Apple Numbers for iPad and iPhone review

By Rob Griffiths

Edited and Republished by Global Information  & Tech

When I reviewed the initial release of Numbers for iPad in April 2010, I noted that it worked well for creating original spreadsheets, and for working on Numbers-native spreadsheets from your Mac, but that it fell short due to its inability to output files in Excel format. Though Apple’s app could read such files, it would convert them to Numbers format. That version of Numbers was also available strictly for the iPad, and not the iPhone or iPod touch.

Numbers 1.4 addresses the Excel issue, adds some other welcome features, and can now be used on the iPhone (3GS and 4) and iPod touch (third and fourth generation) in addition to the iPad. In this review, I’ll focus on what’s new in Numbers, and discuss its use on the smaller iDevices.

The big news in this Numbers update is the small news, that you can now use Numbers on certain iPods and iPhones. While Numbers is a Universal app (one version for all iOS devices), there are a couple of features in Numbers on the iPad that you won’t get to use in Numbers on the iPhone or iPod touch: full screen mode and landscape view.

On the iPad, you can enter a full screen mode to get an overview of your data, and run quick summaries of data sets with a simple flick of your finger. You can’t do much more than that, though, so the lack of this feature on the smaller screened iPhone and iPod touch may not be a major problem for most users.

The lack of landscape mode is more troubling though as many worksheets are laid out in a landscape orientation, and viewing a super-wide landscape spreadsheet on an iPhone in portrait mode can entail a lot of finger swiping. I didn’t realise just how often I used this mode in Numbers on the iPad until I flipped my iPhone around for the first time, expecting to see my worksheet flip, too. When it didn’t, I thought I had the iPhone’s orientation locked, but that wasn’t the case. There simply isn’t any support for landscape mode on the iPhone and iPod touch.

One other minor but potentially annoying “feature” in Numbers on the iPhone and iPod touch is that you can only undo and redo changes by shaking your device, in the iPad app, there’s a dedicated button in the toolbar that doesn’t appear when you run the app on smaller iOS devices. When developing a spreadsheet, I use undo and redo a lot, and shaking the phone over and over again to accomplish that task gets old really quickly. I found myself longing for the iPad’s dedicated button after only a couple of undo shakes.

While Numbers works just fine on the iPhone 4, my biggest problem with it is that there’s simply not enough screen real estate to work productively. It seemed every time I wanted to do something, I was either scrolling or zooming to make sure I had the right cell selected or to see the big picture. It’s also very hard to get a sense for how your finished project will look when you’re laying it out one tiny section at a time.
In short, while Numbers runs just great on an iPhone or iPod touch, I wouldn’t want to use it for anything beyond simple spreadsheets or minor edits to larger projects. There’s a reason that serious spreadsheet jockeys usually have monstrous monitors connected to their desktop machines, there’s no such thing as too much screen space when creating large spreadsheet models.

This release of Numbers includes a number of new and/or improved features that make it easier to do what you need to do, and to share what you’ve done with others. The big news for me was that Numbers can now export in Excel format. Previously it could read but not write Excel files. This means you can now work on an Excel file on your iDevice, and output it back to that same format, so you can share it with those who use Office instead of Numbers.

You can now create folders in the spreadsheet browser mode. Folders work here exactly as they do in iOS in general, just drag and hover one icon over another, and you’ll create a folder. For those with a lot of spreadsheets, this is a welcome addition. Also new since the last review is printing via AirPrint printers, though I was unable to test this feature.

Finally, if you’re the type who never reads in-app help, you should break that habit and read Numbers’ in-app help. It contains a lot of usability tips that will help you get the most out of the mobile spreadsheet app. For example, Help reveals how to restrict a drag operation to a straight line. Hold one finger from one hand on the screen while dragging the object with a finder on your other hand.

Not all is perfect in Numbersland, however. Numbers still can’t import hide rows/columns or merge cells, which are two features that many spreadsheets use extensively. In particular, not being able to merge cells (and having merged cells break on import) will cause some layout headaches. You’re also still limited to your iDevice’s relatively meager font collection, and headers/footers and certain features on graphs also won’t survive the transition from the desktop to your iDevice.

Working with files is still more painful than it should be: you’re generally restricted to working with one file at a time (i.e. when copying to/from iTunes), and you can’t open more than one spreadsheet at a time.

Later this year, Numbers (as well as Keynote and Pages) will support Apple’s iCloud service. This should greatly ease the sometimes tricky document management issues related to working with one file on multiple devices. Instead of winding up with multiple copies of the same file on multiple devices, iCloud integration will allow you to have one copy of the file that’s simply synced to all your devices. Create a spreadsheet on your Mac, close it, and you will then be able to pick up your phone and continue working, right where you left off.
While iCloud integration looks like a win, it’s not clear yet what will happen with iWork.com, Apple’s perpetually in beta iWork document sharing service. The features provided by iWork.com aren’t necessarily replicated by iCloud, so I would expect that it will continue to exist, at least in some form.

The potential upside of iCloud support in Numbers is huge, but we’ll have to wait until later this fall to see exactly how well it works, and what becomes of the iWork.com beta programme.

Five reasons Microsoft could win the tablet war

                                                                                      Windows 8 could put the IT giant back on top

Microsoft has let it be known that the next version of Windows will run on ARM architecture, and it has demonstrated early builds of Windows 8 (or whatever Microsoft ultimately calls the next OS) on a tablet at both CES 2011 and MIX '11. While Microsoft did a quick 180 on comments from Steve Ballmer confirming a 2012 launch of Windows 8, we know it's coming sometime, and when it does it quickly dominate the tablet market.

Why? Well, here are five reasons that Microsoft could come from behind and ultimately win the tablet war.

1. Uniform experience

Microsoft Windows enjoys a dominant market share of nearly 90 percent for desktop operating systems. While the tablet is a different environment than the desktop, users will appreciate having a tablet that has a look and feel consistent with what they're already familiar with.

2. Software library

Intel informed investors that the ARM version(s) or Windows will not be able to run legacy software, so that could significantly reduce the available software for a Windows tablet. But, Microsoft declared that Intel was out of line in speculating, and it has already demonstrated both Microsoft Office and Internet Explorer 10 on ARM-based tablets.

Even if Intel is correct, and it seems quite possible it could be, Microsoft could still provide developers with the tools necessary to make porting from x86 to ARM as simple as possible. The more users can use the exact same software they are already comfortable with from their desktop, the more successful the tablet will be.

3. Diverse hardware

Apple dominates the tablet market right now, but with Apple you just have the iPad 2. Granted, it has a variety of models, but overall an iPad 2 is an iPad 2. A Microsoft Windows tablet will most likely follow in the footsteps of the current array of Android tablets, with a variety of shapes and sizes to choose from. That diversity gives users more options to choose the tablet form factor and hardware specs that work best for them rather than using the one size fits all approach.

4. Price?

You might notice the question mark. On the one hand, different vendors creating rival tablets will drive some price competition, both in the tablet industry overall and among other Windows tablets. The freedom to use different hardware specs will also enable some cost cutting.
But, as it stands now, Apple seems to have cornered the market on many of the key components of tablets, making it difficult for other vendors to purchase the hardware necessary to make tablets in sufficient volume to bring the price down. So, price is a gray area that may be hard to deliver.

5. No rush

Yes, I understand that Microsoft is not new to tablets. Microsoft has been pushing slate or tablet style PCs for a decade with little success. But, as far as the 'iPad generation' of tablets goes, Microsoft is sitting on the sidelines so far. Microsoft strategy seems to be focused on getting it right, rather than racing to market.
If you look at current iPad rivals, it seems that rushing incomplete or unfinished tablets to market can have dubious results. The Motorola Xoom and BlackBerry PlayBook were both hailed as potential competitors for the iPad, but both hit the street missing key elements and leaving users wanting more, resulting in disappointing sales and a first impression for users that may haunt future tablet efforts.

If Microsoft can get it right and deliver a familiar Windows experience, but in a way that is uniquely suited for a mobile tablet, and deliver it at a price that can compete head to head with the iPad, it could still come out of nowhere and eventually dominate tablets as it dominates desktops.

Of course, I still think that a tablet is not a PC, and that it is a mistake to try and put the Windows desktop in a mobile tablet. In my opinion, Microsoft should be developing a tablet version of the Windows Phone 7 platform because Windows Phone 7 has been designed from the ground up to be a mobile OS.

Microsoft plans live TV streaming for Xbox 360

By David Daw


Xbox live service to get selected content over Internet

Today at E3, Microsoft revealed plans to bring live streaming television to its Xbox Live entertainment platform this fall. Microsoft said it was partnering with companies in the US and abroad to provide a variety of television content, but the company didn't announce any partners at the event.

The live TV play is just one part of Microsoft's push to make Xbox Live a central entertainment hub in the home. As part of this push, Microsoft also said it would be bringing YouTube to the console. Together with existing content channels like Netflix and Sky Player, the Xbox system is fast becoming a formidable media centre.

Microsoft also announced plans to integrate its Bing search engine into Xbox Live, and to add voice controls using its popular Kinect peripheral.

While the company has yet to announce details for its Live TV services, it seems likely that the American content partnerships would follow the model Microsoft has already established in Europe.

For the past few years, Microsoft has been partnering with content providers like Sky TV in the UK to bring dedicated live content channels to the Xbox. We don't know who Microsoft is in talks to partner with, but Microsoft has said it's looking to increase its partnerships by a factor of ten in the coming year.

LulzSec hackers claim breach of FBI affiliate

InfarGard targeted as a response to cyberwar announcements

Hacking group Lulz Security claimed it had hacked and defaced the website of the Atlanta chapter of InfraGard, an organisation affiliated to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and leaked its user base.
The group said that they had hacked the InfraGard site after NATO and President Barack Obama had raised the stakes with regard to hacking, by treating it as an act of war.

The website of InfraGard's Atlanta chapter was not accessible late Sunday and returned the message that the site was "under construction" as the future home for the Atlanta InfraGard Member's Alliance. A cache of the site on Google search confirmed that the site was that of InfraGard Atlanta.

InfraGard describes itself an association of businesses, academic institutions, state and local law enforcement agencies, and other participants dedicated to sharing information and intelligence to prevent hostile acts against the US.

The FBI in Atlanta and InfraGard did not immediately respond to e-mailed requests for comments.
LulzSec has recently made news for hacking into PBS. It claimed last week that it had broken into several Sony Pictures websites and accessed unencrypted personal information on over 1 million people.

LulzSec claimed to have obtained about 180 logins from the hack of the InfraGard Atlanta website, and all of them were affiliated to the FBI in some way. It also claimed to have obtained the login of Karim Hijazi, CEO of Unveillance, a network security company.

Hijazi said in a statement last week that LulzSec made threats against him and his company to try to obtain money as well as to force him into revealing sensitive data about his botnet intelligence that would have put many other businesses, government agencies and individuals at risk of massive Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks.

LulzSec claimed that Hijazi had tried to pay them to attack competitors' sites.

Sony hacked again as embarrassment mounts

"We accessed EVERYTHING," claim LulzSec hackers

LulzSec, a hacking group that recently made news for hacking into PBS, claimed today that it has broken into several Sony Pictures websites and accessed unencrypted personal information on over 1 million people.

In a statement released on Thursday, the group claimed that it had also managed to compromise all "admin details," including administrator passwords, as well as 75,000 "music codes" and 3.5 million "music coupons" from Sony networks and websites.

The group has publically posted a full list of compromised sites, along with links to documents containing samples of what it claimed was material stolen from Sony.

The compromised databases included one that appeared to contain information belonging to people who participated in a promotional campaign involving Sony Pictures and AutoTrader.com, as well as another involving a Sony-sponsored Summer of Restless Beauty campaign.

Also compromised in the break-in, according to LulzSec, was a Sony music codes database, a music coupons database, and databases from Sony BMG Belgium & Netherlands.
The compromised databases contained "varied assortments of Sony user and staffer information," the group said.

"SonyPictures.com was owned by a very simple SQL injection, one of the most primitive and common vulnerabilities, as we should all know by now," LulzSec said. "From a single injection, we accessed EVERYTHING."

"What's worse is that every bit of data we took wasn't encrypted," the group claims. "Sony stored over 1,000,000 passwords of its customers in plaintext, which means it's just a matter of taking it."

LulzSec said that it had copied and published only a relatively small sample of the information it had managed to access because it did not have the resources to download everything. The group said that in theory it could have "taken every last bit of information," but that would have taken weeks.

The group posted a link to the SQL injection vulnerability it had exploited and invited anyone to verify it personally. "You may even want to plunder those 3.5 million coupons while you can."

In a brief comment sent by email, Jim Kennedy, executive vice president of global communications for Sony Pictures Entertainment, said the company is looking into the claims made by LulzSec, but offered no other comment.

If the breach is as extensive as LulzSec has claimed, it would be the second major compromise that Sony has suffered since mid-April, when intruders broke into its PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment networks. Those breaches resulted in the compromise of personal data belonging to nearly 100 million account holders.

Since then, there have been a series of intrusions at various Sony websites around the world. The attacks, such as the one carried out against Sony Pictures by LulzSec, have been designed largely to embarrass Sony, which has sparked the wrath of many hackers for its hard line stance over copyright and IP protection.

The continuing attacks have become a huge issue for the company. Sony was forced to shut down its PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment networks for several days to fix issues resulting from those intrusions. Even now the networks are still limping back to normal.

So far, Sony has hired at least three external security firms to help patch its networks. It also recently hired a

 new chief information security officer to help coordinate its security efforts. With the company's websites having been routinely broken into, despite such measures, many wonder just how porous Sony's networks are.

Sony itself characterized the PlayStation Network and Sony Online Entertainment intrusions as highly targeted and sophisticated cyberattacks. However, all of the publicly disclosed ones since then appear to have been the result of some fundamental security oversights on the part of the company.

Several of the attacks have resulted from SQL injection flaws that hackers have claimed were extremely easy to find and to exploit.