In the meantime, here are some of the other apps I’m currently trying out after reading reviews and trying a few things:

dxTop for an additional home page and some other organization changes. This looked more attractive to me than PandaHome. I need to also try organizing things in folders; this can effectively give you as many pages as you want, without /any/ home page app.

ASTRO file manager.

Pandora. Of course. Great in the car, I already had a Bluetooth-to-FM tranceiver.

Dolphin — not yet sure if I like it that much more than the standard browser.

Bubble. 3Banana. Shop Savvy.

Dock Runner. I would like to find a customizable alternative to this, to run Gentle Alarm instead.

RPN Calculator (Yay! I like RPN calculators. No docs, you either recognize the HP ripoff UI or you don’t.)

I also figured out a number of basic new things about Android, like how to add widgets and folders, how to get the screen to stay on when the cable is plugged in, stuff like that. The “documentation” is basically useless, this really is a phone for people that already spend half their lives on the Google search form.

I saw a demo of Google Goggles online a few weeks ago and was wowed. Couldn’t remember the name, though. Now installed.

I’ve used Pandora Radio on my desktop PC, and it rocks. I’ll eventually install it on the phone no doubt.

Has anyone tried any of the barcode scanner apps? They sound promising for mobile comparison shopping.

Pandora: yes! For me, that’s the app that makes the monthly fee worth while.

And Astro File Manager is a key tool for validating the Verizon ad campaign of ‘droid does’. Unlike on an iPhone, you have full access to the file system.

I’ve used Google Goggles a few times on book covers and even on the mountain view outside our house. It works most of the time!

Haven’t used Task Panel but I do run Advanced Task Manager (the free version) to kill off apps that don’t shut down when you close them. I haven’t figured out yet how the system deals with all of these apps in terms of memory and resource usage. But it seems like a good idea if app developers would add a quit option on closing their app.

Regarding WordPlayer: If you decide to seriously get into eBooks, let me know, I can point you to a lot of resources on this topic. I almost wrote a blog article on this, but it never made it past draft stage; maybe I can salvage parts of it as an intro to the headache of dealing with different book formats.

Going to go download Dolphin and Bubble now…

Download Dolphin browser to get true multitouch pinch to zoom.
And grab a copy of 91PandaHome to have as many desktop screens as you need to organize the ever-growing collection of apps.

The GPS Google Maps Navigator works like a charm. We used it on our 1800 mile marathon road trip over the holidays to Arizona and round about southern New Mexico home. Turn on the gas station and restaurant layers to find what you need on the road.

And if you have a picky wife in regards to how level the van is for camping, grab a copy of Bubble.

Thanks for the tip on WordPlayer; I’ve been thinking about adding a book reader. And the tricorder is just awesome! The geeks at work are going to be psyched!