Make A ParchiMicrosoft is making some very slick apps for other platforms and you can see it in this little app for note taking. It’s free on Android and of course, Indians will be amused to see the use of the Hindi word for it.
To make a note in Parchi, you just press the note icon and start typing. You can add a photo, change the colour of the accents, mark the note as a favourite or pin it to the lock screen.
The beautiful interface of the app lets you choose a list or a regular note and pops up a calendar and clock for reminders. It all sounds like nothing new and it isn’t, until you have a look at the neatness of Parchi. The app competes with Google Keep, which right now has the advantage of being able to sync across Google’s services easily.
Reflexion GimmickOneplus, the Chinese company that makes the OnePlus phones, has come up with a surprise product — a little photo app. Get it on Android for free if you want to give your photographs a bit of a twist. The app has a grid in which it places your first photo — a selfie. It mirrors the image. And then you are prompted to take your next photo and it does the same. So you have four sections with two reflected images. You can zoom in and make it look more interesting as well. Reflexion is just a way of giving a selfie an artistic look but of course it can get boring if you use it too often. There are also other apps that do a lot more such as Fragment, which has a huge library of patterns to artistically distort your images with. All the same, Reflexion is a nice party trick to use sometimes.
Get Your NetflixIndians were thoroughly excited as, at the Consumer Electronics Show, Netflix was launched in India. All this time it was an American icon only available to those who knew how to use proxy servers. Now Netflix is available via an app on Android and iOS.
All you do is sign up with your name, email, etc., and your credit card. I haven't checked this out but I think a debit card won't work. You have a one-month trial period. The three paid plans are reasonably priced, starting at Rs 500 a month. The app is quite neat, showing you the line-up of films, TV shows and documentaries available. One problem however is that there isn't a whole lot of content, at least not yet, to choose from. Some very popular shows are there, such as Orange is the New Black, but the choice is limited.
(This story was published in BW | Businessworld Issue Dated 25-01-2016)
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Mala Bhargava has been writing on technology well before the advent of internet in Indians and before CDs made their way into computers. Mala writes on technology, social media, startups and fitness. A trained psychologist, she claims that her understanding of psychology helps her understand the human side of technology.
