Flickr on my photo frame Part 3

The long running saga of getting my Flickr photos on my photo frame finally leads to a result.

As I predicted in ‘Flickr on my photo frame Part 2’ the Google Nexus 7 tablet has proved to be a stunner and all for £159.

So I didn’t need to buy another photo frame or subscribe to another service to replace the defunct framechannel.com I now have a superb screen on which to display my photos – when it’s not in use as my news reader and video player.

I also predicted there would be an Android photo app that I could use to to slideshow a selection of my Flickr photos. Well there is. I am now using FlickFolio. It allows me to select by collection, set, tag, gallery, favourites, groups, contacts and bingo its sits there pretending to be a photo frame.

 

All I need now is a upright stand that also acts as my Nexus 7 protective cover when moving it around. There is an ideal one available from Amazon the G-HUB PropUp case

 

 

In addition to all this convenient functionality it turns out that the authors of FlickFolio, Snapwood Apps, also have apps for Facebook photos, Picasa, Photobucket, SkyDrive and others – bargain.

DLNA

Furthermore with the correct app loaded the Nexus 7 will be DLNA compatible.  I will then be able to show photos off my network and/ or ‘throw’ photos at my TV for big screen viewing.  I have been using Bubble UPnP on my Android mobile so will experiment with it on my Nexus 7 for a while.

Note: There always seem to be some issues with DLNA so it’s a case of trying several apps to see which one best suits the devices on your LAN and the formats of the media you want to share (throw around).

Related items

Flickr on my photo frame 2

My Flickr photos on my WiFi photo frame

My Location Aware Mobile Phone 2

Create once and make it available everywhere

I have been experimenting with a few applications that can capture my location on my mobile phone and share this with my social networks.  I was hoping to achieve a couple of ideals.

My first ideal is for the application to automatically pick up my location using the embedded GPS.  Then for it to create a Twitter post that includes my status and a link to a map which shows my location. The twitter post would then be fed into my social networks, Facebook, LinkedIn, ecademy, Plaxo and FriendFeed. This way I don’t have to persuade my friends to use the same location based software to know where I am.

The other lofty ideal was to be able to use any application that could update and read my location in FireEagle so that it didn’t matter which location based application I was using or my friends were using so long as it could work with FireEagle. In which case they would all update each other.

The overriding principle has been to create once and make it available everywhere or put more simply to manage content in one place and yet have it fed to all applications. I have been attempting this with all my content creation applications such as Flickr and Delicious (see my blog post Joining up my web spaces).

Neither ideal has been totally successful although I think I have achieved a workable compromise.

The applications I have been trialling are Loki, Ipoki, Rummble and BrightKite. Each has its advantages and disadvantages,  which I go through at the end of this post.

Each of the applications works with FireEagle but I have been struggling with getting each application to read a location in FireEagle that has been created by another. 

Only BrightKite will create a Twitter post with my status and a link to a map with my location. In fact I could probably survive on BrightKite alone. The only downside is that it has no means of automatically determining my location on my mobile.

So I have configured a compromise using EagleFeed and TwitterFeed. My location from FireEagle is read by EagleFeed which then creates an RSS feed that Twitterfeed picks up and posts into my Twitter.

This is how it looks

Comparing the four mobile location applications.

Each of these applications will work with FireEagle except that Loki cannot read your location from FireEagle.

With each of these applications you can determine the location of your friends and who is near you.

Loki

Location: Loki uses Wi-Fi to determine your location both on the PC and on the mobile. If you are not in the vicinity of a Wi-Fi hotspot then you have to manually enter the location. You have to download a mini app for the mobile to use the Wi-Fi.

Twitter Post: It won’t create a Twitter post. 

 Other: Loki also has a facebook add-in. You can use Loki to find nearby facilities.

BrightKite

Location: BrightKite uses Loki (on IE) or Geode (FireFox) to determine your location but only on the PC not on the mobile.

Twitter Post: It does create a Twitter post with your status and a link to a map of your location.

Other:  BrightKite has a facebook add-in. It will also find nearby businesses.

Rummble

Location: Rummble use Google Gears to determine my location I think it uses Gears to access my GPS or Wi-Fi from within the browser. There is no need to download a mobile app.

Twitter Post: It will create a Twitter post but not with a link to a map of my location.

Other: You can also use Rummble to rate various eateries and see what rates others have given and you can post an itinerary of a future journey. You can also create a blog of your journey.

Ipoki

Location: Ipoki uses the embedded GPS to produce a real time stream of your location, which is great if you want your friends to follow your cycle or walking route or car journey. You need to download a mini app to use the real time location facility.

Twitter Post: It doesn’t create a Twitter post.

Other: Ipoki has a facebook add-in

Verdict

I will probably stick with Rummble as I love the way it picks up my location and I am normally Tweeting from a local hostelry.  However most of my friends use BrightKite so if I want see which of them is near me I will have to use BrightKite.  Now if BrightKite were able to determine my location using Google Gears on my mobile then……

My mobile

My mobile  is a Vodafone v1615 aka HTC TyTn II aka HTC Kaiser which is a GPS enabled 3G phone with Wi-Fi The other networks have their own label version of the HTC TyTN II.  And no I don’t use an iPhone.

Links

see this excellent primer on location determination on TechCrunch

the first edition of My Location Aware Mobile Phone