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Palringo offers free friend finding facility
Supplier: Palringo
Web: www.palringo.com
Price: Free
Compatibility: Symbian, Blackberry, Java or Windows Mobile
AN IMPRESSIVE mobile app – Palringo – just got more impressive by adding location finding to its messaging capabilities. Curiously this capability is only been rolled out to Windows Mobile phones at present.
Which is ironic as the INQ only discovered Palringo, the app's creator, at the recent Smartphone show. Naturally, location awareness will be rolled out to the Symbian version of Palringo very shortly.
Palringo basically offers IM (Instant Messaging) with a difference. In addition to sending text, you can send a voice message or a photo as well.
The voice messaging works just like the PTT (Push-to-Talk) services which the network operators never bothered to roll out. You hold a button down; speak your message; and the recipient hears the message without having to open another application. It's a very fast way of messaging for those who are one-fingered typists.
The photo facility works in a very similar way. And there's a hidden advantage. One of the available versions of Palringo runs on the Apple Ithingey.
That means you can send a photo from a Symbian, Blackberry, Java or Windows Mobile cameraphone to somebody with an Apple handset. Which gets around the fact that the Duke of Cupertino forgot to build MMS (Photo messaging) into the Ithingey as standard.
Undoubtedly, the best feature of Palringo is going to be its friend finding capability. It enables you to see where you 'buddies' are. Currently, you can only 'see' them on a map, if you posses a Windows mobile.
However, you could download the latest version of Palringo's software for the PC – known as Palringo Local – and be able to discover their location on the d isplayed map.
The catch is that the person you want to track has got to remember to turn the location facility on. However, Palringo's location capability is more sophisticated than most. Here's what the blurb says:
"To calculate location, Palringo Local uses a proprietary algorithm that picks up cell site (2G, 3G, 3.5G) locations, Wi-fi access points and other identifying signals.
There is an element of triangulation in the calculations, but the algorithm makes a significant level of adjustment to identify the location accurately. The algorithm also ‘learns’ over time, through the addition of new location data that is added to the database."
In the demo, location worked fine, but when the INQ set the application up at home and using 3.5G and Wi-fi, Palringo was struggling to find our location. The company was unsure why that was.
The other capability that Palringo boasts is the ability to unite Palringo users with those on a whole host of other IM service.
These include AOL Google Talk, Yahoo! Messenger, Gadu-Gadu, ICQ, Jabber, Windows Live Messenger and Apple's Ichat. It's a shame they don't do Skype as well.
The INQ tried out Palringo with Windows Live Messenger and the integration worked quite well.
The best news is that Palringo is available for free and there are no hidden charges for using the location service. Wonder how they make any money, then? µ
Download it from here http://www.palringo.com
The Good – Great free friend locating facility
The Bad – Location only under Windows Mobile right
now
The Ugly – Doesn't interwork with Skype messaging
Bartender's verdict – 8 out of 10
Tags: Apple
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i m vry soft touchng
Come on chat with me
it is missing tooo many options that should be there. No avatar picture icon, no custom font, doesnt support groups from other services, no call, no video, no smileys, too many voids. It might have voice and picture message, but i do on my phone already with mms I dont need aditional software or simbian for that. Its always beeing updated like crazy. When you compare it to pidgin, another free messenger. It is just another low featured messenger with niche for people with simbian. The whole time i had it in windows, it would not support all the features that simbian could. The program feels like something that should be on a mac, with no options and empty menus. To make things even worse you have to sing up for it, Another password/user to remember. even though palringo remembers your passwords/user names from other services, i would rather it not be storred on their server but on a config file in my pc (/home/$user).

The AA verdict: 3 out of 10, maybe if i was still drinking again.
Ive been persuing them for 2years waiting for java/J2ME release now when its out after years its Java MIDP-2 but CLDC1.1 (not 1.0)
which makes java but compatible to very few devices. most devices are Java-MIDP2.0-CLDC1.0.