This iPhone application is a neat idea, but may need some reworking. The Dog Tricks part of the app. gives you photos to show how to teach your dog a trick or how to prevent behavior you don’t want, like jumping up on guests. Unfortunately, the app. doesn’t always give enough information on how to teach a trick. There is a nifty function where you shake your iPhone and it gives you a random trick to teach your dog. The app. also has information on certain dog breeds and some pics of dogs, but I don’t find that very interesting or useful.
I think the app. would be most useful in teaching a trick that you’re already familiar with or for reinforcing tricks your dog already knows—the random feature would be fun for this. Since an iPhone is so portable, the app. could be good for helping you train when you’re not at home.
The Bark Machine part of the app. has several sound effects like a clicker used in clicker training (too bad it’s 3 clicks instead of the one used in training), a squeaker toy, a doorbell, and a high frequency whistle. The sound effects can be employed during your training, which could be handy when you want to train and don’t have a clicker.
The Dog Tricks & Bark Machine application is free from iTunes.
A video used to be embedded here but the service that it was hosted on has shut down.(podcast via iphoneapppodcast.com)
