iPad thoughts part 2 – Included Apps

The iPad really comes alive when you start using the touchscreen and interacting with the OS and applications. The most common layout in landscape mode is the left third of the screen showing a list of some sort while the middle and right thirds show the selected document or view. The Settings app below shows this, with the list of setting groups on the left and the options on the right.

Turning to portrait mode shows the same options squeezed in width for the narrower dimension, while other apps such as Mail show a full screen view with a dropdown list.

MobileMe – what .Mac should have been

The last major announcement of the WWDC was the new MobileMe service, replacing .Mac from July. Offering a web interface to mail, calendars and contacts with a familiar Mac app appearance, the impressive thing about this is the ability to synchronise or push information across iPhone, iPod, Mac (ical, mail, address book) and Windows Outlook. Syncing of photo’s is also supported, and Apple describes this as ‘Exchange for the rest of us’. Storage of 20Gb is included. Priced at $99 a year it looks like a much better service than .Mac, and should do much to revive Apple’s flagging web service. More information here.