Share Files Between iOS, OS X, Windows And WP7 With AirForShare For iPhone And iPad – Download Now

With Apple’s iDevices the most popular in their respective fields and Windows by far the most-used OS, many gadget fans find themselves lost in translation. For whilst the fruit company’s philosophy is focused around a streamlined, over-the-air infrastructure, Windows is a little more bread-and butter – leaving perks such as AirPlay specific to OS X users.

A new app by BirdsCorp appears to give Windows users some respite though. AirForShare allows multiple iOS devices to wirelessly share text, links, and files not only between each other and OS X, but also between Windows computers and Windows Phone devices.

The process is a little drawn-out, with files uploaded to AirForShare’s web server for secure downloading by anyone connected to the same WLAN, but unless you’re a Mac user, there aren’t many decent alternatives out there. Free to download, and boasting a completely free service, it’s also not straddled with unwanted ads – a usual feature of anything marketed as ‘free’.

As the name implies, AirForShare is a clipboard service which provides easy sharing between otherwise incompatible devices. Before you willfully leap into the App Store and download the app, it’s important to consider that there are a few minor caveats. Files uploaded can be no larger than 5MB, so no feature-length videos or large audio files can be shared this way. In addition, files are only kept on the server for half an hour, but then again, this isn’t – and doesn’t intend to be – a long-term file storage solution; after all, there’s always Dropbox amongst the many hundreds of cloud-based services which cater to mass-storage.

As you can imagine, only compatible files can be opened once downloaded, so your .exe’s won’t open on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, but those common files such as .pdf, .jpg, .txt, .gif, and .mp3 can be shared cross-platform without any issues.

AirForShare 1.0 for iOS is free and available to download via the App Store.

Download AirForShare for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch [iTunes link]

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Turn Your Windows PC Into An AirPlay Receiver To Stream Songs From iPhone, iPad And iPod touch

The ongoing argument between Windows and OS X users as to which holds the crown is of fierce debate, with devotees from both sides quick to point out the various advantages and disadvantages of each.

Whilst Windows is the most widely-used, Apple’s iteration continues to go from strength to strength, and does have many quirks attributing to its increased popularity. AirPlay is one such feature, allowing music to be played wirelessly to compatible speakers. Thanks to a nifty little app by the name of Shairport4w though, Windows users can too stream music from their iPhone, iPad and iPad touch over a Wi-Fi connection.

A simple, small and free app, Shairport4w turns your Windows PC into an AirPlay receiver with a simple setup process that takes less than a minute. It requires Apple’s Bonjour service to be running, but as an iDevice user, you’ll probably already have iTunes installed. As iTunes relies on Bonjour, you needn’t download it separately, but if you don’t have iTunes, Shairport4w will prompt you to download the Bonjour package at first launch.

So, let’s go through the setup process.

Step 1: Download Shairport4w from sourceforge [Download Link].

Step 2: As it’s a portable utility, there’s no need to install anything. Simply extract from the .zip to the desired location and run.

Step 3: Specify a name and if you wish, password for Airport and click the ‘Set’ button. After that, you can minimize and leave it to run in the background, opening again only if you wish to change the name or password.

Step 4: Launch iTunes on any computer and your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch connected to the same wireless network. The name you set in Shairport4w will now be visible in the AirPlay menu – select it and you’re good to go!

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