Your friend just asked if you had heard this incredible story on NPR this morning, but you missed it because, well, you were still in the sack. You could go to NPR’s web site and search for the program, but you’d have to start up the computer, and you’re already late. Why not just listen to it on your iPhone?

NPR Mobile is a new and free application developed by a Pennsylvania software engineer in his spare time. The application calls up news stories by subject matter using the Open API (application program interface) recently released by NPR.

With live streaming, you can listen to radio programs as they are being broadcast.

NPR Mobile allows you to listen to NPR programs that have already aired. NPR archives all of the stories they broadcast on the NPR website. NPR Mobile allows you to access those stories on your iPhone.

NPR Mobile allows access to the stories, by program, series, topic, or person. For instance, a search for “Cheney” yields recent NPR stories on Dick Cheney. The program works well. The interface isn’t fancy, but you can listen to that story you missed.

Version 2.0 is planned for a May release that will have on demand features.