Apple's iOS 4 Explored
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 22, 2010 3:27 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Apple
- iOS 4
- Gadgets
- Mobile
iBooks
I love my Kindle, but I hardly ever carry it around with me when I’m traveling on business. But I’ve always got my phone. The fact of the matter is that devices like the Kindle 2 or Nook were designed for a different demographic than the iPad or even the iPhone. They were designed for those who wanted more of a book reading experience. If you don’t mind reading on a LCD screen, especially a good one (ahem, iPhone 4), then Apple has your answer.
I like reading books through the iBooks app but the selection is just no where near as broad as what Amazon’s Kindle store has to offer. There’s unfortunately no way to buy books through the Kindle app for the iPad/iPhone, you need to use Safari for that. If Apple can compete with Amazon’s Kindle Store in terms of selection, the iBooks app is getting good enough to be a real competitor to the Kindle.
You can bookmark pages as well as keep bookmarks synced to your iTunes Store account. The iBooks app also doubles as a PDF reader, although flipping pages in image intensive PDFs can be laggy at times (the app itself isn’t particularly snappy to begin with).
PDFs sync through iTunes just like anything else. Simply drag the PDF over to your library in iTunes and it’ll get added to the Books subsection. You can search through PDFs and use the scrubber at the bottom to quickly get to a particular page.
Apple even provides you with a brightness adjustment widget in the iBooks app in case your optimal phone brightness setting differs from your optimal reading brightness setting.
Safari
An updated version of Safari ships with iOS 4 but the updates are fairly minor. Bing is now a search option although Google is still the default (for now).
The search box also autocompletes with suggestions.
The new Safari did crash a couple of times for us during the creation of this article but it’s too early to tell if it’s significantly less stable.
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SunSamurai - Friday, June 25, 2010 - link
Get over it. Its either ads or no free apps.robco - Tuesday, June 22, 2010 - link
AdMob isn't blocked from the iPhone, nor does Apple have a monopoly. Since AdMob is owned by Google, a major competitor with Android, there are some analytics Apple won't allow AdMob to access. If you think about it, this makes perfect sense, why give a competitor access to information on potential customers (who are presently your customers)? Developers can still use AdMob if they wish, they just won't get as much data.So far I haven't had many issues. I think we're still waiting for developers to catch up to the new OS. But it works like a charm on my 3GS. Folders is a little clunky, but I'm happy not to have to swipe across multiple home screens to access apps. As for the iPhone 4, the only real compelling feature for me is the new camera with flash. Since I have a 3GS, I'd have to pay through the nose to "upgrade" and I won't do that until LTE is rolled out and the iPhone supports it. Oh, and it's available on a network that isn't AT&T.
Android is looking good, but Google does a horrible job with UI. I know they have UI designers working there, but it appears nobody at Google listens to them. Stock Android looks like Windows 3.1.
anandtech02148 - Tuesday, June 22, 2010 - link
iAds sounds yuck, i'll keep my 3GS and the old os3xxx. another reason why iphone 3gs is so popular because it has a pirate community, reminder to the pc system where you where you have a vibrant thriving hacking community for warez, gamez,. apzz., Google Droid can go to hell, a billion dollars in marketing from verizon won't save you.. Look at Google trying to get back into China. what will hapen to Symbian ^3? nokia N8 looks appealing from hardware standpoint..but their software really needs refresing idea like Palm OS. Intel and Nokia are great hardware companies but software they really need a saviour.haplo602 - Wednesday, June 23, 2010 - link
wow, so Apple is finaly introducing basic features into it's sofware ... how suprising and inovative ...seriously ... I gave up in the middle of the article. there's nothing interesting in it. just the shock at people thanking Apple for providing basic features (ipod playlists FINALY editable, now that's groundbreaking).
my age old HTC Herald can do all these things already a few years. Sure the HW is old and slow, but the functionality is still there.
Death666Angel - Wednesday, June 23, 2010 - link
That a customer (and tech reviewer) can (blindly?) trust a company that is worth over half a trillion USD to look out for him is astonishingly naive, stupid, or malicious, possibly all 3 and even more.A company that has a proven record of shady decisions (we will ban this app, oh wait, it gets media attention, let's actually allow it!), shady handling of the press (accidental leaks, rumors, investigations), shady handling of its competition (violating patents, very closed system) should have the end users best interest at heart? Are you insane?
After reading this and the Froyo article, I have deleted my AT bookmark and will refrain from coming here in the future.
Good bye
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