Along with the announcement of iPad, Apple also revealed an iPad version of iWork, originally available on Mac only. For those who never heard of iWork, it is a suite of productivity applications, similar to Microsoft Office. It bundles three types of application including Pages (word processing), Numbers (spreadsheet) and Keynote (presentation).
For the upcoming launch of iPad, Apple has completely redesigned iWorks for use on the iPad. The apps is specifically designed to take advantage of the multi-touch interface and allows you to interact with the document by using your finger. Everything is optimized for “touch”.
On Wednesday, Apple’s senior vice president for worldwide product marketing Phil Schiller demonstrated the iPad version of iWork. It looks pretty awesome. The interface is great, particularly for Keynote.
iWork on iPad
Keynote only runs on landscape mode for the reason that slide is designed horizontally. You can easily create presentation by a few simple tap and Keynote already offers a set of stunning templates for you to start with. The interface for editing slide is very much like that on Microsoft Powerpoint, with a slide navigator on the left and the slide content on the right. But here, you can interact with the presentation slides using finger. Simply flick through the slide to navigate them. Or you can tap and hold multiple slides to rearrange them. You can also insert photos from your album, edit transition and resize photos using the common finger gestures. Everything looks pretty nice.
Similar the Keynote, Pages is optimized to use with touch and virtual keyboard. It works in both portrait and landscape mode. You can edit the document with easily-accessible options and type using the virtual keyboard. It also adds a page navigator that lets you skim through pages.
Numbers on iPad starts off by a library of spreadsheets. Simply tap on any of the existing spreadsheets or start a new one using the built-in template. Like the other two iWork apps, you can use “tap and hold” gesture to rearrange column and other elements. Specifically for Numbers, it offers a numpad keyboard for your numeric input.
As Apple claimed, all these apps can import iWork ’09 and Microsoft Office documents. You can also send documents in iWork ’09 and PDF formats. The iPad version of Keynote, Pages and Numbers will be sold individually on App Store for US$9.99.
iBooks App and iBookstore
During the Wednesday event, Apple also unveiled the new iBooks app, as well as, its brand new iBookstore. With the larger screen size and sharp display, iPad is considered as a perfect device for reading book. That’s where iBooks app come in. The app shows a collection of your books once launched and simply tap on any of them to start reading it.
Thinking to buy some new books? You can simply go to the iBookstore, with interface similar to iTunes and App store, to purchase your books. Once downloaded, it’s automatically displayed in your bookself of iBooks app. The iBookstore uses the ePub format and prices seem to be ranging from US$12.99 to US$14.99.
What do you think about these apps? Do you think iPad is a great device for reading eBook? Or iPhone is just enough for you. Feel free to leave us comment to share your thought.
[Image via Apple's Keynote]
Hi Simon,
When is OS 4.0 coming. I thought it was suppose to come along with this iPAD on Jan 27th.
I really liked this article. I am interested also in the OS 4.0. Please post what you find out, Magatron. I bought a domain name and hosting plan from 734Digital.com for a blog about this subject.