iPod touch Thoughts & The Future!

This is the third post in the series on my experiences and impressions of the iPod touch look here for:
Part 1 and
Part 2.

Ok now that I've lived with the iPod touch for several weeks I thought it would be worth coming back and revisiting some of my initial thoughts on the product

What's great about the touch?

• Video Playback & Quality - this remains the biggest key benefit to the device so far in my view is the clear high resolution of the screen and the video playback capability. I've experimented with a variety of content (both podcasts and videos downloaded from our Canon Powershot SD800) and can say that the results are simply great. I haven't witnessed any of the issues mentioned in other reviews about the tone of solid blacks or greys on this device.
  
• Touch Interface - in short "IT ROCKS!" - while the smugs can be annoying nothing can replace the fun of endlessly flipping through pictures, double tapping, pinching and a number of other gestures that you quickly begin to realize this is what a user interface should be.
  
• iPod Functionality - a very solid audio player - definitely an improvement in terms of navigation and listening over previous iPods (the 1G & 2G Nano and the 3G Classic that I've owned).
  

What's Not So Hot?

• Safari & Web browsing in general - by all means this is far more useful than the browsing experience on other handheld devices (e.g., various Blackberries, Palm and Windows mobile phones/PDAs). Web browsing is still fairly limited and I continue to have issues with the touch dropping Wifi signals in areas where other machines are fine (maybe I just got a dud on this count).
  
• Lack of External controls - while this isn't huge its enough of a pain to make my list. For a firm that normally thinks and builds hardware that has a better handle of customer usage scenarios that most others in tech land Apple missed the boat on adding a number of very simple controls to this device.
  

What to Hope For In A Software Update?
While I've seen others comment and blog on the fact that this isn't an iPhone I think its important to keep in perspective that the iPod touch isn't meant to be a phone. I wouldn't expect Apple to muddy the waters between the different devices by stacking on a number of features that are meant to establish the iPhone as a SmartPhone including - phone, camera, email management. However, there are a number of things that come to mind that could make a good device even better but here are a few thoughts on what could make this a GREAT device.

• Open Access to Third Party Developers - I firmly believe that the functionality and innovation that will allow this next generation of iPods/iPhones to be fantastic devices will not come from innovation inside Apple. I think that the native apps included on the device are for the most part but in places feel somewhat rushed (read the missing Add function in the Calendar - although Apple is now calling this a "bug"). My take is that as a community the value of strong third party development brings much more to Apple's customers than the value of having a strongly controlled absolutely crash-proof device (which seems to be one of Apple's key arguments). My point is simply that the market has a clear want for third party apps and there seems to be a willing supply of developers interested in investing the time to work on an interesting new hardware platform. I urge you to click on the following link if you have a DIGG account and add your voice to those asking Apple to do the right thing for their customers.
  Inundate Apple with your dissatisfaction
  

• Widgets/Dashboard for iPod touch - One way to make this device far more usable in my mind would be to enable the use of widgets for the look-up of specific information. For example, a number of times I've used the touch to quickly look-up things on the go such as phone numbers, directions and a map. Given that Safari on the Mac can sometimes be a frustrating experience (I remain a committed Firefox user!) and even more so on a smaller device the potential of dedicated Widgets seems to be a much cleaner solution.
  

Overall, two weeks in I'm happy with my touch and would repeat the purchase and will likely hack the device to add new apps once the iPod Touch dev team cracks it. Based on the latest posts from TUAW.com it looks like they're getting close. Even without the hacks I'd still say for those of us outside the US or even those in the US that simply want a solid portable media device the touch is well worth serious consideration.

A Share In Death By Deborah Crombie - Book Review

I realize its been a few days since I posted but getting carried away with work and holidays has meant that the blog has been ignored for a couple of days. Here are a couple of posts to make up for the absence.

In searching Amazon for similiar books to M.C. Beaton's Agatha Raisin and Hamish MacBeth series I happened upon Deborah Crombie's Inspector Kincaid series. "A Share in Death" is the first in a series of books by Ms. Crombie following the adventures of Superintendent Duncan Kincaid and Sergeant Gemma James. This novel introduces us to Kincaid in a holiday setting with a vacation at an English countryside resort which operates as a timeshare. Not looking to give too much away, the plot centers around a series of murders that occur over a period of several days. As the residents of the resort are sequestered to the grounds while the police investigates Kincaid takes a break from his vacation and steps forward to pursue the murderer.

Overall, "A Share In Death" offers up a welcome escape with a nicely drafted mystery that works its way through a series of twists, turns and murders in just under 300 pages. I would recommend this book if you're looking for a relaxing read with a well thought-out mystery and a plot that builds to a sound conclusion as Kincaid and James chase down the killer. Not a deep thought book but a good solid read that leaves you looking forward to reading the next adventure of Inspector Kincaid.

Here are a few links on Deborah Crombie:

The official site hosted by the author herself

A short profile over on Who-Dunnit.com

Fun with the iPod touch

This is the second post in the series on my experiences and impressions of the iPod touch look here for:
Part 1 and
Part 3.

Now that I've iPod touch a couple of days I thought that I'd come back with some further thoughts on the device. Possibly the biggest surprise so far with the device is the use of videos and photos. While I expected to use the regular iPod functions for podcasts and listening to music and the video podcasts the biggest surprise is the use of the pictures. I expected the picture functionality to be somewhat surprisingly

• Wifi Interference - I've continued to use the Safari browser and found that it is more useful than the web browser on my Blackberry 8700 (even when accounting for the pathetically slow speeds on an Edge network). The ability to utilize a double tap gesture or a pinch to zoom in on content makes the browsing experience useful. I've also found that generally the keyboard and the interaction with webforms seems to function much better than other portable wireless web surfing on other devices.
  

More in a bit on this topic as I'll be on the road for the next few days and should be able to experiment on a variety of networks in different environments (e.g., offices, airports, hotels).

Future of Multi-touch
Some interesting thoughts from the future development of multi-touch technlogy from ars techica about some time they spent meeting with Microsoft to review the introduction of its Surface concept tablet computer. Follow the link here. Definitely, multi-touch as an enhancement to existing user interface technologies is going to be a trend in the future. I'd expect that consumer PCs over the next several years will incorporate this technology into PCs. The bigger challenge for this technology to be useful will be to have native touch support built into the operating system to support seamless access across multiple applications.