Not all good apps have dazzling interfaces. Some score purely because they are so darned handy. Today in History is one such app that history buffs will love.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” George Santayana said famously. Well, if you are using the app we are recommending today, it is a fair chance that no matter whatever you forget, it certainly will not be the past. As its name indicates, the app is dedicated to telling you what happened on a particular day. So you get a list of people who were born on that day, passed away on that day and of course, notable events that occurred on that day as well as holidays and religious observances. But just lists would be sort of boring, so there are a few spins on this.
So for instance, you can click on a particular event to get details of it – generally in the form of a Wikipedia article, within the app itself, although you you can view it in a browser too if you wish. There are sharing options over Twitter, Facebook and e-mail. You can even add your own events if you are a registered user, and also mark events as favourites, and choose to share them only with a select circle of your friends. And heck, if you do not want to get tied down to dates, you can even search for people and events and see the important dates relevant to them. It is all perfectly simple, with a plain interface and best of all, it works just fine.
Yes, we wish there were a few more bells and whistles – links to more than just Wikipedia would have helped, as would some multimedia. But even without them, this is a simple, fun app for those who love trivia and history. It costs $1.9900, a snappy download at around 11MB, works fast – even works offline, if do not mind missing out on the Wikipedia links (you need a working Internet connection for that). And it works just as well on the iPad and iPhone – although we found it more handy to use on the iPhone, simply because this is one of those apps that you just wish to pull out and use when you are feeling a bit dull, and are not upto playing a game. It does not even gobble too much bandwidth.
Download it if you are the type that loves useful, no-frills apps. Even if you are not too fond of history. You might just start liking it. Santayana had a point.
Get it from: iTunes App Store
Works with: iOS devices
