It installs on any operating system. Whenever you put something in your dropbox it automatically gets synched to all other computers sharing that drop box. You can even share a drop box with other people or groups.
If you click on the link I provided above you get an extra 250mb of storage. You get 2GB for free initially.
A friend told me about drop box last week and I'm hooked.
It installs on any operating system. Whenever you put something in your dropbox it automatically gets synched to all other computers sharing that drop box. You can even share a drop box with other people or groups.
If you click on the link I provided above you get an extra 250mb of storage. You get 2GB for free initially.
A friend told me about drop box last week and I'm hooked.
It's a good service, lots of users like it.
But at $100/year, the breadth of services offered by MobileMe are without peer.
My first thought when I saw Apple had added the ability for iPhone apps to create PDFs in OS 3.2 was that it'd be great for printing, in that a printer manufacturer could create a PDF printing app or at the very least I can just mail the PDF for anyone to print!
Of course, the iWork apps for iPad uses the PDF support as an export option, but still, I wouldn't be surprised if the PDF support turned out to be key to printing.
You beat me to it. I posted this on Digg yesterday. If they allowed apps to print to PDFs and then it put them in a folder, the PDFs could be printed by a printer app, emailed, texted, edited by other apps or even synced via iTunes...there could even be fax apps. FedEx/Kinkos and others could have apps allowing you to print at their stores, etc... There are a lot of possibilities, and it's all pretty simple on Apple's end.
If they went the server / shared printer route would they even need drivers? The Mac or server offering up the print service would take care of that. All the iPad needs to do is send PDF's to the print queue.
Not that direct printing would be nice but in a portable device it would seem that you would end up with a lot of print drivers installed. Plus there isn't a lot of RAM nor Flash on this first gen device.
Whatever they do it will become an important feature.
Thanks for the alert. I read through the entire Apple FAQ and support thread and the one-way format modifications/conversions/limitations are dismaying, as well as surprising. For some, the utility of the iPad for project collaboration will be significantly impacted.
Edit: Regarding Pages collaboration, at least between a Mac-iPad-Mac, be certain to utilize Styles for all your formatting. In that way, while some may not be incorporated (at least for now) on the iPad, they will be retained for use, or re-use, when returned to the Mac.
Apple has continually underwhelmed people with their iPhone OS updates. I am sure this next release will do the same. I am also sure these improvements will come to fruition, but it won't be soon.
I really hope that this could be the beginning of a new printing system for all computers. I have been thinking for a while that having a print driver on each computer that needs to print seems unnecessary.
A driver should be more like firmware, and instead be on the printer itself. The printer could send its capabilities (color, paper sizes, ink levels, etc.) to devices that are about to print, and then documents can be sent to the printer in a standard format, pdf seems like a good choice, but it could be anything, or everything, there's no reason a modern printer shouldn't be able to handle most kinds of image formats on its own.
What the hell kind of crap article is this? Daniel's citation links to the his own tweet about the support pages making mention that printing support is not yet supported. How about linking to the support pages themselves?
It's inconceivable to offer a word app like Pages, on a device like the iPad, and not offer support for printing. To paraphrase another forum user, it's a basic business requirement to be able to print when connected to a network; also pretty basic to be able to print from within a business-related application like Safari, Mail or Pages.
Not only is this is a major omission for the iPad, but the problem with third party apps is that they're all a cheap substitute for the main app (i.e. close the business app, open and view the document in the printing app and then send it to print).
Not an omission at all, there are third party printing solutions already available - after all, isn't that what most printers currently rely on anyway (with the exception of CUPS drivers, again not developed by apple). You can print from the iPad using any number of apps, some free, some very inexpensive.
Not an omission at all, there are third party printing solutions already available - after all, isn't that what most printers currently rely on anyway (with the exception of CUPS drivers, again not developed by apple). You can print from the iPad using any number of apps, some free, some very inexpensive.
And as I stated, they're all a cheap substitute for the main app. If you're going to sell an Apple-branded Word Processor, you should be able to print out your work without using third party add-ons.
Show me the free app, or for that matter, the paid one, that will keep all of the documents created in Pages' text formatting, wraps, etc. in place between the app and the printer. I've tried them all.
It would be nice to have it, but the article seems to be reading something into a document that might not actually be there. That said, sometimes clues to future capabilities are in cryptic statements like that.
I was just talking to someone today about the iPad, he was only recently aware of the product and seemed very eager to learn more. One of the first specific questions he asked about was printing, I could only tell him that I didn't think there was anything for iPad yet. I print maybe 10-20 pages a day, but haven't had the need or desire to print from the iPhone, and I haven't used or bought an iPad yet.
I think the best way to go about it is just like how the third parties are doing it, have a host computer handle the drivers, just wirelessly zap a standardized file (say, a PDF or EPS) to a computer running a service that sends it to the printer. Most printers don't have a standardized format, supporting only networked printers that offer PostScript support would leave most people out in the cold. Supporting Bluetooth printing would be nifty too, though those printers seem kind of rare. I certainly don't expect to buy another printer unless something breaks, something that would use what I already have would be best.
Comments
It installs on any operating system. Whenever you put something in your dropbox it automatically gets synched to all other computers sharing that drop box. You can even share a drop box with other people or groups.
If you click on the link I provided above you get an extra 250mb of storage. You get 2GB for free initially.
A friend told me about drop box last week and I'm hooked.
If anyone is looking for an easy and free way to share files amongst computers, iphones, ipads just download dropbox. https://www.dropbox.com/referrals/NTU3MDM3MzQ5
It installs on any operating system. Whenever you put something in your dropbox it automatically gets synched to all other computers sharing that drop box. You can even share a drop box with other people or groups.
If you click on the link I provided above you get an extra 250mb of storage. You get 2GB for free initially.
A friend told me about drop box last week and I'm hooked.
It's a good service, lots of users like it.
But at $100/year, the breadth of services offered by MobileMe are without peer.
My first thought when I saw Apple had added the ability for iPhone apps to create PDFs in OS 3.2 was that it'd be great for printing, in that a printer manufacturer could create a PDF printing app or at the very least I can just mail the PDF for anyone to print!
Of course, the iWork apps for iPad uses the PDF support as an export option, but still, I wouldn't be surprised if the PDF support turned out to be key to printing.
You beat me to it. I posted this on Digg yesterday. If they allowed apps to print to PDFs and then it put them in a folder, the PDFs could be printed by a printer app, emailed, texted, edited by other apps or even synced via iTunes...there could even be fax apps. FedEx/Kinkos and others could have apps allowing you to print at their stores, etc... There are a lot of possibilities, and it's all pretty simple on Apple's end.
It's a good service, lots of users like it.
But at $100/year, the breadth of services offered by MobileMe are without peer.
Dropbox is better for file sharing/syncing. It's truly amazing. I can't live without it now. Perhaps Apple will copy their implementation.
It's a very good workaround, actually. Any computer can link to your account and print your documents.
I don't have a printer
What's a printer?
*
What's a printer?
*
duh
Not that direct printing would be nice but in a portable device it would seem that you would end up with a lot of print drivers installed. Plus there isn't a lot of RAM nor Flash on this first gen device.
Whatever they do it will become an important feature.
...
As for Apple directing users to send their documents via email, you lose all formatting, text wrap, etc. when this is done. http://discussions.apple.com/thread....7133&tstart=15
Thanks for the alert. I read through the entire Apple FAQ and support thread and the one-way format modifications/conversions/limitations are dismaying, as well as surprising. For some, the utility of the iPad for project collaboration will be significantly impacted.
Edit: Regarding Pages collaboration, at least between a Mac-iPad-Mac, be certain to utilize Styles for all your formatting. In that way, while some may not be incorporated (at least for now) on the iPad, they will be retained for use, or re-use, when returned to the Mac.
1. Display what you want on the iPad screen.
2. Place iPad on Xerox machine.
3. Press the photocopy button.
Done!
Dropbox is better for file sharing/syncing. It's truly amazing. I can't live without it now. Perhaps Apple will copy their implementation.
It's a very good workaround, actually. Any computer can link to your account and print your documents.
Re: Dropbox, aren't we assuming apps under iPhone OS 4 will be able to save files to the file system directory ??
How is an app going to get its file into the Dropbox folders to share it ?
A driver should be more like firmware, and instead be on the printer itself. The printer could send its capabilities (color, paper sizes, ink levels, etc.) to devices that are about to print, and then documents can be sent to the printer in a standard format, pdf seems like a good choice, but it could be anything, or everything, there's no reason a modern printer shouldn't be able to handle most kinds of image formats on its own.
I kinda like Andy Ihnatko's solution:
1. Display what you want on the iPad screen.
2. Place iPad on Xerox machine.
3. Press the photocopy button.
Done!
Best laugh I've had all day.
It's inconceivable to offer a word app like Pages, on a device like the iPad, and not offer support for printing. To paraphrase another forum user, it's a basic business requirement to be able to print when connected to a network; also pretty basic to be able to print from within a business-related application like Safari, Mail or Pages.
Not only is this is a major omission for the iPad, but the problem with third party apps is that they're all a cheap substitute for the main app (i.e. close the business app, open and view the document in the printing app and then send it to print).
As for Apple directing users to send their documents via email, you lose all formatting, text wrap, etc. when this is done. http://discussions.apple.com/thread....7133&tstart=15
Not an omission at all, there are third party printing solutions already available - after all, isn't that what most printers currently rely on anyway (with the exception of CUPS drivers, again not developed by apple). You can print from the iPad using any number of apps, some free, some very inexpensive.
Not an omission at all, there are third party printing solutions already available - after all, isn't that what most printers currently rely on anyway (with the exception of CUPS drivers, again not developed by apple). You can print from the iPad using any number of apps, some free, some very inexpensive.
And as I stated, they're all a cheap substitute for the main app. If you're going to sell an Apple-branded Word Processor, you should be able to print out your work without using third party add-ons.
Show me the free app, or for that matter, the paid one, that will keep all of the documents created in Pages' text formatting, wraps, etc. in place between the app and the printer. I've tried them all.
I was just talking to someone today about the iPad, he was only recently aware of the product and seemed very eager to learn more. One of the first specific questions he asked about was printing, I could only tell him that I didn't think there was anything for iPad yet. I print maybe 10-20 pages a day, but haven't had the need or desire to print from the iPhone, and I haven't used or bought an iPad yet.
I think the best way to go about it is just like how the third parties are doing it, have a host computer handle the drivers, just wirelessly zap a standardized file (say, a PDF or EPS) to a computer running a service that sends it to the printer. Most printers don't have a standardized format, supporting only networked printers that offer PostScript support would leave most people out in the cold. Supporting Bluetooth printing would be nifty too, though those printers seem kind of rare. I certainly don't expect to buy another printer unless something breaks, something that would use what I already have would be best.