You can play alone or in online tournaments. The company that makes this also makes an app that turns your iPhone into a TV remote control. More info at newpotatotech.com.

If you’re thinking of making money off an iPhone or iPad app, there are lots of things you may not have thought of. Most of them are in this book.  What’s great are the first person accounts from successful iPhone developers, such as Josh Williams, founder of Gowalla, a popular social networking site. The developers discuss all the decisions they went through, from what colors to use to problems when people with wide fingers didn’t know they’d tapped an icon because they didn’t see it react. The same decisions and problems discussed here would apply to making apps for the new Android phones, though the Android is not directly addressed.

• Da Vinci HD: Leonardo’s paintings fill your iPad screen in this 99 cent app. Looking at “The Last Supper,” we found it hard to believe we never noticed that there are 11 male disciples and a woman next to Jesus.
  

  

  You can save the paintings to your iPad photo collection, email them, or read about them.

• The Elements is a 1.8 gigabyte app, so we had to download it to our computer first. But it’s visually stunning. You get to see all the elements that make up our earth, in pictures, video and live data. The live data comes in from Wolfram Alpha’s mathematical search engine. Not cheap at $14, and we have a few criticisms.  The write-ups are jazzy but lacking substance. They rely on old information and leave out important characteristics like chemical valence, the ability to give up an electron or accept one. This of course is crucial information in determining what kinds of compounds the element can form. You can see the elements in 3D, if you buy $5 glasses.

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• Sudoku Soccer from Avanquest.There are free versions available but this one, for $2.99, has a World Cup theme. Fans cheer as you move the ball into a slot and give it a number. Choose your team and your rival from among 32 countries. You can cheat and take a time penalty. Also available for iPhones and Android phones for 99 cents.

Apple maintains an online apps store and getting into it is harder than it may seem at first. This is because Steve Jobs, the big Apple, has rules about good taste and usefulness. Despite this, the best-selling iPhone app recently was one that used the phone’s speaker to imitate people’s release of gas after digesting certain foods. More than 100,000 copies were sold in the first two weeks.

– “Using Mac Os X, Snow Leopard,” by Yvonne Johnson; $23 from quepublishing.com.

This book made us want to go out and buy a Mac. Step by step, it takes you through all the things you can do. Joy was struck by the photo greeting cards, comics, audio recordings and website tools. The author has 60 books under her belt and the experience shows: every step is easy to follow. The book plus website tutorials is $23 or you can get the digital version and tutorials for $16.

– “iPhone and iPad  Apps Marketing: Secrets to Selling Your iPhone and iPad Apps,” by Jeffrey Hughes; $25 from quepublishing.com.

This is a beautifully put together book on step by step marketing for iPhone and iPad apps. It’s interesting that we have never been disappointed by books from Que. Somewhere up there they must have a great editor, or a very good set of rules.

– “iPhone App Development, the Missing Manual,” by Craig Hockenberry; $40 from missingmanuals.com. Covers all the steps for creating and marketing, including advice on how to get your new app into Apple’s app store.

• Roambi Visualizer is a free iPhone and iPad app that makes charts from the data you give it. The data can come from programs like Excel, Salesforce, Google Docs, etc.  The Visualizer analyzes the data for impromptu presentations.
• Web Ex is well known for its desktop conferencing service. But it’s also an iPad and iPhone app.  It allows group calls with screen sharing. It’s free to join a meeting, but to host one, you need a subscription. There’s a free 14 day trial.
• Air Sharing: This $10 app for iPhone or iPad lets you send the contents of your computer to your iPad or iPhone wirelessly.  View and share PDFs, Word documents, etc., and open email attachments that you otherwise couldn’t. Before buying you may want to try out the free SugarSync or DropBox.

• Like the Sprint EVO 4G, it has a front and rear-facing camera, for video chatting.  This is called “Face Time.”
• It’s the thinnest cell phone on the planet, though frankly, we don’t mind a little thicker. (It’s .37 of an inch, compared to half an inch for the EVO 4G.)
• It doesn’t use the super-fast 4G cellular connection, which is why there’s no “G” in the name.
• The phone costs $200 if you have a contract ending in 2010 or you’re a new customer. Other wise, the base price is $300.
• The battery: Video playback lasts 10 hours, talk time 7 hours in “3G’ mode and 14 hours in “2G.”
• The screen display is incredibly sharp –four times the pixel count of previous iPhones.
• The camera is five megapixel, compared to three for the iPhone 3.
• AT&T is still the carrier.
• According to Gizmodo, it lacks the support for the cloud (think Google Docs) that Android phones have.

We’ll call you back when we get more information.

IcePics stands for “in case of emergency pictures.” It’s an iPhone application that lets you tap an icon on the screen to take a picture that is then emailed to your phone contacts in a few seconds. A Google map goes along with the photo, telling the recipients when and where the picture was taken.

This could be a real nuisance to everyone you know if misused, but the main point is defensive:  If you are attacked or in an unfamiliar place where you feel threatened, this provides a nearly instant record of your situation. If you are in an accident or injured and unable to get yourself out, the application will show people your surroundings, and in this case the even more important information of where you are.

The creator of the application suggests telling any attacker what has just been done when you take their picture. Because from that moment forward, their face, time and place are on record and there’s nothing they can do about it; smashing the iPhone will not remove the picture or reverse the process.

The maker of the application suggests that it can also be used to send yourself photos with a push of the on-screen button. It normally takes several steps to send yourself a picture you want to keep and be sure it gets there.

The IcePics application is $3 from icepics.com or the iTunes store. (Note: It is almost certain that this or a similar application will soon be available for other smart phones.)

Instead, we bought the $39 case that everybody says is a must, because it folds up to make a little stand. But it gets dirty easily and dust tends to collect in the corners of the screen. Too much dust can damage the machine. It’s a pain to take in and out of the case. This problem might be solved if you use screen protectors.

We tried the $35 iPad sleeve from Colcasac.com. We really like the way it looks. The makers say it’s partly meant to disguise the fact that you’re carrying an iPad. (There was a news story about a guy who lost his finger when a thief tore an iPad out of it.) The only downside of this bag is that it has no handle. We’re thinking of adding our own handle, by sewing on  a couple of strips of fabric. It’s a cuddly pad, all furry inside, with a nice pocket on the outside for your power adapter, DVDs or flash drives. Colcasa also makes sleeves for Macs, iPhones and Kindles. Comes in solid colors and patterns.

It’s called Phone Data Manager,� and it requires you to sign up for Windows Live, another free service. To find it, type Microsoft Phone Data Manager� into the search box at Google.com.

Another way to go is CyberSynchs, a $3 application for the iPhone or Blackberry. It backs up even more applications, including ring tones, text messages, GPS, calendar notes, etc. More info at cybersynchs.com.

To keep from losing your phone, take a look at zomm.com and phonehalo.com. They offer $50-$80  keychain devices that beeps or plays a tune when you’re 30 feet from your phone.