iPad Live! hits the air tonight

• 9pm ET, 6pm PT, 2am GMT

We’ll be previewing 2011 including iPad 2, what the competition might bring at CES next week, and what we want from iOS and apps in the new year.

Joining Rene, Chad, and Georgia will be special guest, Chris Parsons (Bla1ze) from CrackBerry.com and AndroidCentral.com.

http://www.tipb.com/live/

Be there!

iPad Live podcast tonight! 2011 preview, come chat! is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

Apple is widely expected to introduce iPad 2 sometime in the next few months and, if they follow the same yearly cycle they have for iPhone and iPod touch, ship it in April 2011 running iOS… what exactly? iOS 4.2 still? A new iOS 4.3? Last year iPad was unveiled running iOS 3.2 (then called iPhone OS 3.2). iPhone was running iOS 3.1, and iOS 3.2 looked similar yet at the same time as fresh and new as iPad itself. The same only bigger and in some ways, better. Background wallpaper and home screen rotation alone were enough to make it look new, as were sidebars in landscape and popovers in portrait mode.

Then iPhone got iOS 4 in June, not only closing the gap but with multitasking, folders, threaded email, and other new features, surpassing the iPad, which stayed trapped on iOS 3.2 until November, when iOS 4.2 finally unified the product line. If Apple sticks to pattern iOS 5 will be previewed around the same time as iPad 2 but won’t launch until iPhone 5 does in June, 2011. So it seems like there are a three major options:

1. Apple keeps iOS unified, launching iPad 2 with iOS 4.2 in April and hoping hardware alone wow-factor enough to get attention, entice upgrades, and keep the growing competition at bay. Or Apple waits until June to launch iPad 2 alongside iPhone 5 and iOS 5, getting software along with hardware bang but giving the competition more time to catch up.

2. Apple fragments iOS again like they did last year, launching iPad 2 with a major, iPad-only iOS 4.3 update in April and once again putting it ahead of iPhone and iPod touch for several months, either to unify again in June with iOS 5, or to take its turn and languish again for a September or November, 2011 iOS 5.1/iOS 5.2 unification.

3. Apple pulls an iPod touch, introducing a minor iOS update with a couple of new features that become available to all iOS devices at pretty much the same time. Pretty much what they did with iOS 4.1 last September with Ping, Game Center, and TV rentals.

iPhone always gets the added bump of a new iOS come launch time and even though iOS itself is previewed months before, Steve Jobs usually saves a few key, hardware-based features to announce at WWDC (like FaceTime and HD video last year). iPad got that same bump with iOS 3.2 last year. I can’t imagine Apple not adding some software sizzle to new iPad hardware in 2011, beyond the FaceTime we know will come with camera(s). At the same time, the mere thought of the platform being fragmented again is worrisome. That leads me to believe we’ll get option #3, the minor, cross-platform update, with a small amount of new features like broader AirPlay and AirPrint support, subscription billing for apps, and maybe one or two other bullet points.

That keeps iPhone as the big flagship release alongside the new iOS every year and lets iPad and iPod touch bookend it, or rather follow up and follow up again until the next major product cycle begins.

So iPad 2 could just ship with iOS 4.3, but I’m betting iOS 4.3 won’t be the leap forward iOS 3.2 was, it’ll be the tiny step of iOS 4.1. What do you think?

iPad 2 will ship with… which version of iOS? is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

CES 2011 starts in just a few days and once again the iPad competitors are lining up to take a shot at Apple’s breakthrough tablet. I say “once again” because last year, even before Apple had announced the iPad, rumor of it alone was enough to get Steve Ballmer on stage showing off a Windows-powered HP Slate, and to line the halls with all sorts of in-development tablets based on Android, Linus, etc.

None of those materialized for the mainstream but now that Apple has launched iPad and sold millions upon millions of them, you can bet this year will be different, and here are just some of the players:

• Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer is giving “a number” of slates another shot on stage, this time by Samsung and Dell (HP now has webOS, see below). The SammyPad is said to be similar to iPad but not as thin, allowing for a slide-out keyboard as differentiator. They’ll run full-blown Windows 7 but have a layer on top for better touch-computing. [New York Times]

• HP/Palm’s webOS PalmPad was rumored to be showing up for CES dressed in the old HP Slate duds from last year, but that rumor now seems to have been smashed. Too bad. Palm Pre and Palm Pre Plus both debuted at CES, and a Palm Pad debut would have had interesting symmetry. webOS optimized for the big screen, like iOS was for iPad, could be a serious contender for Apple in usability, elegance, and design — where it’s usually ahead — so hopefully if we don’t see it at CES we’ll see PalmPad soon thereafter. Worst case scenario, Palm is focusing on phones, which isn’t a bad thing… [PreCentral.net]

• RIM’s BlackBerry PlayBook will almost certainly grab a lot of attention at CES. A bold departure from the traditional hierarchy of BlackBerry strengths — BBOS, keyboards, communication — RIM’s tablet runs their new QNX-based PlayBook OS with UI layers powered by Adobe’s Flash. That means RIM can brag about a “fuller” web experience than Apple provides. So, while it might look like an iPad running something akin to webOS, it’ll have the RIM brain-trust (and security focus) behind it. For years they’ve been making fun of Apple’s “toys”, but putting the BlackBerry brand (and BBM) on the device might just get all those who’ve had secret iPad lust in their hearts a way to get some PlayBook, and play-time all their own. [CrackBerry.com]

• Android 3.0 Honeycomb-powered tablets will probably the biggest, baddest competition coming Apple’s way, and Motorola’s (DroidPad?) will spearhead that assault. Demonstrated by Andy Rubin last month, the prototype was as big as an iPhone and looked to really take advantage of that extra size. Android apps can split out into pane-views (perhaps similar to Apple’s column-views, perhaps more free form like windowed computing?) and who knows what else at this point? We’ll also likely see a googolplex of other Android tablets on the floor, shipping with a variety of versions and customizations to the OS, showing again the strength-in-numbers of the platform. [AndroidCentral.com]

There will no doubt be a lot of other contenders as well, some ultra-cheap, some amazingly innovative. Yours truly from TiPb and the rest of SPE, including Dieter, Kevin, and Phil will be on the ground covering the event and will bring you back all the highlights. Which of these devices do you think will be the biggest story and the toughest competition?

Which one do you think Steve Jobs will target the hardest when he takes the stage just a short time later (don’t know when yet!) and introduces iPad 2?

iPad competitors once again lining up for CES is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

TiPb breaks down the must have apps we want to see from Apple, Adobe, Google, Microsoft, and RIM/BlackBerry for iPhone and iPad

Despite hundreds of thousands of iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps in the App Store, there are still some huge gaps, and major apps missing from the big players, including Apple themselves, Adobe, Google, Microsoft, and BlackBerry maker RIM. Some of the best known software on the market simply isn’t available for iOS. We’re hoping that changes in 2011, and after the break are the apps we’re hoping help make the change!

Apple: Files

I wrote at length about the need for a Finder app and amended it to a Files app in 2010 and now, at the beginning of 2011, it still tops my list for new iPhone and iPad apps I want from Apple. The reason is simple: document access on iOS as it currently stands is a nightmare. Apple’s own iDisk and third parties like DropBox and Box.net offer functionality that really should be native and as off-line as it is on. Again, the Photo app is the model. It preserves the sandbox by providing a central repository for files, and allows them to easily be opened via the Picker in any other app. What Photos does or images and video, Files should do for documents (and both should do via Safari so we can upload to the web, just saying…). Apple, make it happen.

Also want:

• iWork for iPhone. We have it for iPad, we’ve seen it teased for iPhone, it can’t possibly not be released in 2011.
• iPhoto for iOS. Create albums, move photos between them, do basic editing like crop and red-eye removal, and sync selected photos. We got iMovie for iPhone (and hopefully for iPad 2 soon), give us iPhoto.

Adobe: Flash Player

For years people have been angry at Apple for the lack of Flash support. And that’s ridiculous. It’s entirely Adobe’s fault for coasting on shoddy code for the last five years and only delivering a workable mobile Flash, in beta, near the end of 2010. But deliver it they have. It’s not great; I’ve disabled it on my Nexus One, but Adobe is working on it fearfully hard, and Google and Palm and RIM have chosen to support it (and in so doing slowed the switch to HTML 5. Jerks.), so it’ll get good enough. I don’t think Apple would allow a Flash plugin like on other devices — it’s a security risk and a user experience hit — but a Flash Player? Apple could work with Adobe to create a Flash app much like the YouTube app. A single app that, if it detects Flash video anywhere else on the device, especially Safari, it can take the handoff and play it in its own little, highly optimized, hopefully hardware accelerated, Flash-cookie-free sandbox. (Much how the QuickTime player handles H.264 video). It’s not 2007 anymore, and 2011 isn’t Flash free, so it’s time to bite the bullet on this one.

Also want:

• Creative Suite Viewer That I can view AutoCad docs on my iPhone and iPad and not Photoshop, Illustrator, or InDesign is a disgrace. Get on that, Adobe!

Google: Gmail

I don’t want to come off as greedy, since my mind is still blown by getting Google Voice and Google Latitude in 2010, but in 2011 I really, truly would like a native Gmail app that can handle things like attaching pictures and video (and Files.app, right Apple?). In a perfect world Google would have made Gmail more compatible with other mail systems, seamlessly handling labels as folders and stars as flags. In a perfect world, Apple would actually handle things like stars/flags in the built-in Mail app. But keeping with the pragmatic theme of this post, and acknowledging how annoying separate email apps are on Android, I’d still like a native Gmail app for iPhone and iPad. If it gets decent push notifications built in, like the Google Mobile app, I won’t even have to worry about iOS not having a “set default mail client” setting.

Also want:

• Google Navigation When Android got this for free we heard rumors iPhone would be getting it as well. Then not. Then again. Then not again. Google, just do it.

(If you could somehow get Apple to add those newfangled vector graphics to the Google-powered, built-in Maps app, we’d appreciate that as well).

Microsoft: Office

Documents to Go is great. QuickOffice is grand. Even Google Docs is usable over the web. But Microsoft, baby (can I call you baby?) none of those are Office. Sure, Office is a beast of a suite, as frustrating as it is fantastic, but it’s the standard and it belongs on iPhone and iPad. You’ve built it for Windows Mobile. You’ve built it for Windows Phone. You’ve even built it for Mac and are working on it for Nokia. You know how to do Apple and you know how to do mobile, so it’s time to do Mobile Apple. Sure you lose a differentiator for your own OS, but you had no problem doing that for Exchange, did you? Microsoft, stop teasing us and make 2011 the year of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint for iPhone and iPad. Okay?

Also want:

• Outlook ActiveSync is okay but for hard core Exchange users a native Outlook app is every bit as important as a native Gmail app is to Googlers. Let’s get that sync’ed.
• Zune Pass Apple hasn’t done subscription music yet but they have sold a gazillion iOS devices. Get those users on Zune Pass before iTunes.com launches.

RIM: BlackBerry Connect

CrackBerry Kevin already laid out why, in a post Kik-world, RIM would be better off owning the cross-platform instant messaging space than sitting on the sidelines while some third-party service breaks the crack off from the berry, so I’ll just echo his sentiments here. BlackBerry Connect used to bring BlackBerry Messenger (BBM) to other devices; it could do the same again. Do I expect to see Big Mike bound across a WWDC stage any time soon? No, but Apple did announce a Microsoft ActiveSync license at the iOS 2 event in 2008, so announcing a BlackBerry Connect license in 2011 wouldn’t be unprecedented.

Also want:

• BrickBreaker. Kidding! Give me BBM and I’m good.

Your picks?

Those the top 5 big name apps I’d like to see come to iPhone and iPad in 2011. What are yours? (Besides Facebook for iPad, of course!)

Top 5 big name apps we want to see on iPhone and iPad in 2011 is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog

That pesky iPhone bug that caused one-time alarms not to go off in 2011 has been confirmed by Apple (phew!), as has the “fix” — either set a recurring alarm or wait, as it corrects itself on January 3rd and works properly thereafter.

We’re aware of an issue related to non repeating alarms set for January 1 or 2. Customers can set recurring alarms for those dates and all alarms will work properly beginning January 3.

But were they aware of it prior to New Year, i.e. could they have had time to release an iOS 4.2.2 bug fix and spared users the inconvenience? If not, given this is the second major bug in the iOS 4 alarm system, hopefully they’re redoubling their QA efforts in that area so we aren’t hit again this spring. Either way, are you happy with the statement? Should Apple have given greater assurance they’re looking into it or maybe even expressed a little empathy for affected users?

[Engadget]

Apple confirms iPhone alarm bug, says wait for tomorrow and it’ll fix itself is a story by TiPb. This feed is sponsored by The iPhone Blog Store.

TiPb - The #1 iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch Blog