Knot
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Daily iPhone App: Knot reminds you of tasks and gives your memory a workout
The iPhone is usually the item you have at hand when you need to make a quick note, and Knot takes advantage of this by making it as easy as possible to leave yourself a reminder -- tying the proverbial piece of string around your finger. Knot goes a step further from basic reminders by utilizing associative memory to prompt you to actually remember what you have to do. You choose where or when your phone will alert you that you have a task to accomplish, type it in and then hit the home button to close the app. When you reach the location or time of the task, Knot will remind you that you needed to do something -- it's up to your brain to supply the missing information. If you actually remember your task, acknowledge it in the app. You can cheat; Knot keeps a list of active tasks you can access at any time. But at the bottom of that list is a memory score letting you know how much you actually remember or shaming you into trying to work those memory skills. It's great for exercising your brain, but Knot is best used when you're busy and need to jot down a reminder for something that will be done in the next couple of hours, not the next few days. Knot isn't good for long-term planning or GTD gurus, but it's great for remembering those little one-off tasks that pop up during the day. Knot is US$0.99 on the App Store.
LG Chem develops very flexible cable batteries, may leave mobile devices tied up in knots
The world is no stranger to flexible batteries, but they've almost always had to be made in thin sheets -- that doesn't amount to a long running time if you're powering anything more than a watch. LG Chem has developed a flexible lithium-ion battery that's not just better-suited to our bigger gadgets but could out-do previous bendable energy packs. Researchers found that coating copper wires with nickel-tin and coiling them briefly around a rod results in a hollow anode that behaves like a very strong spring; mating that anode with a lithium-ion cell leads to a battery that works even when it's twisted up in knots. Join multiple packs together, and devices could have lithium-ion batteries that fit many shapes without compromising on their maximum deliverable power. Some hurdles remain to creating a production-grade battery, such as a tendency for the pack to shed a small amount of capacity whenever it's put under enough stress. LG Chem is fully set on turning these cable batteries into shippable technology, however, and could ultimately produce mobile devices and wearables that really do bend to their owners' every whim.
