1) Open the stock music app and create your playlist. If you just want to play all the music on your phone, you can skip this step.

2) Open AppAlarm and goto the alarm you wish to edit.

3) Tap “App To Launch” –> “Create Shortcut” –> “Music Playlist,” then select your playlist.

4) AppAlarm will not be able to recognize which app the playlist shortcut represents, so on the resulting dialog, press the “Select App” button and find the “Music” app (if you use a different app to play music playlists, select it instead).

5) In the alarm options screen, scoll down and find the option labeled “Force App Restart On Launch.” Make sure this option is CHECKED. This will cause AppAlarm to “kill” the music app before launching it again, which will in turn, cause the music app to “forget” that it was in paused state.

6) Set the rest of the alarm’s option to how ever you’d like.

7) Go back to the alarm list screen, long-press on your new music alarm, and press “Test Alarm.” If you have more than one app installed that handled music playlists, you will probably get a dialog box asking you which app you want to launch. MAKE SURE YOU CHECK THE “REMEMBER MY DECISION” CHECKBOX, otherwise, when it’s time for your alarm to go off, it will get stuck on this same dialog.

After all this, you should be ready to go. Remember, it’s always a good idea to test new alarms to make sure they work correctly.

Got any suggestions, problems or questions? Post them in the comments!

“Killing” an app in Android is kind of like uninstalling it, without actually deleting the files.

This means that all internal system alarms that the app may have scheduled get killed. AppAlarm needs these system alarm to work. So don’t kill AppAlarm if you plan on using it as… you know… an alarm.

Most of the tasks in your taskkiller aren’t actually running.

What your taskkiller probably isn’t telling you, is that most of the apps in its list are just being cached by the Android system in case they need to be used again. This doesn’t make your phone slower or use up your battery.

If you want to see an accurate representation of which apps are actually running in the background, goto Settings -> Applications -> Running Services

TIP: You can also create a shortcut on your home screen to Running Services. Just long-press on an empty spot of your home screen, tap Shortcuts, then tap Settings and pick Running Services from the list.

If you must use a taskkiller, add AppAlarm to its ignore list.

You should add all mission-critical apps to your taskkiller’s ignore list. Remember, not even Google apps can prevent themselves from being killed.

If you killed AppAlarm, or it ever Force Closed, run it once again.

Starting AppAlarm forces your alarms to be re-sheduled. This also happens when the phone first boots and whenever your time or time-zone is synced or changed. The AppAlarm service immediately stops itself once it schedules your next alarm, so there is no need to kill it. Remember, if you see AppAlarm in your taskkiller, it’s probably just being held in memory by the system.

Now I’m not saying all taskkillers are bad. They’re good to have around in case one of your apps starts mis-behaving. But it’s never a good idea to use the Kill All button. Also, try using a more informative taskkiller like System Panel, that actually differentiates between cached apps and running ones.

The other reason I brought the site over here to wordpress is it’s a great place to post news, updates, tips, etc. So you might wanna subscribe to the RSS Feed, if you don’t use twitter or just want a more streamlined source of actual information (as opposed to just twitter babble).

AppAlarm is a new kind of alarm. In short, it gives you the power to turn any app into an alarm clock. I originally created this for use with Pandora and Slacker Radio, but it’s evolved into a fully functional way to schedule tasks.

Confirmed working with:
Pandora Radio,
Slacker Radio, (turn on auto-resume in Slacker settings)
StreamFurious Pro (via Home Screen Shortcuts),
Stitcher Podcast Radio, (turn on “Play Favorites on Start” in Stitcher settings)
Quick Boot (requires root),
Stock Android Music app (via Create Shortcut -> Music Playlist),
1Kill (for scheduling the death of annoying tasks),
EventGhost (for scheduling actions on your PC)

UPDATE: Google Listen v1.1 broke support for AppAlarm, however Stitcher‘s new update to version v1.1 makes it work almost perfectly with AppAlarm (it’s also a really nice alternative to Listen and they’ve got a very responsive dev team). To make Stitcher work correctly, you must go into Stitcher’s settings and turn on “Play Favorites on Start.” WARNING: There is 1 minor flaw in Stitcher where if all your favorites are marked as read/heard, Stitcher won’t start playing. So if you don’t have a lot of favorites in Stitcher you should probably set your backup alarm to “Always Play” or set a 2nd alarm to another app for a few minutes later (never set two AppAlarms for the same time).

UPDATE: AppAlarm v1.1.7.4 brings a bunch of updates including support for StreamFurious Pro via the new “Home Screen Shortcuts” option, which allows you to select one of the existing shortcuts on your home screen as your alarm’s app.

LITE Features:
-Multiple alarms
-Pick any app
-Create shortcuts or pick them from the home screen
-Launch custom “AnyCut” style intents
-Play backup alarm while launching app
-Choose a specific Pandora Station
-Experimental support for Google Listen
-Force close the app when the alarm is done
-Backup and Restore your alarm settings to you SD card

PRO Features:
-Everything in the LITE version
-Repeating alarms
-Launch even if on call
-Network test and option to play backup if the test fails
-Turn wi-fi on/off
-Wifi timeout options
-Custom timeouts
-Set media volume

If you discover any interesting uses for AppAlarm, why not share them with the world on the episode6 boards!

Change Log:

v1.2.6
–Now free and Open Source

v1.2.5
–Bugfix attempt

v1.2.1
–Last minute bugfix for Nexus One problems with “Home Screen Shortcuts” picker

v1.2
–Major backend re-write & cleanup. Should make it much easier for me to add new alarm-specific features
–Backup & Restore alarms to/from SD card
–New snooze dialog with 2 different dismiss options (“Dismiss Alarm” and “Dismiss & Kill App”)
–The “Stop App on Dismiss/Timeout” has been changed to just “Stop App on Timeout” (since you now have a choice of how to dismiss on the snooze screen). Most folks will probably want to leave this option unchecked unless you’re worried about your alarm going off when you’re not there.
–The basic network test is now included in the Lite version (wifi & volume control is still pro-only)
–Attempted bugfix for using the battery timeout when the phone is plugged in and fully charged

v1.1.7.4
–bugfix for cupcake cause I broke the pro version in v1.1.7.3 (sorry)

v1.1.6.3 & 1.1.7.3
–bugfix for random flashing lights
–(PRO) Experimental Google Listen support

v1.1.6.2 & 1.1.7.2
–bugfix for folks who experienced too many “next alarm set” notifications. These were occuring because the android system broadcast ACTION_TIME_SET happens way too often on certain phones, which causes AppAlarm to reset its next alarm. The alarm is still being set in this update, it’s just been silenced (same goes for the alarm reset on boot)

v1.1.6.1 & 1.1.7.1
–Bugfix for Cupcake users (released before the two week pro-exclusive was up, so had to make new version numbers)

v1.1.7 (Pro exclusive for 2 weeks)
–Bugfixes from v1.1.6
–New App Selection Option: Create Shortcut
just like long-pressing on an empty part of the home screen and choosing “Shortcuts”
enables compatibility with music playlists
–New App Selection Option: Home Screen Shortcus
allows you to pick from a list of your existing shortcuts on your home screen
enables compatibility with Streamfurious Pro http://drdmkt.com/16u – First open Streamfurions Pro, long press your desired stream (doesn’t work with podcasts), and tap “Create Shortcut.” Then open AppAlarm, tap “App To Launch,” then “Home Screen Shortcuts” and find the Streamfurious shortcut you just created (it will be the name of the station you selected).
–New AlarmList Long-Press item: Copy Alarm
Long-press on an alarm in the alarm list to make a copy of it. The copy will be disabled. Please make sure not to have 2 alarms enabled for the same time of the same day.
–New AlarmList Long-Press item: Test Alarm
Launches the full alarm procedure as if it had just gone off (except it wont disable a non-repeating alarm). Useful for testing out the compatibility of custom intents.
–Direct Dial option has been removed from the App Selection menu as it is now supported via the “Create Shortcut” option.
–Custom intents using URI_INTENT_SCHEME are now supported. If the Data field of your custom intent starts with “intent:” or contains “#Intent” then the Action and Type fields are ignored and the URI_INTENT_SCHEME is assumed (also, the Action field becomes a label for the app). To see this in action, try selecting a Home Screen Shortcut, then long-press on “App to Launch” and tap “Edit Custom Intent”
–Added “Share Custom Intent” feature. This allows you to share the custom intent you created (or selected via the Create Shortcut/Home Screen Shortcuts options) as a simple link that is then readable by any Android phone with AppAlarm installed. The link that is generated is very long, so AppAlarm will automatically try to shorten it with Bit.ly. To share your custom intent, open the alarm and long-press “App to Launch” (or press the MENU button). This feature was created as an early attempt to support Streamfurious Pro (before I figured out how to read shortcuts from the home screen). I’m not sure how useful people will find this, but it seemed interesting enough to leave in for now. There is also a VERY BETA web app to build intents from your PC and create AppAlarm compatible links. You’re welcome to play with it if you’d like, but it will not be officially supported just yet. http://episode6.com/ibuilder.

v1.1.6 (LITE only, bugfix release)
–Fixed backup ringtone FC issue on Android 2.0+
–Fixed Timezone changed bug

v1.1.5 (Xmas day release, all updates are for both LITE and Pro versions)
–Added “Stop When Done” option to force close the launched app when you dismiss the alarm. It seems to work perfectly with Pandora in my tests but it causes problems with Slacker. READ THE WARNING
–Tweaked the auto-show snooze timing, this should prevent it from interfering with the app that is launching. If you depend on your phone to wake you up in the morning, it might still be safer to set a backup alarm (with the stock alarm clock app) for a few minutes later than your AppAlarm, just to be safe, until you are confident that this feature works.
–You can now un-snooze the alarm, which will restart the alarm service timeout (it acts just like the snooze time ended)
–Added an automatic force-close to pandora (if that’s the app you’re launching) before launching the alarm. This resets Pandora in case you left it paused the last time you used it. I did not include the same check for Slacker because force closing Slacker seemed to have ill effects in my tests (it doesn’t seem quite as robust as pandora in its current form).

v1.1.4 (LITE update only)
–Fixed bug that prevented the LITE version from appearing on the Market for certain devices.

v1.1.3
–Added ability to choose which Pandora Radio station to launch

v1.1.2
–Fixed bug in Mute-Snooze

v1.1.1
–Added Mute-Snooze Feature (required a new permission DISABLE_KEYGUARD)

v1.0.4
–Fixed “Test” button in the custom intent chooser

v1.0.3
–Add option to direct dial at user request. When the dial intent is used, the speakerphone is turned on and in-call volume is set to it’s max level.

v1.0.2
–Added support for small screens
–Synced version numbers

v1.0.1 (LITE update only)
–Added option to stop nagging

v1.0
–Initial release

Screenshots:

NYC Bus & Subway Maps offers something very simple, yet invaluable to both native and tourist alike. Complete offline access to the official MTA Subway and Bus Maps for all five boroughs of New York City. A return to it’s original no-frills design, NYC Bus & Subway Maps is an app you can count on working when you need it most. When you first launch the app, you won’t have any map’s available, but all you have to do is click the “Download Maps Now” button and select as many or as few as you want and download them all at once. No more hoping you remembered to save that BX Bus map when you’re already on the train!

Some of you may be wondering… “Hey, didn’t that app used to be called NYCM-”   STOP!    …  that was a long time ago and we shant speak of it (more like we’ve been advised not to by hoards of lawyers).

Features Include:
- Multi-Touch pinch-to-zoom where supported, or double-tap to zoom in, tap the zoom-out button to zoom out
- Batch download multiple maps in the background
- Quick links to the MTA’s online route details
- Create custom home screen shortcuts to any map or quick-link
- Choose where to save you map tiles (defaults to SD Card)

Screenshots:

Word of Mouth shows you a list of all the Third-Party apps installed on your device and lets you create and share a unique and short URL for each app. This link (which points to drdmkt.com) will open up the Android Market directly to the specified app, when it is accessed from the android browser. When accessed from a PC however, the link will forward to cyrket.com allowing the user to view the app description and comments. Cyrket also provides a barcode for each app which the user can scan to open the market to the specified app page. The current version of Word of Mouth also allows you select multiple apps at once and create one single link for all of them (example: http://drdmkt.com/4k_2_3_1).

It’s an app that I started writing after seeing a friend of mine who had just gotten his first Android phone. He had not seen all of the awesome stuff that the market had available and I wanted to show him some of the apps that I know and love. Everything went fine while he was physically there and I could show him where to go and what to search for, but after he left I realized I had forgotton to mention one of my absolute favorite apps. Thats when I realized that there was no easy way to send someone a link to an app.

I have no idea wheher Word of Mouth will take off or not, but I’m hoping it will be beneficial to both users and developers by giving people a way to spread the word about quality apps. Honestly, this type of linking should really just be a feature in the Market itself, but it’s not, so I built it.

Screenshots:

Very simple utility, when launched from the app drawer it will force close the Home Screen. Useful for when the home screen locks up, just pull up the drawer and launch 1Kill.

v2.0 adds ability to create home screen shortcuts to kill a single other app. Long-press an empty space on Home Screen -> Shortcuts -> 1Kill Shortcut

Screenshots:

Attention: if you have Android 2.0 or higher, then take a look at Dialer One instead (http://drdmkt.com/1kr). I have to admit, it bests SuperDial in just about every aspect, and I don’t have the time to bring my little app up to speed. I wont take SuperDial off the market but I wont be actively supporting it either.

SuperDial is a simple, quick (mostly) and clean replacement for the standard Android Dialer application. It displays your call log when launched and allows you to search through your contacts via the custom on-screen T9 kepypad. It has lots of customizable options including one to display contact photos while searching (although this slows down the app significantly at the moment).

While SuperDial is not yet a polished and finished product, I’ve been personally using it for several months and I find it invaluable (ok, so maybe I’m a little biased). Some people love it, some people hate it, but try it out and make your own decision.

Screenshots:

This was my 2nd app. It was created solely because someone asked for it and it seemed like a good idea. We’re like that here at episode6. Send in an idea, and if it’s possible and seems interesting enough, we might just build it. Now time is limited, and there are quite a few different projects I’m working on that are a little more exciting. But I’m hoping to be able to come out with a whole series of useful transit maps, since they are fairly cheap and easy to make, and exceedingly useful. Simple transit maps will always be free.

Here’s how it works:
When you run the app for the first time an image of the mta map is downloaded to your phone’s SD card. After that, you can access the map anytime, anywhere.

-Drag your finger on the map to scroll.
-Tap anywhere to zoom in.

Screenshots