Augmented Reality based applications are fast showing up with mobiles getting equipped with Accelerometers, Digital Compass and GPS.

The iPhone 3GS has a inbuilt Digital Compass which led to such apps showing up in the App Store these days.

Layar is a new AR based App which uses GPS location and internet data to layer information on the screen over live footage.

The major plus of Layer is that its not just limited to a certain category. Layer can be used to in conjunction with Wikipedia entries, bars and nightlife nearby, Twitter users nearby, nearby Hotels or more specific like which Hotel offers Pizzas, etc. just by pointing  the camera at your surroundings.

AR is fast catching up with people and its been looked upon as a really useful app rather than just a cool showoff app.

Get the Layar App from iTunes : iTunes Store Link

NBA Live is the an upcoming offering in the Sports Game genre by Electronic Arts for the iPhone. EA released a few screenshots to showcase its graphics and gameplay. And let me say that these are one of the best graphics I’ve ever seen on the iPhone.

According to EA, the game will deliver the “most realistic 5-on-5 action” for the iPhone.

Features include:

• Real NBA rosters
• 30 NBA teams
• 82-game Season mode, Exhibition mode, Playoff mode
• Virtual analog stick to control the game.
• 15 music tracks from artists such as Matt and Kim, Snoop Dogg and Xzibit.
• Announcer Marv Albert

The default Messages Application in the iPhone is pretty good but theres no way of knowing whether you’ve reached the Word limit for 1 SMS.

To effectively manage this problem, there’s a small hack available that adds a Word count to the Default Messages.App (SMS App).

After installation you can see how many characters you’ve typed and how many messages you’ll send when you press the send button. The Blue Send button will turn into and display the Character/SMS count and turn back into Send once you stop typing!

To use this feature, your iPhone needs to be Jailbroken !

To install, simple open Cydia, go to Search and Search for “SMS Helper“.

The iPhone has opened up limitless possibilities and ideas for Developers. The things which you could do with the iPhone are countless!

Here’s a concept I came upon by Ocean Observations which proposes a new way of using the iPhones Home Screen for navigation.

Their concept of the modified Springboard utilizes the Coverflow Mode for browsing of Apps within Springboard.

To better understand check out this video of their Concept :

There’s really no limit to what developers can come up with these days for the iPhone. Just when you though that there’s an App for every possible category and task, comes this App which doesn’t fail to amaze you!

Viper SmartStart from Directed Electronics is an iPhone-compatible remote starter capable of warming up or cooling down a car.

SmartStart can be used to remotely lock or unlock the doors, pop the trunk or even sound the car alarm !

“Our customers have consistently told us that the two most important features in a remote starter are range and user interface,” Directed Electronics president Kevin Duffy said in a statement. “We developed the Viper SmartStart in response. Range is virtually unlimited, and iPhone owners can use the elegant touch-screen interface they already carry in their pocket.”

The SmartStart can be installed to your car for $499 or made compatible with an existing started for $299.

Visit their Official Site Click Here

The iPhone and iPod Touch have most of the features any Music device should have. But many people missed an FM Radio. Well there seems to be some good news for FM lovers.

Apple was always reluctant to include a FM Radio in their iPod lineup but with the inclusion of  FM Radio in their latest iPod Nanos opened up hopes for inclusion of FM in other Apple devices too.

The current iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch 3G have a FM Receiver Module, just that theres no software to make use of it.

Apparently Apple is waiting for the integration of Apple Music Store and FM App so that users can buy the Song which they like while listening to FM.

This is not the first time that Apple has decided to keep a feature locked, Apple had previously kept some features hidden initially like the iPod 2Gs Bluetooth. It was 10 months later that Apple decided to make use of the Bluetooth feature.

As to how long will it take for the Official Radio.app to launch is best known by Apple itself. We all can just cross our fingers and wait for the Best!

iPhone has been the only device where you can get almost any application you want. Pick a task and you have an App for that!

The iPhone also had its share of Image Editing applications but none provided much detailed editing of Images.

Adobe the company behind the most widely used PC/Mac based Professional Photo Editing software – Photoshop has now made available a free to use Mobile based version of Photoshop!

Users can create a free account on Photoshop.com to get started with the Mobile App. The Photoshop.com account is linked to the Application and allow you to store edited Photos online. Users get 2Gb of free space to store photos.

The Photoshop Application provides about 9 different effects ranging from the basic Crop, Rotate and Flip stepping up to more advanced effects like Color settings, Filters, Soft Focus, Vibrant, Pop, Warm Vintage, Vignette Blur, Rainbow, White Glow, Soft Black and White.

Get the Free Photoshop Application on the iTunes Store.

Official Photoshop Mobile Site : mobile.photoshop.com

The Pwnage Tool to Unlock iPhone OS 3.1 for the 2G and 3G has just been launched by the Dev team. But that is MAC only at the moment. But sizlopedia.com has provided links to a Custom Firmware Created with Pwnage which you can directly install using iTunes.

iPhone 3G Owners Download these Files and Update/Restore using iTunes to get a 3.1 Unlocked iPhone :

http://rapidshare.com/files/28094968…ated.part1.rar
http://rapidshare.com/files/28095172…ated.part2.rar

After you restore your iPhone 3G to the above Firmware, you’ll need to Unlock it using Ultrasn0w.

To install Ultrasn0w follow :

1. Open Cydia > Manage > Sources.
2. Click Edit and then, Add on the top left.
3. Type repo666.ultrasn0w.com
4. After refresh, go to Search and Search for Ultrasn0w (Zero w) and install it.

iPhone 2G Owners Download these Files and Update/Restore using iTunes to get a 3.1 Unlocked iPhone :

http://rapidshare.com/files/280917147/_2G__iPhone1_1_3.1_7C144_Custom_Restore_768mb_Activated_Unlocked.part1.rar

http://rapidshare.com/files/280919877/_2G__iPhone1_1_3.1_7C144_Custom_Restore_768mb_Activated_Unlocked.part2.rar

Thats it. Just restore your Firmware to the above downloaded custom firmware 3.1 and you’ll have an Unlocked and Jailbroken 3.1 iPhone 2G.

All those Harry Potter fans  out there have yet another Harry Potter related thing to play around with. There’s a free Application by Warner Bro’s to promote its upcoming feature film Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. And best of all- its FREE !

But here’s the down side, as its Free, don’t expect any great 3D Graphics or anything even remotely close to what you see on its PC/Console Game adaption. This is like just an interactive trailer of the Movie. Read the official application description below :

Explore the world of Harry Potter with this exciting new iPhone app for Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince!
View official film content including Videos, Posters, Character Information, and More…

Now you can interact with an engaging recreation of Dumbledore’s Pensieve- a device that allows you to view memories. You will unlock new Memory Vials as you explore the vast assortment of contect that appears in the Pensieve.

Insert yourself and your friends into a Wanted Poster or the Daily Prophet by using your iPhone Camera or your Photo Album on your iPod Touch.

Key Features:

· Explore official film content*
· Unlock new content in the Memory Vial navigation system
· Interact with the Pensieve’s 3D water effects
· Insert moving footage into a Wanted Poster or the Daily Prophet
· Save theatrical posters and images to use as your wallpaper

Download it from : iTunes Link

Push Notifications was a major feature of the 3.0 Firmware. However Push was not working at all for those whose device was Hacktivated (unofficially activated through jailbreak). Along with Push, Youtube too was not working.

The Devteam has just launched a small fix for both of these problems. Note that this Fix is still in a premature level and hence not user friendly.

Follow these steps exactly to Enable Push Notifications and Youtube on your Hacktivated 2G/3G :

1. Download and Extract this Archive to a folder on your Desktop : PushFix.zip

2. Copy the following files via SSH to /private/var/Keychains and set permissions of inject and nimble to 755 (using WinSCP > Right Click on File > Properties).

youtube-cert.bin
youtube-key.bin
push-cert.bin
push-key.bin
inject
nimble

3. Backup(copy) the keychain-2.db file from your iPhone to your PC/Mac. After that Delete it from your iPhone.

4. For further steps you’ll need Mobile Terminal on your iPhone. To download it, open Cydia > Search > type in “Terminal” and download it.

5. Once your have Mobile Terminal installed. Perform the follow set of commands :

cd /   (make sure there is space between cd and /)

then:  cd /private/var/Keychains
then: ./inject (theres a dot . before slash)

6. You will see some actions being performed. Once done, Exit Mobile Terminal.

7. Now Delete any Push Enabled App from your iPhone.

8. Reboot your iPhone. Youtube and Push should be working fine now!