Tag Archives: iPad

Andy Ihnatko on iPhoto for iPad

May 9, 2012 – 9:42 am

Results make up for awkwardness of iPhoto for iPad – Chicago Sun-Times: “iPhoto represents the second generation of iPad apps. It’s not merely a ‘mobile’ photo editor. It’s a photo editor. A less-ambitious photo app like Snapseed is something you play with. iPhoto is an app that you can actually rely on.”

(Via. Chicago Sun-Times)

I have to completely agree with Andy Ihnatko here. When I first started using iPhoto for iPad, I immediately thought, like everyone else, that it was a UI nightmare. But the more I used it, the more I ended up liking it. And more importantly, the more I ended up using it as my go-to app for photo organizing and experimentation. In a few days, I had already used iPhoto on my iPad far more than I ever had any of the other iOS iLife apps. 

iPhoto for iPad truly is as capable, and far more enjoyable to use once you learn it, than its desktop counterpart.

We are entering a second stage of iPad software, as Mr. Ihnatko suggests. One where people start to recognize that the iPad is eventually going to be the laptop replacement, not just a casual consumption device. This is what the Kindle Fire and the Android tablets are all missing. The iPad is so much more than the competition thinks it is. 

And who better than Apple to lead the way with a new generation of apps that go beyond consumption? True, the iPad versions of the iWork apps were heavily compromised for the sake of an easier user experience. But the newer Apple apps, Garageband, iMovie, and now iPhoto, are pushing the boundaries and demonstrating that over time, iOS will become just as capable as OS X on the Mac for most people. 

The trick is figuring out how do these things with our fingers. So yes, user experience is not quite as easy to figure out on these more robust apps yet. But it took several years for the mouse and the original GUI to evolve into tools capable of rivaling text-based user interfaces. It’ll get there. Developers have to be willing to experiment until they find what works. And Apple, of course, has more at stake than anyone in leading that charge. 

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You call that Compelling?

May 4, 2012 – 7:42 am

Compelling idea for moving files from Mac to iPhone | TUAW – The Unofficial Apple Weblog: “There’s iCloud, Dropbox and a host of other services to help us tranfer these files, but there are no solutions as elegant as the concept devised by interaction designer Ishac Bertran.”

(Via. TUAW)

Elegant? I’d say this is anything but elegant. For starters, how is manually holding a phone in one hand while pinching and dragging with the other on a vertical screen more elegant than iCloud automatically syncing the files with no user interaction whatsoever? 

Even Palm solved this problem already much more elegantly with the “bump” feature on the WebOS tablet a few years ago. You see a file on the tablet you want on your phone, or vice versa? Just bump the devices together on the side of the screen, and the file transfers. 

But again, even that isn’t as simple as putting your files in iCloud, where they will simply be available on all devices at all times. Make an update on your phone, your laptop will have it in a few seconds. Make a change on your laptop, and the phone will have it in a few seconds. 

I realize that Apple is just getting started with iCloud, and that they haven’t worked out all the kinks yet, but they’ve clearly demonstrated that this is the plan for the future. There will be no need for the user to ever “sync” anything, because synchronization will be constant and automatic. 

Why you’d try and solve this problem when it’s already been solved is beyond me. 

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Matt Gemmell on Quasar

May 1, 2012 – 2:36 pm

Familiar is not a design:

Quasar was not designed, but rather only implemented. It’s the classic outcome of closed, engineer-based thinking.

(Via Matt Legend Gemmell)

Matt Gemmell sums up my thoughts on Quasar perfectly. The iPad doesn’t present multiple apps on screen at once for a reason, and that reason isn’t because of some hardware limitation, or because Apple wanted to “dumb it down” for users. It wasn’t an arbitrary decision. Apple designed the iPad that way, and I believe it’s a better device for it. You can argue that other systems like Windows Metro or Palm’s Web OS handle this sort of thing better, but you can’t just haphazardly let people fall back into their worst desktop habits and call it an improvement.

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4G, 3G, 3.5G. Does any of this Make Sense to the Average Person?

March 28, 2012 – 10:17 am

Sweden may also investigate Apple over iPad 4G/LTE marketing:

Just a day after the Australian Competition & Consumer Commission filed a complaint over Apple’s 4G/LTE marketing in the new iPad, Sweden is considering an investigation of its own. The Swedish Consumer Agency says it has received a number of complaints from iPad buyers about the device’s LTE capabilities—LTS is only available in the US—and is now weighing whether it wants to open its own investigation into Apple’s marketing practices.

(Via Ars Technica)

Apple’s going to keep running into this problem with other nations. And rightfully so. The carriers, particularly in the US, have been throwing terms around and redefining words (like unlimited) for so long that none of us knows what the heck is going on. And Apple is playing into their marketing terminology soup.

For some reason, the blatant deception flies in the US, but other countries are a little more consumer friendly in their regulations.

But why expose yourself to the legal repercussions? Does anyone really care about the difference between LTE, HDSPA+, etc.? Just keep making it faster every year. And more importantly, improve your coverage area.

Usually, Apple’s approach to geeky tech specs like this is to ignore them. Take them out of the marketing completely. They learned this lesson in the late 90s, when they realized that competing on specs is a slow race to the bottom. That’s why they won’t even tell you how much RAM an iPad has, even if you’re a journalist asking them point blank. (It’s 1GB in the new iPad, by the way.)

I imagine Apple will eventually want to use this approach for cellular technologies. Just stop mentioning the specific terms. The iPad has WiFi, Bluetooth, and Cellular connectivity. Done. No one but a geek cares if it’s 802.111n, Bluetooth 4.0, and 4G LTE. And he or she can always look up the specifics on the web site.

I realize that “4G” is a selling point right now. It’s a buzz word that people look for when shopping for phones and such. But it’s a meaningless term. And that’s the carrier’s game. Don’t play their game, Apple. Make your own rules, like you do for everything else.

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Verizon LTE iPad Hotspot and Battery Life

March 26, 2012 – 10:00 am

Apple’s new Verizon iPad can serve as LTE hotspot for more than 24 hours:

The highly-technical Anand Lal Shimpi over at AnandTech recently revealed that his tests of the new Verizon iPad found that it could act as a mobile hotspot by sharing its LTE connection with other devices — such as a notebook — for approximately 25.3 hours under the proper conditions — namely that the device’s display remained turned off. That’s roughly 5 times longer than the 4 hours and change of popular LTE MiFi hotspots from Novatel and Samsung.

(Via www.appleinsider.com)

My limited experience with using my new Verizon iPad as a hotspot suggested to me that it was far less of a battery hog than when I used to use my iPhone as a hotspot. I was lucky to get an hour or two of use out of my iPhone4s as an AT&T hotspot for my laptop. With the iPad, I didn’t notice any battery drain at all after a few hours.

This research backs up my conclusions. Awesome news.

I’ve never been in the camp of those who suggest paying more for the cellular iPads “just in case” you might want to use data. I still think if you’re pretty much always going to be in WiFi range when you use your iPad, you can save yourself the money or spend less cash on the extra storage space. But if you do plan on being in places with no WiFi coverage at least once in a while, the new LTE iPads (and particularly the Verizon ones with the free hotspot feature) are an even better deal than they used to be.

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