Rick Stawarz (@rickstawarz) wrote an excellent pair of posts about his experiences with the iPad as a laptop replacement. We definitely have some overlap in our “needs”, but he also brought to light some other great points I missed.

The Inability to “Create”

I’m not looking to edit Photoshop files and, frankly, I don’t even want to edit videos with the new iMovie app. Those things should be done on a computer with a mouse and keyboard, but I feel there are a few significant barriers blocking the transition from consumer to creator on the iPad.

Emailing

As I mentioned in my last post, it’s not possible to do something as simple as add an attachment to an email within the Mail app. That’s just not acceptable from a device that would replace my laptop.

Printing

Let’s be honest, there is no printing support for the iPad.

I know there’s AirPrint, but should I have to buy an HP printer? I already have a Brother printer that I love. I understand that Apple doesn’t want to mess with the thousands of different printer drivers out there (Trust me, I used to be a Linux-only guy), but isn’t that just a bit of a cop out?

There are also printing apps in the App Store. I haven’t tried them myself, but the reviews are very mixed. I have to believe it’s a bit of a kludge if it may require me to install software of my desktop computer to make it work.

I don’t print a ton even with my desktop or laptop, but when I need to it’s usually for a good reason and I need it now (concert tickets, receipts, meeting notes).

No Personal Storage Area / Home Folder

I would like to have a home folder that serves as a place for file storage. There are currently various apps that facilitate that storage (both locally and in the cloud) like Photos, Dropbox, Evernote, and GoodReader, but why not natively?

Common Data Storage Area

I’d like to have an area where I can dump a file and not require an Internet connection to access it. This folder would also serve as a common storage area where other apps could source files (much like Twitter and the Photo Library do now). For example, I’d like to download an image from a website and upload it to Twitter or send a stored Word document to someone through Skype.

Replace the USB Drive

When I plug in my iPad to a computer, it should mount like a USB drive. Loading or unloading the iPad should be as simple as drag and drop…no iTunes required, please.

This would allow a person to work on the file at their desk, load it up on the iPad at the end of the day, compose an email on the train ride home and send it off as an attachment. That easily matches the convenience of a laptop.

User Accounts

Although not at the top of my list, the iPad should have user accounts. Here are some cases where it would be nice:

• Perhaps my wife doesn’t want her apps arranged in the same manner as I do. Maybe she doesn’t want an app to show up on her screens at all. My wife uses the iPad entirely differently than I do.
• Two different people usually have different email accounts and mingling the two gets messy and confusing. I’d prefer separate instances of Mail.
• Maybe I don’t want to get work emails over the weekend, and likewise don’t want to be distracted at work with Push notifications from Word with Friends that remind me of the slaying Chris Bowler is administering.
• I’d like to play Angry Birds and beat all the levels myself, but am forced to share with our friends 5 year old who is giving me a run for my money.
• All apps with personalized logins require using shared accounts or logging out and back in each time a new person uses the iPad. Way too much hassle!

Is Apple telling me that my wife and I both need our own iPads? Perhaps. At their current price point I can get three or four iPads for the price of one MacBook, but then of course I’d have to buy all the apps twice. “They’re only $0.99,” you say. Unfortunately, that doesn’t hold much weight with the guy that will make a U-turn for the gas across the street that’s 1 cent cheaper per gallon.

The bottom line is that I really enjoy the iPad and it’s great for most of what I do. I feel like for Apple to take it to the next level and rightly deserve the label of the “go between” device it has to function somewhat more like a laptop and slightly less like a smartphone.

I’d really enjoy hearing your thoughts and responses on Twitter. Hit me up @gstjohn.

I discovered this unfortunate circumstance this morning as I was trying to reply to an email with a screenshot from my iPad. I could have sent it from Photos, but that would have required me to write a new email and the recipients weren’t in my address book. I would also prefer to keep the screenshot associated with the original email for context. No such luck, though.

What about sending non-photo attachments (like a document)? Also, not possible. There is an app called GoodReader that (among other things) will allow you to send files as email attachments, but no such functionality is built into iOS. Do I really want another app to enable such a simple process? And for $4.99?

I love my iPad for 101 reasons, but how can we really call the iPad a “go between” device or “laptop killer” if it can’t natively do something as simple as send an email attachment. I think this discovery just reinforces for me even further that the iPad is a consumption device and isn’t suited for creation/productivity.

At launch, I really liked the idea of the Mac App Store. I felt that is served as a nice, centralized area where I could go to find apps, conveniently checkout with a provider I trust, and come back later for updates in one single place. However, it didn’t take long for the critiques to start rolling in and most of them made a lot of sense to me. But what about Panic’s latest issue? What if this release was a major bug in a core part of their software? Would users be left waiting for weeks on end?

With the Mac App Store being so new it’s no real surprise there are some glitches in the system. Here are a few issues I see that make taking the plunge a tough call:

Apps For iOS and OS X Are Different Beasts

The biggest fault I see with the Mac App Store is that it’s hard to justify the need for it. When the iPhone was first released the App Store made a lot of sense because we were talking about a smartphone with an Internet connection that could be exploited. I would have been somewhat surprised if a carrier was even willing to carry the iPhone without some controls. Apple’s review process minimizes the junk (right?) and clears out the malicious. Everyone is happy because cell phones aren’t being treated as P2P nodes, taking unexpected photos, or constantly tracking our GPS coordinates.

On the other hand, the Mac App Store is aimed at my computer. I don’t need anyone monitoring what I’m allowed to install. If a developer puts out a malicious (or even just a junky) application, the word is going to get out that it’s trash and shouldn’t be installed. If I don’t like it, I uninstall it. There’s really no need for a review process.

Lack of Control of the Experience and Process

As a developer, I value the experience that my user’s get very highly. It’s important to me (and I know even more to some of you) that my work is presented in a certain manner with a specific flow. While the Mac App Store doesn’t control the in-app experience, it does strongly effect the buying experience which is just as important (especially if you have mouths to feed at home). I will admit that the simplicity of the Mac App Store is great, but there are costs involved with surrendering this portion up to Apple.

Lag Time in Pushing Updates

As demonstrated with Transmit, it can be tough to push an important update through the system. This plays into the loss of control from my previous point. We all strive to create bug-free code, but also know it’s impossible. You better believe that when I find something, though, I’m going to fix it now and get it out fast. Not so with the Mac App Store.

The other cause for concern I see here is for those apps that are in early development, like Sparrow. I’ve been using it for some time now and it’s become very stable and offers a great feature set, but earlier on it was being updated quite often. Does this mean that Beta apps aren’t meant for the Mac App Store? Seems a shame to require apps to be fully matured before they “work” in the Mac App Store. Since apps I already have installed are recognized, wouldn’t it be nice if Apple helped Beta users transition into paying customers for v1.0? No deal.

The Cost of Convenience

I understand that not everyone is a web developer and some may not be interested in building and operating their own e-commerce website to sell their software. For this reason the Mac App Store is hugely convenient. But is it worth a 70/30 profit share with Apple? Obviously some would say yes because of the added exposure, but not everyone will be making $1 million in 20 days. With services like Quixly, digital sales and distribution aren’t an overly difficult thing to coordinate. For me, I’m taking home the extra 27% and working with PayPal (yuck) or Authorize.net.

So What Then?

All-in-all I do still think the Mac App Store is a great idea and will likely become more and more of a cash cow for Apple. I like the functionality and potential for what it could be, but I think by surrendering the experience and process to a third party, developers are left at the whim of their provider. Seems like something that definitely calls for counting the cost.

“Customers around the world are experiencing the magic of iPad, and seem to be loving it as much as we do,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We appreciate their patience, and are working hard to build enough iPads for everyone.”

At $500 a pop, I’m thinking Apple definitely sees the “magic of iPad”. Now to get my hands on one…