Software That Takes Advantage of Hardware Sensors

So the newer smartphones come with innovative sensors, but so far there hasn’t been a lot of applications that fully utilize the hardware. While the number of applications for Windows Mobile that integrate the GPS and the various sensors–like the accelerometer–isn’t nearly as plentiful as the iPhone, independent developers are starting to showcase their development efforts, which should be commended for since the sensors aren’t natively supported yet by Windows Mobile 6.1 and HTC hasn’t released the SDKs for those sensors. There is a complete list of mostly free, downloadable applications on WMPowerUser if you’re interested in fun, small applications that exploit the use of the accelerometer.

A couple videos of some of those applications are posted below to give you an idea of what is possible.

My favorite: Navtris, shown in the video below, a Tetris clone that makes use of the sensors, available at XDA-Developers.

Another fun one, BeMario, allows you to become Super Mario and makes the Mario sound effects when you move your device. The demo video below shows the application on an Android G1:

And finally, in the spirit of the Holidays, a snow globe adds some winter cheer.

These are all fun little applications that don’t require hardware directional pads to navigate.

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