Category Archives: Apple

The New New iPad

I didn’t talk about hardware at all in my iPad wish list from earlier in the week because none of my complaints about the iPad 2’s form factor seemed as pressing as the changes I’d like to see in the software. Now that the third iteration of the device is here (announced just today), with a high definition Retina Display, a much improved camera, and 4G LTE connectivity.

That’s all fine and good, and to be sure I will buy one if only out of professional duty. But there’s one major hardware change that I now realize that I do really long for: a reduced bezel.

Across all its models, the iPad bezel has had to strike a tricky balance between providing a grabbable area for the user’s hands, housing the innards of the device, and aesthetically framing the screen. The original iPad’s bezel was thick but excusable, as that version was something entirely new. Its successor was essentially unchanged, but Apple did a beautiful job reducing the depth of the device itself in that model.

Following that trend, I fully expected that in its third revision Apple’s designers would turn their attention to the bezel, minimizing it or at least reducing its width by twenty percent or so. Obviously that didn’t happen, probably due to the demands of the Retina Display and battery.

The reason I’m focused on this is that, to be frank, I find the iPad to be harder to hold than it should be. The screen size itself is great, but the added girth of the bezel always seems superfluous and even cumbersome when using the device on a crowded subway. I don’t want a smaller screen though; If I could keep the existing screen size but just pull in the overall width and height of the device by a few centimeters, it would be a meaningful improvement. Next model, I guess.

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iOS Wish List

By most accounts, it’s almost a sure bet that Apple is set to debut the third iteration of the iPad tomorrow. Presumably, there’s a new version of iOS in the works too, though if the past is any guide such a thing would probably not be announced at the same time. Still, software features are what I’m really interested in; a Retina display would be a nice addition on the hardware side, but most of the improvements I’d like to see in the iPad would be software-based — and I’m not talking about Siri. Here’s a wish list of what I’d like to see.

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The Case of the iPad Cases

With the next major revision to the iPad rumored to be announced as soon as next week, I figure I’d better get any iPad 2-specific posts I’ve had in the hopper posted quickly. In particular, I’ve been wanting to write about cases for a while, mostly because it took me nine or ten months to find a case combination that really works for me.

For a long time, I was very disappointed with the Apple Smart Cover, which to me is an example of a fantastic design on paper that in real life fell short of expectations. I always found it fell off its magnetic hinge too easily, and after toting my iPad to and from work for only a few months, its edges quickly became frayed.

But then I came across the iPad 2 Smart Feather from Incipio, a lightweight hardshell case that hugs the back of the iPad. A lot of cases do this, but this was the first I came across that also clasps around the Smart Cover’s hinge, securing it tightly.

Neither does it add much in the way of bulk to the device. So little, in fact, that when I recently bought a Logitech Zagg keyboard case, I was happy to discover that the Smart Feather fits comfortably in the Zagg’s slot. The Zagg is also designed to let you collapse the iPad on top of the keyboard for carrying them together, a configuration that still mostly works when you have the Smart Feather on the device. It’s not a perfect fit, but it does the job.

I’ve been using all three accessories — Smart Cover, Smart Feather case and Logitech Zagg keyboard — as I’ve been doing more and more of my ‘real work’ tasks on the iPad. Having a real keyboard is a huge help, and being able to carry the iPad anywhere without having to handle it too delicately has been a boon too. It all seems to be coming together… just in time for me to buy a new model.

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Requiem for the Browser Search Box

The changes promised in Apple’s forthcoming OS X Mountain Lion release look promising on the whole, but there’s one that makes me sad: the next major version of Safari will sport a unified address bar. Instead of two fields, one for the URL and one for search, Macworld writes that “the browser now sports a single lengthy field that can be used to type in a URL; pull up the top result in your selected search engine from a keyword or search the Web, your bookmarks and history, or within the page itself.”

Though I spend most of my time using Firefox, which still has both an address bar and a search box, I also spend a fair amount of time using Chrome which of course, popularized the concept of the unified search bar in the first place. I find the unified search bar to be a fine complement to the way I use my browser, but I still stubbornly prefer two fields up there.

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The Miracle of WD-40

WD-40An apparently common problem that many iPhone users encounter is that, after many months of use, the home button — the sole physical button on the device’s face — starts to lose its responsiveness, sometimes precipitously. When this happens, it may take several presses, or a prolonged press, to get the button to produce any results. And sometimes where one press of the button is intended, the device registers two. Very annoying.

I was surprised to discover from a friend that Apple technicians diagnosed this problem on her phone as software related, which struck me as counter-inuitive, as it seemed to me to be very much a hardware problem. There has also been talk of the button needing software recalibration. I don’t know if that approach works or not, but I’ll tell you what worked for me: the miracle “water-displacing spray” WD-40.

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Introducing Mixel

MixelIn my post from August titled “What Comes After Reading on iPad,” I argued that while the iPad is a game-changing reading platform, there has been perhaps too much emphasis on that one particular aspect of the device. Apple’s “magical and revolutionary” tablet brings with it many other transformational qualities that are being undervalued at the moment, and at least a few of them will spawn new businesses and maybe even new industries.

I talked about a few of those opportunities in that post, but the one that interests me the most, and the one that I’m betting on in a big way, is the fact that iPad is an ideal digital art device, one that requires little or no training — no mouse to master, no pen and tablet to plug in. Straight out of the box, it’s a powerful, completely intuitive tool for self-expression: just use your finger to make a mark.

Even better, for the very first time in decades of personal computing history, we have an ideal digital art device in the hands of a mass audience, a huge and still-growing user base composed not just of professional artists and early adopters, but of people from all walks of life who are embracing the liberating simplicity of this new platform.

That’s big. It changes what’s possible for visual self-expression in a huge way. Now anyone can do this — anyone. They just need the right software. Creating that software is what my co-founder Scott Ostler and I are trying to do with our new company.

Our app is called Mixel. It’s a collage-making tool and a social network rolled into one. With Mixel, anyone can create and share digital collages using images from the Web, Mixel’s library, or your own personal photos from Facebook or what’s right on your iPad. You can watch a video (directed by the inimitable Adam Lisagor) that describes all of this over at our site, Mixel.cc.

Why watch it when you can try it out for yourself, though? As of today, Mixel is available for download in the App Store. And it’s free.

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The Post-Personal iPad

Over at Ars Technica, they’re asking whether the iPad is a PC or not, with some debate over the semantic boundaries of the term: does a PC have to have a keyboard? Must it be directly programmable? Does it have to be an open system? It’s an interesting discussion.

Apple’s line, of course, is that the iPad is a “post- PC device.” Their belief is that it augurs a new era that leaves the old paradigm of window, icon, mouse and pointing behind. For my part, I subscribe to that theory, for sure. As I said recently, I fully believe that iPad is a transformative innovation.

But I also have a slightly different take on this concept of a device that is “post-PC.” It’s not just that the iPad is such a different kind of hardware and software from what came before it, but it’s also that people regard the iPad differently.

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Steve Jobs Resigns

I did not start out as much of a tech nerd when I was a kid, so by the time I developed my fondness for computers, Steve Jobs had already left Apple for the first time. He was running NeXT then, but effectively he was in the wilderness and it seemed like his best days were behind him — or at least he would never get a second chance. So tales of his vision, his sheer force of will, his reality distortion field, were like modern fables; things from the past that we’d probably never see again. Like the Beatles getting back together or J.D. Salinger publishing another book.

That’s basically what happened, though; Jobs came back, of course, in 1996, and before too long he was in charge of Apple again, and we got that magical second act in one of the great lives. We don’t get that very often, but this time we did and, well, it was something amazing to live through. I feel very lucky. Thank you, Steve.

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What Comes After Reading on iPad

I’m bullish on the iPad. Some people have assumed the opposite, based in part on my frequent criticism of the way publishers have risen to the challenges and opportunities that it presents.

But I really do believe that the iPad is a truly transformative device, an innovation that’s going to re-make the way we work with and play with technology. Looking back at its introduction in January of last year, it’s fitting that it debuted at the start of what I believe we’ll look back on as ‘the tablet decade’ — if we don’t end up thinking of it as just ‘the iPad decade.’

On the other hand, I think it’s still too early to know exactly how these devices are going to shape the next ten years. We’re all still discovering and exploring how different a multitouch tablet is from laptops and desktops. As that collective understanding progresses, we’re sure to see some unexpected if not startling new uses for them. There’s one safe likelihood though, and that is that the things that are attracting so much attention on the iPad today will probably become less exciting to us tomorrow.

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