We all know that you want an iPad. You haven’t even touched one yet, but you have read every word published on the device since before it was announced on Wednesday’s event. You’ve been up all night dreaming about surfing the web, and looking at your address book in split view. You can’t wait to download iTunes movies and watch them on the gorgeous 9.7″ LED-backlit, glossy widescreen multi-touch display with fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating.
In fact, you have been repeating that last sentence in your head all morning as you watch the keynote again after downloading the high-res podcast from iTunes. You are making a list of which iBooks you will buy from the iBookstore so you can decide which title will be the first to have it’s icon gracefully displayed on your faux wood electronic bookshelf.
You are going to buy an iPad. All that is left to decide is which one. This, unfortunately, could be a difficult decision.
What Are the Choices?
There are six variations on the iPad with various combinations of storage, with and without 3G support, ranging from $499 to $829.
Somewhere in that $330 spread is the perfect iPad for you.
Storage Capacity
You have three choices here: 16GB, 32GB or 64GB. How do you decide how much you need?
iPhone apps are generally pretty small (a quick survey of the 400+ apps I have in my library indicates that they range from 56KB for single-purpose utilities to almost 200MB for some 3D games). It would take a lot of apps to fill up your iPad, even when you consider that the larger screen size will likely require iPad-specific games with larger graphic assets to fill that amazing screen from edge to edge with gaming goodness.
Email and all that doesn’t require a ton of onboard storage either, especially when you are using something like Gmail, Google Apps, Yahoo, IMAP, Exchange or any other solution that keeps most of your archived messages on the server.
Music and movies are the big culprits here. If you want to carry around a lot of music and movies on the device, you will want the bigger capacity iPad. And, if you’re honest with yourself, you’ll want to watch movies on this thing and show them off to your friends.
The real kicker is the pricing. It costs $100 to go from 16GB to 32GB ($6.25/GB) and $100 to go from 32GB to 64GB ($3.13/GB). The storage is actually getting cheaper as you buy more. Don’t be conservative here. Buy the biggest model you can afford.
To 3G or not to 3G? That is the Question
The 3G model offers nearly on-demand access to a wide-area network when you are out of range of Wi-Fi. In the United States, that access will cost you $14.99 for data transfer up to 250MB for the month, or $29.99 for unlimited data. With no contract required, you can sign up for these data contracts on the iPad itself only when you need it (no word yet if you can upgrade mid-month from 250MB to unlimited for the prorated difference). In addition, you also get access to AT&T hotspots as part of your subscription.
But Why Would You Want 3G?
Adding the 3G support to the iPad will cost an extra $130 on top of whatever size model you choose. I think the biggest reason to splash out for 3G is that this model includes support for assisted GPS. You won’t get GPS at all on the Wi-Fi model. The mapping application demonstrated during the iPad introduction (shown at 22:35) looks absolutely stunning andis a huge improvement over the iPhone. The speed on the new A4 processor in the iPad really takes the Maps app to the next level.
The only other reason to get the 3G model is to plan ahead for the possibility that you might need to use the iPad while not near Wi-Fi. If you’re taking this thing out to client meetings, conferences with sketchy Wi-Fi, or Apple press events filled to capacity, you will love having a wide-area network option available.
You might consider using a MiFi or other mobile hotspot to provide connectivity for your iPad while out and about, but those solutions all require long-term contracts. If you already have a MiFi or similar device, then just use that. If you don’t, the 3G model at least offers the opportunity to get online when you need it.
Other Considerations
iPhone Users: If you have an iPhone, the iPad 3G might not be necessary. If you are really in a pinch where you can’t use Wi-Fi, you can rely on your iPhone until you get back into range of an access point.
Upgradeitis: It seems obvious that there will be a new iPad next year. Who knows, it might even have a camera. If you think you might upgrade next year, consider what you need for the next 12 months. I think the two models that will have the highest resale demand in 2011 will be the low-end $499 device because of the price point and the $829 64GB 3G model because it will still be appealing to a power user that is looking for a used iPad to save a little money over next year’s high-end model.
What Am I Buying?
I was leaning towards the $829 3G model because I know I will love the iPad but now I’m pretty sure I’ll get the $499 Wi-Fi model. I want an iPad, but I already have a MacBook Pro and an iPhone. If the iPad proves indispensable, I will sell the original iPad once iPad 2.0 comes out and buy the biggest and baddest model then.
There was a meta-message in today’s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs’s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as “mobile” devices, Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was “bigger”.
Lastly, there’s the fact that the iPad is using a new CPU designed and made by Apple itself: the Apple A4. This is a huge deal. I got about 20 blessed minutes of time using the iPad demo units Apple had at the event today, and if I had to sum up the device with one word, that word would be “fast”.
It is fast, fast, fast. The hardware really does feel like a big iPhone — and a big original iPhone at that, with the aluminum back. (I have never liked the plastic 3G/S iPhones as much as the original in terms of how it feels in my hand.) I expected the screen size to be the biggest differentiating factor in how the iPad feels compared to an iPhone, but I think the speed difference is just as big a factor. Web pages render so fast it was hard to believe. After using the iPhone so much for two and a half years, I’ve become accustomed to web pages rendering (relative to the Mac) slowly. On the iPad, they seem to render nearly instantly. (802.11n Wi-Fi helps too.)
The Maps app is crazy fast. Apps launch fast. Scrolling is fast. The Photos app is fast.
The iPad hardware is exactly what you think. It looks great, it feels great. It’s very nice to hold. (People are complaining about the wide bezel around the display, but without that, where would your thumbs go? You don’t want your thumb that’s holding the device to cover on-screen content or register as a touch. Trust me, it’s just right.) Just like with the iPhone, it’s all in the software. And the software is obviously marvelous in many ways. It is clearly the result of deep thought and hard work.
But: everyone I spoke to in the press room was raving first and foremost about the speed. None of us could shut up about it. It feels impossibly fast. (And our next thought: What happens if Apple has figured out a way to make a CPU like A4 that fits in an iPhone? If they pull that off for this year’s new iPhone, look out.)
Apple doesn’t talk much about the technical details of the iPhone. They never talk about CPU speed or the name of the chip being used. They don’t tell you how much RAM is in there. Part of their vision for moving computers from technical culture to popular culture is about getting away from defining these things by their technical specs. So the prominent talk about A4 is telling. This is something they want us to notice.
I mentioned this year-ago quote from Apple COO Tim Cook the other day, but it’s apt here, too. Cook told BusinessWeek, “We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.”
Apple now owns and controls their own mobile CPUs. There aren’t many companies in the world that can say that. And from what I saw today, Apple doesn’t just own and control a mobile CPU, they own and control the hands-down best mobile CPU in the world. Software aside (which is a huge thing to put aside), it may well be that no other company could make a device today matching the price, size, and performance of the iPad. They’re not getting into the CPU business for kicks, they’re getting into it to kick ass.
They’re Microsoft and Intel rolled into one when it comes to mobile computing. In the pre-taped video Apple showed, Bob Mansfield said of the iPad, “No one else could do it.” Only Apple.
And so my takeaway from this — with the bragging about making their own CPUs and their annual revenue and their size compared to companies like Sony, Samsung, and Nokia — is that this is Apple’s way of asserting that they’re taking over the penthouse suite as the strongest and best company in the whole ones-and-zeroes racket.
Open source content management system Drupal is increasingly being used by organizations, corporations and governments to power their websites and communities.
To name but a few entities who rely on Drupal for their websites: The White House, AT&T, Intel, BBC Magazines, Forbes, Stanford University, Reuters and Procter & Gamble (and plenty more where that came from).
But up until now, there was no other way to set up a website or blog with Drupal than having to download and run code from a server. Acquia, a commercial company that provides Drupal-based products, services and technical support, is today bringing change to that situation with the private beta launch of Drupal Gardens.
You need a beta invite code to get in for now, but the first 100 TechCrunch readers to sign up here will get access today (others will be granted access in the next few weeks).
Drupal creator Dries Buytaert – also co-founder and CTO of venture-backed Acquia – in a blog post announcing the private beta launch refers to Drupal Gardens as the Wordpress.com or Ning for Drupal. Which was also the first thing I thought when I tried it out for the first time (see screenshots below).
Built on the Drupal 7 core, currently still in alpha, Acquia powers the entire back-end for Drupal hosted websites and communities so users don’t need to worry about server management and can focus on the personalization and content part of the equation instead.
Unlike Wordpress.com, Buytaert tells me, Drupal Gardens isn’t really meant for individuals looking to set up their own blog as much as it is aimed to help organizations and small businesses set up a Drupal environment with multi-user blogging features, social integration, forums, custom content types, and so on.
The way I see it, Drupal Gardens is thus more of a competitor to the likes of Ning and Six Apart. Both companies, as well as Automattic, have of course a considerable head start when it comes to hosted micro-site content management services, so time will tell if Drupal Gardens can break the mold.
As powerful as the Drupal CMS and its small army of code contributors may be, how much demand can there really be for another browser-based site builder?
Drupal Gardens will be available for free until the end of this year. By the end of 2010, Acquia hopes to have finished incorporating all of the important features that will enable organizations to create feature-rich, social microsites. Although this is still undecided, Acquia thinks it will be able to continue offering a free tier for smaller sites alongside paid tiers for larger websites or those who want access to premium features.
Preliminary pricing can be consulted on this page, but to be clear: all of these packages will remain free of charge until the end of this year.
You can sign up for the beta here; Acquia will open up the beta to thousands of users in the next couple of weeks. General availability is expected in the second quarter of 2010.
Apple (AAPL) is in talks with the McGraw-Hill Companies (MHP) and Hachette Book Group to include educational and trade titles on its planned tablet computer, according to people familiar with the negotiations.
McGraw-Hill Education, the third largest educational publisher in the U.S. by sales, is discussing getting electronic textbooks and parts of its online learning system onto the tablet, say two people. Apple has also held talks with trade book publisher Hachette Book Group about distributing e-books on the tablet, says one person involved in the discussions.
Apple's tablet, due to be introduced Jan. 27, is likely to feature content from a wide range of book, magazine, and newspaper publishers, as well as entertainment. "Everyone is expecting e-book capabilities and services," says Roger Kay, president of Endpoint Technologies Associates. "This generation of tablets is all about the consumer and media consumption." As it has pushed deeper into consumer electronics, Apple's strategy is to combine cutting-edge hardware design with access to music, video, games, and other applications.
The company's interest in educational content underscores the longstanding popularity of Apple products among schools and institutions of higher learning.
Publisher John Wiley & Sons (JWA) also has talked with Apple about including Wiley content on Apple devices, says Peter Balis, director of digital content sales at Wiley. "We have had ongoing conversations with Apple about their interest in including educational content," Balis says. "We will continue to support their efforts in whatever iteration it takes next week." He declined to comment specifically on the tablet.
Talks Cover Marketing, Software
Apple's talks with McGraw-Hill cover how the two companies can market textbooks for the tablet and ways their software development teams can collaborate to publish digital textbooks and educational content on Apple's latest device, two people say. "The talks are as much about marketing as they are about software development," says one of the people involved in the discussions.
HarperCollins Publishers is negotiating with Apple to make electronic books available for the tablet, The Wall Street Journal reported Jan. 18. "I have heard a lot of publishers are working with Apple," says Kathy Mickey, senior analyst with Simba Information.
McGraw-Hill spokeswoman Mary Skafidas and Apple spokeswoman Katie Cotton declined to comment. HarperCollins spokeswoman Erin Crum and Sophie Cottrell, a spokeswoman for Hachette Book Group, which is owned by Lagardère SCA (MMB:FP), also declined to comment.
For McGraw-Hill, Apple's tablet provides a way to showcase Connect, an online service that delivers educational coursework over the Web. Textbook publishers are ramping up investment in the fast-growing area of online education. "The more Connect can be displayed and distributed, the more it will resonate with students," says a person familiar with McGraw-Hill's plans. "The tablet would be relevant to the ways students study and the way teachers instruct."
Apple has long considered education a key market, offering discounts for students and teachers. For years its Mac computers commanded the highest share of the U.S. education market. In 2000, Dell (DELL) overtook Apple with lower prices, according to data compiled by Needham & Co. As of the third quarter of 2009, Apple's share of the market for PCs sold to U.S. educational institutions was 28.3%, compared with Dell's 31.9%, according to Gartner (IT).
Apple, McGraw-Hill Connect on Project
Connect is just the latest collaboration between Apple and McGraw-Hill. The publisher has been in discussions with Apple about the tablet for the past year, the people say. In October, McGraw-Hill announced it was making 600 of its business titles available as e-books for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch. To offer those books, McGraw-Hill formed a partnership with ScrollMotion, a New York startup that is working with publishers to develop electronic versions of books that work on Apple's iPhone and iPod Touch.
The result of years of research, Connect is designed to help professors manage homework, quizzes, and exams all in one place. College students can use the online tool to watch video lectures, read electronic books, and take personalized tests. It is being used by 1.2 million students in the U.S. this semester, up from 500,000 last semester, McGraw-Hill says. That's still a fraction of the roughly 15 million students the U.S. Education Dept. says are enrolled in undergraduate degree-granting institutions.
A typical Connect course costs students $40 for the semester, or $80 per semester with an embedded e-book. McGraw-Hill also plans to release Connect to high schools, says Mickey at Simba Information. "McGraw-Hill is making much more of a drive in terms of technology," she says. "Publishers want to be careful that they don't get squeezed out in this digital migration."
Like newspapers before them, traditional book publishers are facing the reality of the new digital world. With Apple's much anticipated tablet expected to debut within the next few months, they're under more pressure than ever before to "Think Different". Moving from print to digital isn't a smooth or easy path, despite the fact that most authors are working digitally in the first place. As early experiences with the Amazon Kindle have shown, digital tablets are not geometric or mental equivalents of the printed page.
"You've got to think beyond the page," says Chuck Toporek, my editor at Addison Wesley/Pearson, "because the page no longer exists -- there is no page number, or page to flip." Book content has to adapt and flow to on-device presentation. Like the HTML revolution of the '90s, publishers will need to rethink how their content can adapt to changes in font size, and "the page" is more driven by screen dimension and resolution than a piece of paper is. "[Interaction styles like] pinch and zoom should not hinder the user," Toporek adds.
Publishers need to expand their ideas about how readers interact with a book. A lot of readers tend to make notes in the margins, highlight text, or dog-ear pages as they're reading. Instead of traditional tools, readers will be using electronic equivalents. But what will the electronic equivalents be?
Adobe's PDF system has long included mark-up features in its Acrobat product line. Acrobat users can embed notes, scribbles, and other visual elements in PDF documents, and share those marked up and edited files with others. Over the last year or two, many of these features have found their way into Mac OS X via Apple's Preview application. For the tablet, Toporek thinks publishers need to take highlights and annotations to the next level. "An ebook doesn't have to be a static thing that just sits on a shelf," Toporek adds. "Imagine a scenario where the highlights and annotations I make to an ebook can be exported and shared with anyone else who has the same ebook/device." He goes on to add, "It would be great if I could overlay your notes on top of my own so I can see what's important to you."
He envisions a social network of connected readers, built around technical titles. "Wikis and wikibooks never panned out [for these kinds of technical texts] because people were looking for information they could share in but often they weren't willing or able to write it all themselves...[Authors take] great care in building content for their books, investing hundreds, or often thousands of hours in building that content." Readers might build on top of that content by annotating and commenting on text, digitally highlighting their favorite portions and creating "reader cuts" of the text.
A tablet could allow a community to build itself around a book, just like communities now build themselves around popular websites. "Reading a book doesn't have to be a solo effort; it can be communal. Think about taking all those highlights and annotations and storing them on a community server, where readers could overlay the text with that feedback, whether its 2 or 20 or 200 other people. You could toggle that information on and off at will. You can build a community around an ebook, and that's something you just can't get with a print book."
Toporek points out that ebooks shouldn't limit themselves to static text and images. "You really have to leverage the capabilities of the device, and exploit the heck out of it," says Toporek. "Think of where audio and video fit into an ebook. You can incorporate screencasts and audio clips from the author, or even include content that doesn't make it into the print version, sort of like a director's cut of a DVD." According to Toporek, tablet-based books might incorporate live examples, demonstrating principles in action, just like web pages currently do. And what if you need an ebook that isn't for the rumored Apple tablet? "Publishers should look to delivering ebooks to WebKit-based browsers so they can leverage HTML5, CSS, and JavaScript (think web-standards), or other frameworks such as SproutCore."
If the tablet does emphasize ebooks the way analysts expect it to, we can only hope that Apple helps show publishers The Way in a future version of the iPhone SDK, similar to Amazon's active content Kindle development kit (KDK) announced yesterday. If the tablet succeeds in its arena, the way the iPhone has before, authors and publishers will be able to Publish Different.
Some people want the Apple Tablet to run Mac OS X's user interface. Others think its UI will be something exotic. Both camps are wrong: The iPhone started a UI revolution, and the tablet is just step two. Here's why.
If you are talking hardware, you can speculate about many different features. But when it comes to the fabled Apple Tablet, there are basically three user interface camps at war. On one side there are the people who think that a traditional GUI—one built on windows, folders and the old desktop metaphor—is the only way to go for a tablet. You know, like with the Microsoft Windows-based tablets, and the new crop of touchscreen laptops.
In another camp, there are the ones who are dreaming about magic 3D interfaces and other experimental stuff, thinking that Apple would come up with a wondrous new interface that nobody can imagine now, one that will bring universal love, world peace and pancakes for everyone—even while Apple and thousands of experts have explored every UI option imaginable for decades.
And then there's the third camp, in which I have pitched my tent, who says that the interface will just be an evolution of an existing user interface, one without folders and windows, but with applications that take over the entire screen. A "modal" user interface that has been proven in the market battlefield, and that has brought a new form of computing to every normal, non-computer-expert consumer.
Yes, people, I'm afraid that the tablet will just run a sightly modified version of the iPhone OS user interface. And you should be quite happy about it, as it's the culmination of a brilliant idea proposed by a slightly nutty visionary genius, who died in 2005 without ever seeing the rise of the JesusPhone.
Raskin was the human interface expert who lead the Macintosh project until Steve Jobs—the only guy whose gigantic ego rivaled Raskin's—kicked him out. During his time at Apple, Raskin worked on a user interface idea called the "information appliance," a concept that was later bastardized by the Larry Ellisons and Ciscos of this world.
In Raskin's head, an information appliance would be a computing device with one single purpose—like a toaster makes toast, and a microwave oven heats up food. This gadget would be so easy to use that anyone would be able to grab it, and start playing with it right away, without any training whatsoever. It would have the right number of buttons, in the right position, with the right software. In fact, an information appliance—which was always networked—would be so easy to use that it would become invisible to the user, just part of his or her daily life.
Sound familiar? Not yet? Well, now consider this. Later in his life, Raskin realized that, while his idea was good, people couldn't carry around one perfectly designed information appliance for every single task they can think of. Most people were already carrying a phone, a camera, a music player, a GPS and a computer. They weren't going to carry any more gadgets with them.
He saw touch interfaces, however, and realized that maybe, if the buttons and information display were all in the software, he could create a morphing information appliance. Something that could do every single task imaginable perfectly, changing mode according to your objectives. Want to make a call? The whole screen would change to a phone, and buttons will appear to dial or select a contact. Want a music player or a GPS or a guitar tuner or a drawing pad or a camera or a calendar or a sound recorder or whatever task you can come up with? No problem: Just redraw the perfect interface on the screen, specially tailored for any of those tasks. So easy that people would instantly get it.
Now that sounds familiar. It's exactly what the iPhone and other similar devices do. And like Raskin predicted, everyone gets it, which is why Apple's gadget has experienced such a raging success. That's why thousands of applications—which perform very specialized tasks—get downloaded daily.
The impending death of the desktop computer
Back in the '80s, however, this wasn't possible. The computing power wasn't there, and touch technology as we know it didn't even exist.
During those years, Raskin wanted the information appliance concept to be the basis of the Mac but, as we know, the Macintosh evolved into a multiple purpose computer. It was a smart move, the only possible one. It would be able to perform different tasks, and the result was a lot simpler than the command-line based Apple II or IBM PC. It used the desktop metaphor, a desk with folders to organize your documents. That was a level of abstraction that was easier to understand than typing "dir" or "cd" or "cls."
However, the desktop metaphor still required training. It further democratized computing, but despite its ease of use, many people then and today still find computers difficult to use. In fact, now they are even harder to use than before, requiring a longer learning curve because the desktop metaphor user interface is now more complex (and abstract) than ever before. People "in the know" don't appreciate the difficulty of managing Mac OS X or Windows, but watching some of my friends deal with their computers make it painfully obvious: Most people are still baffled with many of the conventions that some of us take for granted. Far from decreasing over time, the obstacles to learning the desktop metaphor user interface have increased.
What's worse, the ramping-up in storage capability and functionality has made the desktop metaphor a blunder more than an advantage: How could we manage the thousands of files that populate our digital lives using folders? Looking at my own folder organization, we can barely, if at all. Apple and Microsoft have tried to tackle this problem with database-driven software like iPhoto or iTunes. Instead of managing thousands of files "by hand," that kind of software turns the computer into an "information appliance," giving an specialized interface to organize your photos or music.
That's still imperfect, however, and—while easier than the navigate-through-a-zillion-folders alternative—we still have to live with conventions that are hard to understand for most people.
The failure of the Windows tablet
As desktop computing evolved and got more convoluted, other things were happening. The Newton came up, drawing from Raskin's information appliance concept. It had a conservative morphing interface, it was touch sensitive, but it ended being the first Personal Digital Assistant and died, killed by His Steveness.
Newton—and later the Palm series—also ran specialized applications, and could be considered the proto-iPhone or the proto-Tablet. But it failed to catch up thanks to a bad start, a monochrome screen, the lack of always-connected capabilities, and its speed. It was too early and the technology wasn't there yet.
When the technology arrived, someone else had a similar idea: Bill Gates thought the world would run on tablets one day, and he wanted them to run Microsoft software. The form may have been right, but the software concept was flawed from the start: He tried to adapt the desktop metaphor to the tablet format.
Instead of creating a completely new interface, closer to Raskin's ideas, Gates adapted Windows to the new format, adding some things here and there, like handwriting recognition, drawing and some gestures—which were pioneered by the Newton itself. That was basically it. The computer was just the same as any other laptop, except that people would be able to control it with a stylus or a single finger.
Microsoft Windows tablets were a failure, and they became a niche device for doctors and nurses. The concept never took off at the consumer level because people didn't see any advantage on using their good old desktop in a tablet format which even was more expensive than regular laptops.
The rise of the iPhone
So why would Apple create a tablet, anyway? The answer is in the iPhone.
While Bill Gates' idea of a tablet was a market failure, it achieved one significant success: It demonstrated that transferring a desktop user interface to a tablet format was a horrible idea, destined to fail. That's why Steve Jobs was never interested. Something very different was needed, and that came in the form of a phone.
The iPhone is the information appliance that Raskin imagined at the end of his life: A morphing machine that could do any task using any specialized interface. Every time you launch an app, the machine transforms into a new device, showing a graphical representation of its interface. There are specialized buttons for taking pictures, and gestures to navigate through them. Want to change a song? Just click the "next" button. There are keys to press phone numbers, and software keyboards to type short messages, chat, email or tweet. The iPhone could take all these personalities, and be successful in all of them.
When it came out, people instantly got this concept. Clicking icons transformed their new gadget into a dozen different gadgets. Then, when the app store appeared, their device was able to morph into an unlimited number of devices, each serving one task.
In this new computing world there were no files or folders, either. Everything was database-driven. The information was there, in the device, or out there, floating in the cloud. You could access it all through all these virtual gadgets, at all times, because the iPhone is always connected.
I bet that Jobs and others at Apple saw the effect this had on the consumer market, and instantly thought: "Hey, this thing changes everything. It is like the new Mac after the Apple II." A new computing paradigm for normal consumers, from Wilson's Mac-and-PC-phobic step-mom to my most computer-illiterate friends. One that could be adopted massively if priced right. A new kind of computer that, like the iPhone, could make all the things that consumers—not professionals, or office people—do with a regular computers a lot easier.
This was the next step after the punching card, the command line, and the graphical desktop metaphor. It actually feels like something Captain Picard would use.
Or, at least, that's how the theory goes.
Stretching the envelope
For the tablet revolution to happen, however, the iPhone interface will need to stretch in a few new directions. Perhaps the most important and difficult user interface problem is the keyboard. Quite simply, how will we type on the thing? It's not as easy as making the iPhone keyboard bigger. You can read our analysis of the potential solutions here. The other issues involved are:
• How would Apple and the app developers deal with the increased resolution? • How would Apple deal with multitasking that, in theory, would be easier with the increased power of a tablet? • Where would Apple place the home button?
The resolution dilemma
The first question has an easy answer from a marketing and development perspective.
At the marketing level, it would be illogical to waste the power that the sheer number of iPhone/iPod Touch applications give to this platform. Does this mean that the Apple Tablet would run the same applications as the iPhone, just bigger, at full screen?
This is certainly a possibility if the application doesn't contain a version of its user interface specifically tailored for the increased screen real state. It's also the easiest one to implement. The other possibility is that, in the case the application is not ready for the extra pixel space, it may run alongside other applications running at 320 x 240 pixels.
Here is a totally made-up example of home-screen icons and apps running on a tablet at full screen:
However, this would complicate the user interface way too much. My logical guess is that, if the app interface is not Tablet-ready, it would run at full screen. That's the cheapest option for everyone, and it may not even be needed in most cases: If the rumors are true, there will be a gap between the announcement of the device and the actual release. This makes sense, as it will give developers time to scramble to get their apps ready for the new resolution.
Most developers will like to take advantage of the extra pixels that the screen offers, with user interfaces that put more information in one place. But the most important thing is that the JesusTablet-tailored apps represent an opportunity to increase their sales.
From a development point of view, this represents an easily solvable challenge. Are there going to be two applications, one for the iPhone/iPod touch, and another one for the tablet? Most likely, no. If Apple follows the logic of their Mac OS X's resolution-independent application guidelines—issued during the World Wide Developers Conference in June—the most reasonable option could be to pack the two user interfaces and associated art into a single fat application.
How to multitask
Most rumors are pointing at the possibility of multitasking in the tablet (and also on the iPhone OS 4.0). This will bring up the challenge of navigation through running apps that take all over the screen. Palm's Web OS solves this elegantly, but Apple has two good options in their arsenal, all present in Mac OS X.
The app switch bar or a dock They can implement a simple dock that is always present on the screen or is invoked using a gesture or clicking a button or on a screen icon. This is the simplest available method, and can also be made to be flashy and all eye candy.
Exposé This is one of those features that people love in Mac OS X, but that only a few discover on their own. Once you get it, you can't live without it. I can imagine a tablet-based Exposé as an application switcher. Make a gesture or click on a corner, and get all running applications to neatly appear in a mosaic, just like Mac OS X does except that they won't have multiple windows. The apps could be updated live, ready to be expanded when you touch one of them. Plenty of opportunity for sci-fi'ish eye candy here.
A gesture makes sense for implementing Exposé on the tablet—as you can do on the MacBook Pro—but they could also use their recently-patented proximity sensing technology. In fact, I love this idea: Make the four corners of the tablet hot, making icons appear every time you get a thumb near a corner. The icons—which could be user customizable—could bring four different functions. One of them would be closing the running application. The other, call Exposé and bring up the mosaic with all running applications. The other could invoke the home screen, with all the applications. And a fourth one, perhaps, could open the general preferences. Or bring a set of Dashboard widgets that will show instant information snippets, like in Mac OS X.
Here's an illustration—again, totally hypothetical—of what this sort of Exposé interface might look like:
The physical home button in the iPhone and the touch plays a fundamental role, and it's one of the key parts of the interface. Simply put, without it, you can't exit applications and return to the home screen. On the small iPhone, it makes sense to have it where it is. On this larger format—check its size compared to the iPhone here—things are not so clear.
Would you have a single home button? If yes, would you place it on a corner, where it could be easily pressed by one of your thumbs, as you hold the tablet? On what corner? If you add two home buttons, for easier access, wouldn't that confuse consumers? Or not? And wouldn't placing a button affect the perception of the tablet as an horizontal or vertical device? This, for me, is one of the biggest—and silliest—mysteries of the tablet.
What about if Apple decides not to use a physical button? Like I point out in the idea about Exposé, the physical button could be easily replaced by a user definable hot corner.
Revolution Part Two
With these four key problems solved, whatever extra Apple adds—like extra gestures—is just icing on the iPhone user interface cake that so many consumers find so delicious. The important thing here is that the fabled Apple Tablet won't revolutionize the computing world on its own. It may become what the Mac was to the command-line computers, but the revolution already started with the iPhone.
If Apple has interpreted its indisputable success as an indication about what consumers want for the next computing era, the new device will be more of the same, but better and more capable.
Maybe Apple ignored this experience, and they have created a magical, wondrous, an unproven, completely new interface that nobody can imagine now. You know, the one that will bring universal love, world peace and pancakes for everyone. I'm all for pancakes.
Or perhaps Steve Jobs went nuts, and he decided to emulate el Sr. Gates with a desktop operating system.
The most logical step, however, is to follow the iPhone and the direction set by Raskin years ago. To me, the tablet will be the continuation of the end for the classic windowed environment and the desktop metaphor user interface. And good riddance, is all I can say.
When the real thing arrives, will it be as good as the YouTube versions?
Image: CourseSmart
If reality catches up with rumor, Steve Jobs will give one of the great demos of his life next Wednesday at Apple's (AAPL) invitation-only "latest creation" event in San Francisco.
But you don't have to wait until Jan. 27 to get a taste of what he might be showing.
For months, Apple has been secretly meeting with developers, advertisers and publishers about its forthcoming tablet computer. And although it's likely that nobody outside of Cupertino has actually seen the thing, there are concept videos all over the Web.
We've collected three of the best below the fold:
A tablet magazine from Time Inc.'s (TWX) Sports Illustrated
A tablet textbook from CourseSmart – a joint venture of several publishers, including McGraw Hill (MHP), Wiley (JWA) and Pearson (PSO)
A tablet catalog, apparently from Ikea (privately held)
Bonus video: A demo of Microsoft's (MSFT) Courier, the two-paneled concept tablet that created such a stir in tech press last September but was strangely absent from Steve Ballmer's keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show two weeks ago.
What is it about tablets that gets the masses all worked up? I don't know. Yet what I do know is that with Apple's forthcoming tablet sporting high-end accelerometers, GPS and Google Maps, I don't think that any of us will be going around in circles in the desert for 40 years trying to find the Promised Land. "Apple - Reinvents the Tablet," the headlines will read the day after Steve Jobs holds up the tablet to the shouting masses who will be pleased with the sacrifice Apple has made. Others will begin to smelt golden copies of the anointed tablet – but none shall prevail. Yet until that day arrives, the masses are starving for some real news about the coming tablet. What will it offer, pray tell. In part one of this short two part series titled The Tablet Prophecies, we'll first take a look back at some rather interesting tablet-specific applications that Apple has been working on to make their first tablet unique. Then in part two we'll take a look back at some great tablet-specific hardware features that Apple has revealed to us in various patents over the years. Who knows, perhaps some of the coolest applications and hardware features you'll read about this week will actually debut on Apple's' first iteration of the tablet next week. For now, let's dig right into Apple's Tablet Prophecies and find out what we could be in store for.
Overview
In part one of this two part series we'll look at some of the features that Apple could market the tablet with in light of the various modes that Apple has revealed to us through their tablet-specific patents. For instance, Apple has revealed a series of ebook modes that point to various ways that we may end up reading books, magazines and/or newspapers in. In fact a lot of detail has been cataloged concerning this area of development. Which of the modes Apple will debut next week is anyone's guess, but there's room for growth here over the coming years - being that we'll eventually see a duo-display based tablet-set mirror paper based books.
Additionally, Apple points to a two handed virtual keyboard, numerous virtual controls, floating menus, a new way to interact with their iTunes Store and even introduces us to an all new GarageBand application that may debut with the tablet or be reserved as part of an iLife suite upgrade in time for Christmas 2010.
More importantly, perhaps for many, is that Apple's tablet also gets down to business. On paper at least, it appears that the tablet will run word processing and spreadsheet applications and in some recent patents, Apple has shown us that they're still thinking of ways of reinventing, or at least reintroducing, the stylus for Apple's tablet. And though the jury is still out on that contentious point, you can't fight the fact that Apple's engineers are still working on this project according to a number of recent patents. Time will tell on that one, but for now, let's dig right in and cut to the chase.
Welcome to Morphing Virtual Controls & Modes
One of the most important aspects of a leading Apple patent presents us with the fact that the tablet could have morphing virtual controls that presents the user with multi-modes. The patent states that "the user interface mode may be widely varied. The user interface mode may include navigation modes, scroll modes, data entry modes, edit modes, control modes, information modes, display modes, etc."
According to Apple, each mode will typically have one or more GUI interface elements associated therewith. By way of example, a virtual scroll wheel or slider bar may be associated with a scroll mode; a keyboard or keypad may be associated with data entry mode; a tool bar such as a formatting tool bar or drawing tool bar may be associated with an edit mode; a control panel including buttons may be associated with a control mode; a window may be associated with an information mode – and so on and so forth.
The range of applications for Apple's upcoming tablet appear to have no boundaries being that it will run the Mac OS. To make sure that you get this point, the patent lists various examples of applications it will be able to run, with many in plural form: Spreadsheet programs, image editing programs, drawing programs, iTunes, iPhoto, iMovie, GarageBand, word processing programs and so forth. Regardless of the debate over which OS the tablet will actually operate, the larger point is that the tablet will run more standard applications which will make this as much a working tool as it could be a recreational gadget.
Yet let it be said that if OSX could run on a razor thin MacBook Air – there's really no technical reason why it couldn't be earmarked for a future version of an Apple tablet. In fact, Apple has made this very point themselves in a 2008 patent concerning a hybrid notebook/tablet.That particular patent was really about touch technologies that just happened to demonstrate the hybrid product as one earmarked device.
Any naysayer could check out patent 20080168384 under patent point 0145 as follows: "FIGS. 33A-C show another example of a device according to at least certain embodiments of the disclosure. FIG. 33A illustrates a laptop device with a keyboard, a body, a display frame, and a display. The laptop device can be converted into a tablet device as illustrated in FIG. 33B and FIG. 33C. FIG. 33B illustrates the conversion of the laptop device into a tablet device."
New Floating, Reader Controls
According to one particular touch patent of Apple's, the tablet will be able to recognize your thumb (likely by means of biometrics) and open up a floating control as shown in both FIG. 17D and 19C above. The floating control could be set up to display menus, icons, buttons, scroll bars and so forth to give users control over launching a program or gaining access to a network and so forth. The user could also create custom groups. For example, a floating control could be set up for iTunes and the controls that you think that you'll use most often like, raise of lower volume, call up playlists, next-tune etc. For apps, you could set it up to open mail, iPhoto, iMovie, Safari etc.
This is going to be very cool. You'll have minimal toolbar garbage in your face while still being able to access the controls that you deem important: You have to love it.
As an eBook Reader: Page Turning
Apple's patent FIGS. 21A and 21B noted above, clearly illustrate Apple's futuristic touch tablet used here as an e-book or ibook reader. The side-by-side patent figures clearly show us that a page-turning gesture at the bottom of the tablet is turning the page from 1 to 2. You'll be able to whisk through pages in either direction as required.
On that point I'd rather see a one-tap option or a corner-page swipe that looks more like your actually turning a physiical page. That would be cool and different from the way you go to a next page on your iPhone or iPod touch today. But if you're hoping for something a little more radical, then perhaps the next mode will grab your attention.
Tablet with New Back Panel Touch Zone Controls
Apple's patent figures 14 and 15 noted below are from another touch patent titled "Hand held electronic device with multiple touch sensing devices." It is here in this 2006 patent where Apple spells some minor yet interesting details of a coming two handed tablet. Although the shape of the tablet may be widely varied, such a device is typically "page sized," according to the patent. "By way of example," the patent states, "the tablet PC may have a height of about 12 inches, a width of about 8.5 inches and a thickness of about 1 inch (or less)."
"It should be emphasized that page sized is not as transportable as pocket sized. However, by being page sized the device can include increased functionality that is not capable in smaller devices," notes the patent.
It should also be noted that the thickness detailed in the 2006 patent is likely to be irrelevant being that Apple has since developed the MacBook Air - proving the likely thickness for their upcoming tablet.According to Apple's own marketing, "the thinness of MacBook Air is stirring. But even more impressive, there’s a full-size, fully capable notebook encased in the 0.16 to 0.76 inch of sleek, sturdy anodized aluminum." How much slimmer could the Apple Tablet get? Time will tell.
In Apple's patent FIG. 14, you'll notice three areas outlined as patent points 144. These areas could carry touch-areas or zones on the back of the panel where users' hands will typically be while reading or playing a game. In these areas the user's fingers may be tapped, pressed, or slid across the touch surface in order to generate inputs.
While the patent doesn't provide any specifics for what kind of controls could be employed here, we can assume that there could be a page-flip control, a cursor control and perhaps a light adjustment for day to evening reading etc. For gamers, we could only hope that superior gaming controls are on the way. The iPod touch or iPhone are fine for simple pastime games, but it sure would be great to have better controls for higher-end video games. A little more information on video games will be revealed in part two of this series.
Virtual Dials, Click-Wheels & Keyboard Controls
Apple's patent figure 6A above introduces us to a rotation gesture as it relates to a virtual dial. Consider this dial to be that of a volume control, for instance. Apple notes that such virtual controls will also be matched with audible or tactile feedback (as is currently used in some iPod touch/iPhone applications today). Optional virtual controls will be available, especially to developers - so that they could incorporate sliders, buttons and/or switches and the like into their applications. I'm sure in order to get the creative juices going for their developers, Apple's first tablet iteration will be chalk full of neat virtual controls to play with.You'll see new ones below in relation to iTunes.
Apple's iWork: Pages App with Virtual Keyboard
Apple's Pages, a word processing application that is part of Apple's iWork suite appears to be one of the applications being prepared for a future tablet.Apple's patent FIG. 24 noted above is a diagram of a GUI operational method 700 which is configured for simulating a keyboard. The touch screen is positioned over or in front of the display. By way of example, the display may be an LCD and the touch screen may be a multipoint touch screen.As shown in FIG. 25B, a user positions their fingers 576 over the multipoint touch screen 520 over the keyboard 730 to enter data into a word processing program.
The patent figure makes it clear that this is a two handed keyboard and not just a texting keyboard that comes with Apple's iPhone or iPod touch. It should also be noted that while Apple used alien hands for their illustration, word is that humans will be able to work the keyboard as well - Ha!
Controlling iTunes on a Tablet
Apple's new tablet is shown in the patent to operate with new virtual controls that will be displayed automatically as part of a program. They could also be displayed when a particular gesture is performed. By way of example, during the operation of a music program such as iTunes, the virtual scroll wheel may only appear on the GUI when two fingers are placed on the touch screen as opposed to one finger - which is typically used for tracking in iTunes today.
Further, as shown in FIG. 38G, the user may add another finger to the current touch thereby initiating a change from the first control panel 966 to a second control panel 982. The first control panel 966 may include a first set of control options such as play, stop, seek and volume options and the second control panel may include a second set of control options such as song playing order, song information and/or light effect options.
In addition, multiple GUI elements could be activated in the same portion. For example, as shown above in FIG. 38J (at the top left), if the user selects a particular box in the playlist 964, a keyboard 992 may be activated so that the user could enter data associated with the song (e.g., title, artist, genre, etc.). If the scroll wheel 962 is active at the same time as the keyboard, then the scroll wheel may be minimized to accommodate the keyboard as shown. Once the keyboard is deactivated, the scroll wheel reverts back to its original size.
The virtual keyboard will also be used to type in your iTunes Store account information, enabling you to make purchases.
Advanced Video and Sound Editing
Apple's patent FIG. 21D illustrated below shows other additional touch sensitive UI elements that could be added to a new video editing application. For instance, slide bar UI element 796 could be added to detect gestural inputs for invoking level adjustments, such as pan adjustment or brightness, contrast, hue, gamma, etc. types of adjustments.
User Interface (UI) element 795 noted above, could also be displayed within the video application to effect sound editing of the video. Specifically, the UI element could include a plurality of level adjustments for recording or playback of different channels of sounds or music to be mixed with the video.
Uniquely, the patent states that the user will not only be able to customize which UI elements are to be displayed on the interface but also program the UI elements to perform desired functions.
DJ App: A Dual Virtual Turntable Mixer
With Apple's new Hip Hop DJ app coming to the tablet – you're going to be the hit of the party!Apple's patent FIG. 23 noted above illustrates an embodiment of the invention that relates to manipulating the replay and recording of audio or musical files. This new app and/or feature is likely earmarked for Apple's GarageBand in their iLife suite. According to the patent, the music application could display a pair of virtual turntables 844 and 845, on which two musical records 834 and 835 are playing. The noted records could be one of a single or a LP record. The records could be graphical representations of a digital musical file (e.g., song A and song B) that are being replayed via the music application. In other words, the records could be graphical imprints of the musical files as if the musical files were imprinted on physical records.
Like a pair of physical turntables, stylus 844 and stylus 855 could be graphical icon indications of a playback queue, the position of which could be varied by touching the queue on a touch sensitive display screen and dragging the icon to the desired position on the graphical record. The moving of the stylus would cause a jump in the playback point of the corresponding song, as on a physical turntable.
Also like a pair of physical turn tables start/stop buttons 838 and 839 could be touched by one or more fingers to toggle the start or stop/pause of the song reproduction.
Speed variant bars 840 and 841 could be linearly adjusted to control the playback speed of the songs. Windows 831 and 833 could graphically reproduce the frequency representation of the reproduced songs, while window 832 could display the frequency representation of the actual output of the music application 832, which could be simply one of the songs being reproduced, or a mixed/combination of the songs. Mixing/pan bar 850 can be manipulated to modulate or demodulate the two songs being reproduced.
During song reproduction, the records 834 and 835 could be manipulated similar to a physical record. For instance, rapid back and forth movement of a record can cause the sound effect of a record "scratching," as disc jockeys often do on physical turn tables.
The new DJ app sounds like it could be a winner and a blast at parties!
Must the Fun End?
In part one of this two part series we've taken a peek back at a few core Apple based tablet patents that were published during the 2006-2008 timeline; Patents that provided us with some intriguing insights into some of the new software ideas and mechanics that were invented in Apple labs. The focus was on new functionality being devised while sharing a few new application ideas that are likely to come to market.
Must the fun end? Of course not, and in part two we'll explore a couple of very interesting if not cool hardware features earmarked for a future Apple tablet. In additon, we'll take a look at couple of new twists to the tablet OS functionality worth noting, as well. In fact, one feature is so off-the-charts, you wonder if they'll ever get it out of their labs. And yes, it relates to the tablet.
So stay tuned for part two coming this week. Until that time, Patently Apple has opened a new Tablet section for you to check out and we'll keep it up to date as new tablet related patents come to light.
Notice: Patently Apple presents only a brief summary of patents with associated graphic(s) for journalistic news purposes as each such patent application and/or grant is revealed by the U.S. Patent & Trade Office. Readers are cautioned that the full text of any patent application and/or grant should be read in its entirety for further details. Most of the patents associated with this report will be noted in this section the day after Apple releases the tablet.
I’m a writer for a blog that focuses on Apple and its products, including Macs, iPods and iPhones. So I have a duty and an obligation to write one or more posts about the highly anticipated, much discussed, and completely unknown Apple Tablet device expected to be announced on January 27. But based on the last few years, I have a bit of a unique perspective on the tablet, why Apple might create one, and why you might want to buy one if it does.
Almost four years ago — about 9-10 months before the iPhone was first announced in January 2007 — I decided to give up a rather successful user experience consulting practice to follow a dream. I created a company to build and monetize a product of my own making, rather than continue to provide services to others. After some extensive research, a small team I had assembled helped me develop the product concept and strategy. Essentially, we were going to create what we called the “iTunes of apps,” an online ecosystem of applications that you could easily discover and download to all your digital devices. We determined we needed to build a tablet computer as proof of concept and get hardware manufacturers and content companies on board.
We envisioned a product that looked something like the Notion Ink reported recently, and focused on creating “the first room-to-room mobile Internet device” on the market. Our plan was to focus on lifestyle applications that made daily life easier, including video recipes, home/baby/security monitoring, instructional videos for DIY home improvement projects, and a wide array of similar content. The miBook has since been launched with similar ambitions, but focuses exclusively on “how to” type of content, rather than a full ecosystem of diverse apps serving many purposes. Litl is giving something similar a whirl, but it has a keyboard and limited capability touchscreen so it can’t really be called a tablet. HP’s DreamScreen is a digital picture frame that, while hardwired, is also attempting to address similar needs. Alas, we weren’t able to raise the significant capital required to launch such an animal, in part because no one on our team had a hardware background. We’ve since moved on to creating our own software and advising others in the user experience and mobile space.
For us, the effort was all about the user experience. At the time — and even since with the iPhone, full-screen Blackberries, and Android phones — there was a gap in the user experience between the Nokia N series and similar mobile devices, and full-fledged computers. Something incredibly fun and easy to use, with a screen big enough to be viewed across the room (for watching video recipes, sharing photos with the family, or just watching video content of any type). Of course, the iPhone and iPod touch have addressed much of this need, except the bigger screen. Viewing distance and sharing aren’t the only limitations of the mobile screen for content perhaps best consumed in a tablet style device. iPhone video, for example, takes over the screen, eliminating ability to view related text content or even publish opinions about the content you’re viewing to your social networks. There’s not really a good digital equivalent of reading magazines with imaginative typography, color spreads, and other graphic elements. And I have yet to see a compelling digital textbook that not only includes the original text, but also companion videos and graphics, news feeds on related topics, and updates from and conversation with the author.
That’s the sum total of what I know about the Apple Tablet. That there is a market for one, that many companies are trying hard to tap the market, and that there is a lot of content which would best be showcased on such a device. But what I don’t know is likely far more interesting. So without any inside knowledge, here is my not-so-idle speculation about what it might or could include:
Keyboard Dock: Perhaps the best use of a tablet would be a replacement for the consumer-oriented, entry-level white MacBook. But to successfully replace a laptop, the Apple tablet might just need a physical keyboard. What better way to integrate one than to simply make it a recharging dock?
Third OS: My sense is there will be a new operating system for the tablet that bridges the gap between the small size, single-function nature of the iPhone OS and the larger platform, keyboard-driven, multitasking capabilities of Snow Leopard. It might be nice if the OS automatically sensed that the tablet was in the dock, and morphed slightly for keyboard optimized input.
Publication Wrapper: A new multimedia format will join iTunes LP, allowing publishers of primarily text-based content to release multimedia versions of their book, magazine, or newspaper content that dramatically changes how we consume a lot of content in the home.
Apple TV & iTunes Integration: The new tablet will basically become the wireless display to the Apple TV, and Apple will offer a ground-up rethinking about how content is shared among devices on a local network.
Front-mounted Web Cam: Crowding around a MacBook to have a video chat with the grandparents isn’t a terrible experience, but it isn’t ideal. A touch-based iChat application would be far more compelling and fun.
Home Controls: Expect Apple to position the tablet, an updated Apple TV, new and easier sharing of content among devices, apps like Remote, and integration with other systems as a way to make home controls a mass market.
Personally, I enjoy all the rumors and speculation that some have grown weary of. I’m hoping that none of us are completely right, and that Apple will surprise us all with something that we never realized we couldn’t do without.
We all know that you want an iPad. You haven’t even touched one yet, but you have read every word published on the device since before it was announced on Wednesday’s event. You’ve been up all night dreaming about surfing the web, and looking at your address book in split view. You can’t wait to download iTunes movies and watch them on the gorgeous 9.7″ LED-backlit, glossy widescreen multi-touch display with fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating.
Open source content management system 
Like newspapers before them, traditional book publishers are facing the reality of the new digital world. With Apple's much anticipated tablet expected to debut within the next few months, they're under more pressure than ever before to "Think Different". Moving from print to digital isn't a smooth or easy path, despite the fact that most authors are working digitally in the first place. As early experiences with the Amazon Kindle have shown, digital tablets are not geometric or mental equivalents of the printed page.
In Raskin's head, an information appliance would be a computing device with one single purpose—like a toaster makes toast, and a microwave oven heats up food. This gadget would be so easy to use that anyone would be able to grab it, and start playing with it right away, without any training whatsoever. It would have the right number of buttons, in the right position, with the right software. In fact, an information appliance—which was always networked—would be so easy to use that it would become invisible to the user, just part of his or her daily life.
When the technology arrived, someone else had a similar idea: Bill Gates thought the world would run on tablets one day, and he wanted them to run Microsoft software. The form may have been right, but the software concept was flawed from the start: He tried to adapt the desktop metaphor to the tablet format.
