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Features

• Location-based services: Are they there yet?

  Mobile users are more connected to the Internet than ever. As of December 2011, ComScore estimated that there are 97.9 million smartphone users in the US - nearly a third of the total population.

• The future of the $200 tablet

  Spending $150 to $200 on a tablet won't get you much these days: In most cases, you're looking at an off-brand Android product with a single-core processor, barely any RAM and a low-resolution, low-quality display. Depending on the device, you might not even have access to Google's app market or other basic services -- and while that approach may work with retailer-backed, limited-use products like Amazon's Kindle Fire, when it comes to more traditional Androidtablets, it doesn't usually lead to the best user experience.

• Open for business: It's the year of the corporate app store

  With more employees using smartphones and tablets for business, enterprises are setting up their own app stores for application distribution, leveraging a consumer model for mobile application access that is tuned to the workplace. Instead of saddling already overburdened IT personnel with getting applications to individual devices, these app stores provide a central distribution mechanism for employees to download applications themselves.

• Catching the eye of Google

  Google's man in charge of acquisitions - vice-president of corporate development David Lawee - was in Auckland recently, but he was keeping quiet on whether any Kiwi businesses were on his radar.

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  In depth: Nokia's great Windows Phone hope - Beauty without brawn

  Nokia may sell more cellphones than any other company in the world, but it's been all but excluded from the United States for years -- and it's seen its global sales steadily shrink as the iPhone and Android smartphones have become the darlings of buyers in an increasing number of countries. Nokia's relevance has been fast receding, and its Symbian, Maemo, and MeeGo efforts became a pattern of failure for a company that just didn't get it. In response, a year ago, Nokia bet its future largely on Windows Phone 7, Microsoft's answer to Apple's iOS and Google's Android.

• Expert to IT pros: Adopt IPv6 soon or be sorry later

  A dozen of the world's largest Internet companies - including Facebook, Google and Comcast - have committed to June 6, as the start date for their production deployments of IPv6, an upgrade to the Internet's main communications protocol.

• 10 must-have tools for Cloud power users

  For many of us, the Cloud has changed the way we work and play. Thanks to well-known services like Gmail, Dropbox, Facebook and Instapaper, practically our whole lives - photos, documents, contacts and more - are online. So isn't it time to take control?

• Google's Ice Cream Sandwich - a new era for Android

  Google's Android 4.0 operating system is more than just another upgrade.

• What smartphones will be like in 2012

  Since the advent of the first modern smartphone--arguably the original Apple iPhone in 2007--the power of these mobile computing devices that also happen to make phone calls has advanced by leaps and bounds.

• Want Siri on your Android phone? Try these apps

  Wouldn't you like to have your very own gofer dedicated to doing all the menial tasks you hate? That's a big part of the appeal of the iPhone 4S: Siri, the voice-driven virtual assistant, turns anyone with a couple hundred bucks into a CEO attended by a full-time lackey. But can you get the same kind of slavish devotion from an Android phone?

• Technology argument 5: iPad vs. everything else

  We debated whether to call this piece "iPad vs. Motorola Xoom" or "iPad vs. Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1" or whatever the Android tablet du jour is. But really it's still "iPad vs Everything Else."

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  Mobile deathmatch: Apple iOS 5 vs. Google Android OS

  After months of hype, Apple has released iOS 5 for current iPhone 3G S and 4 owners, for iPad and iPad 2 owners, and for third- and fourth-generation iPod Touch owners. But the fact is that iOS doesn't exist in isolation. It competes with Google's Android OS, and the group of smartphones running Android now significantly outsells the iPhone. (It's a different story in tablets, where the iPad is trouncing everyone, including Android.)

• How to prepare your business for Google+

  Google+ just opened its doors to the world by enabling open signups and moving to the beta, testing phase. The nascent social network is still thin on features and ways for businesses to properly use it, but its minimalist approach has gained Google+ millions of users in a very short period.

• Patent madness! A timeline of the Android patent wars

  History may look at Android as the tech industry's Helen of Troy: The OS that launched a thousand suits.

• Video chatting for newbies

  Video chat is all the rage these days, thanks to new services such as Google+ Hangouts and Skype/Facebook integrated video chat. Video chatting is a great way to stay in touch with family and friends--seeing loved ones' faces on a computer screen is almost like actually being there.