App Store Favorite: Intro

Apple's App Store is full of thousands upon thousands of different apps. "There's an app for that" didn't become a popular saying for nothing. It's often difficult to wade through all those apps to find good ones, ones you'll actually want to use. App Store Favorite will be a frequent series of blogs highlighting one of our favorite apps in a little summary, and maybe you'll end up adding it to your list of favorites. 

(On each App Store Favorite blog, you can click the banner to check out more App Store Favs.)

iOS: App Store layout updates

To check out more blog posts about iOS 6, including my introductory one, click here.

Looks like Apple's gearing up for the scheduled release of iOS 6. Some of the webapp-based parts of the App Store on iOS 6 beta 4 is being renovated. And Genius for apps, which was previously "unavailable on iOS 6," can now be enabled, but still doesn't do much.

Homescreen history continues on my iPad

A couple weeks ago, I posted a blog analyzing how I set up my homescreen's icons, how I transitioned from my iPod Touch to my iPhone. I've made another device leap, this time much more diverse. The first thing I did when I got my iPad was put my iPhone right next to it, and arranged icons like they appeared on my iPhone. There were a few problems, though. Before I get to that, let's compare my most up-to-date iPhone homescreen to my iPad's.

iOS 6: Shared Photo Streams

To check out more blog posts about iOS 6, including my introductory one, click here.

In iOS 5, Apple introduced iCloud, and along with it, Photo Stream. Photo Stream is basically a photo syncing feature. If you take a photo on your iPhone, it'll appear on your iPad and on your computer, or on any device you have set up with Photo Stream. You can add a photo to Photo Stream from any device and it'll show up on all your other devices. That's nice and all, but here's why I don't use it: lack of filtering. No matter where the photo came from (saved from a website, received in a text, taken by the device) it's synced to all your devices. No matter what. You can delete photos from Photo Stream, but it'd be really neat if I could choose what photos are in Photo Stream before they're added.

Now, with iOS 6 comes Shared Photo Streams. That's right, Shared Photo Streams. They're essentially albums you create and choose to share with certain people. If you add a photo to that Stream album, it shows up on everyone's devices that you're sharing the Stream with. Then everyone can comment on and "like" the photos in the Stream, like Facebook.

Google Chrome on the iPad vs. all

Before I begin my praise of Google's iOS browser on my iPad, I want to make it known that I haven't actually even tried to use Safari on my iPad. I messed around with it once and just didn't like it. That said, I will be comparing Chrome to Safari, or rather pointing things out that Chrome does better. I'll also probably be referencing Chrome on my iPhone, and a did a rundown of it here, so it's probably a good idea to read through that first. Now, onto Chrome on my iPad.

I've noticed that when comparing a wide variety of things between my iPhone and my computer, there aren't many similarities. It makes sense: the iPhone's screen is much smaller than a computer monitor, so things have to adapt and condense. But when I start comparing things between my iPad and my computer, I begin to see common traits. That makes sense, too. The iPad has much more screen space, like a computer, for information and GUI to be displayed. One common trait is browsers. Safari on the iPad looks a lot like Safari on a computer; a lot more than Safari on an iPhone does, anyway. Google Chrome on the iPad also closely resembles its bigger brother on the computer, and that's something I really like. It isn't a learning experience (however basic) trying to figure out how to use Chrome on the iPad, like it was on the iPhone. Most things are right where they are on the computer version, with some exceptions. I'm going to analyze and rate out of 5 how features are implemented on desktop Chrome, iPad Chrome, and iPad Safari.

iOS 6: iPad favorite features

To check out more blog posts about iOS 6, including my introductory one, click here.

Shortly after getting it, I updated my iPad to iOS 6. I was looking forward to certain features like Siri and the new Clock app. Just like on my iPhone, I'm going to run through my favorite new features in iOS 6 on my iPad.

Clock
Even the icon is a step up from the iPhone’s. The first section, World Clock, has a world map displaying the time and weather in up to 6 places around the globe. A shadow also shows where in the world is dark at the current time.

iOS 6: Updating my iPad

To check out more blog posts about iOS 6, including my introductory one, click here.

I got an iPad, and updated it to iOS 6. I was looking forward to things like Facebook integration in Contacts and Calender, the cool Clock app I had seen screenshots of, and most of all I wanted Siri on my iPad. I did get all those features, and as it turned out, even more that I hadn't heard about.

Just like on my iPhone, after I updated, I got a little setup process.