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The iPad’s Dirty Secret

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Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#31

Post by jodrellblank »

g0atbutt wrote: post #4
jodrellblank wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not poorly handled memory management, it's good handling. Poorly handled would be to give you an out of memory error, or make the other pages disappear completely as if you'd never opened them at all.

I would have to disagree. My Droid also has 256 mb of memory, and I can have more pages open at once without it having to flush pages. This is still true with Pandora running in the background. Overall I'm a fan of the iPad, it just falls short in this area.

To make it a fair test - were they the same pages? iPhone at least does this same thing - but it does not reload every switch, only sometimes.

For all I know the iPad may do that so it can shut down memory chips and save the power of refreshing them. Just because it doesn't do exactly what you wand doesn't mean it's handled badly - it still does what it does gracefully and without errors or slowdowns.

It does after all not claim to be able to hold pages open indefinitely; and you could have saved them to some ereader app for future Reading.

Misuse ipad -> doesn't do what you want, is hardly a 'dirty secret'

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#32

Post by wanderr »

jsz0 wrote: post #29

Breaking old habits is hard but sometimes worth it. Is opening a bunch of background tabs a really efficient way of doing things? On a PC it works if you have a high enough resolution to display all the open tabs and enough RAM/CPU to quickly switch between them. On mobile devices it pays to focus on more efficient ways of doing things because you're dealing with limited resolution, potentially slower 3G networks, li…

I would argue that tabbed or multi-windowed browsing is most important on limited resource and low bandwidth devices. The main advantage of opening a tab/window in the background is not having to wait for it to load; the longer the wait, the more that functionality matters. I used the ability to open links in a new window extensively as soon as browsers offere that functionality, which was probably on a 133MHz machine with less than 256MB of RAM on a 14.4kbps (or 9600 baud...not sure) connection if I remember my computing timelines correctly.

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#33

Post by mikecane »

Perhaps the thinking behind non-caching is that people will forget to clear their cache, so why not do it automatically? It might be best to leave that as a default for people who don't care but offer a cache preference in Settings for people who know what that is, no?

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#35

Post by ahoyhere »

raganwald wrote: post #18

I remember that the iPod's dirty secret was that you had to pay big money for a battery replacement since it wasn't user serviceable. Other dirty secrets for popular consumer products include things like child labour being used to build sneakers or unsafe factory/dormitory combinations that kill hundreds of people when the factories catch fire. I get the sense that the phrase "dirty secret" is being watered down in t…

Very good point about the watering down. I'd add "anti-competitive" and "monopoly" to your list as well.

Oh yeah. And "journalism."

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#36

Post by ahoyhere »

pedalpete wrote: post #24
enjo wrote: post #12

On a side note: The author makes the assertion that anyone can be tossed an iPad and figure out the interface on their own... I challenge that assertion. I've taken a few relatives through the process of getting iPhones up and running, and I would claim that the interface is more difficult than the standard desktop metaphor. At some point an article floated through here suggesting that the iPhone interface isn't simp…

Donald Norman (founder of Human Interface Group at Apple) once said [paraphrasing] 'give people something beautiful, and they'll assume it is simple'. I can't find the original quote, but he said it again on Canada's BNN a few weeks ago.

It's not quite what he's saying. At least not if you read his book, _Emotional Design_. There have been research studies that show that beautiful things are perceived to work better -- after real usage, too, not just "Look at this picture. How do you think it will work?"

Aesthetics are so very important!

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#38

Post by petercooper »

raganwald wrote: post #18

I remember that the iPod's dirty secret was that you had to pay big money for a battery replacement since it wasn't user serviceable. Other dirty secrets for popular consumer products include things like child labour being used to build sneakers or unsafe factory/dormitory combinations that kill hundreds of people when the factories catch fire. I get the sense that the phrase "dirty secret" is being watered down in t…

You once said "Web applications are dangerous." You were taking similar creative license with the word "dangerous." There is nothing wrong with this practice in non-formal writing.

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#39

Post by awolf »

g0atbutt wrote: post #21
raganwald wrote: post #18

I remember that the iPod's dirty secret was that you had to pay big money for a battery replacement since it wasn't user serviceable. Other dirty secrets for popular consumer products include things like child labour being used to build sneakers or unsafe factory/dormitory combinations that kill hundreds of people when the factories catch fire. I get the sense that the phrase "dirty secret" is being watered down in t…

It was meant as a rebuttal to Steve Jobs proclaiming the iPad offers "the best browsing experience you've ever had" which is simply not true. While it's true that other "dirty secrets" (some of which you listed) are more important, it doesn't change the fact that is one of Apple's dirty secrets.

To me, "Dirty little secret" implies a factual piece of information that Apple is knowingly hiding from the public.

"I don't like the iPad browser because it doesn't have tabs." is NOT a "dirty little secret".

Re: The iPad’s Dirty Secret

#40

Post by anigbrowl »

awolf wrote: post #39
g0atbutt wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was meant as a rebuttal to Steve Jobs proclaiming the iPad offers "the best browsing experience you've ever had" which is simply not true. While it's true that other "dirty secrets" (some of which you listed) are more important, it doesn't change the fact that is one of Apple's dirty secrets.

To me, "Dirty little secret" implies a factual piece of information that Apple is knowingly hiding from the public. "I don't like the iPad browser because it doesn't have tabs." is NOT a "dirty little secret".

Yeah, but 'only 256 mb RAM' might be for a lot of people that have got used to more.
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