Best app deals of the day! 6 paid iPhone apps for free for a limited time

Everyone likes apps, but sometimes the best ones are a bit expensive. Now and then, developers make paid apps free for a limited time, but you have to snatch them up while you have the chance. Here are the latest and greatest apps on sale in the iOS App Store.

These apps normally cost money, and this sale lasts for a limited time only. If you go to the App Store and it says the app costs money, that means the deal has expired and you will be charged. 

More: 200 Awesome iPhone Apps | The best Android apps for almost any occasion

Simpler Pro

Simpler Pro is a completely redesigned contacts app that makes your address book light, smart, and user friendly.

Available on:

iOS

Big Clock

Stop squinting! This promises to be the biggest ad-free clock in the App Store. Completely customize your alarm with music, weather widgets, and more.

Available on:

iOS

2Play

2Play is an easy-to-use app that allows you to watch two YouTube videos simultaneously on your iPhone.

Available on:

iOS

Cool Fonts Keyboard

Want more cool fonts that work everywhere? Get all the new fonts and backgrounds you’ve ever wanted now with this app.

Available on:

iOS

LITMUS

Even the simplest of moments define our existence and make life all the more interesting. If you have one, why not note it on LITMUS?

Available on:

iOS

Easy Spending Expense Tracker

See where your money goes and take control of where to spend it effectively using the simple and yet powerful money management App on iOS.

Available on:

iOS

Have fun responsibly with the pocket-sized AlcoMate Breathalyzer

Why it matters to you

You’ll be able to keep yourself safe this upcoming spring break with this pocket-sized device that tells you when you’ve had enough fun for one day.

It may be hard to believe, but spring break is just around the corner, and with it will likely come quite a bit of partying. So it may be time to consider how to keep ourselves from having a little too much fun. Here to help is the AlcoMate Breathalyzer, a pocket-sized device that can help notify users of when they’ve had enough — or more than enough. Not only is the AlcoMate supremely portable, but it’s also easy to use (which will certainly come in handy for users who are impaired but think they aren’t).

And while most other breathalyzers require periodic re-calibration, addressed by way of mail-in programs, the AlcoMate eliminates this downtime by employing sensors that can easily be switched out by the user, so no matter where you are, you’ll be able to get an accurate reading.

Each of the breathalyzers from parent company AK GlobalTech has been tested and approved for accuracy by the Department of Transportation (DOT), as are the sensor modules (which you’ll switch out from time to time to maintain accuracy). Indeed, while other breathalyzers become unreliable in about a year, the AlcoMate comes with Pre-calibrated Replaceable Intelligent Sensor Module (PRISM) technology, allowing customers to avoid calibration altogether.

More: Scientists at Stanford uncovered a 5,000-year-old Chinese beer recipe, then brewed it

But wait, you say — I already have a breathalyzer app on my phone. Why do I need a separate device? As it turns out, smartphone breathalyzers do not undergo testing, nor are they approved by the DOT, which means that their accuracy isn’t guaranteed. And when you’re testing something as important as your blood-alcohol content, precision is of the utmost importance.

And if you need further convincing that the AlcoMate is a trustworthy tool to have on hand, it should be mentioned that these breathalyzers are used exclusively by the United States Navy and Marine Corps for personnel-wide alcohol testing. They’re also used in rehabilitation centers, hospitals, and clinics.

So this spring break, add some responsibility to your pocket with AlcoMate.

PicsArt aims to make photo editing (more) social with a new chat feature

Why it matters to you

Photography fans can now start a photo-editing battle with friends using PicsArt’s new chat feature.

PicsArt wants to make photo editing more social. Today, the mobile app launched Remix Photo Chat, which allows users to share images within private groups for re-editing. The feature builds in the original Remix, which allowed users to tag their photos, indicating whether they are free for others to edit and “remix” using publicly posted images.

While the app is both a photo editor and a social platform, the latest update now allows users to engage in on-one-on or group chats, editing images not shared publicly. While editing photos for a chat with friends may mirror Snapchat, in PicsArt, the photos aren’t designed to disappear after viewing, but instead encourages users to edit the same image. PicsArt says the new feature encourages users to do things like personalize group photos from events, start a photo editing contest or troll friends with an edit of their selfie.

More: Think your photo is unique? PicsArt’s new AI shows you similar images

In Remix Chat, users can choose from the app’s filters, photo overlays, masks, clone and stamp tools, drawing brushes and 10,000 stickers to edit the shot. Users can also start with any of the now four million images tagged with #freetoedit instead of their own shots.

“We’re excited about Remix Chat because we think it’s the next step towards our mission to build the most complete creative social platform on mobile,” said Hovhannes Avoyan, PicsArt co-founder and CEO. “People have been creating and sharing amazing photo edits, memes and mixed media collages with PicsArt for a while. Now, they can do it together, in a conversation — with Remix Chat. We’re looking forward to seeing our community riff off each other in a new creative way.”

To start a new chat, users edit a photo, head into the save options in the upper right, choose to keep the photo private or share publicly, then select “Send Direct Message” to directly share that photo with another PicsArt user.

The latest feature is now available in select countries on both the iOS and Android versions of PicsArt. The company says the feature will also come be coming to Windows soon.

How to clear your browsing history on your iPhone or Android device

Did you know that every time you browse the internet and visit a website, files are being stored on your smartphone? It’s not just your browsing history, which lists all the websites you’ve visited, but also temporary internet files and cookies. Temporary internet files include images and webpage elements that act as a cache and can enable websites to load faster the next time you visit. Cookies are small files that a website stores on your computer or smartphone that contain data about your browser, or login data, which is often used for advertising purposes.

More: How to back up, speed up, and clean up your iPhone or Android device

Temporary internet files and cookies can pile up over time, however, and they will slowly eat away at your smartphone’s internal storage if you don’t manage them. So, we’re going to show you how to delete your browsing history and cookies on an iPhone or Android device. Below are a few guides that you can follow to clear your browsing history and cookies from Safari, Chrome, Firefox, and Opera.

How to clear your browser history on an iPhone

If you use an iPhone or an iPad, then you’re probably using Apple’s default browser (Safari). Unlike most browsers, however, you can’t clear your browsing data from directly within the browser, so we have to go into the device’s settings to accomplish it. Let’s take a look.

Safari

Open Settings.
Scroll down to Safari.
Scroll down to Clear History and Website Data, and select it.
A pop-up message will appear, notifying you that this will remove the data from your device and other devices signed into your iCloud account. Tap Clear History and Data to confirm.

Chrome

Tap the more icon () in the upper-right corner.
Go to Settings.
Go to Privacy, and then tap Clear Browsing Data.
Check what you want to delete from the list, and then choose Clear Browsing Data.
Tap Clear Browsing Data again to confirm your decision.

Firefox

Tap the hamburger menu  () at the bottom, and then tap Settings.
Go to Clear Private Data.
Select the things that you want to delete, and then select Clear Private Data again.
A reminder will appear signifying that this data will be deleted, and that the action cannot be undone. Tap OK to confirm your decision.

Opera

Tap the red “O” at the bottom of your browser.
Tap Settings in the resulting pop-up menu.
Go to Clear. Afterward, you can either clear specific things, such as saved passwords or cookies, or you can just select Clear All.
You will be asked if you’re sure you want to clear the data. Choose Yes.

Need wireless headphones for a phone that can’t support wired ones? Check out Skybuds

Why it matters to you

Smartphones that lack headphone jacks are all the rage these days, and you can stay on trend with these new Skybuds — wireless earphones.

The future of headphones is clearly headed in a wireless direction, and here to help you stay in vogue is Alpha Audiotronics, which recently announced the general availability of Skybuds. Promising stellar battery life, Near-field Magnetic Induction (NFMI) connectivity, and the kind of audio quality any music enthusiast would appreciate, Skybuds may just be the last pair of headphones you need.

With Skybuds, listeners will be privy to four hours of on-the-go listening, in addition to 24 hours of extra battery life by way of the portable Skydock charging case. Like most other truly wireless headphones, Skybuds connect to your smartphone, tablet, or laptop via Bluetooth, but have distinguished themselves by being “pioneers in using NFMI within the earbuds,” which promises the most reliable connection around.

So if you’re tired of the sound sometimes cutting out of your wireless headphones, or having one earbud work better than the other, this may be the solution you’ve been searching for. And don’t worry — whether you’re an Android or Apple user, Skybuds are compatible with your device.

More: Play music, communicate, track activity with Bragi’s The Dash Earphones (23% off)

These wireless headphones also come with a built-in digital microphone for phone calls and on-device button controls so you have full autonomy over your listening experience. Of course, they also claim passive noise cancellation, naturally cutting down on external ambient noise so you can totally focus on your audio content.

And thanks to Alpha Audiotronics’ collaboration with ECCO Design, Skybuds claim to be some of the most comfortable headphones around. With three fit tip options, you can rest assured that even if your ears aren’t shaped exactly like your neighbor’s, you’ll both be able to enjoy the same pair of headphones. Skybuds are also quite small, with each bud measuring no larger than the tip of your thumb.

“Wireless earbuds have typically come with all kinds of trade-offs and compromises,” said Jamie Roberts Seltzer, CEO and co-founder of Alpha Audiotronics. “Skybuds let users have it all with powerful function, versatility, and design, without sacrificing a premier listening experience. Every element of Skybuds’ truly wireless earbuds was intentionally designed, so whether you’re streaming music at the gym, joining a conference call or jumping on a plane, Skybuds fit wherever your life takes you. Our truly wireless technology not only shows the evolution of audio experiences, but also the immersive and endless possibilities of combining audio and connectivity in your ear.”

You can get your own pair of Skybuds at Best Buy or on skybuds.com.

Forget flying cars, BMW’s Hover Ride Concept is futuristic transport with style

Why it matters to you

Flying motorcycles may happen eventually, but this one’s just for fun

Sometimes the best ideas come from unexpected places. Back in January, Lego Technic released a 603-piece creation for BMW’s R 1200 GS Adventure, a dual-sport motorcycle that’s as comfortable on dirt as it is on tarmac. After some tinkering, Lego discovered the same 603 pieces could be reconfigured into a futuristic flying motorbike, and BMW took notice.

The automaker — specifically a training unit called the BMW Junior Company — took Lego’s design and transformed it into a full-size aerial motorcycle called the Hover Ride Concept. Now that’s thinking outside the box. The technology to make it fly safely is unfortunately several years out, but as a mode of future transport, the concept certainly looks the part.

The bike is sleek, sharp, and quite frankly cool as hell, and we can already imagine squads of robotic policemen using it to swarm baddies from above. To make it “air-worthy,” BMW transformed the front-wheel rim into a propeller and added a hover unit under the seat, but unfortunately, the brand has no plans to produce it. At least not right now.

“It was a great idea and a superb creative challenge to develop a fictitious model from the parts of the Lego Technic BMW R 1200 GS Adventure set,” BMW said. “Our concept not only incorporates the BMW Motorrad design DNA with typical elements such as the boxer engine and the characteristic GS silhouette, it also draws on the Lego Technic stylistic idiom.”

More: Airbus intends to test flying car before the end of the year, CEO says

The Hover Ride Concept was shown for the first time earlier this month at Lego World in Copenhagen, Denmark, but if you missed it, it will soon travel to places like the BMW Group Research and Innovation Center and BMW Welt in Munich. How long until the real version comes out? Hopefully not long.

Stanford scientists ‘program’ mice to glow like fireflies

Why it matters to you

Stanford researchers have moved one step closer to the development of cellular vaccines by demonstrating how a mouse can be engineered to glow.

No, it’s not a deleted scene from The Island of Dr. Moreau; scientists at Stanford University really have come up with a way to make mice glow in the dark by producing firefly proteins. And it could just turn out to be a major advance in the development of future designer vaccines or even cancer therapies.

The research was described in a recent paper published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“This study demonstrated for the first time that we can deliver messenger RNA (mRNA) to cells in a dish, or to cells in organs of living animals,” Professor Christopher Contag, one of the co-authors, told Digital Trends. “mRNA is the intermediate between the genome and functional proteins. Prior to this work there has not been an effective way to transfer synthetic mRNA into cells in a way that the cell can turn it into protein. This opens up an entirely new way to have cells express proteins that can treat a myriad of diseases.”

The work represents a significant advance in the ability of scientists to send mRNA through a cell membrane: something which poses a challenge due to the fact that mRNA is negatively charged, and therefore cannot easily sneak through a positively charged cell membrane.

To get around this, the scientists involved with this research came up with a positively charged delivery method. Once inside the cell, the mRNA then detaches from its transporter compound to manufacture proteins without any problems.

More: 96 percent of the world’s genetic data is from white people — here’s how we change that

The reason for the mouse experiment was all about quickly demonstrating that the efforts had been a success.

“We needed a way of getting a readout to show that the material had made it to its destination as intended,” Professor Paul Wender, another co-author, told Digital Trends “What we did was to use mRNA that codes for an optical readout, meaning one that we could see. In this case that meant light coming out of a cell. It’s the fastest way of discovering whether you have succeeded in getting something into a cell, by getting it to shoot photons back at you.”

Not only did the mammalian cell successfully generate an insect protein in a way that was biologically active, but it also did so without the mouse suffering any ill effects — or even seemingly noticing anything was different.

“It was a temporary effect,” Wender said. “The protein production maximized after a few hours, and it plays out anywhere from 24-48 hours. For many therapeutic opportunities, this is exactly what you want. For example, if you or I were to have a headache that requires aspirin, it’s good that it only acts for 8-12 hours. If you were constantly under the influence of aspirin, there would be other undesirable consequences.”

He did, however, note that it could also prove possible to produce longer-lasting, persistent effects by going into the genome and altering DNA on a fundamental level.

It’s still early days for this research, but the possibility of mRNA transmission opens up some enormously exciting, life-altering possibilities in the years to come. And, when you’re talking about reprogramming cells, we mean “life-altering” in the literal sense.

Listen up: NASA wants to talk about a ‘discovery beyond our solar system’

Why it matters to you

Exoplanets, such as those expected to be announced by NASA on Wednesday, may hold the key to life beyond Earth.

If life exists beyond Earth, it likely exists on an exoplanet. These planets orbiting stars outside our solar system have fascinated astronomers for decades. The first was detected in 1988. Over 3,500 have been confirmed since then.

Now, NASA has an update. The agency said yesterday it will host a news conference on Wednesday to discuss recent discoveries of planets beyond our solar system. The findings, to appear in the journal Nature, will be presented at 1 p.m. ET as the event kicks off live on NASA Television.

Five scientists will participate in the conference. The media and public alike are invited to ask questions via Twitter by using the hashtag #askNASA. The agency will also hold a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) at 3 p.m. to discuss exoplanets and the new findings.

More: Kepler finds 104 exoplanets in the largest single haul of confirmed planets

Exoplanet discoveries have been increasing over the past year. In July, the largest ever haul of confirmed exoplanets was announced, detected the Kepler spacecraft telescope. A total of 104 planets were confirmed, four of which showed promise as potentially rocky and habitable worlds. In August, a potentially habitable planet was confirmed around our nearest star system.

And just last week, astronomers publicly released a massive dataset of nearby stars detected by the High-Resolution Echelle Sprectrometer (HIRES) instrument. The team behind the project encouraged citizens scientists to comb through the data in search of orbiting planets.

“[These] data likely contain even more planets that didn’t meet our statistical significant testing, but that more observing may reveal with time,” Paul Butler, staff scientist at Carnegie’s Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, told Digital Trends at the time. “In that sense, these data will likely ‘keep on giving’ for a long time.”

The vast majority (about 97 percent) of confirmed exoplanets are initially detected through indirect means. As in the case of last week’s release, the most common technique is radial velocity, which detects a star’s tiny movements in response to internal forces or external forces, such as the pull of an orbiting planet.

Oh bee-have! Microchipped bumblebees reveal the secrets of the hive

Why it matters to you

America’s native bumblebees are in trouble but studies like this help scientists understand — and hopefully protect — the important species.

Bumblebees fitted with microchip backpacks have offered researchers a unique glimpse into the hidden world of colonies. As it turns out, when it comes to dividing up the workload, bees behave a lot like human beings.

“[Microchips have] been used in a few other studies,” Avery Russell, an Arizona State University graduate student who lead the study, told Digital Trends, “Our novel contribution was to figure out how to track pollen and nectar foraging trips, and to link behavior to morphology of the bees.”

Using superglue, the researchers attached small RFID chips to the bees’ backs. Each chips weighed between two and three percent of the bee itself so as to not interfere with the bee’s flight.

More: With tiny hats, elephant seals help researchers study Antarctica’s melting ice

“The transponders allow us to identify each bee as an individual and, when they communicate with the tag readers,” Russell said. “They give us the information on what the bee was foraging for, when, for how long, and how often.”

Russell and his team discovered a handful of worker bee characteristics that seem to resemble those found in humans.

For one, individually bees carried the weight of their group tasks differently — some were slackers while other made forty times as many foraging trips in a given day. Bees also proved to be “short-term specialists” and “long-term generalists,” according to Russell, preferring to forage primarily for nectar or pollen over the course of the day, but balancing out during their brief lifetime. The bees’ patterns of specialization (the way they behaved) were also not related to their morphology (the way they looked).

Although America’s bumblebees don’t suffer from the colony collapse disorder that’s devastating honey bee populations, our native bees are still at risk.

“Bumblebees (like the buff tailed bumblebee on the endangered species list) are declining drastically in numbers,” Russell said. “Bumblebees are very important pollinators for fruits and vegetables. Many of our crops are pollinated mainly by these native bees and not by honey bees (for instance, eggplant, tomato, blueberry, cranberry, chili pepper). Our work helps us understand how these animals forage for diverse floral nutrients and why animals specialize on a given foraging task.”

A paper detailing their study was published this month in the journal Scientific Reports.

Close to the Metal ep 31: Greenlight is dead, long live Greenlight

After a mixed bag of success stories and frustrating concepts that never came to life, Steam Greenlight is closing its doors. The program allowed independent developers to harbor support for titles with concept trailers and a well-planned idea for a game, turning that favor into a real publishing platform. Now, Valve is looking for ways to skip the middle step and push indie titles right to the masses with Steam Direct.

While the effects on Steam users are fairly clear-cut, how this decision will affect independent developers isn’t as easy a question for us to answer. To that end, we’ve invited Mo Cohen, programmer, writer, and designer for Greenlight game Queer Quest: All in a Gay’s Work to come join us on Close to the Metal. Her game takes inspiration from classic LucasArts games while grappling increasingly relevant issues of tragedy and queer identity.

More: Greenlighted no more: Valve introduces Steam Direct, Greenlight’s replacement

She’ll take us through her development leading up the Greenlight, and then share her experience with the Greenlight application and promotion process. Actually getting approved requires as lot of constant networking, publicity, and updates for existing backers. How do those goals run parallel to a Kickstarter project, and how do they conflict?

After that, we’ll talk more ethereally about the new program, Steam Direct. There are undoubtedly new challenges facing developers without continued support between announcement and release. How will Cohen adapt to these changes, and what new opportuntities does she think afford independent developers on the same path?

All that and more on this week’s episode of our weekly computing podcast, Close to the Metal, where we take a deep dive on a single topic of direct concer to the PC community. Whether that’s GPU selection, the perfect 2-in-1, or the latest gaming trends, we broadcast live at 10 AM PST every Tuesday from the Digital Trends office in Portland, Oregon.