The Fabric of our lives! It warms us, cools us down, and makes it’s rivals look cheap. I’m of course talking about the wonderful little fabric called Cotton, but there’s also an entity that will do the same for Microsoft’s entertainment consumer portfolio: Microsoft Skydrive. As it turns out cloud computing, contrary to what I might have told you more than a year ago, is where the consumer markets are making their next big plays. There are all sorts of applications that allow you to stream music, or store your goodies to enjoy from any device.
Cheese, cheddar, quid. There are many different names for what I affectionately refer to as “skrilla”, but whatever you call it, we all want to save it. Frankie’s MoneyManagerPro helps you keep track of your green with built in support for charting your expenses, scheduling for recurring income, bank account and credit card tracking, and more importantly SkyDrive powered encrypted storage. The app also features international currency modes for those of you outside the of the United States and the European Union. MoneyManagerPro is available for $1.99 with a free trial.
Money may make you cool and cotton may keep you warm but music it what keeps us all engaged in new experiences and ideas. Since external storage in Windows Phone is a non-starter you are pretty limited on how much of your MP3 collection you can carry with you at any given time. It’s true that Zune Music +Video solves this problem for $10.99 a month, but the service does nothing to let you collect the stuff you like streaming often except for pinning it to your homescreen. Enter CelltracSoftware’s Cloud Music application. Simply move all of your favorite music to the ‘Music’ folder in your SkyDrive account and you can stream them wherever you have an internet connection. The application can stream or store MP3 and AAC files, make custom playlist, use the Windows Phone media controls, and play audio in the background. It also features Music + Video hub integration and live tile pinning. It’s one of my new favorite applications, and for $1.29 you can’t beat it with a stick.
We end this week’s Windows Phone App Flow with my favorite Windows Phone application of all time. Early on I mentioned my love for television and asked for recommendations on how to best keep track of my guilty pleasures. Rudy Huyn’s TVShow consistently delivered the features users have requested including customizable live tiles and built in support for sharing information on your favorite shows via Twitter and Facebook. Why am I bringing it up now? In the new 2.7 version, there is now support for multiple live tile pinning and SkyDrive integration so you can back up your progress when you switch devices or reset your phone. Once again I highly recommend TVShow and at $1.99 it’s a steal.
That’s a wrap for this week’s cloud powered edition of Windows Phone App Flow. If you’ve got any recommendations hit me up on Twitter, username @harlemS. Until next week, America!
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