You know what sucks about the iPhone? If you said the walled-garden approach to applications, you're correct. If you said "Apple's fanatical devotion to industrial design," you're less correct. If you said, "dealing with the steaming pile of masticated vegetable matter and half-cooked industrial byproduct that is iTunes every time I want to add something to my iPhone or remove that thing from my iPhone," you win! And the prize is an Android phone, which, if you're reading this, you probably already own. If not, go get one. We'll wait.
There are many ways to get data to and from your Android device without ever doing something so gauche as attaching it to your computer with a USB cable. Apps like WinAmp and DoubleTwist AirSync allow you to sync music over WiFi, to say nothing of more advanced apps that let you ssh or FTP into your phone. I'm currently digging on Titanium Media Sync, from the fine folks who brought you Titanium Backup.
Titanium Media Sync, like the previously-covered Epistle, is a simple app that leverages Dropbox to make your phone more awesome. You use Titanium Media Sync to pair folders on your SD card or internal storage with folders in your Dropbox. When Titanium Media Sync detects a change in one of the watched folders on your phone, it mirrors that change to the remote folder, i.e. the one on your Dropbox.
This means you now have one or more folders that will auto-upload their contents to your Dropbox. For example, if you pair the DCIM folder on your phone, any photo you take will be automatically uploaded to Dropbox and therefore available anywhere Dropbox is: your home computer, the Web, or your tablet.
Taking screenshots on most Android phones is a notorious pain in the behind, requiring either root access or use of a computer running the Developer's Kit.
I use ShootMe, which requires root access, to take screenshots on my Droid Incredible. Pairing my sdcard\ShootMe folder enables me to auto-upload screenshots to my Dropbox as they're taken. That's where all the screenshots in this story came from. George tells me that Windows Phone 7 lets you take screenshots and automatically upload them to Live, which just seems unfair.
Getting screenshots off your phone and into Dropbox is easy with Titanium Media Sync
Since you can pair any folder on your phone, the possibilities extend further than just uploading photos and screenshots. Upload your nandroid backups! Videos! Whatever!
Titanium Media Sync's continuous phone-to-Dropbox syncing is one-way, but it also offers one-shot Dropbox-to-phone syncing. Given that the Dropbox app lets you download files to your phone's local storage at will, I don't mind that limitation. You can choose whether to allow syncing via 3G, 4G, WiFi, or any, and whether to upload when on battery power or only while charging.
Titanium Media Sync is around $2.99 from the Android Market. What cool uses have you found for it?
Titanium Media Sync Market Link
