Email and calendars. Email is, unsurprisingly,  still the most important mobile app. According to Forrester, 87 percent of smartphone workers use email on their devices (which leaves me wondering what other 13 percent use their smartphones for), and collectively, they do 32 percent of their email on a smartphone. While most smartphones come with their own email and calendaring tools most users will use, there are some third-party options worth considering:

• Gmail and Google Calendar. If you use Gmail, it’s worth noting that the mobile-optimized versions of the Gmail and Google Calendar sites are pretty good. They are fast and have a great UI, and one of the advantages of using them is that you can seamlessly switch from device to device without having to set up IMAP details in your various devices’ email clients.
• Touchdown. Brings superb Microsoft Exchange support to Android devices.

Document-based collaboration. Mobile workers need to be able to access their documents while out of the office on any of their devices. Cloud-based document collaboration tools need to include mobile access to be truly effective.

• Documents to Go. Dataviz’s Documents to Go is a popular mobile document editing app. It’s available for a variety of platforms, including iOS, BlackBerry, Android and Palm. When combined with a cloud file sync service like Dropbox or box.net, it enables users to access and edit their documents no matter where they are.
• Soonr. Soonr is a cloud-based document sync service. However, it also offers integrated MS Office document editing capabilities , which means users don’t need to use a separate app like Documents to Go.

Web conferencing. According to Forrester, 18 percent of information workers and 34 percent of senior staff use web conferencing at least weekly. Mobile access means being able to attend meetings even while away from the laptop.

• Fuze Meeting. Fuze Meeting’s impressive service is accessible with mobile devices. Its new Telepresence Connect service can extend traditional room-based telepresence to iPads and Android tablets.
• Join.me. LogMeIn’s simple and easy-to-use web conferencing app is accessible through iOS and Android apps.

Activity streams. Forrester thinks activity streams are becoming a critical resource for organizations that work collectively: sales teams, project teams, and executive staff, for example. Mobile support is crucial as it enables workers to stay updated no matter where they are.

• Yammer. Yammer is a popular enterprise social networking tool very much like a private Facebook for the enterprise. It offers mobile support though mobile apps available for a variety of platforms.
• Socialtext. Socialtext is another enterprise social networking and collaboration app that offers activity streams. It offers mobile support via an optimized version of the website.

Presence and chat. Knowing whether a colleague is available or not is a killer feature when out of the office. While this category of app lags today, Forrester expects adoption to accelerate. These types of features are often also often included in other mobile collaboration tools.

• eBuddy. A multi-protocol mobile chat app that supports AIM , ICQ, Google Talk, Yahoo! and MSN Windows Live Messenger within a single interface. It’s available via a native client for Android and iPhone and there’s also a mobile-optimized website.
• IM+. Another popular “all-on one” IM app that supports a variety of protocols, including AIM, iChat, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo, ICQ, Jabber, Google Talk, Myspace, Facebook, Twitter and Skype Chat, and works on a number of different mobile platforms.

Social collaboration. In this category, Forrester includes access to internal blogs, wikis, community sites, and social networks from a tablet or smartphone. Mobile access allows every professional will remain connected and part of the collaborative process.

• IBM Lotus Connections. IBM’s social suite is supported on a range of mobile platforms, including Android, iPad, iPhone, BlackBerry and Nokia.
• Jive Software. Jive Software’s enterprise social suite provides mobile  access though apps for iPhone and BlackBerry.

Expertise location. Forrester says this type of application is on the rise as firms look for ways to make mobile employees productive by helping them identify experts from anywhere. This type of app brings together presence, notifications, social profiles and data from HR. Many social business tools provide this kind of functionality, including:

• IBM Lotus Connections
• Jive Software
• Yammer
• Socialtext

Video conferencing. Skype has some 170 million active monthly users, and 39 percent of those people use Skype for work. Web conferencing vendors are also adding video to their products. Due to heavy resource requirements, there are few multi-party mobile video conferencing apps, though.

• Skype. Skype provides video calling for mobile platforms including iPhone and Android.
• Fring. One of the first apps to bring four-way video calls to the iPad, Fring provides native mobile apps for a variety of platforms, and also has mobile browser access.

Personally, I’m not convinced expertise location is really a “must-have” category of mobile collaboration app just yet. Do you agree with Forrester’s categories of “must-have” apps, and which apps do you recommend for each category?

Photo courtesy Flickr user Yagan Kiely

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After my recent post about the betas I use, I was introduced to Nimbuzz, an IM program that is now offering voice services in competition with Skype and Gizmo5 (which was recently purchased by Google).

The origins of Nimbuzz are in Europe. It claims a 20 percent market share in several European countries, and it’s popular in the Middle East. The company says that it has 12 million users, and is adding 40,000 users per day — not bad for a service that’s less than two years old. Nimbuzz is less well known in North America, but that may soon change.

Nimbuzz Mobile

Nimbuzz focuses much of its effort on developing mobile clients for a wide variety of mobile phones, including the iPhone/iPod touch, Android systems, and BlackBerry (a native BlackBerry app is new today). Nimbuzz clients are available in several languages.

The Nimbuzz Mobile client supports the IM services one would expect (Windows Live/MSN, Yahoo, Google Talk, AIM, ICQ); social networking chat (Facebook, MySpace); plus some services not often seen in North America, but which are popular elsewhere (the VZ Networks, Gadu-Gadu, Hyves, Giovani).

The client also allows you to make VoIP calls using any SIP account (like Gizmo5), Skype, or its own NimbuzzOut service. Nimbuzz claims that its international calling rates are cheaper than Skype’s.

I found the Nimbuzz mobile client for iPhone/iPod touch to be attractive and easy to use. Both the IM and voice functions work well. I have some minor grumbles, which I’m told will be remedied in upcoming versions.

• In order to make voice calls, the phone number to be dialed must be entered into your device’s address book in full international format — like +1 (555) 555-1212. However, one can’t edit this data directly from Nimbuzz.
• The client supports only one account per service, so if you have, say, two Google Talk accounts, you must pick one.
• Nimbuzz does not yet support GTalk for Google Apps accounts.
• I was recently required to change my GTalk password due to “suspicious activity,” but Nimbuzz for iPhone doesn’t seem to have a way to change service passwords. I had to delete the GTalk account in the client, then re-create it.

Nimbuzz for Mac

The developers at Nimbuzz say that they are “big Apple fans,” and it shows. The Nimbuzz Mac client comes close to the elegance of Adium. I hope the program will maintain its Mac-friendly design as it matures. The Windows version looks good, too, although I haven’t tested it.

The desktop client has most of the features and limitations of the mobile version, although it doesn’t yet support voice calling or Skype chat. It also doesn’t share data with the mobile version, which would be nice, so as to avoid having to input account data more than once. And I would have liked to have seen integration with the Mac Address Book app.

Nimbuzz also offers a web version, which isn’t as full-featured as some other web-based IM services, such as Meebo.

Nimbuzz doesn’t work with Twitter, although I think that’s a good thing. Twitter isn’t a messaging service, it’s a microblogging service, and I have found that Twitter functions in IM clients don’t work very well.

I’m very encouraged by the development of Nimbuzz so far. The company tells me that, instead of adding features willy-nilly, they have chosen to “do it right.”I can certainly agree with that in principle, although given the speed with which other apps are being created and updated, let’s hope that Nimbuzz can keep pace.

Have you tried the new Nimbuzz BlackBerry client? Let us know what you think of it below.

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But why not buy an iPhone, or a Palm Pre, which I’d had my eye on for several months? The Pre seems to be a good phone, but it doesn’t yet have the apps that the iPhone does. And the monthly fees for Pre service are considerably higher than what I’m paying now. The iPhone’s monthly fees are even higher, and many folks I’ve talked to don’t find it to be a very good phone.

So, keeping my current phone and buying an iPod touch seemed like a good compromise. I can get good Wi-Fi coverage in most areas where I live, so I’ll be able to go online, even without the phone function.

Many of my WWD colleagues already have iPhones. Aliza has recently written about good apps for web workers. Dawn’s shared her favorites, too. But with the holidays coming up, here are some of my ideas for apps to put on that brand-new iPhone or iPod touch:

Communication

• eBuddy. A multi-service instant message client for MSN/Windows Live, AIM, Yahoo, Gtalk, ICQ, Facebook Chat and MySpace Chat. Supports multiple accounts on the same service. Versions for web, Android and other platforms also available. Free.
• Facebook. A well-designed way for Facebook users to keep up with their friends while on the road. The app has had its issues, but they are apparently fixed now. Free.
• Gist. Scott and I have both found Gist useful, and the Gist iPhone app does a pretty good job of presenting a lot of information in a small space. Free.
• LinkedIn. This app keeps LinkedIn users, er, “linked in” from their iPhones and iPod touches. The latest upgrade adds some nice features, including an inbox for LinkedIn messages. Free.
• Nimbuzz. You can use this app to make inexpensive international calls over Wi-Fi. The app also includes a chat function, but it’s pretty rudimentary compared to eBuddy. Free app; rates for calls vary.
• RingCentral. If you’re a RingCentral user, you can use this app to manage your phone messages and more. Free for RingCentral users.
• Tweetie. There are lots of Twitter apps, but so far, I like Tweetie the best. It has a clean interface, and supports multiple Twitter accounts. Thanks for the tip, Darrell! $2.99.
• Waveboard. Mobile access to Google Wave. Will hopes for better access soon; I imagine that this app will become more sophisticated as Wave does. $0.99.

File and Idea Management

• Dropbox. This app is another reason to love Dropbox, which many of us at WWD do. As one would expect from Dropbox, it just works. Free.
• Evernote. My colleagues at WWD like Evernote, too, and I’ve finally seen the light. It’s a great replacement for PhatNotes, which I used to use with various Palm products. (The Palm versions are apparently no longer available.) Free.

News

• Reeder. A very nice and elegant RSS reader that syncs with Google Reader. $0.99.

Just about every news source also has its own iPhone/iPod touch app these days. So far, I’ve been impressed with the ones from NPR and from some news outlets that have used the PodCurry platform.

Password Management

• 1Password. Manage and sync passwords. I’ve been playing with the brand-new version 3, and it’s good enough that I’ve moved from SplashID after many years. Use Dropbox with 1Password to make your password data available on multiple machines. $7.99.
• LastPass. Manage and sync passwords across multiple machines. The Firefox add-on for this service was included in WWD’s Add-Ons Collection. Apps for iPhones and other mobile devices available with premium membership, $12/year.

I’ve barely begun finding fun stuff, but I think I’m off to a good start with the Google Earth app, and TriPeaks Lite. I’m sure that I’ll find more, but I really need to get back to work now. Happy holidays!

What iPhone or iPod touch apps would you recommend for new users?

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Om has been using the pre-release version of NimbuzzOut for about a month and recommends it for making cheap international calls — the call quality is good and the app is easy to use. Check out Om’s post for full details.

Have you tried NimbuzzOut? What do you think of the call quality?

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Nimbuzz – Version 1.01 recently arrived for free and has potential as a Swiss Army toolset since it offers far more than voice communications. Nimbuzz works with your Skype or Google Talk account for voice calls, but it’s still a bit buggy yet. I was able to initiate a Skype voice call with one of my contacts and the sound quality was amazing over WiFi. Unfortunately, I couldn’t start a Google Talk call and even subsequent Skype voice calls wouldn’t connect consistently. Still, the app just hit the ground so it needs time to get running. Definitely worth watching because it provides IM (in landscape mode, no less) with many other platforms such as Yahoo! Messenger, AIM, MSN, Facebook, MySpace and more. In fact, The Apple Blog had more overall sucess with it than I did, so you’ll want to see their perspective.

TruPhone – While Nimbuzz is just getting started in this space, TruPhone is… well… tried and Tru. It’s a service that GigaOM reviewed almost two years ago and Om still uses heavily to call his family abroad. The application is free, but you will pay for calls to landlines or other mobile phones. Calls in the U.S. for example are $0.06 per minute. Why bother with TruPhone when you already pay for an iPhone voice plan? TruPhone works over WiFi, so if you don’t have a signal or you’re out of the country without an international plan, a hotspot gets you talking. Plus, TruPhone calls to other TruPhone users are free. The company also offers their TruPhone Anywhere service which routes as much of the call over the Internet at reduced rates, which is handy for international calls. Our own Jason Harris gave TruPhone Anywhere a spin earlier in the year although that was prior to the iPhone version.

Fring – Just last month Fring appeared in the iTunes App Store and has already seen a large number of downloads. Like the other apps, Fring offers calling capabilities to landlines and mobiles, but leverages the SkypeOut feature of Skype. Using this method means that voice calls aren’t free as Skype charges for their SkypeOut service. Still, I find it to be a nominal charge since rates within the U.S. are as low as $0.02 per minute. Adding to the VoIP functionality, Fring supports IM on various platforms like AIM, ICQ, MSN Messenger plus you can post directly to Twitter. Even better: Fring works with SIP, or Session Initiation Protocol, allowing for use of services like Gizmo, Free World and SIPNET.

JAJAH – Here’s the only app in the list that actually isn’t an application at all. JAJAH offers a web-client at http://iphone.jajah.com/ that you can bookmark on your iPhone and use for low-cost calls. The web page offers a dialpad for numeric entry, but you can also maintain an contact list on your JAJAH account, making for quick calls for as little as $0.029 cents per minute. Two things make JAJAH stand out from the other services. First, the international rates can often be very reasonable, making this a contender if you have clients across borders. Second, only the “middle” part of the call is done over the Internet. When you make a JAJAH call, the service calls you back on your handset and then connects your call recipient through their handset. For all intents: each of you is on your phone, but the voice traffic is routed over the oft less-expensive web. As I result, our test calls were very high quality.

Each of these iPhone apps and services has something to offer, depending on what you’re looking for. But each app has one glaring deficiency, even though it’s not the fault of the software developers: none of them are persistent. That means due to iPhone limitations set by Apple, none of them can run continously in the background. When you close the app, you’re effectively unavailable for VoIP or IM on your handset. That doesn’t diminish the value these services can add, but it’s defintely something worth mentioning. For initiating calls and conversations each offers value, right in the palm of your hand.

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