Carpet and iWant

I'm sitting on the couch typing this on my MacBook, sniffling from a combination of dust from the new carpet in the next room and tendrils of cigarette smoke from the tradie outside. It's a relief not to have to put shoes on to walk through that part of the house, and I'm glad we don't have to see that god awful garage floor anymore.



Now that the house is functionally complete (still have more to do around the west side where the bins are), we can start rearranging our accumulation of stuff so that we aren't living with two store rooms at the back. Heck knows what we're actually going to do with those rooms once we clear the junk out of there, but I'm leaning towards a music room or library. Let's hope I can resist the urge to buy more furniture and stuff to fill it.

Speaking of stuff to buy, everyone has no doubt heard about the expected release of the Apple iPad. Engadget has a pretty good guide of what we know about the iPad from various sources and can be read here. I'm certainly not alone in saying that I've been waiting for Apple to release a tablet-style device for some time now, so I woke up especially to catch the news of the keynote coming in on the 27th of January. I'll let you watch Jobs work his magic for yourselves, but suffice to say I was feeling pretty convinced that the shiny object in his hands would be my next must-have-item. In saying that, I was sleep deprived and fully in the clutches of the Reality Distortion Field, so in a desperate attempt at objectivity I had to set my systemic fanboyism aside and questioned my initial zeal and lust for this device. With a few nights sleep and some time to mull over how I see this appliance fitting into my life, I think I've arrived at a rationalised and adult decision.

I WANT IT. I WANT IT NOW!!!



The internet and mass media as a majority have actually landed firmly on the other side of the fence of opinion. Google for articles on the device or pick up a paper and you'll likely read about the disappointing lack of any number of features including multitasking, cameras and the lack of Flash support. Perhaps the most common comment that's being used to dismiss the latest offering from Cupertino has been a terse "It's just a big iPod Touch". My personal reaction is that actually isn't a bad thing at all.

Others on the net have written with greater flair on the subject of why the iPad is actually the start of something big and special in the world of computing. You can read my personal favourites here, here and here (that last one penned by the awesome Stephen Fry). Purely for narcissistic indulgence (after all, that's half the point of having a Blog isn't it?), I'm going to list a few of my own thoughts as well.

It's just a big iPod Touch

Yes, and I think that's actually a good thing. Microsoft have been trying to create a Tablet like device for close to ten years and have failed at each turn due to the fact that cramming a desktop UI model into a miniature form factor plain does not work. It didn't work for Windows Mobile (which incidentally was one of the main reasons why I bought an iPhone in the first place), and it hasn't worked for Tablet PCs. Creating a working tablet device would require a paradigm shift away from windowing systems and desktop mimicry, so it's actually not surprising that Apple decided to just extend an existing and incredibly successful model that they have with iPhone OS.

Aha, but if that's the case then is there any point in getting one of these iPads, especially considering I already have an iPhone? Well the key I think to my justification (call it rationalisation if you will) is that there is an operative word to the iPad death cry on the lips of myopic pundits.

"It's a big iPod Touch"

The increased screen size suggests a lot more than larger movies and a glorified digital photo frame. It offers greater levels of interaction that is now afforded by superior screen real estate. While iPhone apps will initially be the only third party software available, it won't take long for iPad specific apps to arrive and present a more intuitive (dare I say intimate) level of mobile productivity. Lots of people assume that the overlap in functionality will heavily rest between the iPhone and the iPad, while I actually see (or at least hope) to have the cannibalisation occur at the other end of the bridge, with more and more applications that I work with on my MacBook being transferred to the iPad.

The promise of this can already be seen in Apple's own offering of a redesigned iWork for the new device. I'd imagine that most of the following things I use my laptop for will fall by the wayside:

• Browsing full size websites - sans Flash but here's a hope that HTML5 comes along sooner rather than later


• Word processing - Typing on a larger screen should be easier than the iPhone, and there's always the keyboard dock. Great for blogging on the go


• Image Editing - Photoshop for processing RAWs on this would be super! Once again, transferring photos over to the iPad with the camera connector will be really useful while on holidays


• PDF/Comic/Graphic Intensive reading - I do love GoodReader for the iPhone but it's still hard to read a text with lots of graphics unless I'm on a computer. I'd guess that reading PDF text books will be fantastic on an iPad


• Finance Tracking - I'd love to see something like MoneyWell on an iPad. Finance apps for the iPhone never did anything for me with the smaller screen


• Note Taking - I take short notes in Evernote on the iPhone but if I'm at a meeting then I still currently need my laptop. The iPad would be so much better for this

That's not even touching on all the potential when it comes to games on a larger format screen. I'd love to get my hands on an RTS designed for the iPad. Granted that the lack of keyboard shortcuts may be a problem initially, but I wouldn't be surprised to see new UI grammar being invented for the multitouch screen that will allow us to compete at the same level as keyboard/mouse jockeys.

So this is bye bye laptop/desktop?

Heck no! This has been marketed as a device between a laptop and a smartphone and I don't think that's just greed on Apple's part. There are still a number of activities that make more sense on a fully fledged computer, but the thing is most of these aren't really day to day activities, more akin to what one would use a server for.

• Downloading Torrents - Can't live without my movies, TV shows and games. I'm unlikely to chain a mobile device to the wall all day to get the latest episode of How I Met Your Mother


• Encoding - Once again, ripping a CD/DVD or burning media doesn't really make sense to me on a tablet


• Serving media - Of course the same machine in our house that downloads media would need to stream it to the Apple TV and other portable media players, iPad included!


• iPhone/iPad Management - Apple haven't said too much about how the iPad and iPhone would interact with each other. It would be great if I could sync between the two devices without the need for a desktop hub, but I don't know if that's going to happen


• Programming - Unless they release XCode for the iPad, I can't see how I can give up my MacBook

The last point is an interesting one I think, though I doubt anything will come out of it. It would be pretty cool to be able to close the loop and create simple applications on the device itself without having to use OSX.

So your iPhone becomes a dumb mobile

Far from it. I still think that there will be lots of apps that make more sense on the iPhone as a smaller and always connected mobile device, especially when I only plan on getting the WIFI only version of the iPad. Social networking, RSS feeds, media, GPS navigation and casual gaming just to name a few, not to mention having a ubiquitous camera for taking pictures and movies. I also think that the iPhone will be a better device for listening to music, as I've always been paranoid about missing phone calls when I have my earphones in.

It depends on what App Developers do, but I think the iPhone would also make a fantastic satellite device for the iPad. They both run the same operating system (basically) so I could see applications with functionality stretched across both devices. Perhaps a note taking application on the iPhone synced to a text book app on the iPad. A Scrabble boardgame with the iPhone used to display your tiles. A graphics application with the iPhone acting as a palette. You get the idea.

So no disappointments then?

Hrmm... not quite. My cheery optimism for the gospel of Apple can only take me so far. Granted that some of the things on my wish list are a symptom of waiting for the iUnicorn (that mythical Jobsian device that does everything from solving world hunger to toasting waffles), but a guy can still dream.

• Touch-inspired iLife - iWork is great and I'm really happy that they released that, and of course Photos is getting closer to iPhoto with each release, but I was kind of looking forward to seeing Garageband and iMovie at least on the iPad. I'm sure that the App Store will cough up an alternative before long but it would have been nice to see Apple's take on this


• No iBooks store in Australia - Granted I'd still probably be using Stanza to read my free ePub books anyway, but it would have been nice to see the iBooks store as a worldwide release. It took quite a while for iTunes movies and TV shows to come here, so hopefully the wait won't be as long


• Revolutionary Text Input - A large size keyboard seems a little unimaginative, and I'm not entirely convinced that this will be easy to use one handed. Placing the tablet in landscape mode on the lap makes sense, but I think it will still be important to type while standing or on the move. Will have to try it out first hand


• The Name - Enough has been said about this, have a look here. I mean iPad... really? I guess if Nintendo can make millions selling a console that sounds like a bodily function then anything goes.

Another sticking point I have is with the demonstrated user interface. Holdonaminute, no I haven't done an about face. I do think that blowing up the iPhone OS to a larger screen makes sense as a whole, but there are a few tweaks that could have been made on the Home screen to take advantage of the extra space (aside from god ugly backgrounds, what's the deal with that?). Increasing the number of Apps that fit on a page by another column would have been nice. That lock screen is also looking pretty stark. If I had to guess though, I'd say that Apple have simply stuck with what's familiar to get people familiar with iPod Touches and iPhones to adopt the system, and will unveil an evolutionary UI change in the next version of the iPhone OS. Of course there's that iUnicorn again...

So you're getting one then...

Yeah, hopefully in March when they release it and when we're back in Malaysia. I've got high hopes for the thing and my gadget lust is going into overdrive. Especially when I consider how even the first iPhone model released has changed with each new version of the operating system.

I sit here on the couch typing this on my MacBook, smelling some much needed rain falling on our drought stricken grass, and I wish I were holding an iPad. Horrible name and all.