so you can skip to the one you want without having to split the track physically. Gapless playback support is also present for albums that feature it.

EqualizerYou also get plenty of widgets for your homescreen to choose from, including a very nice lockscreen widget. You can customise the amount of information to be displayed on the lockscreen widget too, from album art to equaliser controls. Poweramp also gives you the option to change the theme. You get a bunch of them by default and you can even install third party themes from the Play Store. One feature that we feel should be added is a social component. Apps like MixZing allow you to play your music from your library as well as search for trending tracks around the globe. You can even see what your friends are listening to at the moment and rate songs so your friends can find them.

 

Verdict : Worth the download?

If you want to milk a better audio experience out of your mobile device and don’t want to carry around all sorts of unnecessary clutter like external amps in your pocket, this app is a good way to start consolidating your devices into one unit. Poweramp is available for as little as Rs129 for the full version, which makes it extremely good value. The app is compatible with Android v2.1 and upwards and is constantly being updated with bug fixes and support for the latest version of Android. If you have an Android phone and want to experiment with its audio, Poweramp is the most popular audio app in the Play Store for a reason and we strongly suggest you ditch the stock player for Poweramp.

Get it on Play Store

Control your pointer with WiFi Mouse App

No need to use your old tech mouse in this era where Android/iOS is making its mark of gadgets. Transform your phone/tablet into a wireless mouse, keyboard and trackpad using WiFi Mouse. WiFi Mouse supports speech-to-text as well as multi-finger trackpad gestures. WiFi Mouse enables you to control your PC, MAC or HTPC effortlessly through a local network connection.

XDA Senior Member Williams Joe offers up computer control app. In the above video XDA Developer TV Producer TK reviews Wi-Fi Mouse. TK shows off the application and gives us his thoughts, so check out this app review.

Features:
* Mouse curser movement
* left and right click support
* Middle mouse button scroll
* Remote keyboard input
* PC/Mac hot keys and combination key
* Speech-to-text input for all languages
* Mouse & keyboard full screen
* Auto-connect on application startup
* Compatible with XP/Windows Vista/Windows 7/Windows 8/Mac OSX.

Gestures:
* Tap-to-click
* Two finger tap for right click
* Two finger scroll
* Pinch to zoom
* Three finger drag & drop or highlight
* Four finger swipe down to show desktop
* Four finger swipe up to maximise current window
* Four finger swipe sideways to change current window focus
* Left handed mouse support (swap left and right mouse click)

How It Works

For an app this advanced it’s fairly easy to set up, all you’ve got to do is install the app from the Play Store and then install the Server software. I can’t speak for Mac Users but the installation on Windows was pain-free and more importantly – safe and unobtrusive.

After that all you have to do is open up the app on your phone and then either click auto-connect and wait for the magic to happen. I manually entered the IP address because I really don’t trust Windows and networking but in testing both worked fine.

Conclusion

To control a PC off in the distance or just use touch for a change through your smartphone is brilliant. Its execution is good as well, a solid application that serves it’s purpose almost flawlessly. These apps were all the rage some years ago and whilst you could say this app is trying to revive a trend I’d disagree because the app changes the rules and gives you an experience that touchpad manufacturers have struggled to deliver in laptops for years – through your smartphone.

Get the app from Play Store.