I am looking for suggestions for android applications that are cool and useful for my first android phone which is currently on order. I am especially hoping for several things listed below.

IRC client
XMPP client
userland SSHD that does not require getting root
good web browser
calendar app supporting caldav
podcast client
network tools (ping, traceroute, etc.)
SSH client
server monitoring (preferably using standard commands instead of a server program to show things like RAM usage load average, etc.)


Thanks.

If I was using an Android phone (which I'm not), an SSH client would certainly be one of the most valuable tools in my arsenal. I can't say that I exactly see the point of an ssh daemon/server other than for the novelty of it. What are you leaning towards?

The SSHD would be to occasionally get a client to make a ssh connection with the SOCKS proxy option (-D I believe) without actually tethering the phone (an extra $20 a month to do). It might also be used to copy files to and from the device via SFTP so I don't need the cable as often.

connectbot is the SSH client for most people I've talked to. Though I run WinMo so I haven't checked out many android apps yet.

If there aren't existent ping/tracert-type network testing tools, that might be something fun to start with (and not insanely complex).

There are apps that will do tethering for free. PDAnet is a decent option, or if you root it you can use it as a wifi hotspot (that is what I do with my Droid).

"Good web browser" would be the Android web browser.

Networking tools: those are all built in I think. You just need a shell program. But they are going to be fairly useless.

Server monitoring: There isn't a standard for that.

Thanks on the tethering and browser and network those are all useful info. The server monitoring I mean is like Server Remote on the iphone/itouch where it looks at the system load average, ram usage, uptime, and swap usage over ssh by querying procfs like cat /proc/uptime and it displays it graphically and autoupdates it every x seconds. Do you understand what I mean by standard better now?

Ah, yes. No idea if that exists on Android, but SSH clients certainly do, and things like jsch (ssh java library) work as well, so if you know what data you want you could try your hand at making your own UI.

That is a good point though I am still thinking about that, I might actually try my hand at making them in PHP though (I have heard of it being done for android). I still know no java or really any of the other languages android supports out f the box.

Perhaps I may point you to this application of mine, just for the sake of fun?

http://www.cemetech.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4153

That looks pretty cool, I hadn't seen this before, I might use that for at least monitoring from my desktop.

You can't make Android apps with PHP, only Java has SDK support, with some C/C++ support via JNI.

Although I think there are some ports of like Python and stuff, but just straight Java is a far better option even though Java kind of sucks.

The only way I can think of to do PHP would be to install a lightweight build of php5-cli and try using that on your Android device, which sound highly inefficient. I also hate the idea of Java, but I guess if that's what you gotta do, that's what you've gotta do.

I know PHP isn't supported out of the box but I have heard of ways to put PHP onto the device and actually being able to use the native javascript API from it. I will consider java but as I have never coded a single line of jave I don't really like the idea.

I agree that there's probably ways to get PHP working natively on the device, but that doesn't mean I think it's a good idea in terms of the capabilities of the device and how heavy PHP is.

If you are going to go that route just make it a website and host it on a LAMP server - that is effectively what you are going to try and force the device to run, which will suck.

yeah, but at that point you're making a webapp, and then there's no point targeting Android exclusively.

That could do most of the processing but the PHP would be interactive in a way HTTP doesn't allow on the device and it would have access to android native display code through JSON I believe it was and the Javascript API, I would not need to make repeated connections out just to run an app though for some things that is exactly what I would do as it would be easier but if I want that display code and interactiveness I will want local.