Apologies if this is all I seem to be blogging about lately, but it's the only interesting thing I've been doing!

I've just pushed out a small update to my Google Wave Notifier application (v0.6). You can read about it here.

New features include the ability to play the Windows "New Mail" sound when you get new messages, the ability to change the interval it polls for new messages and some general tidying up and bug fixes!

I wasn't planning on pushing out an update to my Google Wave Notifier application so soon, but I realised that without automatic update notification, people will just get stuck on the old version and never update.

So, I've pushed out v0.4 which will notify you when an update to the app is available. Other than that it just has some minor tweaks (such as a busy icon while it's checking).

If you find it useful, let your friends on Wave know about it!

Click here for the Google Wave Notifier website.

Edit: Google Wave Notifier has been released now. You can find the latest posts here.

After some thorough testing, I've decided to publicly release the Google Wave Notifier I've been working on recently. Thanks to everyone that helped test it over the last few days.

Because Blogger doesn't support attachments, I've created a download page on Google Sites.

As always, please post your suggestions or bugs to the bug tracker. I hope you might find this useful!

Click here for the Google Wave Notifier Download Page

Note: As I post this, Balloons! has been reduced to £0.59 for the paid version. Get it while it lasts!

A few weeks ago I was lucky enough to participate in the beta of Balloons! for iPhone. Since it's now available to buy, I thought I'd share my thoughts on the app here.

Balloons! is purely for entertainment, though it doesn't really fall into the category of games. The basic idea is that you pick a balloon and attach a message and/or photo to the label, and launch it into the air. The balloon will travel around the globe (electronically, of course) to be caught by other Balloons! users. When someone catches your balloon, they may attach their own message and photo and relaunch it into the sky for someone else to catch.

I've included a few screenshots below, and although you can see the level of polish Balloons! has, unfortunately you can't see the subtle animations that really bring the app to life. The official website has a video that might give you a better idea of how it looks.

The Balloons! menu screen.

When you launch a balloon, you get to choose how it looks from a selection ranging from normal round balloons to heart and bear-shaped balloons.

Catching a balloon is easy. You can catch balloons from all over the world, though realistically, they have to have been travelling for some time to get from one side of the globe to the other!

The Balloon Tracker allows you to see all balloons you've launched, along with the messages and photos that have been attached to them. This is only available in the paid version.

If you click on a balloon in the Balloon Tracker, you get to see the original message/photo, along with any other messages added to it.

Paid vs Free

Like most apps on the App Store, there's a free version and a paid version of Balloons! With the exception of ads, the only difference is the "Balloon Tracker", which lets you see all balloons you've launched, and the messages that have been added to them. It's well worth paying for this additional feature, or you'll be left wondering whether anyone has caught and added messages to your balloons!

Edit: Google Wave Notifier has been released now. You can find the latest posts here.

Those of you lucky enough to have a Google Wave account have probably noticed there's no official app to notify you of new waves. Google Talk doesn't do it, GMail Notifier doesn't do it, and there's no official Google Wave Notifier.

Yesterday I put together a quick app that will check for new messages in waves and light up a system tray icon (along with showing a notification balloon) when new messages are found. Before I release it into the wild, I'm trying to find a few people to help me test it. If you've got a Google Wave account and would be happy to try it, please send me a wave: danny.tuppeny @ googlewave.com.