Unique apps and widgets to give you the edge in the boardroom

June 7, 2010 6:00 am

Categories: Guides Extra Tags: Android, galaxy s, PP, Samsung

The Samsung Galaxy S knows how to have fun, but many of its built-in widgets and apps are perfect for helping you out at work, in meetings or at networking events. Who knows, maybe one day it’ll win you a promotion. Want to know how the Samsung Galaxy S is tooled-up for modern business? Read on.

It’s only a matter of time
It might seem simple, but one of the most important widgets you’ll ever choose for your mobile is a clock. It’s the widget you’ll look at most often, and tends to be the centrepiece of any Android user’s default home screen. The Samsung Galaxy S comes with three special clock widgets, all with an eye on kicking up your productivity a notch.

The simplest is the Dual Clock widget. It’s the one to pick if you frequently have to liaise with an office in a different time zone because it’s comprised of two independently customisable digital displays. Set a city for each and you’ll have a constant reminder of what time it is where your colleagues are. And it’ll help you to avoid starting conference calls five minutes before your co-workers head home.

The Calendar Clock is a more ambitious widget. It’s an analogue clock that syncs with your Samsung Galaxy S‘s calendar. Events are displayed as differently-coloured segments on the clock’s face, giving you an instant summary of the day, and showing you if there’s somewhere you need to be.

If you have a stock portfolio, the Y! Finance clock is a widget you shouldn’t be without. It displays the ups and downs of your stocks throughout the day on the face of an analogue clock. Adding new stocks is as simple as tapping on the clock and selecting them from the pop-up menu.

The day aheadl at your fingertips
If you can do without a large clock widget on your Samsung Galaxy S, there’s only one widget you should consider dropping into its place on the primary home screen – Daily Briefing. This brand new widget from Samsung collates feeds from Accuweather, Yahoo Finance and the Associated Press news service, as well as giving you notification of any upcoming calendar events. It’ll give you an instant heads-up on the day ahead, as well as any breaking news or financial updates.

Daily Briefing takes up a whole home screen, but the amount of information it puts at your fingertips makes it well worthwhile. The Accuweather and Yahoo Finance panels are customisable too, so there’s not a wasted pixel of home screen space.

Contacts in a jiffy

The built-in Buddies Now widget may sound frivolous, but it’s the fastest way to pull up contact information. It’s a window that you can stick on a home screen, and with a simple flick of the finger you’ll be able to switch between your favourited contacts, and you can call them right from the home screen too.

Office, on a phone

Want to take a peep at a spreadsheet, or dive inside a Word document on the go? With the Samsung Galaxy S on your side, there’s no need to lug a laptop everywhere. Samsung’s Android smartphone comes with ThinkFree Office pre-installed, which will view any Microsoft Office files stored on the phone’s internal memory or microSD card.

Minutes in minutes
It’s far too easy to forget what’s been said in meetings, especially if you’re the one tasked with writing up the minutes from notes scribbled down in a hurry. Never fear. The Samsung Galaxy S can become a trusty dictaphone with the tap of a button thanks to the built-in Voice Recorder app. With 16GB of built-in memory, you can record up to 10 days’ worth of MP3-quality sound. Even the most monumental of meetings don’t last that long.

Check out the Samsung Galaxy S in action…

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Unique apps and widgets to give you the edge in the boardroom

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