Why is it that the trackpad on my MacBook Pro seems like it can handle more multitouch gestures than what the iPad will have to offer? Sure, you may not be able to completely control MacOS X with gestures, but most of the activities on the iPad seem to be single contact-point gestures or movements, which really isn't all that different from operating a computer with a single point and click mouse. On my MacBook Pro I can expose with four fingers up and down, switch applications (which in some ways performs the same task as expose), and with three fingers i can scroll back and forth between files, finder pages, safari pages etc, and with two i have the ability to scroll in all directions. Additionally I can rotate with two fingers and have the pinch motion. On the iPad it seems the only real feature that requires multiple touches is the pinch motion, which isn't so impressive after so many years of the iPhone and other platforms that have adopted it since. So, in some ways it seems as though the MacBooks have taken greater advantage of multitouch technology than the iPad or iPhone have. Why isn't there a difference on the iPad between how I touch it with one finger or four? It seems like Apple has the capability of incorporating so much more interactivity with the iPad than what they did. Why didn't they make these multitouch gestures as "out of control" as everyone believed they would? Does anyone think there is a particular reason? I feel like people were ready to be blown away by a revolutionary UI but were let down by something that was marginally more attractive than the iPhone only because the screen is a little bigger. Someone please help me understand this.
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iPad multitouch features
- Thread starter cdubbs
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Most of the gestures you reference are only useful in a multi-tasking environment. Something the iPad lacks.
Developers can define their own gestures to expand upon the default set. However they should only define new ones if the defaults don't logically apply to the task at hand.
That is partially my point. I think Apple has really underestimated the potential market for the iPad to be a productivity device. It's pretty obvious that content consumption is central to their generating of revenue, but they seem to have an opportunity to establish themselves as the dominant platform early on in a product category that has yet to really mature. It doesn't make sense to me that they wouldn't take advantage of this right out of the gate. I'm looking for someone to explain to me why.
Just as WytRaven says, there is no virtue in adding complicated gestures just for the sake of having them. Apple has designed the OS and apps so that complicated gestures are not required, which makes the device more accessible to everyone. The support is still there for much more complex gestures if an app really requires them, but in a perfect world this would never be the case.
Based on the way apple is talking about iPad, I think they very clearly see it as a productivity device. I think they see it as productivity without a laptop.
This is why iWork was front and center.
Right at release they won't have all the productivity features ready, but they will by summer just in time for back to school.
FWIW, many gestures using more than one finger on the iPhone 3GS are used in the device's screen reader, VoiceOver (which one has to activate of course, but still) and the Zoom feature (again, you have to activate it but one still uses "normal" gestures with it, except for when you are zooming which uses three fingers). Perhaps Apple didn't want to tangle both normal gestures and accessibility gestures.
Just a thought.
Just a thought.
