In This Chapter
Browsing for cool apps
Searching for specific apps
Getting apps onto your iPad
Managing iPad apps
Updating apps to make them better
Voicing your opinion on apps
Reporting issues with recalcitrant iPad apps
One of the best things about the iPad these days is that you can download and install apps created by third parties, which is to say apps not created by Apple (the first party) or you (the second party). At the time of this writing, more than 185,000 apps are available in the iTunes App Store. Furthermore, iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad owners have downloaded over 4,000,000,000 (yes, four billion) apps. Many apps are free but others cost money; some apps are useful but others are lame; and some apps are perfectly well-behaved but others quit unexpectedly (or worse). The point is that among the many apps, some are better than others.
In this chapter, we take a broad look at apps you can use with your iPad. You discover how to find apps on your computer or your iPad, and you find some basics for managing your apps. Don't worry: We have plenty to say about specific third-party apps in Chapters 16 and 17.
Apps enable you to use your iPad as a game console, a streaming Netflix player, a recipe finder, a sketchbook, and much, much more. You can run three different categories of apps on your iPad:
Apps made exclusively for the iPad: This is the newest kind, so you find fewer of these than the other two types. These apps won't run on an iPhone or iPod touch, so don't bother to try them on either device.
Apps made to work properly on an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch: This type of app can run on any of the three devices at full resolution. What is the full-screen resolution for each device? Glad you asked. For the iPhone and iPod touch, it's 320 × 480 pixels; for the iPad, it's 1024 × 768 pixels.
Apps made for the iPhone and iPod touch: These apps run on your iPad but only at iPhone/iPod touch resolution (320 × 480) rather than the full resolution of your iPad (1024 × 768).
You can double the size of an iPhone/iPod touch app by tapping the little 2x button in the lower-right corner of the screen; to return it to its native size, tap the 1x button.
Frankly, most iPhone/iPod apps look pretty good at 2x size, but we've seen a few that have jagged graphics and don't look as nice. Still, with 185,000 or more to choose from, we're sure that you can find a few that make you happy.
Tip
Figure 7-1 shows you what this looks like.
You can obtain and install apps for your iPad in two ways:
On your computer
On your iPad
To use the App Store on your iPad, it must be connected to the Internet. And, if you obtain an app on your computer, it isn't available on your iPad until you sync it with your computer.
But before you can use the App Store on your iPad or your computer, you first need an iTunes Store account. If you don't already have one, we suggest that you launch iTunes on your computer, click Sign In near the upper-right corner of the iTunes window, and then click Create New Account and follow the on-screen instructions.
Figure 7-1. iPhone/iPod touch apps run at a smaller size (left), but can be "blown up" to double size (right).
Note
Let's put it this way: If you don't have an iTunes Store account, you can't download a single cool app or iBook for your iPad. 'Nuff said.
Okay, start by finding cool iPad apps using iTunes on your computer. Follow these steps:
Launch iTunes.
Click the iTunes Store link in the sidebar on the left.
The iTunes App Store appears, as shown in Figure 7-2.
(Optional) If you want to look only for apps designed to run at the full resolution of your iPad, click the iPad tab at the top of the window.
After you have the iTunes App Store on your screen, you have a couple of options for exploring its virtual aisles. Allow us to introduce you to the various "departments" available from the main screen.
The main departments are featured in the middle of the screen, and ancillary departments appear on either side of them. We start with the ones in the middle:
The New and Noteworthy department has 12 visible icons (iBooks to IMDb in Figure 7-2) representing apps that are — what else? — new and noteworthy.
Tip
Only 12 icons are visible, but the New and Noteworthy department actually has more than that. Look to the right of the words New and Noteworthy. See the words See All? That's a link; if you click it, you see all apps in this department on a single screen. Or, you can click and drag the scroll bar to the right to see more icons.
The What's Hot department actually displays 12 icons, though you can see only six of them [Real Soccer 2010 to Frogger Pad (US)] in Figure 7-2 representing apps that are popular with other iPad users.
The Staff Favorites department, which appears below the What's Hot department and is not visible in Figure 7-2.
Warning
Apple has a habit of redecorating the iTunes Stores every so often, so allow us to apologize in advance if things aren't exactly as described here when you visit.
You also see display ads for four featured apps between the New and Noteworthy department and the What's Hot department (Angry Birds HD to Photogene in Figure 7-2).
Three other departments appear to the right, under the Top Charts heading: Paid Apps, one of our favorite departments; Free Apps; and Top Grossing Apps (which is not visible in Figure 7-2). The number-one app in each department displays both its icon and its name; the next nine apps show text links only.
Finally, the App Store link near the top of the screen is also a drop-down menu (as are most of the other department links to its left and right). If you click and hold on most of these department links, a menu with a list of the department's categories appears. For example, if you click and hold on the App Store link, you can choose specific categories such as Books, Entertainment, and others from the drop-down menu, allowing you to bypass the App Store home page and go directly to that category.
Browsing the screen is helpful, but if you know exactly what you're looking for, we have good news and bad news. The good news is that there's a faster way: Just type a word or phrase into the Search field in the upper-right corner of the main iTunes window, as shown in Figure 7-3, and then press Enter or Return to initiate the search.
The bad news is that you have to search the entire iTunes Store, which includes music, television shows, movies, and other stuff in addition to iPad apps.
Ah, but we have more good news: Your search results are segregated into categories — one of which is iPad Apps (refer to Figure 7-3). And, here's even more good news: If you click the See All link to the right of the words iPad Apps in Figure 7-3, all the iPad apps that match your search word or phrase appear on a single screen.
Tip
The little triangle to the right of each item's price is another drop-down menu (shown for the iProjector for iPad app in Figure 7-3). This one lets you give this app to someone as a gift, add it to your wish list, send an e-mail to a friend with a link to it, copy the link to this product to the Clipboard so that you can paste it elsewhere, or share this item on Facebook or Twitter.
Now that you know how to find apps in the App Store, this section delves a little deeper and shows you how to find out more about an application that interests you.
To find out more about an application icon, a featured app, or a text link on any of the iTunes App Store screens, just click it. A detail screen like the one shown in Figure 7-4 appears.
This screen should tell you most of what you need to know about the application, such as basic product information and a narrative description, what's new in this version, the language it's presented in, and the system requirements to run the app. In the following sections, you take a closer look at the various areas on the screen.
Tip
Notice the blue More link in the lower-right corner of the Description section. Click it to see a much longer description of the app.
Bear in mind that the application description on this screen was written by the application's developer and may be somewhat biased. Never fear, gentle reader: In an upcoming section, we show you how to find reviews of the application — written by people who have used it (and, unfortunately, sometimes people who haven't).
Notice that this application is rated 4+, as you can see below the Buy App button, near the top of the screen shown in Figure 7-4. The rating means that this app contains no objectionable material. Here are the other possible ratings:
9+: May contain mild or infrequent occurrences of cartoon, fantasy, or realistic violence; or infrequent or mild mature, suggestive, or horror-themed content that may not be suitable for children under the age of 9.
12+: May contain infrequent mild language; frequent or intense cartoon, fantasy, or realistic violence; mild or infrequent mature or suggestive themes; or simulated gambling that may not be suitable for children under the age of 12.
17+: May contain frequent and intense offensive language; frequent and intense cartoon, fantasy, or realistic violence; mature, frequent, and intense mature, suggestive, or horror-themed content; sexual content; nudity; or depictions of alcohol, tobacco, or drugs that may not be suitable for children under the age of 17. You must be at least 17 years old to purchase games with this rating.
Just below the application description, notice the collection of useful links such as Autodesk Inc. Web Site and SketchBook Pro Support. We urge you to explore these links at your leisure.
Last but not least, remember the three different categories of apps we mentioned earlier in the chapter, in the section "Tapping the Magic of Apps"? If you look between the rating (Rated 4+) and Customer Ratings (4.5 stars), you can see the requirements for this particular app. Because it says "Compatible with iPad. Requires iPhone OS 3.2 or later" and doesn't mention the iPhone or iPod touch, this app falls into the first category — apps made exclusively for the iPad. Another clue that it falls into the first category is that it says "iPad Screenshots" above the three pictures shown in Figure 7-4.
Note
If it belonged to the second or third categories — apps made to work properly on an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch, or apps made for the iPhone or iPod touch — it would say "Compatible with iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad" rather than "Compatible with iPad."
Now you're probably wondering how you can tell whether an app falls into the second or third category. One clue is to look at the screen shots. If you see two tabs — iPhone and iPad — after the word Screenshots, the app is the second type and will work at the full resolution of an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch. If you don't see the two tabs and it just says "iPhone Screenshots," the app is the third type and will run at iPhone/iPod touch resolution on your iPad.
Tip
One way to ensure that you are looking only for apps that take advantage of your iPad's big screen is to click the iPad tab on the front page of the App Store (shown in Figure 7-2). All the apps displayed under the iPad tab are of the first or second type and can run at the full resolution of your iPad.
If you scroll down the detail screen, near the bottom you find a series of customer reviews written by users of this app. You can see the first of these in Figure 7-4. Each review includes a star rating, from zero to five. If an app is rated four or higher, as SketchBook Pro is, the app is well-liked by people who use it.
In Figure 7-4, you can see that this application has an average rating of frac12 stars based on 176 user ratings. That means it's probably a pretty good app.
You see a few more reviews with star ratings below the review shown in Figure 7-4. If you care to read even more reviews than are shown on the detail page, click the small buttons on the right side of the Customer Reviews section — Back, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and Next — to navigate to the six additional pages of comments for this app.
Finally, just above these icons is a pop-up Sort By menu that says Most Helpful in Figure 7-4. This menu lets you sort the customer reviews by your choice of Most Helpful, Most Favorable, Most Critical, or Most Recent.
This part is simple. When you find an application you want to try, just click its Free App or Buy App button. When you do so, you'll have to log on to your iTunes Store account, even if the app is free.
After you log on, the app begins downloading. When it's finished, it appears in the Apps section of your iTunes library, as shown in Figure 7-5.
Note
Downloading an app to your iTunes library is only the first half of getting it onto your iPad. After you download an app, you have to sync your iPad before the application will be available on it. Chapter 3 covers syncing in detail.
By the way, if your iTunes App library doesn't look like ours (with big icons in a grid pattern), try clicking the icon in the middle of the trio of icons to the right of the Search field near the top of the iTunes window. The leftmost icon displays your apps in a list; the rightmost icon displays your apps in what is known as the Cover Flow view.
Every so often, the developer of an iPad application releases an update. Sometimes these updates add new features to the application, sometimes they squash bugs, and sometimes they do both. In any event, updates are usually a good thing for you and your iPad, so it makes sense to check for them every so often.
To do this in iTunes, click the Check for Updates link near the lower-right corner of the Apps screen. Note that if any updates are available, this link will tell you how many updates are available (it says 1 Update Available in Figure 7-5) instead of Check for Updates.
Another way of knowing that you have updates waiting is to look at the little number in a circle next to the Apps item in the iTunes sidebar (which is 1 in Figure 7-5).
To grab any available updates, either click the Download All Free Updates button or click the Get Update button next to each individual app. After you download an update this way, it will replace the older version on your iPad automatically the next time you sync.
And yet another way of knowing you have updates waiting is that the App Store icon on your iPad will sprout a little number in a circle in its upper-right corner.
Tip
If you click the Get More Apps link next to the Check for Updates link, you find yourself back at the main screen of the iTunes App Store (refer to Figure 7-2).
Finding apps with your iPad is almost as easy as finding them by using iTunes. The only requirement is that you have an Internet connection of some sort — Wi-Fi or wireless data network — so that you can access the iTunes App Store and browse, search, download, and install apps.
These icons are described as follows:
The Featured section has two tabs at the top of the screen: New (see Figure 7-6) and What's Hot. These two tabs represent two different pages full of apps.
The Top Charts section offers lists of the Top Paid iPad apps and the Top Free iPad apps. These are, of course, the most popular apps that either cost money or don't.
In the upper-left corner of the Top Charts screen is a Categories button. Tap it and you'll see a list of categories such as Books, Education, Games, Music, News, and Productivity, to name a few. Tap one of these categories to see the Top Paid and Top Free iPad apps for that category.
The Categories section works a little differently: It has no tabs, and its main page contains no apps. Instead, it offers a list of categories such as Games, Entertainment, Utilities, Music, and Lifestyle, to name a few. Tap a category to see a page full of apps of that type.
Tip
Most pages in the App Store display more apps than can fit on the screen at once. For example, the New and Noteworthy section in Figure 7-6 contains more than six apps. A few tools help you navigate the multiple pages of apps:
The little triangles at the top and bottom of the New and Noteworthy section are actually buttons you click to see the next or previous page of apps in that section. Tap them to see the next or previous page of apps.
The little dots in the middle of the gray area above and below most sections (four dots appear in Figure 7-6) tell you how many pages the section contains; the white dot indicates which page you're currently viewing (the first one in Figure 7-6).
Finally, tap the See All link at the top of most sections to (what else?) see all the apps in the section on the same screen.
If you know exactly what you're looking for, rather than simply browsing, you can tap the Search field in the upper-right corner of the screen and type a word or phrase; then tap the Search key on the keyboard to initiate the search.
Now that you know how to find apps in the App Store, the following sections show you how to find out more about a particular application. After tapping an app icon as you browse the store or in a search result, you see a detail screen like the one shown in Figure 7-7.
Tip
Remember that the application description on this screen was written by the developer and may be somewhat biased.
The information you find on the detail screen on your iPad is similar to that in the iTunes screen you see on your computer. The links, rating, and requirements simply appear in slightly different places on your iPad screen. (See the section "Getting more information about an app," earlier in this chapter, for explanations of the main on-screen items.)
The reviews section differs most from the computer version. To read reviews from your iPad, scroll down to the bottom of any detail screen and you find a star rating for that application. It's also the link to that application's reviews; tap it to see a page full of them. At the bottom of that page is another link: More Reviews. Tap it to see (what else?) more reviews.
To download an application to your iPad, follow these steps:
Tap the price button near the top of its detail screen.
In Figure 7-7, it's the gray rectangle that says Free. The gray rectangle is then replaced by a green rectangle that says Install App.
Tap the Install App button.
When prompted, type your iTunes Store account password.
After you do, the App Store closes and you see the Home screen where the new application's icon will reside. The new app's icon is slightly dimmed and has the word Loading beneath it, with a blue progress bar near its bottom to indicate how much of the app remains to be downloaded, as shown in Figure 7-8.
(Optional) If the app is rated 17+, click OK in the warning screen that appears after you type your password to confirm that you're over 17 before the app downloads.
Figure 7-8. The app above the iPod icon is downloading; the blue progress bar indicates that it's half done.
Warning
The application is now on your iPad, but it isn't copied to your iTunes library on your Mac or PC until your next sync. If your iPad suddenly loses its memory (unlikely) or if you delete the application from your iPad before you sync (as we describe later in this chapter), that application is gone forever. That's the bad news.
Tip
The good news is that after you've paid for an app, you can download it again if you need to — from iTunes on your computer or the App Store app on your iPad — and you don't have to pay for it again.
After you download an app to your iPad, the next time you sync your iPad, the application is transferred to your iTunes Apps library.
As mentioned earlier in this chapter, every so often the developer of an iPad application releases an update. If an update awaits you, a little number in a circle appears on the Updates icon at the bottom of the screen. (That number happens to be 1 in Figures 7-6 and 7-7.) Follow these steps to update your apps:
Tap the Updates icon if any of your apps needs updating.
If you tap the Updates button and see (in the middle of the screen) a message that says
All Apps are Up-to-Date, none of the apps on your iPad requires an update at this time. If apps need updating, they appear with Update buttons next to them.Tap the Update button that appears next to any app to update it.
If more than one application needs updating, you can update them all at once by tapping the Update All button in the upper-right corner of the screen.
Note
If you try to update an application purchased from any iTunes Store account except your own, you're prompted for that account's ID and password. If you can't provide them, you can't download the update.
Most of what you need to know about apps involves simply installing third-party apps on your iPad. However, you might find it helpful to know how to delete, review, or report a problem with an app.
You can delete an application in two ways: in iTunes on your computer or directly from your iPad.
To delete an application in iTunes, click Apps in the sidebar and then do one of the following:
Click the app to select it and press the Backspace or Delete key on the keyboard.
Click the app to select it and then choose Edit
Right-click (or Control+click on a Mac) the app and choose Delete.
After taking any of the actions in this list, you see a dialog box that asks whether you're sure that you want to remove the selected application. If you click the Remove button, the application is removed from your iTunes library, as well as from any iPad that syncs with your iTunes library.
Here's how to delete an application on your iPad:
Press and hold any icon until all the icons begin to "wiggle."
Tap the little x in the upper-left corner of the application that you want to delete, as shown in Figure 7-9.
A dialog box appears, informing you that deleting this application also deletes all its data.
Tap the Delete button.
To stop the icons from wiggling, just press the Home or Sleep/Wake button.
Note
Deleting an app from your iPad this way doesn't get rid of it permanently. It remains in your iTunes library until you delete it from iTunes, as described earlier in this chapter. Put another way: Even though you deleted the application from your iPad, it's still in your iTunes library. If you want to get rid of an application for good after you delete it on your iPad, you must also delete it from your iTunes library.
Tip
You also make icons wiggle to move them around on the screen or move them from page to page (as we describe in Chapter 3). To rearrange wiggling icons, press and drag them one at a time. If you drag an icon to the left or right edge of the screen, it moves to the next or previous Home screen. You can also drag two additional icons to the dock (where Safari, Mail, Photos, and iPod live) and have a total of six apps available from every Home screen.
Sometimes you love or hate an application so much that you want to tell the world about it. In that case, you should write a review. You can do this in two ways: in iTunes on your computer or directly from your iPad.
To write a review using iTunes, follow these steps:
Navigate to the detail page for the application in the iTunes App Store.
Scroll down the page to the Reviews section and click the Write a Review link.
You may or may not have to type your iTunes Store password at this point.
Click the button for the star rating (1 to 5) you want to give the application.
In the Title field, type a title for your review.
In the Review field, type your review.
Click the Submit button when you're finished.
The Preview screen appears. If the review looks good to you, you're done. If you want to change something, click the Edit button.
To write a review from your iPad, follow these steps:
Tap the App Store icon to launch the App Store.
Navigate to the detail screen for the application.
Scroll down the page and tap the Write a Review link.
You will probably have to type your iTunes Store password at this point.
Tap one to five of the stars at the top of the Write a Review screen to rate the application.
In the Title field, type a title for your review.
In the Review field, type your review.
Tap the Submit button in the upper-right corner of the screen.
Whichever way you submit your review, Apple reviews your submission. As long as it doesn't violate the (unpublished) rules of conduct for app reviews, it appears in a day or two in the App Store, in the Reviews section for the particular application.
Every so often, you find an app that's recalcitrant — a dud that doesn't work properly or else crashes, freezes, or otherwise messes up your iPad. When this happens, you should definitely report the problem so that Apple and the developer know about the problem and (hopefully) can fix it.
If you try to report a problem using iTunes on your computer, you click a number of times, only to end up at a Web page that says, "If you are having issues with your application, report the issue directly to the developer of the app by visiting the developer's website." Don't bother.
You can, however, report a problem from your iPad. Here's how:
Tap the App Store icon to launch the App Store.
Navigate to the detail screen for the application.
Tap the Report a Problem button near the upper-right corner of the detail screen.
You probably have to type your iTunes Store password at this point.
Tap one of the three buttons to identify the type of problem you're reporting: This Application Has a Bug, This Application Is Offensive, or My Concern Is Not Listed Here.
Type your report in the Comments field.
Tap the Report button in the upper-right corner of the screen to submit the report.