Amazing iPad Software Evolution

I suppose if I had owned an iphone for the last few years I would have seen this process in motion, but as a new iPad owner, I'm seeing first hand. I'm writing here about the amazing pace of software evolution and innovation in the Apple ecosystem. I have about 30 applications that I've downloaded and purchased for my iPad.

My favorite example of this: note-taking. The iPad uses a capacitative screen, something that's finger friendly, but not very useful for note taking. It doesn't work for note taking because one's natural inclination is rest your palm on the screen while you write. And as the screen detects all touches, that leads to lots of strange marks on each page. Historically, this problem has been solved by using an electromagnetic pen on a screen that is not touch sensitive. That's how note taking works on a Thinkpad, for example. Steve Jobs, however, is not fond of the stylus and doesn't think one is needed, so there's no provision for that on the iPad.

The Apple ecosystem quickly solved this problem, however. Companies like TenOne design developed specialized styluses that mimic the touch of a finger and software developers created a bunch of different ways to address the needs of inking. Many of these programs are already in their second or third generation, even though the iPad itself is only a two months old.

I think I've purchased about every one of hand-writing note taking programs out there, and so far, I've got three favorites, but no absolute winner yet.

FastFinga: a brilliant piece of software from down under, these guys wrote a version for the iPad without even having an iPad to test it out on. The program is designed for fingers - hence the name, but it works very well with the stylus. You write at the bottom of the screen, in large type, and it condenses your output. It outputs to printers, jpeg, and Evernote. Output looks smooth and polished.

NoteTaker HD: this program operates in a similar way to FastFinga, but is more tuned up for full pages of notes. Writing in the first edition looked bad, but it has since improved. NoteTaker lets you export in a variety of modes and also condenses your writing nicely, since it's not easy to write in small letters on the iPad screen.

Penultimate: this is overall favorite so far, and the only one of the three that didn't get it's start on the iPhone. Penultimate is a "one man" operation in San Francisco, but so far has the most ingenious solution to hand palm-on-pad issue. Penultimate simply ignores touches that don't look like a stylus writing. If you're right handed, it works brilliantly and the text looks smooth and polished. The only downside of penultimate is that it can't shrink big chunks of text down, so a hour our meeting can quickly stretch over 10-15 pages of notes.

Perhaps the most amazing thing about all three of these programs is that not one of them costs more than $5. The enormous size of the Apple market and the willingness of customers to drop $2-5 on a good program means that even at low prices, volumes are high enough to give very generous rewards to good developers. And competition is intense, too, so updates come quickly and developers respond quickly to user feedback, lest they negative feedback in their user ratings.