There are tons of things that major smartphone makers try to attract a consumer's attention with. That process usually involves quite a lot of bragging: how gynormous of a screen the company's product has, how incredibly long its battery will last on a single charge, how astonishingly good are the photos that it takes, among other hyperbole-rich statements. In addition, often there are exclusive apps and features bundled, which is another trick for manufacturers to make a buyer pick their smartphone instead of the competitor's offering. Some of these apps and features are just useless gimmicks, but others can be quite useful.And you know what, just because a company is launching a product with exclusive features, that doesn't mean that alternative apps haven't been already made. In fact, that is what we have collected today: a handful of Android apps that emulate the functionality of features that companies like to brag with. Go ahead and check them out in the slideshow below, and as always, drop us a line in the comments in case you know any apps that should have been on our list.
Touted smartphone features and their alternatives
1. Motorola Smartactions
Motorola Smartactions is an app made for experienced Adnroid users who wish to have better control over their smartphone. It can be set to do things when an event is triggered or at a specific time - switch your phone to silent, turn off Wi-Fi, turn on Bluetooth, and so on. However, you can do the same things with apps like Llama, AutomateIt, or Locale. Moreover, these three apps are capable of using your location as a trigger, so settings can be tweaked automatically depending on where you are.
2. Samsung Smart Stay
Smart Stay is a feature that Samsung introduced with the Galaxy S III. Basically, it uses the front-facing camera of the device to detect whether you are looking at the screen or not. If you are, the screen timeout is bypassed and the display remains on. If not, it gets shut down. SmartStay Ex and ISeeYou for Android can do the same thing.
3. Nokia Transport
Nokia Transport is a Lumia exclusive app that is quite useful if you commute using public transportation. It can provide information about the subway, buses, trams and trolleys in over 500 major cities. Thankfully, there is an Android app called Öffi that can be used as an alternative, as long as you are in one of the cities where it works.
4. Samsung Popup Play
Samsung Pop up Play allows videos stored locally to be displayed in a window. That way, you can type a text message while watching that House M.D. episode you missed the other night. Yet you can do the same with apps like PopCorn player or Super Video, so check them out in case you find the feature useful.
6. Flip to mute
Some manufacturer UIs come with an option that allow you to mute the ringer of your smartphone with a flip. When a call is incoming, you turn the handset face-down and the ringing stops. A free app called Flip-silent can enable that too, so get it in case your smartphone does not support the aforementioned feature.
7. Burst Shot
Today's high-end Androids can take photos really, really quickly, with zero shutter lag and without shrinking them down in size. With an app like Fast Burst Shot, one can capture images in a quick succession too, albeit in lower resolution. It works on older smartphones too!
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