Pack your apps

Plan your trip
TripIt, a free app for iOS and Android devices, organises your flight and hotel reservations. All you need to do is forward the confirmation email from the airline to plans@tripit.com, and the details will be logged into your TripIt app. If you enter hotel details as well, TripIt will map the route from the airport to the hotel. The app also tracks flight details.

Another app similar to TripIt is Kayak, which you can use to book flights and hotel rooms, as well as rent cars. Like TripIt, you can also forward your flight and hotel reservation emails to Kayak so as to organise your itinerary better.

While Kayak has a lot of handy features, its database of hotels is rather limited for places in India. You could try out the Trip Advisor (iOS, Android/Free) app instead for this. The added advantage is that you will also get access to user feedback to these places.

Take photos
Instagram adds an extra level of mood to photos clicked on your camera phone by adding filter effects, making it a must-have on your trips. The Android version of the app was released a few months ago, just before it was acquired by Facebook.

While photos are great, they aren’t as immersive as panoramas. A 360-degree view of a monument or picturesque landscape makes for great memories to show off to your friends back home. Microsoft’s Photosynth is an excellent free app to get this done for iPhone and Windows Phone users. You can also post the photos to Facebook or Twitter from within the app. 

If you are an Android or iPad user, you can download the 360 Panorama app for $1. It pretty much accomplishes the same objective. All you need to do is start the camera and move slowly on the spot 360 degrees. The app does the rest.
If you like sending postcards from your trips, then there are a handful of apps to help you out. Touchnote and Postagram are among the most popular apps in this category. The apps themselves are free, but they charge $1-$2 for printing and posting the postcards.

Translate
You are in a foreign country where they don’t speak English, and are wondering what that street sign means. Just open Word Lens, which starts the camera on your phone. The app then recognises the text and provides real-time translation. The app currently supports Spanish, French, and Italian languages. Each language app costs $4.99.

Google has also added an additional feature to its Translate app: You to click a picture and it translates only the highlighted portion. It is not in real-time like Word Lens, but at least the app is free, and supports 64 languages. Another Google app called Goggles offers the same functionality. But unlike Word Lens, both these apps need an active data connection, which, while roaming, can cost you a fair amount of money.