Anyone who’s familiar with my posts by now is probably aware I’m not a fan of the iPad. Now, let’s not get our lines crossed; Apple is The New Hotness – not to mention The Old Hotness – and Jobs is a wonderful man whom I’d gladly have a beer with. Hell, I’m even typing this post on a Mac Pro! I just haven’t really cared for the iPad up to now.
At any rate, this video was a welcome surprise this morning. Seems there’s an app for jailbroken iPads now tailor-made for people like me – that is, people who wonder why Apple’s flagship device is a giant iPhone, and not more like a netbook. Well, now it’s both! BTstack Mouse enables bluetooth mouse support for your iPad, bringing it one step closer to being the device you hoped it was going to be all along. Just make sure you have, like, a stack of books or something to prop the thing up.
Ballin’.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wklrVOFMKA
[Redmond Pie, via 9to5Mac]
This seems counter-intuitive to me. You’re taking a mobile device and anchoring it to a desk to get it to work with a mouse? So to use it the way you think it should be used I need a wireless mouse, batteries, a wired or wireless keyboard, not to mention case to carry all that crap. The point of an iPad is for it to be a mobile device that is easy to take with you and use. I can put together a client presentation while sitting on the train then plug it into a projector to present, take notes at the meeting, even sketch up concepts, without all that crap. A netbook would have half the battery life, require all the same crap as a laptop and run on the horrific Windows OS.
I often wonder why Apple didn’t just create the iPad as a computer (using Mac OS X Snow Leopard).
I want a mouse to use Citrix though the IPad, otherwise its just a really expensive toy. I’m trying to look at this as a business device. A citrix desktop without a mouse just doesn’t sound very usefull for much.
Don’t currently have an IPad, but I wouldn’t want to jailbreak one just to get mouse functionality.
You’ve missed the point of the iPad completely. The,”It’s just a giant iPhone arguement” is so yesterday. Anyone who’se really used an iPad for any length of time with it’s best apps like flipboard, not to mention just browsing the web or navigating information understand the difference the additional screen realestate makes. It’s a defining difference, a monumental difference. Interfacing with UI elements directly with multitouch gesture support vs a mouse may be cumbersome and seem counter productive to you, but that’s because you’re set in your ways. In terms of efficiency, ease of use, everything that makes UI successful and how information is accessed, it is a superior system that gives information more value and the user a richer user experience. You can bitch about how Apple and their iPad aint nothing special, but you’d be turning a blind eye to a revolution and depriving yourself of one of the most pleasurable user experiences consumer grade personal computing technology has to offer today.
Mouse or not, it is the FREEDOM that is important. Give us the freedom too choose. When something is completely not capable of doing something it is taking away the freedom to choose. For a netbook you can choose to use the mouse pad on it or bring your own bluetooth or usb mouse. Most of my co-workers who use a mac book pro will close the lid and use an extra DVI adapter, bt keyboard and mouse/trackpad. At first I thought it was so retarded but I end up doing that too. Imagine if you cannot do that on the macbook? It will piss off a lot of my co-workers. Having a mouse capable in iPad is not gonna force everyone to use it. You have the freedom to choose not to use it right? Most of us who wants to be able to use a mouse to not asking to replace the multitouch with a mouse but simply give us an extra option. I use my bt keyboard on ipad too since it is much better to use it to type long text. But I still have to reach out my hand from time to time to do the clicking on the screen. An option to use a mouse can solve this. I will still be using the multitouch on a train, in bed etc.