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CoolNote: Amazing home screen notes for Android

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It's rare you come across something genuinely new in the glitzy world of high-end smartphones, but every now and again something does pop up with a great big lightbulb "aha!" moment as you realise you've genuinely just stumbled across something not seen before. Usually our old friend Mr. Hindsight then shows his mug saying it was obvious all along, but if so why wasn't it done before?

Take CoolNote for Android for example. Jostling amongst the 20+ (I gave up counting past then) note taking apps already on the Android Market, I saw this new kid on the block's ads and thought it was just a mockup - the kind of representation the video game business is notorious for. They showed what appeared to be hand-written memo notes stuck on the Android home screen. Nice, but what does the app look like? That's the kicker - these notes *are* the app. These are not mockups - you type whatever you want in them and they're drawn exactly as shown on the home screen but with your text. None of the other note apps that I could find did this. And its so damn obvious - you pull out your phone, check the note without even having to run an app.

 

Stick it on your Home Screen

The app is deceptively powerful: a quick play soon convinces you there's a lot more going on than merely sticking a big yellow note on your phone.

 

 

 

For a start it doesn't have to be big, nor the yellow memo pad you see here. When you choose to add the widget, you're offered large or small - the large one taking up all the screen (when in portrait) apart from space for a row of 4 icons. Choosing small allows you to add several to the screen, it looks like 4 will fit, with space left over for a few more regular icons too. There are 3 preset backgrounds of which the yellow memo pad is the default, the others being crumpled and parchment which both appear exactly as described. Similarly the fonts - again 3 presets, felt tip, casual and memo, the default being felt tip. So the act of adding a widget, tapping it, entering some text and tapping the ok icon produces blue felt tip text on a yellow memo pad, which I must say looks pretty cute before any customisation has even started.