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Research In Motion
has launched a new update to the Twitter for BlackBerry application that adds new features such as geotagging and more.
RIM announced the beta release of Twitter for BlackBerry 1.1 on Feb. 22 with new features-including geotagging, which allows users to identify their location with their tweets; new language support, including Polish and Czech; cleaner interfaces; new notifications and other tweaks. Twitter for BlackBerry smartphones v1.1 is a beta download available through BlackBerry Beta Zone (www.blackberry.com/beta).
The popularity of Twitter has not been lost on the BlackBerry, as the Twitter for BlackBerry application has been downloaded more than 10 million times, RIM officials said.
Among the other new features in version 1.1 are Social Feeds integration and “retweet” updates. Social Feeds integration enables deeper integration with Social Feeds and allows users to perform Twitter actions right from Social Feeds, without launching the application. With retweet updates, retweets now appear in the Home timeline with a tag of “retweeted by you,” quickly alerting users that a retweet has been sent.
In addition, Twitter for BlackBerry 1.1 features @mention Push Notifications, where users are now alerted with push notifications to the ribbon when they have @mentions, helping users quickly reply to @mentions. Another new feature is #Topic Autocomplete. The way this works is that when users include a hashtag in their tweet, a dropdown list of key words will be presented based on previously used #topics.
Meanwhile, Direct Messages has been renamed “Messages.” Direct messages are now threaded in the style of BlackBerry Messenger conversations. Related messages are grouped together, making the direct message area less cluttered. Also, there is new gesture support for users with touch-screen BlackBerries. BlackBerry users with a touch-screen device can now refresh page content by simply dragging a finger down the device screen and releasing it.
Twitter for BlackBerry 1.1 runs on BlackBerry Device Software 4.5 or higher and requires a data plan.