Posts archived in Gadgets
Want a cool new way to stay in touch with your favorite creative communications agency when you’re on the go? There’s an app for that.
We are proud to announce the release of the Signal mobile application for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad, now available as a free download from Apple’s App Store.
Download it now!
The app gives you the latest news updates from the Signal blog, plus contact information and driving directions for our locations in Raleigh, Wilmington and Nashville. You can browse a mini portfolio of our design work and watch videos we’ve produced. Meet the Signal team in our staff bios and in fun photo galleries from special events and creative challenges.
The Signal app marks the first finished product resulting from our extensive study and research into the mobile application market. We have plans in the works to release versions of the Signal app for the BlackBerry and Android platforms, and we will soon be debuting nifty mobile apps created for our clients.
Mobile is the most popular and most rapidly adopted technology in the world with an estimated 4.6 billion subscribers, about 70% of the world’s population. And with smartphone sales accelerating rapidly, mobile devices are on their way to becoming the #1 means of accessing the Internet. In this new landscape, mobile apps will change from novelties to necessities. Ask us how Signal can help you stay ahead of the curve by developing your own mobile app.
Ever wished there was an easier way to edit photos on your computer? We recently discovered a free online image editing tool that’s perfect for businesses that don’t want to invest in Adobe Photoshop, but have the occasional need to prepare images for their blog or Facebook page. It’s called Pixlr Editor, and it’s similar to Photoshop and other well-known software, but it’s very intuitive and it’s free!
Pixlr allows you to easily crop, resize, filter and adjust your images. You can even create new images from scratch and layer one image over another. The novelty of this tool comes from the fact that all editing functions are performed directly from your browser on an easy-to-use interface, with no purchase, no registration and no installation necessary. Once you’re done editing, you simply download your image and save it to your computer.
While Pixlr is not meant to replace professional applications like Photoshop, it is definitely an easy solution for handling quick image edits or fixes with a polished look and feel. And oh, did we mention… it’s free!
Give it try: http://www.pixlr.com/editor/
Google has a new website translator gadget that makes it quick and easy to make your site’s content available in 51 different languages. It’s easy to implement – just copy and paste a few lines of code into your webpage. After that, if the language specified in your visitors’ browser settings is different from the language of your page a translation banner will appear prompting your visitor to translate the page.
After clicking the Translate button, visitors see the translations directly on the page.
This can be a great addition to pretty much any site, but particularly useful for site owners who know they have potential with international audiences and may not have the budget to pay professional (human) translators to do a thorough job. Keep in mind Google states that “Automatic translation is convenient and helps people get a quick gist of the page. However, its not a perfect substitute for the art of professional translation.”
If you’re worried Google’s “gist” may do more harm than help, test it! The gadget is powered by Google Translate – test your content here and get an opinion on the quality of the translation. You can also use the Google Translator Toolkit to edit weak areas in the translation of your web pages and set that version as a preferred, global translation.
Site owners should also keep in mind that although this gadget will help make their content more accessible, it will not help them increase visibility in international search engines. And the gadget can’t translate everything. If you’re using elements like text in images or Flash, it’s important to note they will remain in their original language.
On a related note, another new offering from Google Translate is 1-click translations from your browser’s toolbar! Just drag and drop your language from this page (scroll to the bottom) into your browser’s toolbar. Then whenever you want to translate a webpage, just click the new button on your toolbar.