What is the difference between a smartphone and a basic phone? Last three weeks l have been without a smartphone due to lost of my galaxy s4. Since then l have switched to a basic $14 Acatel phone that l got from AT&T to temporary use. After using this phone for a while and realized the $30 l’m saving now on my AT&T bill, I decided to stick with for a while and see how much l can cope without the constant distraction of a smartphone. What l miss most on my smartphone is the Apps such as Whatsapp, Facebook, Skype, Twitter and WordPress app that helps me write posts to my blog easily from the comfort of my smartphone.
Being a I developer, I won’t say l miss the internet because I spend all day on the computer and can access the internet any time so that wasn’t my problem but the absence of Apps in my life was the only thing bugging me. In my quest to give myself access to Apps such as Whatsapp on my laptop so l can easily talk to my friends through that messenger, I started researching on an android simulator that l can install on my laptop so l can run an App on that platform which will provide a mobile environment for the Application to work. I came across one really good one called BlueStacks App player, which can be downloaded at http://www.bluestacks.com/app-player.html. The fantastic thing about this engine is that, it syncs with my google account and google app store so l can easily search, download and install the apps on my laptop with ease.
First App l installed was whatsapp messenger because its the favorite of the ones l was missing. After installation, it said it was going to try to send sms to my phone but that didn’t work and it gave me the instruction to press call me on the screen so l can get a call from Whatsapp to receive a code to activate my installation. I followed the instruction, get the code and put it into the whatsapp installation and bamm l logged into my whatsapp. What I see first is bunch of messages waiting for me from friends especially wishing me the happy new year since l lost my phone on Dec 31st, a day before 2014. But strange thing is l can only recognize people by their profile pictures because only their numbers and profile pictures showed or a blank avarta if that user has not uploaded a profile picture. I am not good at remembering peoples number so l quickly log into my online account which has all my contacts synced on Google and try to map the numbers to the names in other to know who is who before replying to those messages. It was tedious adding those contacts into the whatsapp application l just installed but that’s the only way l could think of at that time to start using my whatsapp from my laptop smoothly.
Secondly, l tried installing viber. It got installed but with viber, you must already have the application running on a mobile phone in other to get the activation code to activate it on a computer. Actually, with viber you don’t even need a simulator to use it on laptop but the disadvantage is you have to get viber installed on a smartphone first before being able to install it on laptop because viber sends the activation code to the viber application running on a smartphone, not to the one on the computer. I hope they change it so they can call and give users the activation code. Another thing l realized is whatsapp said they will charge me $0.99 per year for using the application after the first year of using it for free. I have to say I ain’t mad at that at all because they don’t sell Ads and it cost a hell lot cheaper than sending SMS to people international on any wireless career in the United States so l think they deserve it. l keep installing Apps and so far l think l have gotten up to speed on all the fun l missed on using the Apps. If only l can carry my laptop in my pocket and go everywhere with it, this will be death of a smartphones to me but because l can’t do that, l think Samsung galaxy S5 comming up will trick me into that world again. What’s your favorite smartphone?
One thing l have not yet done on the simulator is uninstalled an App. I don’t think I have seen that option to uninstall the apps yet but will keep searching that option. So there you go, if you don’t have a smartphone but still want to experience the app world, just follow my footsteps and you are ready to enjoy it.
Happing Computer Apping !!!
