Tag Archives: ipad

GMail’s less than perfect iPad app

20130427-074329.jpg

Although Apple’s stock iPad mail app is perfectly adequate and does a good job handling Gmail, Google created its own Gmail iPad app. This makes sense to people committed to Google’s mail service and wider technology stack.

It works fine for dealing with text mail messages, but fails badly when people send messages laid out using tools like HTML or, worse, text embedded in images. The mail body appears to the right of the message list – as shown in the picture above.

Often the text is tiny – in some cases in 4 or 5 point size – making it unreadable. You can, of course, zoom the message pane, but it’s clumsy when line lengths don’t readjust.

There are two lessons from this:

  • Why bother with a separate Gmail app when it does the job less well than the standard iPad mail app?
  • The problem underlines why you should stick with plain text in mail messages. Save the fancy stuff for web sites.

    • Let’s put Apple numbers in perspective

    Comparing operating margins

    John Kirk makes interesting points in Apple In Perspective at Tech.pinions when he says investors and those who watch the stock market put too much emphasis on quarterly reporting.

    His point is if you look at Apple’s numbers for the recently announced quarter, you might think you’re looking at a company in decline. But year-on-year numbers show anything but a decline.

    Sales of iPhones and iPads continue to grow at a healthy clip. And profits of US$9.5 billion on revenue of US$43.6 billion is an outstanding result by the standards of any other company in the world.

     

    Related articles

    HP ElitePad 900 display backward compatibility, feature or straight-jacket?

    ElitePad 900: Most apps works best in landscape view

    ElitePad 900: Most apps works best in landscape view

    Tablets computers all look much the same. There’s not much scope for different designs when a touch screen takes up most of the front. However, the HP ElitePad 900 stands out from the pack because is has a 16:10 ratio screen. That makes the tablet longer and thinner than rival devices like the Apple iPad.

    HP says it opted for the 16:10 ratio design because that makes it backward compatible with laptops and desktop displays.

    There’s a logic behind the decision. The ElitePad 900 uses Windows 8 and can run just about any Windows application written in the last 10 to 15 years. That makes it attractive to business users who are unwilling to invest in new hardware devices that can’t run key applications.

    That 16:10 ratio means applications will use the full display – if HP opted for the same screen dimensions as the iPad, the information would appear in a small strip across the display.

    In practice this doesn’t matter when using the ElitePad 900 in landscape view – the one favoured by those legacy applications. Things get a little weird when you turn the HP tablet 90 degrees to the portrait view.

    Test is often too small to read in portrait view

    Test is often too small to read in portrait view

    Portrait view works fine for reading websites, ebooks, word documents and the like, but a surprising number of native Windows apps don’t make the transition. For example, you can only view the Windows store in landscape view.

    Even when writing documents using the Word app, that Portrait view is a little odd, the text across a nominal A4 page is tiny and harder to read than attempting the same on an iPad.

    In practice I find I rarely use the ElitePad 900 in portrait mode. Perhaps this isn’t important, but it does mean there’s a different experience using the ElitePad compared with doing exactly the same work on an iPad.

    Ironically, this screen format works to the device’s advantage when it comes to playing movies. They look better on an ElitePad than on an iPad.

    So there you have it, the legacy screen format – which is essential for users with older software – doesn’t work so well for business applications, but shines for entertainment.

    Related articles

    Can Microsoft’s free web apps replace Office 365?

    Microsoft wants users to buy a full Office 365 subscription

    Microsoft wants users to buy a full Office 365 subscription

    Last week Microsoft sent reminders to people using the preview version of Office 365. At NZ$165 for an annual subscription covering five devices, the price is reasonable, but could you keep that money in the bank and get by with the free versions of Microsoft’s productivity suite?

    There’s a simple answer and a long answer. The simple answer is: “It depends”. If you just jot notes with Word, crunch a few Excel numbers and are a casual PowerPoint user then the free apps could be enough.

    Microsoft’s Office Web Apps are versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and OneNote that work through your browser. You need to be online to work with them and you have to store documents in Microsoft’s SkyDrive cloud service. I’ve found they work best in Internet Explorer, but Chrome and Firefox users won’t be disappointed. If you’re an Apple user, the Safari browser is also fine.

    I’ve used the apps on a desktop, laptop, tablet and on my smartphone. Office Web Apps are not the full Microsoft Office experience, but there’s enough functionality for my work. In many respects the apps are like Google Documents – I find the Office Web Apps are more polished than Google’s tools.

    Documents created with Office Web Apps will open in standard Microsoft Office applications – there’s no problem switching to and fro between the two suites.

    In practice the Web Apps lack nothing I need. I use the web version of Excel to create tables used elsewhere on this site. I’ve used all the Web Apps on my iPad without any problems.

    There are a few negatives. The web software isn’t as responsive as local applications and if you lose the web connection you’re in trouble. Sending Word documents as mail attachments can be tricky, but it is do-able.

    Overall, Office Web Apps are worth considering if you don’t need the fancy features – sooner or later you may rub up against limitations. I’d say for many users, particularly casual users, Web Apps are good enough.

    Related articles

    iPad can’t embed links? Now you tell me

    How I feel about iPad URL embedding

    How I feel about iPad URL embedding

    For 18 months or so I’ve used my iPad to write news stories, blog posts and other articles while on the move. Coupled with a wireless keyboard the iPad is better than a standard laptop with longer battery life, less distraction and increased portability.

    It turns out none of the writing apps can add or embed URLs into a document. That usually doesn’t matter, I don’t need to add them or if I do there will be just one which I can list at the end of the story. And it doesn’t matter if I writing a blog post because the WordPress app CAN insert URLs.

    Soon I’ll be back on the road. I was planning to travel light with just my iPad and keyboard for writing.That plan is scuppered because I write a daily column that includes as many as 30 URLs embedded in the text.

    This is a problem. I sold my old laptop. Luckily Mrs B has an old one stashed away, so I’ll get to relive the pleasures of Windows XP for a few days. Happy, happy, joy, joy.

    Does Microsoft still matter? Revisited

    Martyrdom and Funeral of St. Ursula

    Martyrdom and Funeral of St. Ursula Vittore Carpaccio

    After writing Does Microsoft still matter? it occurred to me that I write a lot of posts about a company that is possibly out of the running when it comes to leading the technology industry.

    At the time of writing there are 92 stories tagged “Microsoft” on this site. That’s more than the number of tags for Apple, Google and Samsung combined.

    One possible reason is my tagging isn’t that good. The word “Apple” turns up in 114 posts, while “Microsoft” is in 140. That’s partly because Microsoft has ambiguous brand names. I have to spell out that Word or Windows means the Microsoft product while iPad, Mac, iPhone and iPod are all unambiguous.

    A second reason is that this site is now seven years old. Microsoft loomed larger in the early days. If you look at posts only from the last two years, Apple is well in front of Microsoft.

    And let’s not forget my focus is more on business than on consumer technology – that tends to slew more in Microsoft’s direction.

    Still, for a company that may “no longer matter”, Microsoft gets a fair share of coverage.

    Related articles