Twitwars: Twidgit Packs A Big Punch For A “Lite” Package
Twitter has become a huge part of every day life for a lot of people. We think about it when we’re waking up, commuting to work, bored at said job, and when we get home looking to hop in on some fun with a few of the trending topics every day. We also use it to get our hands on breaking news and information that might otherwise not get out as fast as other mediums. What are the best – or best combination of – tools to satisfy your tweet-hungry needs? Over the next few weeks, we’ll go in depth with a selection of Twitter apps and run through each one’s feature set so you can decide what’s right for you.
Twidgit Lite was a great first app to review because it solves a lot of problems that most other clients don’t: it has an awesome widget. For those looking for a quick burst of blue bird overload, Twidgit is great for you. The “Lite” in its name doesn’t denote the existence of a paid version – there isn’t. Instead, it’s used to describe just how quick, small, and easy this client is.
Whether you have a small timeline that can easily be checked in a few minutes or if you want to get a quick tweet out without having to hunker down and navigate through a particular app, Twidgit will prove very useful and convenient for casual use.
The Widget itself is your typical 3×1 home-screen overlay that will display the latest tweet since it last refreshed itself (which is customizable in the settings menu – more on that later). Along with the latest from your timeline, it has a button to jump quickly to the compose screen or to manually refresh.
Even on a smaller screen with less resolution, these buttons are very accessible and easy to press. Tapping the whole of the widget brings up an overlay that presents you with a considerable amount more. Your tweets are stacked in a scrollable view that you can navigate like you would any list.
The app is very fast in this regard, but that’s because you don’t have much to load to begin with: let’s just say you shouldn’t expect to be able to load 50 new tweets every 5 minutes. For this reason alone, it’s very unpractical for the common user that needs to go as far back in their timeline as they need to.
Also unfortunate is the inability to change this setting in the app’s rather small list of preferences. Here, you’re given the option of setting your twitter account (you can use one at a time), update frequency, and the types of notifications you want to receive.
The lite also comes in to play where you don’t get much more outside of your usual “responsive” options (retweet, favorite, reply, or direct message) on any given tweet: you can’t view a profile, you can’t change your own profile, you can’t search or click a trending topic within a tweet itself. You do get some nice composition features, however, with the ability to shrink links and add pictures at the touch of a button.
If you’re looking for more, though, then you’ll want to keep looking. It’s almost impossible for me to knock Twidgit Lite on ANY of its lack of features being that it’s what the app was designed to do: cut out out all the fluff and provide a quick, painless way to send out a tweet or check out a few from your timeline. There are very few flaws in what it does present, though, but I did have the occasional force close (to be fair, this might be because I tried to delete the Twidgit widget from my home-screen while the app was running).
The Pros:
- Very lightweight client, clocking in at 479kb
- Loads very fast in both downloading tweets and app performance
- Easy to use and non-obtrusive so you can get to your tweets faster
The Cons:
- The home-screen widget could show a tad bit more information, ala HTC Peep
- To the previous point, more widget size options would’ve been a welcome addition for a possible paid version
The Bottom Line:
This is the app you want if you don’t use Twitter much. The exclusion of lists, trending topics and searches, profile option and more would be deal-breakers for some, but this app was never intended to be used by those people. Even with that, it’s a great companion to a more full-fleshed Twitter app that is worth keeping on your home-screen whenever you need to get a quick blurb out and don’t want to have to deal with the bloat of another app. Its relatively small footprint on your phone still packs a ton of features that will suffice for your “lite” twitter needs.
—
Be sure to check back frequently as we’ll be bringing you more reviews of some of the premier twitter apps that the Android market has to offer. If there’s a review for an app you want to see in particular, let it be known in the comments below!
Also, be sure to follow me on Twitter if you haven’t already.