In This Chapter
Surfing the Net
Opening and displaying Web pages
Using a wireless network
Having fun with links, bookmarks, and history lists
Securing Safari
"You feel like you're actually holding the Web right in the palm of your hand."
Marketers use lines like that because, well, that's what marketers do. Only when an Apple marketer says such a thing to describe surfing the Web on the iPad, a lot of truth is behind it. The iPad's glorious display, in combination with the snappy new Apple-designed A4 chip inside the machine, makes browsing on Apple's tablet an absolute delight.
In this chapter, you discover the pleasures — and the few roadblocks — in navigating cyberspace on your iPad.
A version of the Apple Safari Web browser is a major reason that the Net on the iPad is very much like the Net you've come to expect on a more traditional computer. Come to think of it, the Net often looks a lot better on the iPad thanks to its beautiful screen. Safari for the Mac and for Windows is one of the very best Web browsers in the business. In our view, Safari on the iPhone has no rival as a cell-phone browser. As you might imagine, Safari on the iPad is equally appealing.
We start our cyberexpedition with a quick tour of the Safari browser. Take a gander at Figure 4-1: Not all browser controls found on a PC or Mac are present. Still, Safari on the iPad has a familiar look and feel. We describe these controls and others throughout this chapter.
Before plunging in, we recommend a little detour. Read the "Living on the EDGE" sidebar, earlier in this chapter, to find out more about the wireless networks that enable you to surf the Web on the iPad in the first place.
Tip
Surfing the Web begins with a Web address, of course. When you start by tapping the address field in iPad's Safari, the virtual keyboard appears. Here are a few tips for using the keyboard in Safari (and see Chapter 2 for more help with using the virtual keyboard):
Because so many Web addresses end with the suffix
.com(pronounced dot com), the virtual keyboard has a dedicated .com key. For other common Web suffixes —.edu, .net, and.org— press and hold the .com key and choose the relevant domain type.Of equal importance, both the period (.) and the slash (/) are on the virtual keyboard because you frequently use them when you enter Web addresses.
The moment you tap a single letter, you see a list of Web addresses that match those letters. For example, if you tap the letter E (as we did in the example shown in Figure 4-2), you see Web listings for EarthLink, eBay, and others. Tapping U or H instead may display listings for USA TODAY or the Houston Chronicle (shameless plugs for the newspapers where Ed and Bob are columnists).
The iPad has two ways to determine Web sites to suggest when you tap certain letters:
Bookmarks: One method is the Web sites you already bookmarked from the Safari or Internet Explorer browsers on your computer (and synchronized, as we describe in Chapter 3). More on bookmarks later in this chapter.
History: The second method iPad uses when suggesting Web sites when you tap a particular letter is to suggest sites from the History list — those cyberdestinations where you recently hung your hat. Because history repeats itself, we also tackle that topic later in this chapter.
You might as well open your first Web page now — and it's a full HTML page, to borrow from techie lingo:
Tap the Safari icon docked at the bottom of the Home screen.
It's another member of the Fantastic Four (along with Mail, Photos, and iPod). Chapter 1 introduces the Home screen.
Tap the address field (refer to Figure 4-1).
Begin typing the Web address, or URL (Uniform Resource Locator, for trivia buffs), on the virtual keyboard that slides up from the bottom of the screen.
Do one of the following:
To accept one of the bookmarked (or other) sites that show up on the list, merely tap the name.
Safari automatically fills in the URL in the address field and takes you where you want to go.
Keep tapping the proper keyboard characters until you enter the complete Web address for the site you have in mind. Next tap the Go key found on the right side of the keyboard.
Note
It's not necessary to type www at the beginning of a URL. So, if you want to visit
www.theonion.com(for example), typingtheonion.comis sufficient to transport you to the humor site. For that matter, it even works if you type theonion without the.com.
Warning
Because Safari on the iPad runs a variation of the iPhone mobile operating system, every so often you may run into a site that serves up the light, or mobile, version of a Web site, sometimes known as a WAP site. Graphics may be stripped down on these sites. Alas, the producers of these sites may be unwittingly discriminating against you for dropping in on them by using an iPad. In fact, you may be provided a choice of which site you want — the light or the full version. Bravo! If not, you have our permission to berate these site producers with letters, e-mails, and phone calls until they get with the program.
If you know how to open a Web page (if you don't, read the preceding section in this chapter), we can show you how radically simple it is to zoom in on the pages so that you can read what you want to read and see what you want to see, without enlisting a magnifying glass.
Try these neat tricks:
Double-tap the screen so that that portion of the text fills the entire screen. It takes just a second before the screen comes into focus. By way of example, check out Figure 4-3. It shows two views of the same Sports Illustrated Web page. In the first view, you see what the page looks like when you first open it. In the second one, you see how the picture takes over much more of the screen after you double-tap it. The area of the screen you double-tapped is the area that swells up. To return to the first view, double-tap the screen again.
Pinch the page. Sliding your thumb and index finger together and then spreading them apart (or as we like to say, unpinching) also zooms in and out of a page. Again, wait just a moment for the screen to come into focus.
Press down on a page and drag it in all directions, or flick through a page from top to bottom. You're panning and scrolling, baby.
Rotate the iPad to its side. Watch what happens to the White House Web site, shown in Figure 4-4. It reorients from portrait to a widescreen landscape view. The keyboard is also wider, making it a little easier to enter a new URL. This little magic won't happen if you set the Rotate Lock described in Chapter 1.
When we surf the Web on a desktop PC or laptop, we rarely go to a single Web page and call it a day. In fact, we often have multiple Web pages open at the same time. Sometimes, it's because we choose to hop around the Web without closing the pages we visit. Sometimes, a link (see the next section) automatically opens a new page without shuttering the old one. (If these additional pages are advertisements, this isn't always welcome.)
Safari on the iPad lets you open up to nine pages simultaneously. After you have one page open, here's how to open additional Web pages in Safari:
Tap the New Page icon (refer to Figure 4-1) on the left side of the navigation bar at the top of the screen.
You see a tic-tac-toe grid with thumbnails of recently opened sites or pages, similar to Figure 4-5.
Tap the page you want to view or tap New Page to open a fresh page.
If you tap New Page, you need to tap the address field and type a URL for your new page.
To close one of your open Web pages, tap the white X inside the black circle, which appears in the upper-left corner of each Web-page thumbnail.
Surfing the Web would be a real drag if you had to enter a URL every time you want to navigate from one page to another. That's why bookmarks are so useful. And, it's why handy links are welcome too. Because Safari functions on the iPad the same way browsers work on your PC or Mac, links on the device behave much the same way too.
Text links that transport you from one site to another are typically underlined or shown in bold type or merely items in a list. Tap the link to go directly to that site or page.
Tapping other links leads to different outcomes:
Open a map: Tapping a map launches the Google Maps application that is, um, addressed in Chapter 6.
Prepare an e-mail: Tap an e-mail address and the iPad opens the Mail program (see Chapter 5) and prepopulates the To field with that address. The virtual keyboard is also summoned so that you can add other e-mail addresses and compose a subject line and message. This shortcut doesn't work in all instances in which an e-mail appears on the Web.
Tip
To see the URL for a link, press your finger against the link and keep it there. Use this method also to determine whether a picture has a link.
Warning
Not every Web link cooperates with the iPad. As of this writing, the iPad didn't support some common Web standards — most notably, Adobe Flash video. It's a void that we hope is addressed in the future, because Flash is the backbone for video and animations across cyberspace. But we're not holding our breath. At press time, for example, you couldn't play videos on the iPad from the popular Hulu.com video site, among many others. But all is not lost, even with the absence of Flash. Apple does support an emerging standard for streaming audio and video called HTML5 and HTTP. In the meantime, if you see an incompatible link, nothing may happen — or a message may be displayed about having to install a plug-in.
You already know how useful bookmarks are and how you can synchronize bookmarks from the browsers on your computer. It's equally simple to bookmark a Web page directly on the iPad:
Make sure that the page you want to bookmark is open, and tap the + symbol at the top of the screen.
You have the opportunity to tap Add Bookmark, Add to Home Screen, or Mail Link to This Page. Figure 4-6 shows these options near the top of the screen.
Tap the Add Bookmark option.
A new window opens with a default name for the bookmark, its Web address, and its folder location.
To accept the default bookmark name and default bookmark folder, tap Save.
To change the default bookmark name, tap the X in the circle next to the name, enter the new title (using the virtual keyboard), and then tap Save.
To change the location where the bookmark is saved, tap the > symbol in the Bookmarks field, tap the folder where you want the bookmark to be kept, tap the Add Bookmark button in the upper-left corner of the screen, and then tap Save.
To open a bookmarked page after you set it up, tap the Bookmarks icon in the upper-left portion of the screen (refer to Figure 4-1) and then tap the appropriate bookmark.
If the bookmark you have in mind is buried inside a folder, tap the folder name first and then tap the bookmark you want.
Tip
If you tapped Add to Home Screen rather than Add Bookmark in Step 1 of the preceding set of steps, your iPad adds an icon to your Home screen to let you quickly access the site, a topic we discuss in detail in the section "Clipping a Web page," later in this chapter. If you tapped Mail Link to This Page instead, the Mail program opens, with a link for the page in the message and the name of the site in the subject line.
If a bookmarked site is no longer meaningful, you can change it or get rid of it:
To remove a bookmark (or folder), tap the Bookmarks icon and then tap Edit. Tap the red circle next to the bookmark you want to toss off the list, and then tap Delete.
To change a bookmark name or location, tap Edit and then tap the bookmark. The Edit Bookmark screen appears, showing the name, URL, and location of the bookmark already filled in. Tap the fields you want to change. In the Name field, tap the X in the gray circle and then use the keyboard to enter a new title. In the Location field, tap the > symbol and scroll up or down the list until you find a new home for your bookmark.
To create a new folder for your bookmarks, tap Edit and then tap the New Folder button. Enter the name of the new folder and choose where to put it.
To move a bookmark up or down in a list, tap Edit and then drag the three bars to the right of the bookmark's name to its new resting place.
Tip
You can constantly display a Bookmarks bar in Safari by turning on the Always Show Bookmarks Bar setting in Settings. As with many other settings, make sure that the blue On setting is shown rather than the gray Off setting. For more on Settings, head to Chapter 13.
You frequent lots of Web sites, but some way more than others. You're constantly going online to consult your daily train schedule, for example. In their infinite wisdom, the folks at Apple let you bestow special privileges on frequently visited sites, not just by bookmarking pages but by affording them their unique Home screen icons. Apple calls these Web Clips, and creating one is dead simple:
Open the Web page in question and tap the + symbol.
Tap Add to Home Screen.
Apple creates an icon out of the area of the page that was displayed when you saved the clip, unless the page has its own custom icon.
Type in a new name for your Web Clip (up to 10 characters) or leave the one that Apple suggests.
Tap Add.
The icon appears on your Home screen.
Sometimes, you want to revisit a site that you failed to bookmark, but you can't remember the darn destination or what led you there in the first place. Good thing you can study the history books.
Safari records the pages you visit and keeps the logs on hand for several days. Here's how to access your history:
Tap the Bookmarks icon.
Tap History.
The History option is at the top of the Bookmarks list.
Tap the day you think you hung out at the site.
When you find it, tap the listing.
You're about to make your triumphant return.
Tip
To clear your history so that nobody else can trace your steps — and just what is it you're hiding? — tap Clear History at the upper-right corner of the History list. Alternatively, tap Settings on the Home screen, tap Safari, and then tap Clear History. In both instances, per usual, you have a chance to back out without wiping the slate clean.
Most of us spend a lot of time using search engines on the Internet. And, the search engines we summon most often are Google and Yahoo!. So it goes on the iPad.
Although you can certainly use the virtual keyboard to type google.com or yahoo.com in the Safari address field, Apple doesn't require that tedious effort. Instead, you tap into Google or Yahoo! by using the dedicated search box shown in Figure 4-7. The default search engine on the iPad is Google, and Yahoo! is the first runner-up.
To conduct a Web search on the topic of the iPad, follow these steps:
Tap the search field shown earlier, in Figure 4-1.
A funny thing happens. The search field expands (as if Google or Yahoo! expected you to enter more text than could fit in the field initially). At the same time, the address bar gets smaller and your ever-obedient virtual keyboard slides up from the bottom. In Chapter 2, we explain how the keyboard adapts to what you're doing. The one that shows up now has a Search key.
Enter your search term or phrase, and tap the Search button to generate pages of results.
Tap any search result that looks promising.
You can capture most pictures you come across on a Web site — but be mindful of any potential copyright violations, depending on what you plan to do with the images. To copy an image from a Web site, follow these steps:
Press your finger against the image.
Tap the Save Image button that appears, as shown in Figure 4-8 (or tap Copy, depending on what you'd like to do with the image):
Saved images end up in your Photos library, from which they can be synced back to a computer.
If you tap Copy instead, you can paste the image into an e-mail or as a link in a program such as Notes.
In the case of an advertisement, you also see buttons to "open" the image or "open in new page."
Along with the riches galore found on the Internet are places in cyberspace where you're hassled. You might want to take pains to protect your privacy and maintain your security.
To get started, tap the Settings icon on the Home screen. Now tap Safari.
The following settings enable you to tell your iPad what you'd like to be private and how you'd like to set your security options:
Fill out forms with AutoFill: When AutoFill is turned on, Safari can automatically fill out Web forms by using your personal contact information, usernames and passwords, or information from other contacts in your address book.
Fraud Warning: Safari can warn you when you land on a site whose producers have sinister intentions. The protection is better than nothing but don't give up your guard. The Fraud Warning isn't foolproof. The setting is on by default.
Turn JavaScript on or off: Programmers use JavaScript to add various kinds of functionality to Web pages, from displaying the date and time to changing images when you mouse over them. However, some security risks have also been associated with JavaScript.
Block pop-ups: Pop-ups are those Web pages that show up whether you want them to or not. Often, they're annoying advertisements. But at some sites, you welcome the appearance of pop-ups, so remember to turn off blocking under such circumstances.
Clear cookies: We're not talking about crumbs you may have accidentally dropped on the iPad. Cookies are tiny bits of information that a Web site places on the iPad when you visit so that it recognizes you when you return. You need not assume the worst; most cookies are benign.
If this concept wigs you out, you can take action: Tap Accept Cookies and then tap Never. Theoretically, you will never again receive cookies on the iPad. A good middle ground is to accept cookies only from the sites you visit. To do so, tap From Visited. You can also tap Always to accept cookies from all sites.
Warning
If you don't set the iPad to accept cookies, certain Web pages won't load properly.
Tap Safari to return to the main Safari settings page.
Clear the cache: The cache stores content from some Web pages so that they load faster the next time you stop by. Tap Clear Cache and then tap Clear Cache again on the next screen to (you guessed it) clear the cache.
Developer tool: Unless you happen to be a developer, we don't ask you to pay much attention to this setting. It lets you turn a debug console (showing errors, warnings, tips, logs, and similar details that developers find useful) on or off.