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Gwabbit is a Microsoft Outlook add-on, and now a BlackBerry application, that helps business professionals who get the names, numbers, and e-mail addresses from a contact’s e-mail into their address book without all the tedious typing.

(Credit: Technicopia)

Gwabbit works its trade by automatically searching the signature block at the end of an e-mail and comparing that to the entries in your Outlook or BlackBerry address book. If there are discrepancies or omissions between the two, Gwabbit will launch and ask if you’d like to create a new address book entry or overwrite an existing one. Gwabbit’s edge over Outlook and BlackBerry’s native contact management systems is its proficiency in almost instantly grabbing e-mail, phone numbers, and title to create more information-rich entries than either technology’s contact-builder does alone.

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Originally posted at The Download Blog

Perhaps because the Google Android operating system is already a year old, because the Android Developer’s Challenge will be kicked off after Google’s I/O developer conference instead of before, or because the platform differences between Android 1.0 and Android 1.5 aren’t as dramatic as …

Originally posted at The Download Blog

(Credit: JBL)

Though they are portable devices, the iPod and the iPhone can make wonderful sources for headphone-free music when connected to speakers. Of course, wading through the glut of iPod-ready tabletop speakers on the market today takes patience and know-how, especially if you have an iPhone, which requires a …

Originally posted at iPod accessories

Android 1.5 on Google’s brand-new ‘Ion.’

(Credit: CNET/Photo by Stephen Shankland)

To encourage gifted developers to give iPhone programming a rest, most mobile platforms have built app stores that lure with the promise of a cash-positive distribution. But not Google. It baits with cash.

Sure, Google installs …

Originally posted at Crave

Read and filter RSS feeds, and update your social status.

(Credit: CNET/Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt)

A little over a year after Skyfire began making a splash, the Silicon Valley startup has officially released version 1.0 of its free third-party mobile browser for Windows Mobile and Symbian phones. During …

Originally posted at The Download Blog

My BlackBerry, after recovering from Wednesday's swim.

(Credit: Ina Fried/CNET)

It’s every gadget lover’s nightmare and, on Wednesday, it became my reality.

My BlackBerry went for an ever-so-brief tour of CNET’s plumbing facilities. I’m not sure how it ended up exactly where it did, but suffice it to say, it did. And, to answer the question before you ask, it was a clean bowl.

I pulled it out within a second of hearing that dreaded splash. I shook it off, dried it, and headed to my desk with a sheepish look on my face.

With a quick glance to make sure no one was looking, I googled “What to do if cell phone gets wet.”

As you may or may not know, many cell phones meet their end by visiting pools, tubs, and other reservoirs of different shapes and contents. There are so many such incidents, cell phones now have indicators that show whether they have gotten wet and are therefore ineligible for warranty replacement.

I called Verizon Wireless to see how often this happens. Although spokesman Jeffrey Nelson didn’t have any solid numbers, he said, “I do think it happens a fair amount more than people realize.”

Nelson said his own cousin has dropped his BlackBerry in the toilet twice and a Facebook friend dropped his phone in a cup of coffee this morning. (The Verizon folks also helpfully pointed me to this phone, should I really want a phone that can handle the water.)

Luckily, even some of the non-waterproof devices survive their aquatic ordeals and there is plenty of advice on the Internet about how to maximize one’s chances.

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Originally posted at Beyond Binary

Israeli start-up Waze is at the Where 2.0 conference this week showing off its service for collecting real-time traffic and driving condition data from its users. Currently running on 80,000 smartphones in Israel, Waze shows you traffic flows on highways, and unlike other traffic services, it also shows …

Originally posted at Webware

Yahoo's Java app plan.

(Credit: Yahoo Inc.)

Things were looking promising for Yahoo’s mobile repositioning. By April 1, Yahoo had a redesigned mobile Web site, a richer but similarly-featured iPhone app, and plans for a Java phone edition, of which we got to take a sneak peek. …

Originally posted at The Download Blog

(Credit: Google screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET )

It’s no secret that Google’s mobile team has been slowly rolling out features from its desktop Web mail to the mobile version of its e-mail site. A few weeks ago, visitors to Gmail.com from the iPhone or Android G1 began …

Originally posted at The Download Blog

For months, Mozilla’s mobile version of its Firefox browser has been in first alpha, then beta modes on two Maemo-run Nokia Internet Tablets that few possessed. On Friday, Fennec (as it’s been code-named) has arrived on a platform that many more testers will be able to sink their …

Originally posted at The Download Blog