ipad posts

Most of the bloggers here at TUAW are huge fans of Dropbox, the free cloud storage service. Since you can share documents with all of your iDevices, wouldn't it be nice to be able to edit your files from any of them as well?

There are actually several solutions for cross-platform on-the-go Dropbox file editing, like Documents To Go Premium (US$14.99) for both iPhone and iPad. However, if your need is just for plain vanilla text file editing for iOS, you might want to take a look at Droptext ($0.99) from developer Kevin Smith.

Any type of file with a MIME type of TEXT can be opened from Dropbox and edited in Droptext. Those files types include .txt, .php, HTML, CSS, and many source code types. Smith promises to add the ability to add your own file extensions in a future version of Droptext. Editable file types appear with a text file icon when you browse your Dropbox, and they're opened immediately with a tap. When you're done editing, tap Save, and the file is saved back on Dropbox in its revised form.

It's not a fancy app, but Droptext does what it is supposed to do -- bring Dropbox text editing to iOS.

[via Wired Gadget Lab]

Is that little 50' motor yacht of yours just not making your heart beat with joy any more? Do you need a new yacht on which to stretch your legs and get away from the paparazzi? Does it just bother you that Oracle CEO Larry Ellison has a bigger yacht than you do (see photo above of his "boat" in Copenhagen)?

No need to worry! Just pull out your iPhone or iPad and install the new free Sunseeker Brokerage app -- it's free! -- and you'll have access to details about the entire line of new Sunseeker Motor Yachts, as well as over 200 pre-owned luxury yachts. The new boats section includes vessels from 48 feet in length to 170 feet, along with plenty of interior and exterior images and specifications. You can find your nearest Sunseeker office from the app, then fly your Gulfstream G550 to that location to finalize your customizations and sign the paperwork.

Of course, with the state of the economy being the way it is, you might have to tighten your belt and look at pre-owned vessels like that €18 million Leopard 46 Metre that is languishing at anchor off of Cannes. The Sunseeker Brokerage app lets you email questions about each yacht you're interested in, or email specs to your buddies. You can browse all of the vessels you're interested in while you're offline; the app can save info for any boats that meet your requirements.

Me? I think I'm going to hold out for that ISA 133 series -- it's a steal at only €10,800,000.

Update: Manton Reece points out that the issue of in-app purchases being made without challenge is probably due to the App Store's holding onto purchase authentication for a few minutes after buying or updating an app. Craig Hockenberry cites the advantages and potential pitfalls of 'communal computing' on iDevices.

Several iPhone and iPad users have noticed charges totaling several hundred dollars on their iTunes accounts. At first, the issue looked to be part of the App Store's recent woes, but it appears to be linked to an app called Fishies from PlayMesh -- best known for its iFarm app.

Fishies allows you to create a virtual fish tank. You can raise fish, become friends with other users and make purchases for your underwater world. The program itself is cute and colorful, therefore appealing to kids. While the app itself is free, you have to purchase in-game currency called virtual pearls. These run from 99 cents for 10 pearls to $149.99 for 1950. To do this, you need to input your iTunes account information -- though some are reporting that the app isn't prompting for this before the purchase is made.

I've been watching the e-reader competition with great interest lately -- after the iPad entered the market with such a splash, Amazon and Barnes & Noble have been trying to position their own devices in a place where they'll at least be profitable. But at the same time, those apparent iPad competitors have also been updating their own App Store apps. Amazon updated the Kindle app a little while back, and now Barnes and Noble has updated its own iPad app, including support for multiple orientations and brightness control, along with a few other bugfixes and features.

As I said before, I like the precedent here -- even if these companies don't match up with Apple on the hardware, this update does a lot to bring the B&N eReader in line with iBooks. Of course this gives us iPad users more options -- even if we don't own a Kindle or a Nook, we've still got the chance to use those services.

I would like to see a little more progress made with compatibility -- it's annoying to buy a book on one platform and not be able to read it on any other. But I guess that's the trade-off for having options -- Amazon and B&N will only keep up their app development while the money is coming in from their respective bookstores.

I love my iPad 3G, almost unnecessarily so. I use it as my primary computer for a multitude of tasks. The only thing that I dislike about my iPad is that I have to pay AT&T even more money to use their data network, even though I'm already paying for it with my new iPhone 4.

We have covered in the past how to manage your 3G data with your iPad using the Apple/AT&T-sanctioned methods built in to the device itself. Today, we want to show you how you can swap Micro-SIMs to make use of your iPhone's unlimited data plan with your iPad.

Note: This is not an officially sanctioned technique and you do this at your own risk! If AT&T comes down on your SIM-swapping antics with the force of a truckload of anvils... you are on your own, brother.

That said, let's proceed.

Predicting Apple's sales numbers is always a guessing game. Phillip-Elmer DeWitt notes that, despite Apple announcing the 3 millionth iPad sale 5 days before the quarter ended, this time will be no different.

He's compiled a number of estimates over at Apple 2.0, with an average around the 3 million mark. On the low end of the range is 2.50 million units sold from Mike Abramsky of RBC Capital. Mark Moskowitz of J.P. Morgan is more optimistic with a projection of 3.75 million units sold.

Most were surprised by the sheer volume of sales. At one point, Apple was selling 45,000 iPads per day. Bernstein Research's Toni Sacconaghi considered what could happen if that "scorching pace" was maintained: "Apple could sell from 25 million to 42 million units in fiscal 2011, its first full year of sales...revenues would amount to about $15B, and likely grow about $10B [year over year]. This would make iPad revenues in their first full year nearly as large as Apple's current Mac ($18B) business."

Of course, it's unlikely that such a rate of sales could be maintained, even if the iPad has truly joined its smaller brethren in breaking out of the core Apple customer base. Sacconaghi estimates that 18 million iPads will be sold in fiscal year 2010.

Apple's Q3 financial conference call will take place on July 20th. We'll be live blogging it as usual.

I like this idea -- the folks behind a new under-development app called iWishApp (that's designed to create a wishlist of iPhone apps) have decided to declare this Saturday, July 10th, as "Appsgiving Day." Basically, you go into iTunes on Saturday, the anniversary of the App Store's debut, and choose to "Gift This App" on an app you like to someone special. Not only can you support quality developers (like the ones we highlight here on TUAW every day), but you can give a nice cheap gift to an iPhone or iPad owner of your choice.

OK, sure, it's basically a completely made-up commercial holiday, and the whole point of the thing is to sell some apps -- you may have already spent more money on your iPhone than you want to admit. But there are a lot of great developers working hard on the iPhone, and why not spend a buck or two and make someone else happy with a great app, right? Seems like a good way to celebrate the platform that's come so far.

You've seen the commercials and heard that they're "your minutes" so why is "your data" any different?

I'm old enough to remember when "rollover" minutes were first announced, and I was hugely impressed by the idea. The idea was -- and is -- simple: you pay for a certain number of minutes per month, and if you don't use them this month, you can use them the next. This recognizes that some months you may use more and some months you may use less, but you can pay for approximately what you need.

I'm assuming that it also allows the company to have some reasonable idea of how much network usage will occur on any given month, which benefits them as well. This seems like a nice, reasonable balance between offering "unlimited" calling plans but still providing their customers with a good value.

Since AT&T has started metering data usage for the iPhone 4 and iPad, it seems only logical to ask (and I know I'm not the first): why isn't AT&T rolling over data too?

The almost-too-painfully-obvious-to-even-say-aloud answer is that AT&T will make more money by not offering rollover data, so they aren't. I don't expect this will change anytime soon. AT&T has done nothing to suggest they have any interest in providing value to their iPhone and iPad customers, but let's imagine a different world, one where AT&T hoped to keep some of their iPhone customers, perhaps a world where other carriers had the iPhone and AT&T had to actually compete for their business.

Read on to imagine with me...

A few months back, Box.net launched its effort to deliver 20 brand new iPads to a business that could make use of Apple's tablet and the cloud sharing service in an innovative and interesting way. Box.net eventually chose D7 Consulting, a construction consulting company in Newport Beach, California, to receive the iPads. Yesterday, I drove down to the company HQ to see the beginning of the project. Over the next 12 months, Box.net will provide not only the free iPads but also free service to D7's employees. Together, the two companies hope to get a good look at, as Box's Marketing Communications Manager Sean Lindo put it, "the possibilities and realities of cloud and mobile devices for how people need to work today."

TUAW will be following up periodically with Box.net and D7 to see how the project is going. As you can hear directly from D7 CEO Joe Daniels in the second half of this post, the next year is going to be an interesting experiment, not only to see how his employees are able to use iPads with their work on construction sites but also to see how Apple's tablet can be used reliably and well in the workplace. In the gallery below, you can see yesterday's unboxing. Read on for more on how this all came about and what challenges Daniels expects to face in the coming weeks.

There's an old saying, "When all you have is a hammer, every problem looks like a nail." For Henry Blodget of Business Insider, perhaps we should change it to "When all you have is a comparison between Windows and Mac OS from the 1980s, every situation looks like a repeat."

In an article entitled Hey, Apple, Wake Up from January 5th, 2010, Mr. Blodget compared the "iPhone vs Android" market to "Mac OS vs Windows" of the 1980s. I missed the article the first time, but that turns out to be OK because 6 months later (almost to the day) he's written the same article again, but this time with a chart!

Featuring a headline that couldn't be any more link-baiting if it included LeBron James' free agency choice or Lindsay Lohan's ice cream card, This Android Chart Should Scare the Bejesus Out of Apple rehashes what is almost exactly the same article ("NEW AND IMPROVED! NOW CONTAINS REFERENCES TO THE iPad!") and ends with a chart showing "Percent Of Developers That Have Developed For Each Mobile Platform" showing Android in the lead over iPhone/iOS.

The body of the article links not once but twice to his previous article, plus a callout box to his previous article (which also links to another article about the same chart), and at the end of the article, in case you missed it, there is a "See Also" link which will bring you back to -- wait for it -- the same article he wrote back in January.

Memo to H. Blodget: Saying the same thing over and over again does not automagically grant it the mantle of truth.

Well, if the video above doesn't prove to you how compelling Flash on the iPad can be, nothing will. Yes, the inevitable happened and Comex got Flash working on an jailbroken iPad. We all knew this was technically possible, but clearly Apple doesn't feel that Flash's performance on their mobile devices warrants full support. Whether it is battery or multitasking or whatever, Flash isn't allowed and we don't think it will be allowed any time soon (10.1 notwithstanding).

Nevertheless, if you're in the iPad jailbreaking set, go ahead and give it a try; Engadget has the how-to. You're missing out on all those crazy dancing skeletons and laughing babies. As you can see in the video you'll want to break out that Bluetooth keyboard to enjoy the full spectrum of the Flash web, as touch events aren't always analogous to mouse clicks and controls for games often require basic arrow key functionality.

As someone who cares about words, I have been considering signing up for the AP Stylebook Online ($25/year, all prices listed are USD) or buying the AP Stylebook for iPhone ($24.99) but had trouble deciding which one would be the better deal. You can also pick up a printed version of the 2010 stylebook at the AP website for $18.95. (The 2009 version is available on Amazon.com for $12.89, but the 2010 stylebook is not yet available on Amazon.com as of this writing).

I contacted the folks at AP and asked if I might be able to review the iPhone app and get a trial for the AP Online to compare them on the iPhone and iPad.

The quick and dirty summary is: if you want access to the AP information on your iPhone frequently, without having to rely on the availability of an Internet connection, get the iPhone app. For any other use case: get the online subscription.

Read on for more...

Dear Auntie TUAW,

Thought I'd send this up to see if y'all can reproduce it too. I'd seen reports on the Apple discussions that when folks were plugging into iTunes, any app they had installed directly on the iPhone was being deleted instead of transferred back. Mine does this as well, which is quite annoying!

Can y'all reproduce it or are only some of us suffering this one? I've checked all the settings, de-authorized and authorized my computer, just did a restore and setup as new a few days back. Updates transfer back just fine, but good luck keeping a new app on there!!!!

Love & huggies,

Your niece Lauren

Many iPhone users have become accustomed to using their devices to settle arguments.

• Arguing over the best route to take for your weekend getaway? Pull out the Maps app or one of the many iPhone GPS apps.
• Found someone who doesn't believe that Inigo Montoya and Jason Gideon are played by the same actor? Fire up the IMDB app.
• Disagreement over when Star Wars was released (or re-released)? Head over to Wikipedia.com or one of the many Wikipedia apps.

It's one thing to argue over facts and dates, but can iPhone apps help settle arguments about the existence of God? A recent NY Times article showed that some folks on both sides of the question are making an effort.

On the side of religious skeptics are applications like Bible Thumper, the Atheist Pocket Debater, and mAtheist. For those who are certain they can convert others to faith, if only they find the right argument, there are apps such as Doubt Busters, God Tools, or Jesus Evangelism Tool by Mobile Jesus. (As an aside, I think developers of these sorts of apps may want to avoid the word "tool" in the title, or they're just asking for people to twist the meaning.)

Read on for more...

Although most of the East Coast of the U.S. is sweltering right now, it's a cool day here at the TUAW TV Live studios in Colorado. However, things should heat up during today's episode of TUAW TV Live. We'll be talking about the alleged iPhone 4 reception issues, past iPhone release issues, new apps, updates of old favorites, why the Mac isn't in jeopardy of going away any time soon, and there could even be a giveaway.

To join in from your Mac or PC, just go to the next page by clicking the link at the bottom of this post, and you'll find a live stream viewer and a chat tool. The chat tool allows you to join in on the fun by asking questions or making comments.

If you're driving somewhere and would like to watch TUAW TV Live while you're stuck in traffic, please don't -- keep your eyes on the road! However, if someone else is doing the driving, you can watch the show on your iPhone by downloading the free Ustream Viewing Application.

We haven't forgotten about iPad users, as you can tune in to TUAW TV Live on your iPad! That link will send you to a non-Flash page, although you won't have access to our chat tool.