Glympse

Editors' ReviewDownload.com staffNovember 26, 2011Glympse is a brilliantly conceived mobile application that lets you share your real-time location via SMS, email, Twitter, or Facebook. It's a useful, easy-to-use tool that doesn't require you to sign up, create any profiles, or invite contacts.Imagine asking a friend to meet you at a new restaurant in your neighborhood. With Glympse, you wouldn't text her the address; you'd merely send her a Glympse of your current location, and with a tap on her screen, she'd navigate her way there. Or if you're not yet at the restaurant, you might send her a Glympse showing it on a map, as well as your real-time location as you make your way there. There are so many possibilities with such a powerful, location-aware application.The Glympse app is clean and refreshingly simple to use. To get started, launch the app, hit Menu, then Send a Glympse. Next, input a phone number or e-mail, or choose to share a Glympse with Facebook or Twitter. Set the duration (anywhere from 10 minutes to 4 hours). And that's it. For the allotted time frame, your contact(s) will be able to view your real-time location on a map, from a mobile device or desktop browser. If you're on the move, you can also input your destination, so your contact can see where you're headed.For those who routinely use Glympse to transmit a location (e.g., children with eagle-eyed parents), the app includes a nice Favorite feature, which saves the recipient(s) of your Glympse, duration, and destination, all for easy sending later. The app also comes with an optional home-screen widget, which puts Favorites, Glympse History, and Send Glympse functionality right on your home screen.One thing users should know is that Glympse eats battery life voraciously. But considering it continuously transmits real-time information, that should be expected.Overall, we think Glympse is an incredibly useful download that has the potential to become incorporated into many of our daily routines. Try it out for yourself, and see if you and your friends start saying, "just Glympse me."