I'm not big on apps as I find they are generally over hyped.
That said, for those of you who do not have cable TV and use your computer to view digital content, Gmote is a good little app for your Android. One of the things about using your TV as a second monitor and playing PC content on it, is that you don't have a 'remote control', but with Gmote you now do.
What Gmote does is control your PC through your Android phone. It's like having a remote mouse.
For me my main set up is I have a PC with a video card that connects to my PC monitor and to my television (via HDMI). So I'll often have video (from my PC or web) playing on the television, while I'm working on my PC.
That said, when I'm just relaxing and watching a video from the couch, I have no control over said video (it's only when I'm at my PC can I use my mouse to manage it). I can mute the tv using the tv converter, but I can't pause the video, or fast forward, or switch to another video. I have to get up from the couch and walk over to my PC and use the PC mouse to do that.
With Gmote though, I simply click the Gmote mouse and I can remote control my PC mouse from the couch, allowing me to pause, fast forward, or close and open various content as though I were sitting at my computer. Heck, I could check my email, surf the web, or do anything else using Gmote as well.
If you're still confused, here's a video someone did on YouTube explaining Gmote (I wish I had a vid cam so I could show you how much better it is when you are controlling your desktop that is being displayed on a television, that's where the real value is I think - PC monitors are just too small for watching movies in my opinion).
Gmote also has a bunch of other things:
1) You can play videos or music that are on your PC on your phone (not sure why anyone would do this, but it does it). I suppose it might have some of some value if you are in a different room and want to hear a song for some reason (you can have your phone play the song off your PC).
2) You can play music through your PC but control it using your phone. This has some value.
For instance, if I'm in the kitchen cooking with music playing (off my PC and TV in the other room) and I get a phone call, then I have to dash to the computer to pause the music so I can answer the call. But with this app, I could simply pause the music even though I'm in the kitchen, take the call, then un-pause the music afterwards.
So basically I can start, stop and restart the music (as well as mute, lower or increase volume, etc) on my PC without ever leaving the kitchen.
3) It also catalogues all digital content on your PC so that you can one-click activate any digital content files from your Android. My problem with this is that it launches the video on your PC monitor, which is not what I want (I want videos to launch on my television... or more accurately my 'second monitor').
Now, if your PC monitor is your only monitor this probably doesn't have a lot of value since your monitor is likely small enough that you want to be sitting in front of it when video is playing.
The only time you need a remote is if the content is being watched on the tv (like I often do), in which case, the content opening on your PC monitor doesn't help you.
This is why I've used Gmote as a remote mouse (versus using it's cataloguing features) so that I can drag any content on my PC monitor over to my tv and control it using my Android phone.
4) Any remote type activity Gmote is valuable for. I'm thinking of presentations for instance. Instead of having to buy some special adaptor that let's you connect with your laptop and control your powerpoint presentation with some button-based device, you could just use Gmote.
What would make this a killer app
With Gmote you can not only use it as a remote mouse, but it works as a remote keyboard also. So remotely on my Android phone I can open Microsoft Outlook (or word, notepad, etc.) on the PC, start a new email, type the text on my Android and the text appears on my PC.
The one thing missing? It would be super cool if Android's voice recognition / dictation application worked with Gmote. Then you could sit on the couch, dictate your email, Android voice rec would translate it to text and Gmote would remotely input that text to your PC.
As it stands now, I'm not going to using my Android keyboard to write an email or word document just so I can sit on the couch. I'd rather go sit at the PC and use my Logitech keyboard (because I type 100 times faster on a keyboard than my smartphone).
But there's no reason why Gmote can't work with Android voice rec, I'm sure it's a simple programming process to get the two to recognize each other. In that scenario, especially for lengthy emails, or working on word docs, it would be amazing to be able to kick back on the couch and dictate them and have Gmote sending the text to Outlook or Word (or whatever program I'm creating text for).
Gmote is a good little app, especially for folks like me that do not have cable tv, yet watch a lot of digital content (on their TV, which is connected to their computer) and want to kick back on the couch without having to get up and go to the PC to pause video or load new videos.
(Note: the one thing about Gmote is that you need a wireless router for it to work.)
Could RIM and BB10 take the lead on this?
This is yet another example of how smartphones are in their infancy. RIM's new BB10 has for the past few months shown a user streaming content from their phone to their tv with the push of a button. I'd insert a video of that feature, but when I googled YouTube I couldn't find one (let's go RIM, get your marketing butts in gear!).
The question becomes, has RIM thought through the business side of using your phone as a remote access point to your PC?
Will their voice-to-text software work in conjunction with their remote application to allow you to dictate something on your phone and have it remotely dumped in to Microsoft Word for instance?
The smartphone industry has been a story of not killer apps, but million apps (who has the more apps basically). The winners though will be those who create the killer apps. If a phone existed today that allowed me to dictate text while sitting on the couch and have that text show up in real-time in word for instance, I'd buy that phone over any other.
Remote PC / TV management could be a killer app if someone can take it to the next level. There's nothing stopping anyone from doing so since the wireless connection to your PC is already there through your wireless router.
It will be interesting to see if RIM has pushed the envelop on these fronts with BB10.
What Gmote does is control your PC through your Android phone. It's like having a remote mouse.
For me my main set up is I have a PC with a video card that connects to my PC monitor and to my television (via HDMI). So I'll often have video (from my PC or web) playing on the television, while I'm working on my PC.
That said, when I'm just relaxing and watching a video from the couch, I have no control over said video (it's only when I'm at my PC can I use my mouse to manage it). I can mute the tv using the tv converter, but I can't pause the video, or fast forward, or switch to another video. I have to get up from the couch and walk over to my PC and use the PC mouse to do that.
With Gmote though, I simply click the Gmote mouse and I can remote control my PC mouse from the couch, allowing me to pause, fast forward, or close and open various content as though I were sitting at my computer. Heck, I could check my email, surf the web, or do anything else using Gmote as well.
If you're still confused, here's a video someone did on YouTube explaining Gmote (I wish I had a vid cam so I could show you how much better it is when you are controlling your desktop that is being displayed on a television, that's where the real value is I think - PC monitors are just too small for watching movies in my opinion).
Gmote also has a bunch of other things:
1) You can play videos or music that are on your PC on your phone (not sure why anyone would do this, but it does it). I suppose it might have some of some value if you are in a different room and want to hear a song for some reason (you can have your phone play the song off your PC).
2) You can play music through your PC but control it using your phone. This has some value.
For instance, if I'm in the kitchen cooking with music playing (off my PC and TV in the other room) and I get a phone call, then I have to dash to the computer to pause the music so I can answer the call. But with this app, I could simply pause the music even though I'm in the kitchen, take the call, then un-pause the music afterwards.
So basically I can start, stop and restart the music (as well as mute, lower or increase volume, etc) on my PC without ever leaving the kitchen.
3) It also catalogues all digital content on your PC so that you can one-click activate any digital content files from your Android. My problem with this is that it launches the video on your PC monitor, which is not what I want (I want videos to launch on my television... or more accurately my 'second monitor').
Now, if your PC monitor is your only monitor this probably doesn't have a lot of value since your monitor is likely small enough that you want to be sitting in front of it when video is playing.
The only time you need a remote is if the content is being watched on the tv (like I often do), in which case, the content opening on your PC monitor doesn't help you.
This is why I've used Gmote as a remote mouse (versus using it's cataloguing features) so that I can drag any content on my PC monitor over to my tv and control it using my Android phone.
4) Any remote type activity Gmote is valuable for. I'm thinking of presentations for instance. Instead of having to buy some special adaptor that let's you connect with your laptop and control your powerpoint presentation with some button-based device, you could just use Gmote.
What would make this a killer app
With Gmote you can not only use it as a remote mouse, but it works as a remote keyboard also. So remotely on my Android phone I can open Microsoft Outlook (or word, notepad, etc.) on the PC, start a new email, type the text on my Android and the text appears on my PC.
The one thing missing? It would be super cool if Android's voice recognition / dictation application worked with Gmote. Then you could sit on the couch, dictate your email, Android voice rec would translate it to text and Gmote would remotely input that text to your PC.
As it stands now, I'm not going to using my Android keyboard to write an email or word document just so I can sit on the couch. I'd rather go sit at the PC and use my Logitech keyboard (because I type 100 times faster on a keyboard than my smartphone).
But there's no reason why Gmote can't work with Android voice rec, I'm sure it's a simple programming process to get the two to recognize each other. In that scenario, especially for lengthy emails, or working on word docs, it would be amazing to be able to kick back on the couch and dictate them and have Gmote sending the text to Outlook or Word (or whatever program I'm creating text for).
Gmote is a good little app, especially for folks like me that do not have cable tv, yet watch a lot of digital content (on their TV, which is connected to their computer) and want to kick back on the couch without having to get up and go to the PC to pause video or load new videos.
(Note: the one thing about Gmote is that you need a wireless router for it to work.)
Could RIM and BB10 take the lead on this?
This is yet another example of how smartphones are in their infancy. RIM's new BB10 has for the past few months shown a user streaming content from their phone to their tv with the push of a button. I'd insert a video of that feature, but when I googled YouTube I couldn't find one (let's go RIM, get your marketing butts in gear!).
The question becomes, has RIM thought through the business side of using your phone as a remote access point to your PC?
Will their voice-to-text software work in conjunction with their remote application to allow you to dictate something on your phone and have it remotely dumped in to Microsoft Word for instance?
The smartphone industry has been a story of not killer apps, but million apps (who has the more apps basically). The winners though will be those who create the killer apps. If a phone existed today that allowed me to dictate text while sitting on the couch and have that text show up in real-time in word for instance, I'd buy that phone over any other.
Remote PC / TV management could be a killer app if someone can take it to the next level. There's nothing stopping anyone from doing so since the wireless connection to your PC is already there through your wireless router.
It will be interesting to see if RIM has pushed the envelop on these fronts with BB10.
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