New Satisfaction Survey Released

The survey found that 83.65 percent of respondents were satisfied with the iPad, while 62 percent ranked Apple's device as "excellent," 10 percent said "best imaginable," and 21 percent said "good."

--Appleinsider

App store holiday sale

Some free titles and others on sale for a few dollars.

Why the iPad Is the Most Hated Gadget Ever

Consumers love the iPad. But the unprecedented success of the iPad is laying waste to products, product categories, companies and even entire industries, and nobody can stop it. Never before in the history of consumer electronics has a single product earned so much love – and so much hate.

http://www.cultofmac.com/135844/why-the-ipad-is-the-most-hated-gadget-ever/

BASIC and LOGO programming

There used to be a ban on programming apps on the iStore but a recent search shows that has changed.

There is a Commodore BASIC app called Hand BASIC and a LOGO programming app called LOGO Draw (both are free).

I hope the Scratch programming is let back in the iStore.

An Update on my Parent's App Usage

There are two things my parents are now comfortable using the iPad for:

1. getting directions to places, by typing in the street address, using the built-in Maps app;
2. reading email, usually with photos attached, which were sent by family members.

The iPad has definitely replaced the Pearly map-book for finding places. They also rely less on me to be the intermediary who used to receive the emails with photos which I would then load onto my laptop to show them.

They have not sent an email yet. 

Bluetooth vs. Airplay Speakers

It's better to choose Bluetooth speakers over Airplay speakers, to stream audio wirelessly from an iDevice, according to this article.

FontBook App for iPad

The FontBook is now an iPad app.

Aluminum Keyboard Buddy iPad Case

The Aluminum Keyboard Buddy transforms an iPad into a laptop with a Bluetooth keyboard.

This is what I expected Apple to launch instead of the Macbook Air.

"Marathon" Game now on the AppStore

The first-person-shooter game Marathon is now available on the AppStore for free (requires iOS4.2).

I've never played the game but it seems to have been popular with many gamers.

IRC999: A Review of a Free IRC Client for iOS

I found a free IRC client called IRC999 for iOS. I tried it out and it's mostly very intuitive to use. You can configure the server, port and nickname/password you wish to use and the channels you wish to join (autojoin is an option) and you're in.

The interface adapts itself to landscape/portrait orientations. In landscape mode you can see the status of various channels on the left pane, with the conversation of the current channel on the right pane; in portrait mode, the current channel takes over the entire screen. It has a few customizable options including font size (S/M/L).

It can list the nicknames in the current channel, but the list is unsorted; there is no tab-completion for nicknames.

1. Usability: .5
2. Usefulness: .5
3. Looks: 1
4. Enjoyability: .5

19th Century British Library Book Collection

The British Library has made some of it's collection available for browsing and downloading ofr offline reading via an iPhone app (compatible with iPad iOS4).

Titles include classic novels, works of philosophy, history and science digitally scanned in high resolution.

Roger Ebert's Great Movies App

Ebert's movie reviews from his Great Movies books have been collected in this iOS4+ Great Movies app for iPhone with links to Netflix and Amazon.

Because of the amount of text involved, I would definitely wait for the Universal App if you have an iPad as reading pixel-doubled text on the iPad is painful.

iOS5 Music App combines iTunes+iPod Apps

Cult of Mac has a screenshot tour of the new Music App in iOS5 which combines the functionality of the separate iTunes (which I always had disabled preferring insted to use iTunes on the desktop) and iPod Apps in previous iOS releases.

Apple Design Award iPad Winners

The three apps that won the 2011 Apple Design Award in the iPad category are:

1. The game ($10), Osmos
2. Al Gore's interactive book ($5), "Our Choice"
3. Party app ($20), Djay

Thoughts on iOS5/Lion/iCloud

On June 6th, Steve Jobs gave the WWDC 2011 keynote address and announced Lion, iOS5 and iCloud (the replacement for the stillborn MobileMe).

I am looking forward to iOS5 (due sometime in the Fall) more than Lion (due in July, upgrade from Snow Leopard for $30). iCloud is interesting, but I don't know if Apple can pull it off this time, given the past failures.

The biggest and most welcome surprise was the un-tethering of the iDevices from the PC. iDevices with iOS5 will "work" out-of-the-box without first being required to be connected to a PC. I can give a child an iDevice and it will work after a minimal setup.

The un-tethering also means freedom from being held hostage by that pig of an application called iTunes, which surprisingly was the original reason I joyfully switched to a Mac after using iTunes on Windows/XP, but which became a tiresome annoyance since it was co-opted (via the AppStore) to do more than its share of heavy lifting. Sub-textually, I look forward to iCloud as a replacement for iTunes.

The second surprise was iMessage (instant messaging including video and photos via Wifi or 3G between iOS5 devices securely (?) through Apple's servers) which aims to destroy the BlackBerry Messaging system, the last feature that RIM could claim as a distinguishing feature of its devices and kills the SMS cash-cow that mobile carriers have been milking. (I get the distinct impression that Apple (and Google) want to bypass the carriers entirely. I can see Google becoming/spinning-off a network carrier company.)

Unfortunately, iMessage also creates a walled garden of iOS devices. (Update: AppleInsider reports that iMessage is built on the open-standards XMPP. Update 2: iMessage can be used for group SMS) I am certain that Google will have a similar solution soon, but the lack of interoperability between everyone's messaging systems disappoints me.

Aside: Microsoft recently purchased Skype, to compete with Apple's Facetime and Google's WebRTC. If the past is any indication, Skype will be dead in 2 years (there were two major uncheduled outages (no doubt due to infrastructure re-configuration)  after the purchase. Even though Facetime is an open standard, Google has chosen an alternative solution.

I would like to predict that in the near future, there will be a start-up that will magically allow iOS devices to message Androids and Facetime users to chat with Android users.

April 2011 Apps

I have been remiss in keeping track of new Apps I have downloaded which were mostly games...

I found out about Terra, a tabbed browser, just yesterday. Do I trust that if I type in my passwords, they are not being sent off to third parties? No. It's nice for surfing though.

Having deleted Flipboard because of boring content, I have been using Zite instead and find it has a lot of interesting articles. Recommended.

The Google App's most impressive feature is voice-search. Recommended for demo purposes.

Shredder Lite (iPhone) is a chess program that uses the Shredder engine.

Pop-out Peter Rabbit ($3.99) is an interactive book which reads itself or by tapping on a specific word. There is a lite version you can try out. Recommended if you have kids or as a demo app.

G-Form iPad Case

The G-Form case is a reactive armour case for the iPad that stiffens whenever a sharp force is applied to the normal looking fabric.

In the video, an iPad encased in the G-Form case survives the impact of a bowling ball dropped from a height of 3 feet on to the glass face.

People spend more time with tablets (iPads, really)

According to a recent survey by Google, people spend more time with tablets (iPads, really) than other content delivery systems like TVs, and books.

"The Secret Garden" Illustrated EPub at Project Gutenberg

Frances Hodgson-Burnett's classic, The Secret Garden, (with illustrations and without) is available at Project Gutenberg as an EPub edition for iBooks.

I was going through the list of 50 books every child should read.

YKYBUTiTLW...

You Know You've Been Using the iPad Too Long When... you're reading the newspaper (the NY Sunday Times in this case) and you look up at the top of the newspaper page to check the time.

I expected to find a status-bar with the clock right next to the date.

A Review of the NY Times for the iPad App

The experience of reading the NY Times on the iPad is similar to eating at an a la carte restaurant. The news is segregated into separate compartments that begin and end abruptly with visits to the main menu. I would prefer a more continuous experience of reading the entire newspaper at a single sitting with the ability to bookmark the place if I am interrupted. The App also lacks the social aspects (as found on nytimes.com) of being able to publicly comment on an article.

The experience also lacks features that are possible with a real newspaper:
  - clipping and saving an article for reference later
  - hilighting (or copying and pasting) a small section of an article
  - "starring" a particularly well written article
  - after the newspaper is delivered to my house, it is "instantly on"; the App however, takes some time to get started and after it does, it starts with the articles from the last time I was reading. One would think that it would be downloading new content while I stare at a white screen with the NY Times logo.

iPad 2 Launch brings App Sale for Limited Time

There is a limited time sale this weekend for many titles to celebrate the launch of iPad 2.

iPad 2 (or iPad 1.5 as some say) Announcement

The iPad 2 was announced last Wednesday in a surprise appearance by Steve Jobs, who is on medical leave from Apple.

There is a good summary and commentary  by Richard Gaywood.

The iPad 2 is what the first iPad should have been-- a light, sleek device with dual cameras and FaceTime video conferencing (not necessarily with dual CPUs as the iPad 2). I won't be buying the iPad 2 for myself. I will be getting one as a birthday gift for my sister, whose kids have been in love with my parent's iPad.

I have held-off upgrading the iPad to iOS4 but will definitely will upgrade to iOS 4.3 as it provides a performance boost to the Safari Javascript engine.

Reverting to an Older App

If you upgraded an App and found that you preferred the older version, you can revert to the older app (as long as you have a copy of it via TimeMachine, etc.).

iPhone (iDevice) Explorer

iPhone Explorer is a utility that allows you to use your iDevice as a USB drive.

HP Touchpad

The HP Touchpad running WebOS is the first real competition I have seen for the iPad. The tablets won't be available until the summer (Wifi model first then 3G). The iPad2 will be out by then...

My reluctance for buying HP is that they are famous for making craptacular hardware.

If they started building hardware like my old HP engineering calculator, then I would be more inclined to buy one.

WSJ Cofirms iPad2 Features

In general terms the iPad2 features:

• thinner and lighter 
• faster CPU & GPU
• more memory (I assume this is system memory)
• front-facing camera (for Facetime)

The iPad, Circa 1970

The scifi show Tomorrow People featured a tablet that looked remarkably similar to the Apple iPad: a silver back, a black bezel and approximately 9 inches in size.

iPad vs. Galaxy Tab Comparison

Let's Go Mobile as a comparative review of the Samsung Galaxy Tab and the iPad.

App Store Now on Twitter

The App Store now has a Twitter account with 50,000 followers and counting. The tweets will feature apps and promotions.

If you're not on Twitter (like me) you can follow the account's RSS feed.

iPad and Xoom Specs Comparison

A head-to-head comparison of the hardware specs of the iPad which has been out for nearly a year and the soon-to-be released Motorola XOOM, running the Android Honeycomb OS.

Naturally, the XOOM wins the hardware comparison since it was designed after the release of the iPad. The software, usability and app comparison is still up for debate.

The release of the iPad 2, however, will make for a fair comparison.

Aside: There was a rumour that the read-facing camera on the iPad2 will be 1MP (that will be a disappointment if it were true.)

Dual Cameras Confirmed in iPad 2

MacRumors found an image of the iPad desktop, used to display wallpaper settings, in the iOS 4.3 Beta 2 that shows apps for the rear- and front-facing cameras. This image all but confirms the existence of cameras in the iPad 2 (iPad HD or whatever it might be called).

Rumours of the (unbelievably) higher resolution screen, device size and shape, bezel width, removal of the home button and the SD card slot are currently unconfirmed.

There is also the cost of the device which is unconfirmed. The iPad 2 could be a "Pro" model of the iPad at a much higher cost.

8th-grader Writes App that Dethrones Angry Birds Lite

Bubble Ball, written by an 8th grade student and his Mom, has risen to the No. 1 free app downloaded from the App Store, dethroning Angry Birds Lite.

Nomad Paintbrush

A handmade conductive paint brush for the iPad.

It's only a matter of time before the cheap, mass-produced knock-offs arrive.

Kindle Lending Club

Amazon recently allowed Kindle ebooks to be lent out (the lender is unable to read the ebook they lend out for 14 days).

There is now a Kindle Lending Club website where borrowers and lenders can get together.

Those with the iPad Kindle app should be able to take advantage.

PadPivot Stand for iPad (Kickstarter Project)

Jim Young, a Seattle designer, has started a Kickstarter Project looking for funding to build the PadPivot, an iPad stand that works both on your lap and on a desk.

It looks interesting, but I'm not too keen on gluing something to the back of my iPad.

New Features of iOS 4.3 (Beta)

New multi-touch gestures and Personal Hotspot (tethering) are among the new features of the developer release of iOS 4.3.

Support for magazine/newspaper subscriptions will also arrive, possibly by the 17th or 18th of January. It is uncertain whether 4.3 will be released around that time or whether that release will be an intermediate 4.3 release.

VLC pulled from the AppStore

VLC, the video player for AVI format files, was pulled from the AppStore because its GPL license was incompatible with the AppStore Terms and Conditions.

Since GPL apps are no longer welcome, it means that Emacs (once ported, of course) will never  appear on the AppStore and will only be available if the iPad is jail-broken.

Even if GPL licensed apps were welcome, there was still the restruction of an apps running interpreted code  being disallowed.

I would be willing to jailbreak my iPad to get Emacs.

Crayola ColorStudio HD

Crayola ColorStudio HD App works with a digital stylus, called Crayola iMarker.

iMarker safely interacts with iPad's Multi-Touch display, allowing the ColorStudio HD app to differentiate between the child’s input (fingers, swipes, etc.) and the iMarker automatically. This allows intuitive, creative play that brings the accuracy and ease of a stylus but, for the first time, allows the user to both manipulate the creative space and color, without having to toggle the app between modes.

This app and marker is great for kids, what what about artists who want different thicknesses and variety of brushes?

I hope we will soon see something for artists who want to use the iPad.

Notion Ink Tablet at CES

One if many new tablets which will be demonstrated at the 2011 CES will be the Notion Ink running Android Honeycomb (I think).

The multi-tasking demonstration showing thumbnail views of the running apps is just how I imagined I wanted multi-tasking to be.

Test-driving MobileRSS HD Free for iPad

I am currently testing MobileRSS HD Free, a new RSS feed reader that syncs with Google Reader.

Initial impressions (compared to my current reader, Feeddler):
- prettier aesthetics
- the feeds can be sorted manually into a preferred order rather than appearing alphabetically
- switch to a night mode by changing the theme
- it displays favicons (a nice touch)
- IT REMEMBERS THE LAST ARTICLE I WAS READING, WHEN I RE-ENTER THE APP! YAY!

I discovered this reader via the Appsfire Appstream app, which I highly recommended you go download now and which definitely gives a better apps-discovery experience than browsing the AppStore.

Update: Jan 4, 2011, I have switched over from Feeddler. Review to come.