hedgehoglab

Since the iPad was announced to much fanfare last month, the Internet is abuzz with some people decrying it as a "larger iPhone" (what's wrong with that?) and others announcing it as the next shift in computing.

Personally, I stand between both viewpoints. I agree that it is indeed a larger iPhone, but I also see the potential a large touch-screen device provides. A majority of the current discussion around the pros of the iPad are based around how this is a consumer computing device for "your mum and your grandparents" but fails to see the larger picture around what this might mean for business and work in general.

There has been very little debate surrounding the potential of the iPad as a business device. I admit it might not work in an organisation like ours (although we still have ideas that would work perfectly on an iPad) but there are many organisations where geeks, technology, and code are a means to an end and just support tools for the core business.

The problem with imagining the iPad as a business computer arises from the instant reaction most people will have. The inevitable, "it's not a real computer" argument will be thrown about. "It can't multi-task!" "It doesn't have a real keyboard." Yet, there are so many real-world scenarios I face in daily life where an iPad would have greatly diminished the pain and improved the job a person does.

Mobile Workers

We recently had a Central Heating Sales engineer come out to give us a quote to install new boiler. I felt fairly sorry for him due to the amount of baggage he had to move around with him to do a fairly simple task of filling in a few forms (in response to a set of questions) and generate a quote document.

The process involved what must be the heaviest laptop, and stone-age wireless connectivity that took a set of rituals and prayers to set-up. He had to spend a major part of the call joking about "IT" and apologising profusely for "problems with the Internet."

I could not help wondering how the iPad could have made this entire process (which he probably repeats many times a day) much easier and more interactive for the customer and the sales person. You could get rid of all the brochures in the briefcase and convert these into electronic brochures for display on an iPad. Typing would not be much of an issue as most of the form fields were designed to be choices and number entry. Even if data entry involved a fair amount of textual data, an external keyboard would have instantly solved this problem.

The only flaw in the process as far as the iPad goes, was the ability of the existing laptop to connect to a small printer via USB to print a quote. This could be a stumbling block unless Apple allows easy Bluetooth printing or someone comes up with a printer interface to the iPad.

Data Entry in the field

A while ago, I worked on an R & D product prototype for a FTSE client in the property business, who was looking to cut their costs in relation to the time-consuming process of data-entry by skilled staff. They had highly-paid property managers who would go out to inspect properties in their portfolio, whose job it was to ensure the properties were maintained and managed to standards. However, it was clear that it was very inefficient for these property managers to go out with paper forms, fill them out in the field, and return to their desks only to type out these forms into a computer.

The solution (at the time) was to use existing smartphone technology to build mobile apps that would facilitate data entry in the field. This would allow a "single" point of data entry and cut the time spent duplicating this information on paper and on the computer.

The only real problem was that mobile phones (the iPhone specifically) were too small to really enable the interactions that we had in mind for really quick data-entry. Although the iPhone was leagues ahead of other mobile technologies, it just didn't allows us screen real-estate to build the kind of user experience we wanted. I remember thinking "I wish Apple made a bigger iPhone!" Yet, ironically, it seems like this is what makes the iPad underwhelming.

The Sky's the Limit

The interesting thing about what iPad means for computing in general and for business in specific has very little to do with the hardware and all to do with the potential of software that could be built to allow multi-touch interactions on a well developed platform like the iPhone OS. In this sense, the hardware is not really important at all. Lack of USB, camera, screen size etc. are all trivial points that might or might not have implications in very specific circumstances.

The real question to be asked is, "What kind of software is going to be built for this thing?" Then, you can start seeing the potential an iPad brings for not just e-mail and the web for mum, but how it could greatly simplify the lives of people who are forced to use computers for their daily job but don't enjoy it at all. I believe the iPad has immense potential in areas like business intelligence, publishing, medicine, education, retail, and other sectors I can't even begin to imagine. I don't know about you, but that's pretty exciting!

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