The Professional and the iPad: Part 3 - Got Tablets. Need iPads.
In Part 1 I noted that I am currently a tablet user. The machine I am using is the HP TC4400, a venerable Core 2 Duo convertible notebook; it doubles as a 10" (1024x768 res.) laptop and with a flip of the screen can be folded back to make a thick slate. Weighing in at over 4 pounds, it is a pretty hefty note pad to carry around. As a Microsoft Windows XP tablet enabled machine, I was getting pretty frustrated with it's functionality by the end of 2008 but the release of the Windows 7 Ultimate Beta and Release Candidates really interested me in sticking with the machine (I have since licensed a Windows 7 Professional upgrade). Windows 7 renewed the hardware and improved much of the basic tablet functionality. Handwriting recognition is really improved and the overall response of the machine is crisp. With 3 MB of RAM I have found myself inking much more than I did in the previous 2 years. That said, the principle note taking application from Microsoft is Onenote and I have had my fill of that program. The basic metaphor is that of a binder with tabbed dividers and separate pages. It should work, right? It does -- as long as you don't have 5 years worth of notes. I found my workflow around OneNote breaking down about 2 years ago and have been re-building it for about as long. That is unproductive -- so I have said goodbye to Onenote.
The promise of the 2001 Bill Gates tablet seems in retrospect to be half-hearted. There certainly were organizational barriers to the success of the tablet concept at Microsoft. From a distance, one might be forgiven for thinking that the tablet's lack of success was due to corporate ADD. Microsoft's vision was half-baked; it was conceived primarily as a software solution. Where was the hardware that could fulfill the dream of a go anywhere computer? It was left to others to create an elegant piece of hardware that would fulfill the dream of large screen portable computing on a Windows platform. Yeah. We're still waiting.
Portable computing is more than software. Exhibit #2 would have to be Windows CE and the Windows Mobile phone platforms. Has there ever been a must have Windows Mobile device? Maybe Microsoft started too soon. Maybe they were ahead of the curve. Maybe the hardware wasn't ready. Why though were RIM and, subsequently Apple, able to develop more compelling products even as Microsoft went through multiple iterations of its platform? Tablet computing on the Windows platform has always felt incomplete. Until Windows 7 it was a bolt on. It's still a cranky work-around in most applications. The promise of tablet specific applications never materialized and what we tablet users were left with have been "tablet enabled" applications. It's been good enough for enthusiasts and vertical markets but hasn't made the radar of most working professionals or knowledge workers.
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