The concept is simple:  It is an App recommendation engine that will notify you of a cool new apps available for the Google Android platform once a day.  I hope this will be a good way for people to discover cool new things they might not know about otherwise.  It is free, and I don’t take money for sponsored apps, or do any other marketing.

You can search for it in the market, or here is the QR code (if you don’t know what this is, simply start a barcode reader app on your phone, point it to this, and the rest will happen magically):

Here is a simple screen-shot, so you know what it looks like:

Droid Of The Day Sample Screen

I previously used a similair procedure to update my G1, with minimal risk, and success.

I have used these steps, and verified they work.

The process is quick an easy, just follow the directions.

1. Grab the update from Google: here.
2. Move the zip file to your sd card, and rename it: update.zip
3. Boot your device (holding down the trackball and power button at the same time)
4. Go to bootloader > recovery
5. When you see the image of the droid with triangle, press the power button and volume up
6. Select: Apply sdcard:update.zip
7. Wowza, your phone should be updating
8. Select Reboot
9. Wait patiently, and you will be rewarded with multi-touch goodness (and hopefully a better 3G radio).

If something goes wrong, simply restart the phone (the normal way – don’t do any of the special key presses) to restart your phone without the update.

Of course, if you are worried about this sort of thing, just wait for the OTA update to be pushed to you, which is less risky.

Ingredients

• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• 1 medium onion, diced
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 (15.5-ounce) can black beans, preferably low-sodium, drained and rinsed
• 1 tablespoon minced chipotle pepper in adobo
• 4 tablespoons lime juice
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1 tablespoon water
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 cups corn kernels (10-ounce box frozen corn)
• 1/4 cup chopped cilantro leaves
• 2 ripe avocados
• 4 medium tomatoes, seeded and diced (about 2 cups)
• 1/4 cup thinly sliced scallion
• 1 tablespoon finely diced jalapeno pepper, optional
• 3/4 cup shredded extra-sharp Cheddar

Directions

Heat the oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Add onions and cook until they soften, about 3 minutes. Stir in the garlic and cook for 2 minutes more.

Put half of the onion mixture into a food processor with the black beans, chipotle pepper, 2 tablespoons of the lime juice, cumin, water and salt. Puree until smooth. Set aside.

Add the corn to the skillet with the remaining onion mixture and cook for about 3 minutes. Remove from the heat and stir in the cilantro leaves.

In a small bowl mash the avocado with the remaining lime juice. In a medium bowl toss together the tomatoes, scallion and jalapeno, if using. Season tomato mixture with salt and pepper, to taste.

Spread the black bean dip into the bottom of an 8 by 8 glass baking or serving dish. Top with the corn mixture, spreading it out to form a single layer over the beans, repeat with the avocado, then the tomatoes. Top with cheese. Serve with baked chips.

Per Serving:

Calories 140; Total Fat 8 g; (Sat Fat 2 g, Mono Fat 3 g, Poly Fat 0.7 g) ; Protein 5g; Carb 16 g; Fiber 5g; Cholesterol 6mg; Sodium 245 mg

Preparation

Crust:
Position rack in center of oven; preheat to 350°F. Blend cookie crumbs and sugar in processor. Add melted butter; process until crumbs are evenly moistened. Press crumb mixture onto bottom and up sides (not rim) of 9-inch-diameter glass pie dish. Bake until crust begins to set and no longer looks moist, pressing gently with back of fork if crust puffs, about 12 minutes. Remove crust from oven, then sprinkle chopped chocolate over bottom of crust. Let stand until chocolate softens, 1 to 2 minutes. Using offset spatula or small rubber spatula, spread chocolate over bottom and up sides of crust to cover. Chill crust until chocolate sets, about 30 minutes.

Filling:
Whisk sugar, cocoa, cornstarch, and salt to blend in heavy medium saucepan. Gradually add 1/3 cup milk, whisking until smooth paste forms. Whisk in remaining milk, then 1/4 cup cream. Using flat-bottom wooden spoon or heatproof spatula, stir mixture constantly over medium heat, scraping bottom and sides of pan until pudding thickens and begins to bubble at edges, about 5 minutes. Add chocolate; stir until mixture is smooth. Remove from heat; stir in rum and vanilla. Pour hot pudding into crust and spread evenly. Cool 1 hour at room temperature. Cover with plastic wrap; chill overnight. DO AHEAD: Can be made 2 days ahead. Keep refrigerated.

Topping:
Using electric mixer, beat crème fraîche, whipping cream, sugar, and vanilla in medium bowl just until stiff peaks form and mixture is thick enough to spread (do not overbeat or mixture may curdle). Spread topping decoratively over top of pie, swirling to create peaks, if desired. DO AHEAD: Pie can be made 6 hours ahead. Cover with cake dome and refrigerate.

Sprinkle chocolate shavings decoratively atop pie, if desired. Cut pie into wedges and serve.

Here is a slice of the pie:

* Sold at some supermarkets and at specialty foods stores.

This recipe is from America’s Test Kitchen, and is wonderful.  It takes a bit of time to put together, but is very easy if you follow the directions (and is worth it!)

Serves 6 to 8.   Published January 1, 2010.   From Cook’s Illustrated.

Use a good-quality, medium-bodied wine, such as Côtes du Rhône or Pinot Noir, for this stew. Try to find beef that is well marbled with white veins of fat. Meat that is too lean will come out slightly dry. Four pounds of blade steaks, trimmed of gristle and silver skin, can be substituted for the chuck-eye roast. While the blade steak will yield slightly thinner pieces after trimming, it should still be cut into 11/2-inch pieces. Look for salt pork that is roughly 75 percent lean. The stew can be cooled, covered tightly, and refrigerated for up to 2 days. Reheat it gently before serving.

Ingredients

Instructions

1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and heat oven to 300 degrees. combine garlic and anchovies in small bowl; press with back of fork to form paste. Stir in tomato paste and set mixture aside.

2. Pat meat dry with paper towels. Do not season. Heat 1 tablespoon vegetable oil in large heavy-bottomed Dutch oven over high heat until just starting to smoke. Add half of beef and cook until well browned on all sides, about 8 minutes total, reducing heat if oil begins to smoke or fond begins to burn. Transfer beef to large plate. Repeat with remaining beef and 1 tablespoon vegetable oil, leaving second batch of meat in pot after browning.

3. Reduce heat to medium and return first batch of beef to pot. Add onion and carrots to Dutch oven and stir to combine with beef. Cook, scraping bottom of pan to loosen any browned bits, until onion is softened, 1 to 2 minutes. Add garlic mixture and cook, stirring constantly, until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add flour and cook, stirring constantly, until no dry flour remains, about 30 seconds.

4. Slowly add wine, scraping bottom of pan to loosen any browned bits. Increase heat to high and allow wine to simmer until thickened and slightly reduced, about 2 minutes. Stir in broth, bay leaves, thyme, and salt pork. Bring to simmer, cover, transfer to oven, and cook for 11/2 hours.

5. Remove pot from oven; remove and discard bay leaves and salt pork. Stir in potatoes, cover, return to oven, and cook until potatoes are almost tender, about 45 minutes.

6. Using large spoon, skim any excess fat from surface of stew. Stir in pearl onions; cook over medium heat until potatoes and onions are cooked through and meat offers little resistance when poked with fork (meat should not be falling apart), about 15 minutes. Meanwhile, sprinkle gelatin over water in small bowl and allow to soften for 5 minutes.

7. Increase heat to high, stir in softened gelatin mixture and peas; simmer until gelatin is fully dissolved and stew is thickened, about 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste; serve.

Ginger Molasses Cookies

Makes about 2 dozen cookies

Wet ingredients:
1 cups sugar
3/4 cups (1.5 sticks) unsalted butter
1/4 cup molasses
1 eggs

Dry ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 t. baking soda
1/4 to 1/2 t. salt
11/4 t. cinnamon
1/2 t. ginger
1/8 t. nutmeg

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees.
In large mixing bowl, beat sugar and butter until light and fluffy.  Add molasses and eggs; beat well.

Whisk dry ingredients in separate bowl to combine.  Add flour mixture to butter mixture in two batches. Mix well until incorporated.

Form dough into walnut-sized balls (or use a small cookie scooper) and arrange onto cookie sheets lined with parchment paper or silpat.

Bake at 350 for 8 to 10 minutes or until edges just begin to brown. Cool 1 minute; remove from cookie sheets. Cool on wire racks.

Ginger Molasses Cookies

Overall, I think it is a pretty good phone, well built, with some great software and hardware enhancements, but there are some limitations that made this phone less than perfect for me.

Pros

• Hardware design (durability, and appearance)
• Blur (UI enhancements, and integrated social features for the most part)
• Overall snappiness of phone
• Camera

Cons

• Phone Stability
• Blur (in particular the contacts integration)
• Keyboard
• No support for Android 1.6

Hardware improvements of the Cliq over the G1

• Both phones have identical screens, and processors (which the same configuration as the MyTouch and a variety of other phones too)
• More memory for applications
• 3.5mm headphone jack
• Light and proximity sensors
• Bigger battery (and better battery life)
• Higher Megapixel Camera

Hardware:

I think the hardware is great.  The industrial design of the phone is terrific – the phone looks great (especially the rounded corners, and titanium accents), is a great size, and feels solid.  Motorola has always built tank-like phones, and this one is no exception.  It is heavy, and feels comfortable in the hand.  The sliding mechanism for the keyboard has a great feel, and the buttons are comfortable (but I am not a fan of their soft-nature, I don’t personally like the feel or response of them).

Kudos on including a 3.5 mm jack, and including an array of dedicated buttons.  Especially good, is the hardware button to silence the phone (which should be mandatory on all cell phones).  I wish they used standard mini-USB as their charging port, instead they use micro.  Since we are talking about mandatory hardware requirements, I think all phone manufacturers should be required to use the same port, so all my devices can charge with the same cord!

The size of the phone is great.  It is comfortable in the hand, and fits in a shirt or pants pocket easily.  On first inspection, it looks to be thinner, and a little wider than the G1, but when I took pictures to compare them together, I realized that they are almost exactly the same size (which surprised me).   Here are the pictures comparing the 2 phones:

Cliq on top of the G1

Cliq Vs G1 from the side

The Camera

The camera on this phone works pretty good.  It focuses quickly, and manages to take pretty good pictures (in good to moderate light).   I do wish they included a hardware flash, for low light conditions. Overall, it is a huge improvement over the terrible camera on the G1.  Here is a picture taken with the G1, and one with the Cliq (with the exact same lighting and other conditions), for comparison (the quality difference between the 2 cameras is clear):

Picture taken with HTC G1

Picture Taken with the Motorola Cliq

The Keyboard

I am of the opinion that a smart phone requires a hard keyboard, so I was enthusiastic that Motorola included one on this phone.  The keys themselves are decent sized, and sufficiently rounded to be able type by feel.  I did find my fingers bumping against the screen at the top of the keyboard, and hitting the wrong keys a lot.

I really didn’t care for this keyboard.  It has a whole row fewer keys that the G1 (no numbers on the Cliq), and the keys were much closer together.  I was constantly mistyping on this keyboard.  I can’t put my finger on exactly why (pun not intended), but I just couldn’t type accurately on this keyboard.  I also was constantly hunting for the “Alt” key so I could use punctuation and other special characters (some of which have dedicated keys on the G1).  This keyboard is better than nothing, but really not great, which is disappointing.  Bottom line, I found myself requiring many more key presses to input the same text as would be required on the G1.

The 5 way rocker on the left of the keyboard is useless.  I never used it, and found it a complete waste of space.  Maybe if it was on the screen I might use it to navigate, but in its current configuration, it didn’t have much utility.

Cliq Keyboard

Moto Blur

Motorola built a custom interface on top of Android (version 1.5), with a variety of social networking, and other utilities built in.  Overall, I was impressed with some of the value add in the beginning, but over time, most of them just became annoying.  Plus, most of the features could be enabled with Apps (or are included in the Android 2.0 release, which most people will get eventually anyway).

I would like to say that the overall experience on the phone is great.  The phone is actually very snappy, and seems to work well (it feels faster than my G1, which may be my imagination, since both phones share the exact same specs).  Motorola has done a good job of creating some nice eye-candy for the interface.  They have changed quite a few of the standard UI elements (like the status bar pull down, transitions between apps and screens,  in call screen, icons and images for battery charging, etc) to make them a little more flashy.  This is welcome, as the original Android interface, while being functional, is not particularly visually appealing.   I do think the Blur experience is significantly different than the standard Android one.

Blur is intended to aggregate various social services (including Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, etc) and provide common interfaces to all of them.  They have built interfaces to these services right into the phone.  For instance, there is a “Happennings” app that aggregates status updates from all your various contacts into a single app (which you can then sort in a few ways).  They also place a widget directly on the desktop to display the most current update from Twitter.  Most importantly, they aggregate all your contacts from the various services directly into your main contact list.

It was extremely easy to set all this up.  I just gave my userids, and passwords for the various services, and Blur did the rest.  Luckily it didn’t really aggregate all the contacts (ie. actually insert my Facebook contacts into my Google contacts), but just provided a common view.  I had heard that the Palm Pre actually joined the various contact groups into one big one, which would be a huge mess (nobody wants all their Facebook contacts in their main phone book).

At first I liked the contact integration, but now I find it annoying.  Because there is so much information in the contacts application, I find it takes quite a few key presses to locate a person, and make a call.  Bottom line, having a phone that makes it difficult to make a call, is not a good thing.

Blur takes advantage of some of the additional sensors, which is great.  For instance using the proximity sensor, when you hold the phone up to your face, the touch screen goes dark (and inactive).  I didn’t find a way to automatically start Google Voice search when holding the phone to your face (like on the iPhone) – which would be another smart use of the proximity sensor.  I didn’t see any particularly important use of the light sensor, but maybe it was more subtle.

An important thing to note, is that Blur is written on top of Android 1.5.  This could have limitations when trying to run applications targeting 1.6 features (I have been running into a ton of problems with the ADP2 applications, which may be buggy applications, or limitations due to the version of Android- I honestly don’t know;  I also couldn’t install the new hack for Google Nav functionality which relied on 1.6 libraries – but in fairness, isn’t supported officially anyway).  Motorola has publicly stated that they don’t intend to update Blur to 1.6, but will be going directly to 2.0.  They currently have not announced when the 2.0 update will be available (although the phone itself will definitely be able to support an update).  I haven’t received an OTA update on the phone at all, which is surprising, since there are usually quite a few minor bug fixes pushed out in the first few weeks of a new release.

Blur Security Features

Blur includes some other nice features.  One of them is the ability to backup your phone, to an external server (and clone it, if you lose your phone, and want to duplicate your settings on your new phone).  I didn’t try this (but will at some point, and will update this site when I do).

Another is the ability to locate your phone remotely if it is lost or stolen (and wipe it remotely).  Again, these features are available through 3rd party apps on any Android phone, but they are certainly value add.  I tried this, and it did locate my phone reasonably well (it was using cell location, so I didn’t expect super good accuracy).  I didn’t try to wipe the phone remotely, but will try this at a convenient time, and update this post with my results.

Battery

It has been great on this phone.  I don’t always remember to turn the various sensors off (GPS, Wifi, etc), and this phone will give me a full day of heavy use.  That’s really all I need, as I plug it in every night.

Stability

The phone has not been reliable for me.  In fact, as I am typing this review (note: not doing anything on the phone, or even touching it) I noticed that it just rebooted itself (completely powered down, and came back to the original flash screen).  This phone has crashed on me 7 times in the past 3 weeks.  I am not sure if this is a problem with my particular phone, or symptomatic of these phones in general.  I have never had my G1 lockup, or crash in the previous 10 months that I have owned it.  I would guess that these sort of problems will be addressed with a software update, but as it stands now, this phone is not reliable.

Conclusion

If you are an early adopter, and thinking your G1 is looking a little long in the tooth, I would advise waiting for another phone to upgrade.  This phone is not a significant enough improvement to justify the upgrade.  I sincerely hoped this phone would be better, as I want to support Motorola (they are big time proponents of the Android platform, so their success will only be good for the platform in general).  As a first generation phone, it shows some great ideas, but falls a little short on implementation.

If you are a T-Mobile customer, and looking to get a new Android phone, this would be a great first device, it is snappy, has good hardware, and will allow you to get your feet wet with the  platform.

Update: Dec 23, 2009

BLUR Security Functionality

I did have a chance to test out the remote data wipe funtionality, and then the restore functionality.  Overall, I was impressed with the ease and effectiveness of it.

To wipe the phone, you log onto Motorola’s website, enter your Blur account info, and enter the selection to wipe your phone.  It prompts you with a few “are you sure messages”, then tells you it will wipe the phone, and that it could take up to an hour.  Very quickly (within 5 minutes), the phone rebooted (without me touching it), and when it came back up, it was wiped clean (it had a clean image on it, like when I first took it out of the box).  The website reflected that the wipe was successful, and at what time it was completed.  It worked really well, and would be a really useful thing if I ever lost my phone.

To recover, I entered my Blur and Google account info.  It maintained some of my other info (like Facebook, and Twitter), and reestablished my contacts, etc.  It didn’t however retain any of my installed apps.  Overall, I was reasonably happy with this, but would have like my apps recovered as well (there are apps in the market that will do this for you).

Bottom line, I was pretty impressed with how smoothly the security features in Blur worked, and think this is a value add.

Ingredients

Cooking Instructions

1. Heat the oil in a medium skillet over medium-high heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring, until softened, about 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic and jalapeño and cook for 1 minute.
2. Place the beans in a food processor. Add the onion mixture and the remaining ingredients and process until smooth.

• 1 pound ground beef, I used the leanest I can get
• 1 red onion, finely diced
• 1 red bell pepper, finely diced
• 2 carrots, finely diced (or 10 baby carrots)
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp oil
• 1 small can tomato paste
• 28 oz canned diced tomatoes
• 1 tbsp dried oregano
• 1 tbsp dried parsley (or dried basil, I was out)
• 1 tsp sweet paprika
• 2 tsp sugar
• salt and pepper
• 2 cups uncooked macaroni noodles
• Red pepper flakes (to taste)

1. First finely dice the onion, pepper, and carrots.
2. Cook the ground beef in a dutch oven, seasoning with salt and pepper. Drain fat and discard.
3. In the same durch oven, heat oil over medium heat and add butter.
4. Add the vegetables and garlic and stir to cook several minutes until soft.
5. Add the tomato paste and cook, stirring for a minute.
6. Add the un-drained diced tomatoes to the pan and the cooked ground beef.
7. Add the spices and turn down the heat to a simmer, cover the pan and cook for 30 min.
8. While sauce is cooking bring a large pot of salted water to a boil.
9. Cook macaroni until tender, reserve 1 cup of pasta water, drain.  Do not rinse.  If your sauce seems to be drying out at any point add in some of your reserved pasta water as needed.
10. Taste sauce and season with salt and pepper.
11. Combine with noodles. Toss to mix well and separate the noodles. Serve.

http://mswolfson.wordpress.com/2010/05/18/droid-of-the-day-available-now-in-android-market/

My list of indispensable apps:

I don’t remember all of the cool Android apps I have downloaded, but here is a rundown of the ones I find most useful. I intend to keep this post updated when I find cool new apps. If you know of an Android app, that is really cool, or that you can’t live without, please list it in the comments!

Linda – file manager
Google Voice (but only if you have a GV account – which I have invites) – look online for what this does, it basically allows you to control all your communication (works on Verizon too!);  Now allows you to use GV for all your voicemails – so you get transcription, and visual voice mail – this is a must have, even if you don’t use a GV number.
ACast – podcast aggregator (I am sticking with this over Google Listen, as it is more straightforward, and finds updated feeds quicker)
SavvyShoppper – comparison shop products by bar code
MissedCall – changes LED based on type of notification (SMS, VoiceMail); fully configurable (this doesn’t work on my Nexus One – I miss it)
Barcode Scanner – read all sorts of different barcodes (including 2D)
MyTracks – good for running or hiking; keeps track of distance traveled, speed, elevation gain etc; good for keeping track of workouts (From Google)
Scoreboard – for sports fans, gives you notifications of sports scores (From Google – doesn’t reliably give my updates on my N1 unfortunately)
USA Today – news
Facebook – they have an official app
Twidroid – my favorite Twitter App (but I don’t use Twitter that much, so I may not be the person to endorse this).  People like Seesmic too.
Shazam – identify any song by “listening” to it; tells you song information
Pandora – internet radio
Layar – augmented reality puts information on top of the map (or streetview) with tons of different information; This is just the beginning of this sort of app, this sort of functionality will be huge in the future
Locale – change phone settings based on location; kind of buggy but when it works, it is great.  When going to download this to my N1, they are now charging for this – $9.99, this is too expensive, as this app doesn’t work reliably.  I am willing to put up with bugginess on a cheap app, but not if I am paying for it.
3Banana – list manager (integrated with website to keep lists on phone and web)
TuneWiki – alternative Media player, with the coolest feature that is downloads lyrics, and displays them in sync with the music;  Also will link out to music video of songs if it knows of them – Ad Supported.
Dolphin Browser - alternative browser with some cool features.  I like the way it handles tabs, and it uses some great getures, to allow easier navigation.  Also includes multi-touch, for all phones, which is pretty cool.

Some apps I am playing with, but can’t endorse yet:

Pro Paint Camera – replacement for stock camera, with enhanced functionality (photo effects, advanced white balance, etc)
http://www.popcrowd.com

Geogad Tours – audio and video clips that create tours of specific locations.
Web site: http://www.geogad.com
Download link: http://market.android.com/search?q=pname:com.geogad

ShapeWriter – different on-screen keyboard that allows you to link words by holding down on keyboard to make work (with predictive text correction). http://www.shapewriter.com

Swype – another alternative keyboard.  Didn’t work great on my N1, kept giving me screen resolution errors.  But I liked the idea, thought it worked pretty well.  Here is a link to a site with a link to a beta copy of it.  Not sure if it will always be available.  http://www.androidcentral.com/download-beta-version-swype-android