Every week a few of us from team TiPb will bring you our current favorite, most fun and useful App Store apps, WebApps, jailbreak apps, even the occasional accessory, web site, or desktop app if the mood strikes us. As long as they're iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch related, they're fair game.

To see what we picked, and to tell us your pick, follow on after the break!

CaptureNotes 2 – @Alli_Flowers

Holy wow! This is not just an app – this is the ultimate in note taking. Print, type, audio – you can even add .pdf documents.

Set up different binders, each containing different notebooks. Inside each notebook, keep handwritten notes, or even typed notes. You add what you want, how you want. Mix your media. Do you need to underscore the importance of something? Flag it! Just like you would with those great little sticky flags on paper – grab the colored flag that you want from the right, and drag it into your notebook. Position it where you want.

What’s that? You aren’t a wordsmith? You can illustrate what you want, but can’t come up with the words to write? Speak the speech, I pray thee. Click the record button right there in your notebook, and embed it in the notebook with a flag for later recall.

You can change paper, too. I like graph paper in my binder. More features…Dropbox sync – who doesn’t love Dropbox sync?! And export to pdf. And the devs say they have more coming in the next update. I can’t wait!

[$1.99 - App Store link]

Icon Project – @chrisoldroyd

This week's pick is an app that is a hidden gem. If you want to put shortcuts on your home screen for a settings toggle or specific contacts from your address book, this app can do it. Yes you read that right, to turn on Bluetooth normally you have to go to Settings, General, Bluetooth and then you can turn it on. With Icon Project, you can create an icon on your desktop which will take you directly to the Bluetooth toggle page in one click!

It doesn’t stop there either, you can create all sorts of system services shortcuts as well as individual contacts from your address book. Make an icon of your wife’s contact details and drop it on your home page, one click and you are calling or sending her a text message. Icon Project makes getting things done much quicker and is a very powerful app.

[$0.99 – App Store link]

Shortmail – @Bla1ze

This week the folks from Shortmail have released their iOS client to the masses. if you’re not familiar with Shortmail it’s basically an email system but the unique thing about it is that it limits you to how much you can actually send and receive. That may not sound all that compelling but if you’re a person who often gets friends and family members complaining about the length of your emails then it’s great. As the developers describe it:

Shortmail lets you communicate with anyone who has an email address — one-to-one or as a group. Messages are limited to 500 characters, which keeps them concise and conversational. Shortmail supports push notifications, to keep you on top of important messages. And you can also have “public” and “open” conversations, to share your discussions with the world!

With the services, you also get a free email account — when using the app, it will be your Twitterhandle@shortmail.com. No attachments, no junk mail, no folder management. Just communication – with any email user, anywhere.

[Free - App Store link]

Verbs – @sethclifford

We use GTalk for IM at the office, and my entire contact list is essentially just the people at the company. It’s pretty much a dedicated chat channel for work and little else, which is fine with me, since there’s a million other ways I can communicate with people. But I still go back and forth between feeling like I need IM on my iPhone, and feeling like I don’t want anyone to bother me once I leave work.

The end of the year is usually pretty busy at NF, and this year is no different. So since I have to be more available at least in the short-term, I decided to give IM on the phone a go (again). I’d purchased Verbs a long time ago when it first came out and thought it was a great app, but didn’t really see myself using it all that much. The semi-recent (a few months is recent, right?) release of Verbs Pro as an in-app purchase made me revisit it as my needs had changed.

Ally’s already given it a spin as a pick when Pro was released so I won’t tread over the same ground. It’s a good upgrade if you like the app, because it adds push notifications and allows you to stay available for up to 7 days. I noticed this week that it really works well even when iChat is running on the desktop, and that was great, because I’ve had issues with other iOS IM clients not working properly in the past if I was logged in somewhere else. But the thing that turned me around on having IM on my phone again was my car ride yesterday.

I had somewhere to be first thing in the morning, so I was headed into the office a little late, but because Verbs kept me logged in, people were asking me questions as I drove and I was able to get them and answer them in a timely fashion. Having Siri do the heavy lifting with the voice dictation so I didn’t have to type, well, that pretty much clinched it for me right there. It’s a great looking, solid app that feels right at home on the iPhone and iPad. Short of Apple bringing iChat proper over to iOS, this is the next best thing.

[$0.99 with $4.99 in-app purchase to go Pro - App Store link]

Superman – @reneritchie

I’ve always believed a man could fly. That we were a great people, that we wished to be, that we only lacked the light to show us our way. Part of that is because Superman was the second movie I ever saw in theaters. Superman was the second poster I ever hung up in my room. Superman — a giant sized reproduction of Action Comics #1 — was one of the first comics I ever owned.

As the bright side of The World’s Finest, counterpoint to the Batman’s darkness, Superman is half of the modern American mythos. While Batman is intent of forcibly saving the world one person at a time, Superman wants to inspire us to save ourselves. While Bruce Wayne is the mask the Batman puts on to walk among normal people, Clark Kent is the true, very human face of Superman.

Opposites in almost every way but their desire for justice, they do share one very profound thing in common — both have been put into a lot of very crappy video games.

Batman’s recent Arkham series, and a handful of other titles over the years, have helped put the Dark Knight Detective on a better path. For the Man of Steel, however, most games remain as painful as a Kryptonite splinter.

Which brings us finally to Chillingo’s Superman for iPhone and iPod touch, and Superman HD for iPad. If the name sounds familiar it’s because they were or the publishers behind a lot of famous games, including Angry Birds, Cut the Rope, and some 250+ other titles. That should help frame Superman for you — it’s a decidedly casual game, very, very different from the aforementioned Arkham series of Batman titles.

It’s also beautifully done; an old school platformer vibe rendered and powered by thoroughly new school technology. You do what you’d expect to do — what anyone who ever played a classic side scroller adventure game would expect to do — and that’s a good thing. Sure, there’s room for an amazing 3D, Paul Dini-penned epic Superman game on consoles and mobiles alike, but there’s also a place for this and more of these.

And I hope we get more of them.

Cue John Williams theme

[$0.99 for iPhone - App Store link] [$2.99 for iPad - App Store link]

Ride NJT ! – Jared

Trying to figure out train times to get myself into NYC is not something I enjoy too much, and planning the return trip is usually even worse for me. Until recently I would plan my trip there, and then just hope for the best on the way back, until I stumbled upon Ride NJT, a great free app that allowed me to easily plan my trip on the go. The application is quite simple, launch it and select where I am departing and where I want to go, and it does the rest. It gives you the various train times, allows me to view the map of the path to know where I will be going, and even gives advisories about delays on any trains. Whether you travel often or occasionally this is a must have application for you.

[Free - App Store link]

BabyBump Pregnancy Pro – @llofte

That’s right folks, I’m pregnant! I used BabyBump with my first pregnancy and loved keeping up with the weekly updates on Baby’s progress. Since then, BabyBump has been updated to include daily updates, tips, and recommendations. This is fabulous! Now I have a reason to launch BabyBump every day, versus just once a week.

One of my other favorite features of BabyBump is that it displays an approximate weight and size of you baby and compares its size with a common item. For example, at 5 weeks, my baby is currently about the size of an appleseed. It also shows a countdown until your due date – only 243 more days to go!

Other features include a journal, kick counter, contractions tracker, a (non-graphic) video of birth, names search, forums, and a place to store photos. BabyBump truly is a full-featured pregnancy app. I just wish it was universal for the iPad.

[$3.99 - App Store link]

Your pick?

You're part of the team as well, so we will be choosing one reader to make a submission each week! Just look for the announcement on twitter or our Facebook page each weekend for a chance to be picked! In the meantime, jump into the comments and let us know your pick of the week!

Interesting comparison by Minimally Minimal of Apple vs. Samsung product strategies, including their current U.S. device lines. (Spoiler: 3 vs. 134). No doubt there’s a debate to be had about when both lack of and way too much choice become frustrating.

Hit the link below for more.

Source: Minimally Minimal via Daring Fireball

Official Steve Jobs biographer Walter Isaacson has given an interview to the New York Times where he reveals what Steve Jobs was going to tackle next at Apple, including television, textbooks, and photography.

He had three things that he wanted to reinvent: the television, textbooks and photography. He really wanted to take these on. I didn't go into details about these products in the book because it was implicitly Apple's creations and it's not fair to the company to reveal these details. But, he did talk about the television. He told me he'd "licked it" and once said, "There's no reason you should have all these complicated remote controls."

While an Apple television set has been rumored for a while now, and the iPad certainly seems part of a textbook plan, photography is interesting to see on the list. What about photography now is broken and in need of a Steve Jobs-style fix?

Source: NYT

MacWorld‘s Jason Snell has written up a quick way to force your local Windows or Mac iTunes library to upgrade all your songs to the 256kbps iTunes Match versions. If you’re still syncing your iPhone, iPod touch, or iPad to iTunes via USB or via the new Wi-Fi sync, it’s a quick way to get them on your device(s) as well.

While iTunes Match makes the — often higher quality — tracks available in iCloud, it keeps the local — often lower quality — track on your actual drive until you tell it otherwise. If you have thousands of tracks, that could be a long process.

Snell’s tip involves creating a Smart Playlist or two and having the courage to delete all your local versions, trusting iCloud will replace them. If that doesn’t scare you off, hit the link below and get your upgrade going fast.

Source: MacWorld

A Charlie Brown Christmas is now available in the App Store and it looks like another excellent app by Loud Crow Interactive Inc. The Charlie Brown Christmas app is an interactive book based on the 1965 Charlie Brown Christmas TV special.

“Isn’t there anyone who knows what Christmas is all about?!” Help Charlie Brown, Snoopy, and the entire Peanuts gang as they struggle to find the true meaning of Christmas. Peter Robbins, the original voice of Charlie Brown, narrates the rebirth of the 1965 animated classic as an interactive storybook complete with original dialogue and digitally remastered illustrations, animation, and music optimized for your Apple device. Play Schroeder’s piano, finger paint with the gang, go carolling with the Peanuts choir, and participate in the Spectacular Super-Colossal Neighborhood Christmas Lights and Display Contest to unlock decorations for your very own Charlie Brown Christmas Tree! With something to discover on every page, this is one interactive Peanuts adventure you won’t want to miss this holiday season!!

• Original dialogue from the 1965 animated classic
• Captivating narration by Peter Robbins, the original voice of Charlie Brown
• Charming soundtrack featuring music and sound effects from the original show
• Decorate your own Charlie Brown Christmas Tree
• Participate in the Lights and Display Contest to unlock rewards
• Educational features such as word and note highlighting to help improve reading and musical skills
• Hear individual words spoken with the tap of a finger
• Touch and drag objects to make them "spring" to life or tilt to watch them slide and move
• Objects that literally pop out of the page to delight you and your family!

A Charlie Brown Christmas costs $6.99 and is a universal binary which means it is suitable for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch.

[App Store link]

Have an app you'd love to see featured on TiPb? Email us at iosapps@tipb.com, tell us about your app (include an iTunes link), and we'll take a look.

New to iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch and curious how to set up Notification Center’s Lock Screen and privacy options? To help you juggle the opposing demands of convenience and security, Apple has provided several options for each app. This gives you some granular control over how much — or how little — glance-able information your notifications show you.

How Lock Screen info works

• If it's a single notification, you get a single popup.
• If it's multiple notifications, you get a stacked list view.
• If it's a single notification but there have been previous unread notifications, you get a single popup but can view the complete list by swiping down from the time/date bar (a small gripper icon indicates when this is possible.)
• If it's a notification along with a secondary action, for example Snooze for an alarm notification, a secondary button will also appear for that action.

You can also optionally make the LED flash go off, or set a sound/vibration as well for a Lock Screen or any notification.

Slide the icon for any notification — just like Slide to Unlock — to go directly to the app. (Sliding the icon, or sliding to unlock, clears all Lock Screen notifications.)

Lock Screen info and privacy settings

Note: Not all apps have all the options listed below.

1. The Show Preview toggle is for privacy advocates. By turning this off, you’ll no longer see a preview of the notification (which can include who sent email, tweets, iMessages, etc. and even some or all of the content). Instead, you’ll simply be alerted of a new notification waiting.
2. A Repeat Alert option lets you tell iOS to continue alerting you of the notification at two minute intervals. If you’re trying to be discreet, this can be a big problem. If you’re trying to make sure you don’t miss anything, it can be a life saver. You can set it to repeat the alert up to ten times.
3. View in Lock Screen is either your best friend or your worst nightmare. It shows your notifications even when your iPhone is asleep and locked, turning on the screen and showing you — and anyone nearby — everything coming your way. Turn this on if you don’t want to have to unlock your iPhone to see your alerts. Turn this off if you want to keep things on the low down.

Let us know how these tips worked out for you, and if you have any questions, ask them in the comments below!

Daily Tips range from beginner-level 101 to advanced-level ninjary. If you already know this tip, keep the link handy as a quick way to help a friend. If you have a tip of your own you'd like to suggest, add them to the comments or send them in to dailytips@tipb.com.

Sent is a Gmail client for iPhone that’s decidedly more native than Google’s own, still disappointing Gmail app. It also offers multiple account support. But before you get too excited it’s $4.99 and doesn’t offer push notifications (yet?). It also asks you to login to your Google account right inside the app, rather than sending you to Google’s web page for authorization. Maybe that doesn’t work for 3rd party clients, but it does work for my security paranoid brain that flinches at the thought of putting my creds into 3rd party app. The internet birthed Xauth for a reason, after all.

Whether you like the idea of a separate app for Gmail or not — and I personally don’t — it would be nice to see Google take some of their search billions — nicely fed by iOS devices, thank you! — and make the first party app a lot of people are still waiting for.

$4.99 – App Store link

Features:

• Fast
• Conversation view
• Gmail search (e.g. “before:2011/10/01 in:important has:attachment”)
• Stars and labels
• Attach photos
• Support multiple accounts
• Gmail Motion support
• Nope, just kidding

Ha. Ha. It’s not for me, but if it is for you and you try it out, let me know how it compares to Google’s app and/or web app.

Cut the Rope: Holiday Gift has been updated with a new greeting card feature that lets you add Cut the Rope clip art to your photos – including Om Nom himself!

Om Nom and I are best friends.

ZeptoLab wants to thank all you Om Nom fans out there by giving you this all new Holiday Gift featuring a great new stocking feature that magically shoots the Candy round the box. You guys rock, Happy Holidays! Oh, and shake your iPhone for a special surprise!

• New feature: Create a Photo Greeting Card with Om Nom
• The final level now has ROCKETS!
• New Om Nom animations
• Improvements for iOS5, including iCloud support
• Other minor bug fixes and optimizations

Cut the Rope: Experiments for iPhone has also been updated with new levels and iCloud support.

• 25 new levels
• New gameplay element – the Rocket
• New voice commentary from the Professor
• New photo of Om Nom in the Professor's Album
• New achievements and leaderboard – including “perfect” mark for fully completed level packs
• Optimized for iOS 5 – including iCloud support to save game data across all iOS devices

Cut the Rope: Holiday Gift is available on the iPhone and iPad for free. Cut the Rope: Experiments is available on the iPhone for $0.99.

[Holiday Gift App Store link] [Experiments for iPhone App Store link]

Have an app you’d love to see featured on TiPb? Email us at iosapps@tipb.com, tell us about your app (include an iTunes link), and we’ll take a look.

The popular productivity app Omnifocus has been updated with the ability to capture reminders created with Siri. When the app is launched, it will grab the tasks in your Reminders app and add them to your OmniFocus inbox. Location-based reminders have also been improved with this update.

Here’s the update notes:

OmniFocus 1.13 for iPhone adds the ability to capture reminders created with Siri, improves Location Reminders support, and fixes a handful of bugs.

Capturing iCloud Reminders

• OmniFocus and Siri now work together!
• Create reminders on the go with Siri. When you open OmniFocus, it will move these reminders into your OmniFocus Inbox. Please see iCloud Capture in OmniFocus Help for additional information.

Location Reminders & Map

• Fixed a bug where OmniFocus would sometimes monitor a context's location even if Location Reminders were not enabled for that context.

Miscellaneous

• Fixed a regression which caused Shake to Undo to be unavailable.
• Fixed a bug where the list of actions in Forecast mode was not resorted after an action's due date was changed.
• In Forecast mode, inbox items are now sorted above actions which share the same due date.
• Actions are now sorted by project in Context lists.
• OmniFocus populates the password field of the login prompt when possible.

Omnifocus for iPhone is available for $19.99

[App Store link]

Have an app you’d love to see featured on TiPb? Email us at iosapps@tipb.com, tell us about your app (include an iTunes link), and we’ll take a look.

Every day, TiPb gets flooded with announcements for new and updated iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps and games. So every day we pick just a few of the most interesting, the most notable, and simply the most awesome to share with you!

• Kick the Buddy Episodes: Buddy did not waste time either and prepared a surprise. Meet a cheerful Santa Claus on your roof in the new Santa Stops Here episode. Hit the Buddy with a Christmas tree or blow him up with fireworks! And you can do a lot more in this "truly Christmassy game". [$0.99 for iPhone - App Store link]

• JabMe: Now you can jab your Game Center and Facebook friends. Send jab messages with awesome sounds to your friends. It’s the world’s first app to let you message your Game Center friends. [Free for iPhone - App Store link]

• Frosty Camera: Lets you take frosty photos of your family, friends and even yourself. Apply our special photo effects and frosty frames in Real Time.Watch as Frosty Camera transforms the world around you into ICE AGE. [Free - App Store link]

• Love Injections: “Love Injections” are extraordinary ways to surprise the one you love. It stirs your creativity, to think outside the box when surprising someone. With more than 200 images and text it’s full of original ideas to express your emotions. [$1.99 for iPhone - App Store link] [$3.99 for iPad - App Store link]

• Shiny Treasure: Become the richest and most feared pirate of the seven seas in Shiny Treasure! Build guard towers and use the powers of the mysterious green pearl to protect your valuable treasure chest from evil pirate looters! A tower defense game. [Free for iPhone and iPad - App Store link]

Any other big app or game releases or updates today?

Have an app you’d love to see featured on TiPb? Email us at iosapps@tipb.com, tell us about your app (include an iTunes link), and we’ll take a look.