What Apple didn't do with the new iPad.

With the new iPad released yesterday, Apple made some, mostly minor, hardware upgrades. However, it's more important to look at what they didn't do, but should have.


Improve the OS User Interface (UI)


This is the number one thing Apple should have focused on. From the beginning of their entry into the tablet market with the original iPad, Apple ignored the fact that a tablet is not a phone or media player. It is a completely different animal that has more in common with a laptop than a phone. A tablet is a device intended to bridge the gap between smart phones and desktop computers. iOS should have been modified to operate in that role. 
Apple essentially created a giant iPhone, did nothing to differentiate it or add value to the new form factor and has continued to ignore the opportunity to do so.
Comedy writers were all over this glaring screw up on Apple's part right from day one.
 Check it out.

Given the new iPad has even more pixels to play with, what was Apple thinking when they decided not to take any advantage of it whatsoever with the main user interface?


Let's compare.


First, here is an iPhone 4S home screen.

iPhone 4S

Now here's the iPad.

iPad

Amazing isn't it how Apple went all out making use of the extra screen space?


Now, Google on the other hand waited before releasing an official tablet version of Android until they had one that was optimized for the tablet form factor.
Take a look at the main desktop screen of my Asus Transformer which is running Android 4 (ICS).

Let me point out some of the differences.

First, notice that you can put many more items on the screen (if you wish). In the iPad, Apple kept the same icon columns as the iPhone, and just spaced them out further, leaving a lot of empty space. On Android the icon spacing remains normal and just fits more on the screen.

Next note the app drawers. There are six on the right side of the screen. These are totally user customizable. You create them, name them and decide what apps you want in them. As you can see, I've created categories of apps I commonly use and put my most used apps in those drawers.

Widgets. This is a key feature of Android over iOS. Widgets are live, active programs that run on the desktop. They can be interacted with, update themselves etc. On the screen above you can see a weather widget in the top left and a date widget in the bottom right. These are the most basic kinds of widgets. They just display information that is updated automatically. The YouTube widget is interactive. You can flick through the panels to see the latest videos in your subscription lists and tap to view any that interest you. In the middle of the screen you can see widgets that display information in a customizable way. You can choose what data and how they display  it. For example the middle of the three shows a graph of battery life and CPU use.

Note: I don't normally have the YouTube widget on the main screen, but I moved it there for this demo.

Overall, you have a much more pleasing, customizable and functional User Interface with Android on tablets. Apple hasn't bothered because they aren't user driven, they are driven to sell content. As long as they keep making money, they won't add anything that doesn't contribute to content sales.

Other things missing on the iPad

Still no USB or SD-Card slots!

 I'm not surprised. While this is a huge convenience for users, for Apple it's only a way for users to side-load content without using iTunes so they may never support it.

I'll add more as I have the time and inclination. 

Note: All linked media is from third party sources and copyright their respective owners.