We can thank Apple for the massive boom in awareness and availability of apps for smartphones. The Apple App Store has been a runaway sales success and has spawned a litany of competing offerings from other smartphone makers.

According to research firm ABI Research the future of smartphone and mobile applications lies in cloud computing. The research firm says that a new architecture for cloud-based apps will change the way the apps are developed, acquired, and used. ABI figures that the market for could-based apps will reach $20 million annually by 2014.

With the poor economy and the soaring popularity of cheap netbooks, it’s become normal for new machines to be introduced frequently. Many of the netbooks on the market are from big name makers like Dell, HP, Asus, and MSI. However, even smaller and lesser known computer firms are getting in on the netbook action like Cherrypal.

The Cherrypal Bing is a 10.2-inch netbook offering a screen resolution of 1024 x 768 with 160GB of storage, Intel Atom N270, 160Gb HDD, Wi-Fi, and a webcam. Sounds just like all the other 10-inch netbooks on the market right?

Google today has announced the roll out of a much anticipated feature for the online Google Docs - bringing them offline. Starting today a select group of individuals that have Google Gears will be able to save their online Google documents and have them available offline as well.

The online Google tools currently provide a great convenience with things like Gmail, calendars and online documents with centrally located storage that can be accessed from almost any browser with an internet connection. One of the downsides is that as soon as the internet connection is lost, so are the documents, email, etc. With this new feature, the documents will still be available through the browser when the internet connection is lost and it will continue to save changes, syncing up with the online storage the next time a connection is available.