I was surprised to get mine yesterday, I thought we did not get
Saturday UPS deliveries, but apparently Apple paid for doing so.
It really is different, that's for sure. And it will take the iPhone
apps folks a couple of months to figure out how to migrate.
Several new UI features are shared amongst the apps. One is a
combination of menu and panel .. using the larger screen to drop down
a menu-like selection but with buttons and sliders in addition to the
menu items. Great use of the screen space.
Another innovation is the portrait/landscape transition. Several apps
use portrait for a smaller media window plus controls, and the rotated
view becomes the "full screen" media mode. YouTube does a great job
of this.
iBooks is great fun. Currently it is not built in, you get it for
free from the Apple store. Not sure if that's to be nice to Kindle or
Lawyers or just it was too late to be on board. Comes with a free
Winnie the Poo book.
The Kindle app is surprisingly complete, they must have had a team
working on it for quite a while. And it makes the iPhone version
better too. They actually have an advantage over iPad for a while ..
they work better on phones due to having small screen support.
Photos are incredible. Music as you'd expect, although without cover
flow for some reason. iTunes synch much the same as for iPhone. I
bought Keynote but haven't played with it yet .. hard to believe a
full bore app for only $10. And naturally mail and web quite
impressively good.
Pdf's were a biggie for me because of school and digital books. There
is no pdf reader like Preview on the Mac. But the core is there ..
send yourself an email with the pdf as an attachment! There are a few
doc reader apps for the iPhone, one that even had an iPad version
(Goodreader) ready for the launch. I'm sure there will be dozens.
One important stunt for TeX-pdf files: you should "save as" from
Preview before sending them to your iPad. This is to make sure all
non-standard fonts are embedded in the pdf, not relying on local
fonts. TeX uses several unusual critters, but Preview is clever
enough to pack them into the .pdf if "save as" used to build a second
copy. Slightly larger.
iPhone apps that are not converted to iPad still work surprisingly
well. They show as half size, and you can click on "2x" to make them
fullscreen .. jaggies and all. Actually not an issue: I have an
Italian dictionary and found its use just fine.
iPad is far more of a "lap" device than the laptop is .. you find
yourself curling up with it, and naturally "touch" interfaces are far
more immersive.
Typing on the larger screen is much, much easier. All the pundits are
writing their first post using it. (I'm clearly not a pundit .. this
is from my laptop!) You end up typing with a two-finger-per-hand hunt
and peck. I think it won't take long to master.
Overall, I'm surprised that it seems to be so effortless to learn and
use. iPhone, and likely Android, users will feel comfortable with the
touch interface. It is strikingly gorgeous. It really is a new class
of computing, creating it's own niche. Certainly for most mobile use
it is fine, and at 1.5 lb, that's saying a lot! .. or maybe little? :)
-- Owen
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