This morning on my oh-so-boring train trip to work, I was thinking about just how much I’ve come to rely on my iPhone for my day-to-day activities and just how big of a part it now plays in my day to day communications.

In short? I am an iPhone addict. As I’ve mentined before, sticking with the one phone for more than a couple of months is quite a big deal for me. I’ve now had my white 16GB iPhone for almost a year, and even though she’s a little worse for wear (the poor darling has a tendency to fall out of my pocket and down the nearest set of stairs every five minutes)… I don’t see myself changing phones any time soon.

Here’s a list of my six most useful iPhone applications. I was going to make it my 5 most useful iPhone apps, however, as much as I tried I couldn’t narrow the list down anymore! I haven’t included games, because, they’re not really ‘useful,’ just fun! I’ll make that list another time!

• Metlink (free)
  I could spend this paragraph whining about Melbourne’s public transport systems… but I won’t, because really… I have far better things to be doing. That’s probably why I find this little application so useful. As well as listing all the train, tram and bus timetables for Melbourne, it also has maps of the public transport network and lists of current disruptions and alterations. I think my favourite feature is the plan trip feature. It allows me to pick a start point, a finish point, and a start time, and based on that information it calculates the best way for me to get from the start point to the finish point by public transport!
• iiQuota ($3.99)
  I like this particular app because it allows me to monitor my phone and ISP usage straight from my iPhone. It shows me exactly how much of my call and data allowances I’ve currently used in an easy to read graphical format. I currently use this to monitor my 2 mobile phone accounts (one on a plan and one on prepaid) as well as my home ISP and wireless broadband. It’s so much easier to have all this information collated in one place rather than having to log into 3 or 4 different websites.
• Wikipanion (free)
  I love Wikipedia. Before I do any serious research on anything, I usually Wikipedia it first, just to get a general overview! I really like Wikipanion because as well as being faster than loading Wikipedia up with Safari, the formatting of the information is so much nicer and easier to read on the iPhone’s display.
• FlickIt (free)
  I use FlickIt to add Flickr metadata to the photos in my iPhone photo library (title, description, privacy settings etc.) and then use it to upload these photos directly to my Flickr account. It also allows me to assign tags and assign photos to sets. So much easier than getting photos off my iPhone and onto my computer, then uploading them to Flickr!
• TwitterFon (free)
  I’m yet to actually find a twitter application for the iPhone I actually love. TwitterFon may not be the prettiest Twitter app I’ve seen, but it’s simple, clean and very easy to use. That said, I have been playing around with Tweetie ($2.99) a bit over the last couple of days. I love the multiple account support and it does everything I use TwitterFon for (while just being that little bit prettier). It’s coming very close to replacing TwitterFon as my Twitter application of choice.
• ToiletMate ($1.19)
  Toilet mate will take your current location and inform you of the nearest public toilets. The app will then provide you with directions. It’s a simple app, but an absolute lifesaver when you’re somewhere unknown and really, really, really, really need to find a bathroom!

Please note: Some of these are Australian orientated! Namely Metlink, iiQuota & ToiletMate.