Village Gamer

Get ready to start texting, tweeting and chatting like crazy, because keeping in touch with fellow Canadians just got a lot easier, cheaper and, well, a lot more fun! Boston company Heywire has launched HeyWire Canada as the very first iOS texting app to provide a Canadian phone number for unlimited texting (real SMS) to any mobile phone in Canada and to 45 countries for only $1.99 per month.

Whether you’re living in Canada, traveling on vacation or living abroad, HeyWire Canada provides an easy, inexpensive texting alternative using a Canadian phone number for connecting with friends and family in Canada and to 45 countries, including the U.S., Mexico, China, and countries within the Caribbean, South and Central America. Think of the HeyWire texting service as having a second line for your iPhone or a primary phone line for your iPod touch or iPad with access to unlimited texting greatness!

HeyWire Canada is available for $1.99/month. As a month-to-month subscription, you have the option to stop the service any time. So check-it out! Here’s how:

Step #1 – Make sure your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad has access to a 3G mobile data service or Wi-Fi.

Step #2 – Download HeyWire Canada from the iTunes App Store Social Networking category for free. Open the app, complete registration and simply purchase your Canadian phone number with unlimited texting for only $1.99/month. After that, once per month you will be reminded to renew so you can keep your Canadian number and unlimited texting. Yup, really easy! Read the rest of this entry »

Tungle is now available in the BlackBerry App World as a free download. Tungle.me is an app that makes scheduling meetings easy – across organizations, calendar systems and time zones – by eliminating the multiple emails, phone calls and double bookings that typically come with finding a time to meet.
While it is not a calendar itself, Tungle.me synchronizes with the leading online calendar systems including BlackBerry®, Outlook, Google Calendar, Apple iCal, Entourage for Mac, Lotus Notes, Yahoo! and Windows Live. Tungle.me does not require people you schedule with to sign up or download anything.

Tungle.me lets you send meeting invitations that propose multiple times and automatically adjust for time zones. You can also invite others to schedule with you through your personal Tungle.me page, which displays your custom availability (not your calendar details).

With Tungle.me for BlackBerry, you can share calendars with others, inside or outside your organization, across different calendar types. You can schedule meetings by overlaying calendars of people you share with and proposing multiple times to meet. Tungle.me sorts replies for you, dynamically prevents double bookings, and automatically adjusts for invitees’ time zones. You can also reply to meeting invitations received from other Tunglers, or through your personal Tungle.me scheduling page.

Tungle is now a part of the RIM group, and can be used on PC, Mac, mobile iDevices and as mentioned above, BlackBerry.

Following the great success of “I Learn With Poko: Seasons and Weather! HD,” Tribal Nova has released the iPhone version of this top ranking educational app. The iPad version has been selected by Apple as “New and Noteworthy” or “Staff favorites” in the U.S and 15 other countries. Users and reviewers have also given the game rave reviews bringing the app to the top position of the Games-Educational and Games-Kids charts in Australia as well as a top 10 positions in the U.S., Canada and the UK.

I Learn With Poko: Seasons and Weather! is an educational game that lets children 3 to 7 years old learn many key concepts about the weather in various seasons, how to dress and what activities to do depending on the weather… while having tons of fun! Produced by the developers behind the award winning PBS KIDS PLAY! and CBC Wonderworld online learning programs, this app is the first app available on iPhone in the groundbreaking iLearnWith educational program, which is designed to help kids get ready for school, one app at a time.

“Seasons and Weather is one of the most important Science subjects taught to children in Pre-k and Kindergarten, yet there are no games for young children covering the subject in the app store. We are happy to fulfill this need and are committed to developing a comprehensive educational program in which each app will address a specific subject in the curriculum. We have another nine apps currently in development covering various skills in math, literacy, science and foreign languages,” says Pierre Le Lann, co-founder of Tribal Nova.

This app is based on National Standards and has been developed with child developmental psychologists and educators. The game has three levels, increasing in complexity, details and subject covered. Moreover, each level contains a mechanism that adjusts the difficulty based on the child’s success rate. These elements combined enable the game to meet children’s developmental needs regardless if they are 3 or 7 years old.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FrMprG-AEYQ]

The game contains many ways for children to learn about seasons and weather: finding certain weather conditions such as clouds or snow to help Beebee find pictures for her photo album; or spotting clothes that do not fit the weather to help Poko take a perfect picture; or guessing what activities Poko did certain days of the week based on the weather and the month of the year.

Educational content, rich graphics and audio, fun game mechanics and a high production budget really set this app apart to deliver both learning and fun to families.

“We have developed over 100 online educational games for young children over the past 5 years. We are very excited to apply our expertise to touch screens, and are confident we can develop some of the best kids apps in the app store with truly educational content and great gameplay,” says Guillaume Aniorte, Tribal Nova’s other co-founder.

Digital Leisure has released a new title to WiiWare. Overflow is a quick-fire puzzle game that challenges you to take control of the lab and keep everything flowing smoothly. Available now, Overflow is rated E for Everyone and costs 500 WiiWare Points.

Professor Lexis just finished his greatest and most energy-efficient machine yet. However, the moment he flipped the switch for the first official test, the machine exploded and sprayed all of the professor’s new multicolored fuel everywhere. He now needs your help to collect the precious fuel and repair the damage before the worldwide energy symposium begins.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMqcJfYXEh0]

Twist your Wii Remote™ controller to place wooden planks, funnels and particle transportation portals to guide the fluids back to the correct collection channels and repair the damage in 30 warped levels. The professor will even have you tackling the dangerous task of mixing fluids to create new fuel colors. Just be sure to contain the spill before you cause an overflow.

Pizza Pizza has made its mark on mobile shopping with the launch of its first-ever iPhone app. This month, the Canadian-based pizza chain was honoured with a Webby Award, a prestigious international web-based award that recognizes excellence on the internet. The company’s one-of-a-kind smartphone ordering application was named the best shopping tool for a handheld device, just over a month after its launch.

The win comes in the category of mobile shopping for handheld devices. Other nominees considered for the award included big-box American retailers Target and Walgreens. Pizza Pizza and Plastic Mobile, the mobile marketing agency that developed its app, are the lone Canadian companies to receive a Webby award in this category this year.

“We’ve really made a push to enter the online world through our web ordering system and now our mobile app,” said Pat Finelli, Chief Marketing Officer for Pizza Pizza. “This is a big win for us. It proves that we’ve delivered when it comes to reliability and convenience, which are characteristics of ours that customers have really come to expect and value.”

The easy-to-use, interactive app was launched earlier this year, the first of its kind from a national Canadian-based pizza chain. The Pizza Pizza app is available at no charge for all iPhone^(R), iPod touch^(R) and iPad^(TM) models that run iOS 3.0 or later.

PEI developer Timeless Technologies (2007) Inc. has announced the beta release of a new online tool called DomainHole which is designed to help people find great domain names. During the beta release, Timeless hopes to test the stability of servers and ensure DomainHole can scale properly. Timeless is also looking to get feedback on the user interface and effectiveness of the current tools.

DomainHole provides a set of web based tools to help eliminate the pain of not being able to find an available domain. One of the flagship tools that DomainHole offers is the Expired Domain Search. There are approximately 60,000+ new domains that expire every day, and DomainHole maintains this full list of expired domains in a searchable database. Using this search tool, you are able to find keyword rich and high Search Engine Optimization value domains by entering just a few search values.

“We are very excited to announce our public beta testing launch of DomainHole,” stated Brad Pineau, CTO of Timeless Technologies. “Over the past few years, we’ve been developing internal tools to help us find great domain names, so we’re excited to finally share these tools with everyone. We’ll be rolling out several more tools over the next few months.”

DomainHole provides users with additional domain related tools. These tools currently include: a name spinner, instant availability check, and name generator. The name spinner combines a keyword search with hundreds of words to get domain name ideas. The instant availability check tool checks the availability of domains in real time to quickly find a domain name. The name generator tool generates random, unique, brandable and pronounceable domain names. The DomainHole team is currently working on several other tools to help people in their search for a great domain.

Calgary’s Print Audit®, the print management company, has followed through on its promise to provide great products and support to its customers with the enhancements made in the recent releases of Print Audit Facilities Manager and ICE.

Facilities Manager is a powerful, easy to use tool designed to remotely collect meter reads, automate supplies fulfillment and report service information for managing fleets of copiers, printers, fax machines, and MFPs. The Facilities Manager release has enhanced many of the program’s core features including faster and more accurate reporting capabilities.

ICE gathers information for Facilities Manager by tracking and scanning print devices from all major manufacturers and when incorporated with Print Audit 6, it can accurately track local devices. With the newest release, ICE enhancements include better detection of Kyocera Mita devices and improved integration with Print Audit 6.

The Facilities Manager web portal is updated automatically so all changes are already implemented. Through ICE’s automatic update function, the program will periodically check for a new version and will automatically download and install the update.  Print Audit invites you to try a free demo today.

After months of consultative planning with customers, Toronto’s Monitor 24-7 Inc., creators of the award winning IncidentMonitor service desk software solution, are ready to announce the launch of IncidentMonitor version 9.2, featuring the same famous flexibility and functionality, but with new user interfaces and other user-identified features.

Monitor 24-7’s Marketing and Sales Director Riaz Mohammed says: “The new interfaces were designed directly from customer input. We received input from a wide cross-section of current and potential customers including general usability issues to “cool” features that will greatly simplify user interactions.”

IncidentMonitor has been chosen by customer-centric companies worldwide for its functionality, flexibility and price. The company also welcomes suggestions on how to make its product even better – which, in large part, guided the launch of the new release, notes Mohammed, “one of the biggest concerns was around request submission. The feedback we received showed that most vendors have not done a good job at simplifying the request submission interface. We listened to the feedback and provided a new request interface that provides a very simple yet powerful contact search, and built-in intelligence to automatically present possible resolutions from Knowledgebase (KB) articles and existing requests. Service Level Agreements and service policies are automatically linked and visible, and the customer has easy access to view all service policy details.”

In addition, IncidentMonitor’s technician view has been improved in the area of searches and sorting to quickly access requests. Request updates, assignment, resolution and approvals are all accessible by a single-click without losing advanced task-based updates. A configurable dashboard presents information required (such as team requests, category trends, project summary and My Open Requests) when the technician logs in. Performance improvements have also been implemented in the web interface, which now operates more like a Windows application. Multiple forms can be minimized and easily accessed within one browser window.

Features for End Users:

• Single-click functionality allows screen captures, files copied to the clipboard and attachments to be easily linked to a new or existing request
• Advanced web navigation features, which provide the flexibility of a Windows interface within the browser
• Integrated chat that is accessed via predefined service items

Features for Technicians: Read the rest of this entry »

Finnish developer Grey Area has released Shadow Cities, the world’s first mobile global location-based massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) for free on mobile Apple devices in Canada. Shadow Cities uses location based technology to create an augmented reality and a revolutionary global arena for its players to participate in real-time large-scale combat with friends and other gamers. Players will engage each other in epic battles around the world in their very own neighborhoods and cities.

Shadow Cities Features Include:

• Choose your side: Players can choose to fight on the side of the Animators or Architects, two opposing schools of magic locked in a struggle for power and control.
• Definitively Massive: Hundreds of gamers at once will clash and battle with one another across neighborhoods, towns and cities across the world.
• Best in Class RPG Elements: Building upon traditional roleplaying systems and concepts, Shadow Cities offers a deep leveling system that allows players to customize their character by learning spells and developing attributes.
• Draw your Spells: Using the touch screen of the Apple mobile device, players draw magical runes to cast a variety of spells with which to attack foes, heal allies and defend their neighborhoods.
• Transform your Neighborhood: As players move around in the real world, their position in the parallel world of Shadow Cities will also move, revealing both new friendly and enemy players, spirits, traps, neighborhoods and much more.
• Transport Friends: Portals can be opened in cities that allow friends and allies to move between locations and take part in full-scale virtual battles, creating a truly global gameplay experience.
• Speedy Recovery: As mages engage in battles their health and mana will deplete but also refill over time. Players will have the option to purchase potions from the in-game store to refill mana instantaneously.

Shadow Cities is rated Rated 9+ for the following:

Infrequent/Mild Horror/Fear Themes
Infrequent/Mild Cartoon or Fantasy Violence

Requirements: Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch and iPad. Requires iOS 3.1 or later.

TRAC Records, Inc., a records management consulting firm based in New Westminster, has launched its DIY Records Management Series with the release of two new books. The books will focus on two important aspects of records management: records retention and file classification. Both titles, “DIY Records Retention & Disposition Schedule Workbook” and “DIY Functional File Classification System Workbook” are now available for purchase on the company’s web site, and for a limited time, TRAC Records will also provide one free hour of phone support with the purchase of the books.

Vice President Patricia Beelby said that the series was designed for organizations that have pressing records management needs but cannot afford to hire consultants.

“Much of the work in developing file plans and records retention schedules is labour intensive. We were frustrated that we couldn’t help organizations who didn’t have the consulting funds. This approach is for them,” she said.

The series will serve as a step-by-step guide to managing records in an efficient, cost-effective manner, and will explain the many legal requirements on how long to keep records. Many organizations often misunderstand these regulations and don’t have a proper retention strategy in place. In August 2010, a Symantec Corp study found that “Most enterprises (87%) believe a proper information retention strategy should allow them to delete unnecessary information. However, less than half (46%) actually have a formal information retention plan in place.”

Barrister and solicitor Gale Prestash said that TRAC Records’ new series will help organizations make better use of their legal budgets, regardless of their jurisdiction.

“They can do more for themselves in designing systems that comply with ongoing legal records requirements, and reduce their costs in the event of litigation,” Prestash said.

Marcel Roy, TRAC Records’ president, said that these books are the first in the field to use mind maps.

“In my forty years of records management experience, I’ve always struggled with getting clients to understand file plans and retention schedules,” he said. “Once I started using of mind maps, they completely understood what I was doing.”

Roy and Beelby will be presenting on mind mapping in records management at the Association of Records Managers and Administrators (ARMA) Canada conference June 6, 2011 in Charlottetown, PEI.