Take a trip with tech

Don't know how to get through a holiday without going incommunicado or wanting to stomp on that infernally heavy laptop that you just had to bring with you to update your Facebook status? Sowmya Rajaram spoke to experts to figure out how to make technology work for your vacation, instead of the other way round

Technology today is ubiquitous. So, whether you like it or not, it's hard to disconnect from the many temptations of your phone, blogs and social networks, not to mention the thrill of games the pimped-up app stores across platforms have to offer, even when you are on vacation. Of course, with that comes the perennial curse of always being connected and available, of having to lug around wires, cables and weight, and more importantly, knowing what to carry and what to ditch. Read on to find help with all of that.

Gadget backpack
Fishing in and out of your clothes, lotions and shoes everytime you want to find a gadget or an accessory is best avoided, especially if you are going to be moving a lot of hotel rooms or locations, because it increases your chances of misplacing something important. A sturdy backpack with lots of compartments keeps all your digital load organised in one spot while saving you the trouble of worrying about security.

Expert speak:
Deepak Ajwani, Editor, (Media and entertainment), Director-Online, Forbes India "Especially if you are on a business trip, your crisply-ironed garments will go for a toss if you are constantly digging into your bag. Samsonite and Jansport make some great backpacks that have enough compartments to keep all your gadgets and wires safely zipped and locked up."

World Travel Charger
This is an absolute must if you don't want to be looking for tangled wires to charge your gadgets every other hour -- which is a real possibility when you are likely to be digitally loaded. A travel charger with a six-seven port adaptor is really useful because it keeps all of your power-hungry batteries charged at one spot, making life infinitely simpler.

Expert speak:
Nikhil Kumar Verma, Product Manager, Pinstorm
"I'd recommend the world travel chargers by Samsonite and Belkin. The Canon DSLR battery grip attaches to the camera body through the camera's own battery compartment and provides a cassette to hold additional batteries to increase the battery life for the camera."

Apps
For iPhone
Worldmate tracks and syncs flight information and any changes/cancellations in reservations from your email inbox and alerts you, as well as updating the time when you travel across zones. This really helped people who were stuck abroad when their flights were grounded due to the volcanic ash recently.
Word Lens is an app that lets you take a picture of some text, say a signboard in a foreign language, and translates it for you. Super useful when you don't know the language.

For Android devices
Where is a free app that uses your location to give you real-time information on fuel stations, weather forecasts, movie timings, restaurant listings, traffic conditions, and news headlines. It also lets you browse the Yellow Pages and the Yelp directory. Google Goggles is a visual search application that can recognise places and objects without any manual typing and searching. Just fire up the app and point your camera at the object.

Smartphone
This one's a no-brainer, whether you're headed on a business trip or a poolside vacation. A smartphone with a big screen and a decent battery life can double up as an e-book reader, a GPS navigator, a scheduler, alarm clock...you name it. It can help you kill time with games, music, videos, in addition to enhancing your holiday with apps that do the work from you -- from syncing flight itineraries to locating entertainment, as well as doubling up as the device that lets you surf the Internet (if you really must). Just download the Kindle app on your smartphone and you are set for hours of in-flight reading, while Angry Birds is a great way to blow off steam in a long waiting line. Need we say more?