Informer's World

Apple iPad is an awesome device for reading PDF documents and ebooks – the screen is brilliant, the text and graphics are perfectly legible and it almost feels like you reading a real book.

Favorite PDF Reading Apps for the iPad

The iPad has built-in support for the PDF format. For instance, if you get a PDF document as an email attachment or if you happen to click a PDF link inside the Safari browser, you can read the contents of that file inside the iPad without requiring an external PDF reader app.
However, if you have more than a couple of PDF documents to read on your iPad, it makes sense to have a dedicated app. Now there are a few dozen PDF reading apps, both free and paid, in the iTunes store so let’s see which of them are worthy enough to deserve a place on your iPad.
One of the most versatile document viewer app for the iPad is the 99¢ GoodReader that can handle PDFs and a large variety of other formats including Office documents, web pages, audio and video files.
Page turns are a bit slow on Good Reader



You can transfer PDF files from the computer to Good Reader on the iPad via iTunes or using your local Wi-Fi network if you have one. The software can also connect to your online accounts at Google Docs, Dropbox, etc. so you can download PDF files from these locations directly on to the iPad and read them even while you are offline.
GoodReader is a fantastic app for reading PDFs but there’s only one downside. When you turn a page, the next page is not rendered instantly and this lag become slightly more evident when you are flipping heavy pages (that contain graphics).

The next good choice for reading PDFs on your iPad is the Cloud Readers app – it’s both free and simple. You can either use a USB cable or your wireless network to copy PDFs from the computer to Cloud Readers.
There are two things that I really like about Cloud Readers – one, it renders documents really fast and second, there’s a unique “Two Up” view so can you display two pages of a PDF side-by-side (see screenshot).
Another PDF reading app that you should seriously try on your iPad is Stanza from Amazon, yes that same company that also develops the Kindle e-book reader. Like Cloud Readers, Stanza renders PDF pages extremely fast but there’s more.
Stanza has an integrated dictionary so you don’t have to quit the app to find a word meaning, you can easily arrange books in categories* and it also display thumbnails of books and magazines. If you don’t like the default cover image, grab a new one from the web.

[*] Good Reader has folders while Stanza has categories or subjects which are more like labels in Gmail – you can associate one or more categories with a single PDF document.
[**] You can find a mobile version of Adobe Reader for Android and Symbian phones but surprisingly, they have nothing to offer for the iPhone OS that powers the iPhones and the iPads.

Apple took the wraps off its iPhone OS 4 yesterday, letting developers and consumers know what major new features would be coming to its mobile platform. One thing the company did not specifically highlight in its presentation, however, was a slight change to its Phone Developer Program License Agreement. What’s different? Section 3.3.1, which now reads in part: “Applications that link to Documented APIs through an intermediary translation or compatibility layer or tool are prohibited.”
In plain English, this is bad news for developers who were planning to roll out apps to the iPhone using technologies like MonoTouch or Adobe Flash CS5.
The change in the licensing terms appears to have first been called out by Daring Fireball’s John Gruber.
Apple’s iPhone—and now iPad—are famous for not supporting Adobe’s proprietary Flash technology, which is widely used to being video and other interactive elements to the Web. Apple’s no-Flash stance has seriously weakened Flash’s one-ubiquitous presence on the Web: it’s one thing if you have a vast installed base on computers, but if your technology isn’t available on (arguably) the most significant mobile media platform currently on the market, you have a problem.
Adobe had been hoping to work around the no-Flash-on-the-iPhone problem by providing a deploy-to-iPhone capability in Adobe Flash CS5: the idea is that developers could create their applications in Flash without any specific knowledge of the iPhone, then deploy it as an iPhone-ready application essentially by choosing a “deploy to iPhone” command.
Under Apple’s new licensing terms, iPhone applications may only use documented API calls and be written in C, Objective C, C++. Apps may also be written in JavaScript to be executed by Apple’s built-in WebKit engine, which powers the iPhone’s Safari browser.
Apple’s new licensing terms may prove particularly troublesome to Adobe, which had been telling developers they can stick with their Flash development tools and will soon be able to deploy those applications to the iPhone.
However, while industry watchers have no doubt Apple is well aware what Adobe was planning to do with creating iPhone apps from Flash, the move is probably best seen in the context of Apple’s long-term efforts to control its platforms from the ground up: historically, the company feels that maintaining total control of its products leads to creating the best customer experiences…and hence best-selling products. Apple’s new license terms essentially bar developers from implementing a development framework for the iPhone on top of Apple’s own Cocoa Touch and WebKit APIs. If such a framework were to gain significant traction amongst developers, it would essentially seize control of Apple’s iPhone platform…and that’s something the Cupertino company is unlikely to tolerate.

The iPad officially became available for pre-order earlier today and while plenty of you are still debating about whether or not to pre-order, it appears as if the device might already sold 51,000 units in just two hours via pre-order. Wow.
If you’ve ever doubted how dedicated Apple fans are, the background on how these figures were determined will assuage any doubts. A group of particularly prudent Apple fans from the APPL Sanity Board at Investor Village decided to put together a spreadsheet of order numbers, times that orders were placed and contents of those order. As someone who has been known to obsess over Apple details myself (tracking a freightliner from China to the US with 27″ iMacs on-board in order to better guestimate delivery time), my hat is off to these folks!
Using this information, they were able to come up with a baseline for the number of items being sold through the Apple Online Store.
Fortune’s Phillip Elmer-DeWitt reports:

“51,000 orders in two hours,” announced Victor Castroll shortly after noon. He’s an analyst with Valcent Financial Group and an AAPL Sanity member who, with the blogger-analyst who calls himself deagol, has been monitoring the spreadsheet.

This matches other estimates from blogger Andrew Erlichson who wrote:

“We just bought two iPads, about 30 minutes apart. Our order IDs are 10,000 apart. Assuming those order IDs are sequential, and they appear to be, then Apple is selling 20,000 iPads per hour.”

Now as with anything unofficial, there are caveats — major ones — assuming that the order number system has been identified and “cracked” so to speak, this would really be more accurate for all orders placed through the Apple StoreApple Store, not just iPad orders.
Additionally, these figures wouldn’t account for orders with multiple iPads (you can only pre-order two at a time). This also doesn’t include any reservations to pick up an iPad at a local store (no payment information is required for that and you aren’t given an order number).
Still, it’s safe to say that the majority of orders placed through the Apple Online Store are for the iPad.
I’ve reached out to Victor Castroll for a more recent update and will update the post if I’m able to get any more information.
Update: Victor Castroll from the Valcent Financial Group and AAPL Sanity got back to us with some numbers that account for approximately the first 6 hours of sales. Here’s what he tells us:

“We’re at 90k in 6 hours. Keep in mind, this doesn’t include multiple orders but we have some dirty data from regular Apple business which now is about 4k orders out of the 88k orders. So, we estimate Apple has already sold about 90k today, not including in-store reserves.
“$54 million in revenue in a quarter of a day is a great opening. Looks like contrary to much speculation about who would actually want one of these, like the iPhone, people are voting with their wallets. Considering these are just pre-orders for a product still three weeks out, iPad is home run.”

Indeed, 90,000 pre-orders in just one day is extremely impressive!

Apple's iPad will be a little later than expected in North America: the company says it will be on sale April 3.
When Apple announced the iPad a little over a month ago, it didn’t name a specific date that the much-anticipated device would be available, but said that it expected to kick off sales in late March. Turns out, at least in North America, that date was just a hair optimistic: Apple has just announced that North American sales of the Wi-Fi-only iPad will start on Saturday, April 3. Models with additional 3G connectivity will be available in “late April.”
“iPad is something completely new,” said Apple CEO Steve Jobs, in a statement. “We’re excited for customers to get their hands on this magical and revolutionary product and connect with their apps and content in a more intimate, intuitive, and fun way than ever before.”

Beginning March 12, customers will be able to pre-orders either the Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi + 3G models from Apple’s online store or reserve a Wi-Fi model that can be picked up at an Apple retail store on April 3.
Apple also says the iBooks applications and its new iBookstore will be available as a free download from the App Store when the iPad goes on sale April 3.
The iPad’s pricing remains unchanged: Wi-Fi models will be available for $499, $599, and $699 for versions with 16, 32, and 64 GB of storage, respectively. Models with both Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity from AT&T will be available in late April for $629, $729, and $829 for the same 16, 32, and 64 GB capacities.
Late April will also see the international availability of both Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi + 3G versions of the iPad, with Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Spain, Switzerland, and the UK first in line. No pricing details or carrier partners have been announced, although Apple is expected to go with iPhone carrier partners in international markets…although in some cases that means multiple carriers may be duking it out for iPad exclusivity.

Apple has announced the date of release of iPad, their revolutionary device with the most advanced technology and lots of incredible features and apps. Precise gesture readable large 9.7-inch high-resolution LED-backlit IPS touchscreen along with numerous functionalities have been embedded into a thin and lightweight device that can go beyond anyone’s imagination. It’s quite hard to tell about the future of existing iPod, Kindle and other e-book readers when this ultra-portable device with some really unique features will footstep into the market. Designed in three different capacities, 8GB, 16GB and 32GB, along with high-performance Apple A4 custom-designed processor, the iPad features efficient multitasking ability to ensure smooth operation. The rechargeable lithium-polymer battery can keep you surfing the net for up to 10 hours by using the wi-fi or 3G connectivity and can be charged via power adapter or USB to computer system.


Official Information from Apple:
Display

• 9.7-inch (diagonal) LED-backlit glossy widescreen Multi-Touch display with IPS technology

• 1024-by-768-pixel resolution at 132 pixels per inch (ppi)

• Fingerprint-resistant oleophobic coating

• Support for display of multiple languages and characters simultaneously
Sensors and Processors

• Accelerometer

• Ambient light sensor

• 1GHz Apple A4 custom-designed, high-performance, low-power system-on-a-chip
Wireless and cellular
Wi-Fi model

• Wi-Fi (802.11a/b/g/n)

• Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR technology
Wi-Fi + 3G model

• UMTS/HSDPA (850, 1900, 2100 MHz)

• GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)

• Data only2

• Wi-Fi (802.11a/b/g/n)

• Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR technology
Accessibility

• Support for playback of closed-captioned content

• VoiceOver screen reader

• Full-screen zoom magnification

• White on black display

• Mono audio
Input and output

• 30-pin dock connector

• 3.5-mm stereo headphone jack

• Built-in speaker

• Microphone

• SIM card tray (Wi-Fi + 3G model only)