Filed under: Web services, Google, web 2.0, Android
Android First-look: Twitroid
by Christina Warren Oct 23rd 2008
I'm pretty addicted to Twitter, so the very first application I sought out for Grant's T-Mobile G1 was an Android-based Twitter client. Unsurprisingly, the Android Market didn't have anything to meet my needs, but I did manage to stumble upon Twitroid, which as far as I can tell, is the only Android-based Twitter client available at this time.
Although the first official release will not be available until Monday (and the devs expect it in the Android Market shortly after), you can download the 0.7 pre-release version from twitroid.mobi. First, you need to enable "Unknown Sources" in the Applications settings on your device (Settings > Applications > check "Unknown Sources"), but after that, it is a simple OTA installation.
Because Twitroid was still in beta at the time of my test, I'm not going to grouse over the error messages and some of the quirk I experienced, but I do want to point out that those bugs did not negatively impact the rest of the device or any of its software. When the app crashed (really, I got a time-out message and was forced to choose "Force close"), the rest of the device continued to work swimmingly. Actually, Twitroid still continued to work, I just got a lot of "not responding" messages. After covering and reading about so many bugs and crashes in pre-2.1 iPhone firmware for TUAW, this was a bit of a relief. Even if something crashes, it does not appear to be the end of the world.
Aside from any beta bugs, Twitroid is a very nice Twitter client. It provides an easy way to send messages, take pictures and send those as messages (though the G1's camera didn't want to cooperate with me to send a non-blurry photo for an adequate test), access and reply to direct messages and even search search.twitter.com. By default, it automatically checks for new tweets every 3 minutes, though you can refresh that manually.
All in all, it is a solid first step for a Twitter client, and I look forward to playing with the first official release next week. A side note -- the actual mobile web interface for Twitter looks fantastic on Android's WebKit broswer. Readable, clean and very, very nice. While I still think a Twitter client is helpful for people who have lots of followers or want to manage more features, it is nice to know that the web interface is a step-up from the BlackBerry interface, anyway.
Check out the gallery for screenshots of Twitroid, it' pretty sexy.
Although the first official release will not be available until Monday (and the devs expect it in the Android Market shortly after), you can download the 0.7 pre-release version from twitroid.mobi. First, you need to enable "Unknown Sources" in the Applications settings on your device (Settings > Applications > check "Unknown Sources"), but after that, it is a simple OTA installation.
Because Twitroid was still in beta at the time of my test, I'm not going to grouse over the error messages and some of the quirk I experienced, but I do want to point out that those bugs did not negatively impact the rest of the device or any of its software. When the app crashed (really, I got a time-out message and was forced to choose "Force close"), the rest of the device continued to work swimmingly. Actually, Twitroid still continued to work, I just got a lot of "not responding" messages. After covering and reading about so many bugs and crashes in pre-2.1 iPhone firmware for TUAW, this was a bit of a relief. Even if something crashes, it does not appear to be the end of the world.
Aside from any beta bugs, Twitroid is a very nice Twitter client. It provides an easy way to send messages, take pictures and send those as messages (though the G1's camera didn't want to cooperate with me to send a non-blurry photo for an adequate test), access and reply to direct messages and even search search.twitter.com. By default, it automatically checks for new tweets every 3 minutes, though you can refresh that manually.
All in all, it is a solid first step for a Twitter client, and I look forward to playing with the first official release next week. A side note -- the actual mobile web interface for Twitter looks fantastic on Android's WebKit broswer. Readable, clean and very, very nice. While I still think a Twitter client is helpful for people who have lots of followers or want to manage more features, it is nice to know that the web interface is a step-up from the BlackBerry interface, anyway.
Check out the gallery for screenshots of Twitroid, it' pretty sexy.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Todd said 1:28PM on 10-23-2008
Hemorrhoid jokes not withstanding...Between the Twitroid and the mobile version of Twitter on Android's browser, which one handles clicks outs of tiny URLs better?
Do either make use of Android so-what lame copy paste?
Do either reach over to Android address book?
Reply
Christina Warren said 1:35PM on 10-23-2008
Both handle URLs the same way -- it just opens a new window (at the bottom of the browser, you can press a button to choose what window you want), or a browser window if you are in Twitroid and the browser isn't open.
I didn't try copy-paste, I'll try that tonight and let you know. As for address book, there was nothing that I could tell from Google Contacts that would let me instantly "tweet" a person. I think you can SMS them, like you can on BlackBerry, but there was no address book integration.
Lindsay said 9:41AM on 11-09-2008
Do you know if the twitter messages count as text messages with the Twitter client?
Reply