Anyone gain any benefit from language learning apps?

Went to Germany in October for the first time for a large-number birthday. Did Duolingo for about six weeks prior: It gave me no ability to speak actual German -- aside from "Danke" and "Schuss," but it did enable me to recognize enough words help me with directions, navigate via public transportation and pick out different varieties of beer and sausages on a menu. Thankfully, with the impact English has had on the world through rock and roll and movies, pretty much everybody I encountered in Berlin spoke or at least recognized English. This was less true in Vienna.
 
My experience in Germany has largely been that they speak better English than I do. With one exception--I needed to get a cab and somehow I found the only young person working at a hotel in Germany who had no English. As I tried to ask her in German, I kept getting it mixed up with Japanese and my sentences were a weird mix of the two languages. She just looked at me like I was the dumbest person on Earth. Can't blame her.
 
I used Rocket Russian and Rocket Italian along with books to pick up some bits.

The Italian helped when on vacation in Italy. I’m not even close to fluent. Yeah, not in the same neighborhood.

Spanish I picked up on the streets. Mostly in work environments. I’m not fluent but I can survive.

One of the things that helped with Spanish was an online community where you would list your mother tongue and target language. You could then find folk that were opposite and have phone conversations. It was all free at the time, probably 10 years ago. I don’t recall the name.
 
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