<http://schema.org/articleBody>
"  Popular Mechanics has released two free iPad apps for download in iTunes this week: QuakeTracker and Be the Spark. QuakeTracker uses data from the U.S. Geological Survey to display all the seismic activity in the continental United States over the previous seven-day period. It also shows the biggest quakes to hit the country since the mid-19th century. The second app, Be the Spark, is a simple game that challenges the player to keep an engine running by triggering the spark plug at the right moment in the four-stroke cycle. These delightfully geeky apps first appeared within our monthly iPad magazine several months ago. This app-within-an-app idea was one of the main motivations for building PM&amp;#039;s magazine app in-house, using our own developers. The roll-your-own approach to product development comes with challenges, but it pays off in terms of flexibility and creativity. We wouldn&amp;#039;t have been able to integrate pieces such as QuakeTracker and Be the Spark into off-the-shelf digital-magazine software. The new apps were developed in cooperation with outside partners. Be the Spark was built by GameSalad to our specs for an article about DIY game creation. Anyone with creativity and some doggedness can use GameSalad&amp;#039;s software to build a game without doing any programming. Our partners at GameSalad will be posting the building blocks for Be the Spark on their site later this week, and we hope to see lots of other people expand on what we&amp;#039;ve done. QuakeTracker takes a fresh approach to displaying seismic data, and it shows vividly the high number of earthquakes that fire beneath our feet each day. We built it with Jonathan Cousins and Nick Sears, a pair of &amp;quot;creative technologists&amp;quot; who met at NYU&amp;#039;s Interactive Telecommunications Program and are interested in everything from data visualization to welding to multimedia art pieces. We&amp;#039;ll be doing more projects with these guys in the future. We&amp;#039;ve got more apps in the works, and many of them will debut in the monthly iPad magazine. Let us know what you think at pmappsupport@hearst.com. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/apps/reviews/a7317/popular-mechanics-launches-two-new-free-ipad-apps/>