On May 28th, 2010, the iPad was released in Canada. So far the numbers haven’t been announced, but all indications are that it’s been profoundly successful here as well.
So what’s the appeal? On first glance, it looks and works much like an iPhone or an iPod touch. In fact, when running iPhone applications, it looks exactly like an iPhone. When running the native iPad applications, however, the device shines. Applications such as Maps, Calendar, Videos, Contacts and email benefit greatly from the larger screen and power of the iPad. There are still lots of things I don’t like, however; how complicated can it be to create a unified inbox, for example? Or allow you to mark all messages as read? To be fair, these are features that are promised in the next OS upgrade, but they should have been there from the get-go.
People who only use a computer to browse the internet, read email, and write an occasional response, could easily make do with nothing other than an iPad. If you want to do more than that, however, you start to feel the limits of the architecture. Typing on-screen, while easier than on the iPhone, is still a challenge. Touch-typing is impossible; resting a finger on the screen for a second, or grazing the screen as you move your fingers, inserts an unintended character. Regardless of your typing ability, the typing style regresses to one finger on each hand. I haven’t tried the external keyboard, but at $150 for a wireless keyboard I suspect I probably won’t try it anytime soon.
The iPad has a great-looking screen, and good battery life (considering how poor battery life on the iPhone is). There are a couple of things I don’t like.
- This could be a great platform for demonstrations and presentations, but why should you need to shell out almost $100 for an adapter to connect to an external display? And try connecting to a standard boardroom projector with a VGA connector! There are adapters available to provide component output, for example to connect it to your large-screen TV, but you need to use a separate adapter to get sound; we know the socket adapter transmits sound (that’s how all the docking stations work), so why can’t the cord incorporate a sound output as well?
- Why can’t the new devices connect to all the older adapters you have around? I have a car adapter that I acquired a few years ago for an earlier iPod, but when I try to plug it into the iPad (or the iPhone) the screen displays a message saying that the device wasn’t made for this unit. I know that, but since the device is already recognized by the unit, couldn’t you just go ahead and let me use it? The same thing happens when I plug in to my Logitech docking station, or the iPod adapter on my Sony surround sound system. I can’t be that hard to build in backwards compatibility for this stuff, and it’s either shortsighted or arrogant that Apple decided not to.
- Why can’t the device charge from any USB port? Apple says that charging from a USB port “…if supported…” will take longer, that’s fine, but shouldn’t it charge eventually? I usually plug my iPhone into the computer every day or two, which lets it sync up and charge. With the iPad I need to plug it in to sync, then go plug it into the wall outlet to charge.
As a developer, I’m excited by the potential for iPhone and iPad development. However, it’s frustrating that Apple has decided that a Mac is the only development platform they will support, and that iTunes is the only distribution platform. While there’s an active hacking community that has figured out how to build apps without using the iPhone SDK, and how to jailbreak iPhones so that applications can be installed, it’s still frustrating that these kinds of workarounds are even necessary. Apple has said that the next version of the OS will support an Enterprise distribution model, which hopefully means that developers can distribute applications directly within an organization or within a business group. As a professional developer, I see the iPhone as being marginal as a business platform, largely because of the distribution model that Apple has required to date.
And talking about Itunes – you would think that a company that can turn out such creative and well-designed hardware would be able to produce good software. iTunes is terrible; resource-heavy, flaky, slow, and often confusing. Ever try to figure out how to remove missing files from your iTunes library? There are ways to do it, but RealPlayer can do it with one click.
It would be nice if Apple supported using the iPad as a development platform, but I don’t expect that’s going to happen any time soon.
iPad – So what’s the buzz?
Posted on June 14, 2010 by admin in Commentary
So what’s the appeal? On first glance, it looks and works much like an iPhone or an iPod touch. In fact, when running iPhone applications, it looks exactly like an iPhone. When running the native iPad applications, however, the device shines. Applications such as Maps, Calendar, Videos, Contacts and email benefit greatly from the larger screen and power of the iPad. There are still lots of things I don’t like, however; how complicated can it be to create a unified inbox, for example? Or allow you to mark all messages as read? To be fair, these are features that are promised in the next OS upgrade, but they should have been there from the get-go.
People who only use a computer to browse the internet, read email, and write an occasional response, could easily make do with nothing other than an iPad. If you want to do more than that, however, you start to feel the limits of the architecture. Typing on-screen, while easier than on the iPhone, is still a challenge. Touch-typing is impossible; resting a finger on the screen for a second, or grazing the screen as you move your fingers, inserts an unintended character. Regardless of your typing ability, the typing style regresses to one finger on each hand. I haven’t tried the external keyboard, but at $150 for a wireless keyboard I suspect I probably won’t try it anytime soon.
The iPad has a great-looking screen, and good battery life (considering how poor battery life on the iPhone is). There are a couple of things I don’t like.
As a developer, I’m excited by the potential for iPhone and iPad development. However, it’s frustrating that Apple has decided that a Mac is the only development platform they will support, and that iTunes is the only distribution platform. While there’s an active hacking community that has figured out how to build apps without using the iPhone SDK, and how to jailbreak iPhones so that applications can be installed, it’s still frustrating that these kinds of workarounds are even necessary. Apple has said that the next version of the OS will support an Enterprise distribution model, which hopefully means that developers can distribute applications directly within an organization or within a business group. As a professional developer, I see the iPhone as being marginal as a business platform, largely because of the distribution model that Apple has required to date.
And talking about Itunes – you would think that a company that can turn out such creative and well-designed hardware would be able to produce good software. iTunes is terrible; resource-heavy, flaky, slow, and often confusing. Ever try to figure out how to remove missing files from your iTunes library? There are ways to do it, but RealPlayer can do it with one click.
It would be nice if Apple supported using the iPad as a development platform, but I don’t expect that’s going to happen any time soon.
Tags: Apple, iPad, Software