TapTapDial makes phoning and driving safer

Unless you have voice recognition and Bluetooth in your car, dialing any cellphone can be dangerous to your health. It's truly frightening to see great numbers of commuters fooling around with their phones while trying to drive. Driving is tough enough these days without the distractions; without any tactile feedback on the iPhone, it's especially challenging to operate while in motion.

All the more reason for us to take a look at TapTapDial [App Store link]. This $0.99US app makes it easy to dial without looking at your phone and it provides voice, audio, and on screen confirmations, but don't look at that screen!

Describing how to use the app is a lot more difficult than just using it. You can add favorites from your phone book, and the app assigns them a number. If you want to call someone who is in position 3, you tap 3 times. The app will respond audibly with the initials of the person you are calling as a double check. It also will say if the favorite is a home, office, or cell number.

If your list is really long, you can tap on the right side of the screen to go through your list in increments of ten, so if you wanted to call person 31, you would tap 3 times on the right, and once on the left. If you make a mistake, simple swipes left, right, up, or down will move you around your list and provide other navigation functions inside the app. Once you have the person you want, a swipe up or down initiates the call.

You can even dial numbers that aren't in your address book, by tapping on the lower half of the screen. 6 taps dials 6, 3 taps dials 3, and soon. I think this feature is better for the vision impaired. Keeping track of all those taps while driving is probably not a good idea.

This is a clever and needed app that is, as I said, much easier to use than to explain. Some people will get quite addicted to it, and it will certainly result in safer roads and highways. I'd just make sure you have the app up and running before you get in the car, otherwise you'll be doing something dangerous just to get it up and running.

I don't really have any suggestions for the app, other than I think the GUI is not very attractive or contemporary to my eyes. Of course, if you're using the app correctly, you're not looking at it anyway.

Here are some screen shots of TapTapDial in action:

TapTapDial

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Source: http://www.cookwareinc.com/TapTapDial/

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iPhone App Store App Review

Unless you have voice recognition and Bluetooth in your car, dialing any cellphone can be dangerous to your health. It's truly frightening...

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nayeem43

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June 25 2009 at 12:27 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Maddy

I don't really have any suggestions for the app, other than I think the GUI is not very attractive or contemporary to my eyes.

May 18 2009 at 3:19 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Whosthatrandom

It doesn't much matter if you're looking at the screen or not, it's highly irresponsible to focus your hands and mind away from the road. Although I suppose things are slightly different in the US compared to the UK (and Europe); you don't have to change gears and most of your roads are straight and deserted. Which is why texting, dialing, eating food etc. is illegal in the UK if it distracts your attention away from the road, but not in the US.

May 17 2009 at 7:26 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

MIchael

why not just show a video of how this works?

wouldn't that help us figure it out?

May 17 2009 at 4:36 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

David Tyler

This application should also do a GPS lookup and send an SMS to the police to alert them to the dangerous idiot who is trying to dial a telephone and drive at the same time.
How the idea that "some people will get quite addicted to it" will "certainly result in safer roads and highways" baffles me.

May 17 2009 at 3:51 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Luna Lovegood

"[I]f you wanted to call person 31, you would tap 3 times on the right, and once on the left."

And I'm supposed to remember who's in the list at #31 and #25 and #9 and so forth?

"If you make a mistake, simple swipes left, right, up, or down will move you around your list and provide other navigation functions inside the app."

Better put AAA in the #1 spot on your list because taking your eyes off the road to engage in all this swiping and "other navigation" will probably cause an accident.

This app is ridiculous.

May 17 2009 at 12:50 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Mike

Shuffle Dialer is a much easier way to dial while you're driving! ;) Not that I encourage driving while talking on the phone.

http://iTunes.com/apps/shuffledialer/

May 16 2009 at 11:46 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

EH1

Doesn't matter how you dial. Talking on the phone while driving is every bit as bad as doing so drunk, as shown by study after study. Anyone who does so is a dangerous moron. Period.

May 16 2009 at 8:53 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

4 replies to EH1's comment

kduerr

We went with a similar concept on Easy Dials It. For those times when you need it to be dead simple to dial a favorite with one hand (like when you're driving). We also thought there could be plenty of times when speech recognition might be impractical. Double tap to call, tilt to change contacts, and a host of other features.

Check it out:
http://www.riverturn.com/iphone/

May 16 2009 at 6:15 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

robogobo

or you could just pull over.

May 16 2009 at 4:47 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply