...is going to change the way you write on the iPad and iPhone. This simple, elegantly turned out text editor supports Dropbox sync so your notes are always up to date. There are some quirks as you’d expect from a first release, but Hogbay Software has produced a thing of beauty. Intuitive, beautifully turned out and a joy to use, us writers now don’t need anything else. When the promised word count and search features arrive, this is going to be the app that turns the iPad (and the iPhone, at least a little bit) into the perfect writer’s foil. And currently it’s free. Bravo.

...without a pilot’s license is now possible thanks to er..Skywriting HD, a terrifically nonsensical app for the iPad which lets you write with your finger onto a beautiful blue sky above some of the world’s most recognisable landmarks. Just choose a picture, think of a message and then start writing. After a while, the electronic wind blows your words away and you can start again. Set the strength of the wind, choose your own picture background, but most of all - think about what you’d say if you really could write in letters 100 feet high...

...everything they’re saying about Star Walk is true. This wonderful iPhone app, reviewed on the IT Reviews web site here, is a triumph. Entertaining, dippable (you don’t have to spend a lot of time exploring it, you can just get in and get out) and with a clever interface that lets you get at the program’s key features without getting in the way. Everyone we’ve shown it to says: “Right, I’m buying that.” One even said: “Right, that’s enough to make me buy an iPhone.” And standing in the pub car park after an evening’s fishing, it’s a great companion while you’re waiting for someone to finish their cigarette!

...is easier than ever thanks to this great little app - VAT Pro. It’s 59p and lets you just type in an amount and then specify whether it includes or excludes VAT so that the total is broken down into with and without tax. It’s easy to change tax values so you can still use it when the UK rate goes up to - gulp - 20 per cent in the new year, and for maths dunces like me, it’s well worth the price. It comes with four rates already pre-set on the main screen but you can alter these to suit, so the app’s useful across many different countries and tax systems. And until the day we can say goodbye to sales taxes completely, it’s going to stay on the app shelf.

...is currently free from the iTunes App Store. One of the most entertaining of the iPhone’s many physics-based games, it’s worth it for the fancy feline sound effects and the eerie expressions on the cats’ faces - as if they’re caught in the headlights of a speeding truck and they just don’t care. One of three free games being rolled out this summer by Donut Games and if they’re all as bizarrely addictive as this, I’m on it.

This is note-taking up the gazumba. Now, I've just written that and don't really have a clue what it means. Yet it feels like the right description because Awesome Note is the most beautiful note taking and task management app yet for the iPhone. It reminds you of how beautiful something can be when someone can be bothered to design it - like discovering a Moleskine after years of ringbound cheapo notebooks. It lacks alarms, but as soon as they've sorted that out, this should be first app on any iPhone - especially when Apple finally lifts the lid on a Bluetooth keyboard. Oh, and did I say you can back up notes and tasks to Google Docs? Well you can. Up the gazumba indeed.

I've always been a shoot 'em up sort of guy, so this appeals to me. That and the fact that it's humorous, has great graphics and makes some very satisfying sounds. It's a Defender performalike, so you just sit back, relax and blast those lunar lunkheads out of the atmosphere as they come for earth, wave after ugly wave of them, slathering (or whatever they do on the moon) for your blood. There's a lite version so you can have some fun for free, but I reckon you'll stump up for the real thing after about five minutes of this. Right, newspaper...comfy chair...ammo? Let's go.

First in a series of regular reviews of iPhone apps and we might as well start with my favourite subject - being organised. I've tried everything, everything I tell you and have still - after thirty years - ended up with a dog's backside of a system that involves Google Calendar, the iPhone, a paper notebook and now, Put Things Off. It's the simplicity I like. You can either do something today, put it off 'till some pre-defined date in the future, or leave it sat there, dateless. The update adds a badge to the icon so you can see how far behind you are and in all, it's the gentlest of taskmasters. Oh and author Nick Cernis' musings on staying organised are a real treat.