Ondrej Holzman When Apple yesterday sent out invitations, in which he indirectly confirmed that he will present a new iPad next week, another wave of speculation immediately arose as to what the new Apple tablet will look like. At the same time, deductions are based only on that invitation. However, she may be saying more than it might seem at first glance...
Retina display yes, Home button no?
If you take a quick look at Apple's invitation, you won't see much out of the ordinary - just a finger controlling an iPad, a calendar icon with the date of the keynote, and a short text that Apple uses to entice fans. Of course, it wouldn't be the Apple community that didn't analyze the invitation in detail and come up with some interesting conclusions.
The first one is the Retina display. If you take a closer look at the iPad photographed on the invitation (preferably with magnification), you will find that its image is much sharper, with almost invisible pixels, and if we compare it with the iPad 2, we will see a clear difference. And not only in the overall concept, but also, for example, with the label Wednesday on the calendar icon or at the edges of the icon itself. This means only one thing – the iPad 3 will have a display with a higher resolution, so probably a Retina display.
While I would probably throw my hand in the fire for a higher resolution, I'm not nearly as convinced about the second conclusion that can be drawn from the invitation. The photographed iPad lacks a Home button on the invitation, i.e. one of the few hardware buttons that the apple tablet has. You probably immediately thought why the Home button is not in the picture and how it is possible, so let's break down the individual arguments.
The most common reason was that the iPad is turned to landscape (landscape mode). Yes, that would explain the absence of the Home button, but colleagues from Gizmodo they examined the invitation in detail and found that the iPad must almost certainly have been photographed in portrait mode and horizontally in the middle. If it was turned to landscape, the spaces between the individual icons in the dock would not fit, which are different with each layout. The second possibility is that Apple just turned the iPad upside down, so that the Home button would be on the opposite side, but that doesn't make much sense to me. In addition, in theory, the FaceTime camera should be captured in the photo.
And another reason why apparently the Home button is not where it should be according to established rules? A close examination of the wallpaper and the drops on it shows that the iPad is indeed turned in portrait. At least a comparison with the same wallpaper on an iPad 2 shows a match. When we then add Apple's message to everything "And touch" (And touch), the speculation takes on more real contours.
Apple could certainly manage without a Home button on the iPad, but earlier in iOS 5 it introduced gestures that can replace the function of the single hardware button on the front of the device. But the fact that the Home button is missing from the invitation does not necessarily mean that it will completely disappear from the iPad. It is possible, for example, that it just transforms from a hardware button to a capacitive one, while it could be on all sides of the tablet and only the button on the side of the iPad will be active.
In switching applications, closing them and returning to the home screen, the Home button replaces gestures, but what about Siri? Even such an argument can fail. Siri is launched by holding down the Home button, there is no other way to activate the voice assistant. After the success in the iPhone, it was expected that Siri could also be deployed in the iPad, but this is not a guaranteed news. So if the Home button disappeared, either Apple would have to come up with a new way to start the assistant, or on the contrary, it wouldn't let Siri into its tablet at all.
Will Apple introduce another new iPad app?
In the past, we could see that Apple transfers its Mac applications to iOS if it makes sense. In January 2010, along with the introduction of the first iPad, he announced a port of the iWork office suite (Pages, Numbers, Keynote). A year later, in March 2011, together with the iPad 2, Steve Jobs introduced two more new applications, this time from the iLife package - iMovie and GarageBand. That means Apple now has office apps, a video editor, and a music app covered. Are you missing something from the list? But yes, photos. At the same time, iPhoto and Aperture are one of the few applications that Apple does not yet have on iOS (we do not count the native Photos application as an iPhoto equivalent). Otherwise, only the apparently dead iDVD and iWeb remain.
If we were to calculate that Apple will continue the established tradition and introduce a new application for the iPad this year, it will most likely be Aperture. That is, assuming he doesn't come up with something completely new. The first argument is the retina display mentioned above. Details are important for photos, and editing them makes much more sense on a fine display. The fact that it is the last missing part of the iLife package also plays a role for iPhoto, and Aperture for its more advanced editing functions. I'm of the opinion that no matter what name it gets into the iOS app, its main focus should be photo editing. This slightly favors the latter program, because while iPhoto focuses mainly on organizing photos, Aperture has much more diverse editing options and is generally a more professional software.
Also, I'm not sure Cupertino would want any photos stored/organized in this app at all. Camera Roll is already used for this in iOS, from which the new application would classically draw images. In Aperture (or iPhoto) only the photos would be edited and sent back to the Camera Roll. However, something similar to the Lightbox from Camera+ could work in this application, where the photos taken are temporarily stored, which after editing are saved to the Camera Roll.
I think Apple may actually have something similar up its sleeve.
Will we see Office for iPad?
Information leaked to the Internet world last week that an Office suite from Microsoft is being prepared for the iPad. Daily The Daily he even posted a photo of Office on iPad already running, saying that they are finishing it up in Redmond and that the app will appear in the App Store before long. Although Microsoft will release information about the port of its popular package for the iPad shortly denied, however, journalists have brought more detailed information that suggests that Office for iPad does exist. They look similar to OneNote and use a tiled user interface known as Metro.
Word, Excel and PowerPoint for iPad certainly make sense. In short, Office continues to be used by the vast majority of computer users, and Apple cannot compete with its iWork package in this regard. It would then be up to Microsoft how they would deal with the tablet version of their applications, but if the port was successful for them, then I dare to guess that it would be a great success in the App Store.
If we really get Office for iPad, it is possible that it is still in development, but I don't see an obstacle in why we can't at least take a look under the hood already next week when the new iPad is presented. Even much smaller companies than Microsoft have appeared at the keynote with their achievements in the past, and Office for iPad is a relatively big thing that certainly deserves a presentation. Will we see representatives of Apple and Microsoft on the same stage again in a week?
I can't wait... In addition, someone might also be interested in this analysis of the invitation to cult of mac - http://sy.pe/4xvh it's really interesting, but I don't believe most of the estimates and some are really interesting. I just hope Apple doesn't release a hybrid between the retina and the current state...the retina is the only thing I've been waiting for the whole time to get an iPad. Well, the home button can easily disappear on the iPad, which is not very good considering that it is a device that does not have a stable orientation. That is, if it is not there, nothing happens, gestures will replace it, but I wouldn't worry about Siri, if Apple wants to add it, they will certainly figure out how to invoke it. It would be best if she went to call up the device by simply saying "Siri" and she would immediately activate and ask "How can I help you?" ;) that would be TOP control and I was a bit hoping that there would be similar control from the beginning … it takes too long to hold the button, but addressing our assistant by name is a matter of seconds and feels more natural and definitely adds depth to the conversation. In addition, I would like it if in the following years Siri would get a really sophisticated engine so that it would be possible to have a real conversation with her. Imagine how easy it would be to learn languages if you could have a natural conversation with iStroj.
It will never happen that you call up siri just by speaking, because the microphone is not always on, but only when you need it.
That doesn't mean that Apple can't figure it out, plus the microphone isn't exactly a power-hungry component, so maybe so. Siri can already be called by putting it to your ear, so why not do it this way too ;) never say never. In addition, I have already seen an advertisement for a similar system like Siri, I don't know, in Android, and there it was triggered by addressing. But I don't know what it was anymore.
I also came across this interesting study, which tells a lot about how the iPad is used by women vs. men and what apps they have, why anyone would buy an iPad 3 and more. It's worth checking out.
http://sy.pe/sGQtb
ArnieX: very nice infographic, thanks.
Radoslav, you're welcome, I also found it interesting, so I shared it, and it turns out that there was a lot of interest in it. There have been 111 clicks on the first of the links from the apple store so far, and 84 clicks on the second link.
so I went through the photo with photoshop, and don't be fooled... the home button on the ipad3 image is blackened... you can see for yourself... http://stuff.orad.cz/ipad.jpg
Of course it is blackened! The image is focused from a close-up on the finger and the calendar icon, so the home button is a scattered gray smudge, see the photo from Gizmodo... A scattered bright spot that also extends into the black area where white text needs to be inserted. They just retouched… No fucking science. Haven't you tried putting the font on a mottled background?
Well, I'll tell you... it doesn't really matter if HB will be there or not... but I personally lean towards not putting it there at all, after all, it's a fart... gestures are nice and apple is not afraid to take such steps that users like from the beginning but they don't have to start…. take it from the other side that the iPad can be used in 4 orientations and the button is simply a distracting element for this type of use. I've also seen users using the iPad with the camera down, so I guess.
If I wanted to cancel HB in Photoshop, be sure you wouldn't know it. This is bullshit whether HB is there or not.
JK: Well, of course, in addition, in Apple, these invitations should not be made by secretaries and the graphics should definitely be TOP, and to cancel HB on a black background is perhaps the easiest thing...
The button does not need to be retouched, it is enough to take a photo in complete darkness so that the light of the display reflected from the finger does not illuminate it.
Aperture is a promising tip, but not as a full desktop equivalent. Raw processing, even on a decent computer with 8GB of memory, is not always completely fast, and the iPad is still nowhere near these parameters. I would expect very limited editing options and an orientation towards working with a library of jpg versions synchronized with home Aperture.
Oh, and gentlemen (and ladies?) did anyone notice that something important is missing from the invitation?? The dots showing the position between the surfaces and therefore the number of surfaces... at least one should be there correctly, but it is missing on the invitation... what could this mean?