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Facebook finally releases an official iPad App

| Latest News | October 10, 2011

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It was the App we doubted we would ever see. But it's here: Facebook for iPad

As much as we love our iPad, it's been a rather frustrating place to use Facebook. Neither its Desktop or Mobile site would work well in Safari on the iPad. Ok so you can just run the  iPhone Facebook app but even with 2 times magnification it would feel clunky, especially when using the on screen keyboard within the app itself.

So that left you with using a third party Facebook app or simply giving up the ADDICTION.

Well Facebook have solved that now with the latest update to its app. iPad users may well be relieved to see the '+' sign appear on it on the App Store, denoting that it is designed for both iPhone, iPod Touch and the iPad:

Facebook App version 4 on the App Store

Facebook App: Runs on both iPhone & iPad

We're just downloading it now on iTunes. Many of us have wondered what has took them so long, so now's the time to find out if there was a good reason for the wait...

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Twitter shows Facebook the way on the iPad

| Latest News | September 10, 2011

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We've just spotted that Twitter have updated its web interface for the iPad. Very smart it looks too. Previously if browsing to Twitter on the iPad you would be directed to the rather basic mobile version of the site which clearly looked optimised for Mobile phones.

Now you there is a much slicker looking (dare we use the cliche 'HTML 5 style') site, reminiscent of Google's excellent GMail web app for the iPad.

It looks great too. In fact it looks just like the desktop version of Twitter since its long overdue recent overhaul. Twitter's original website had become a poor relation to many of the third party Twitter clients out there which made the service far more usable whilst using Twitter's own API's.

But does an improved web interface matter on the iPad when you can just use the excellent Twitter app? Definitely.

For example, when following a link from an email from Twitter in the iPad's Mail app to Safari, you where stuck with essentially the Mobile version of the site, which was too basic for the iPad, unless you switched to the Desktop version, bringing the headache of it often being a bit too much for the iPad's screen size and touch interface. Not now though, as Twitter, like Google with Gmail, have designed a great iPad (or should we say Tablet? There are others out there. Allegedly) web interface. We'll all of done it.

So this is a great example of how good sites can be on an iPad when they are designed with it in mind. You experience a great combination of looking and acting like a native app but yet still also feeling like a website you can easily browse to. Well done to Twitter.

In fact this really highlights to us just how far off that other social networking behemoth is in this area: Facebook. They are still miles off from offering a good experience on the iPad. You have the choice between using the desktop website, the mobile site m.facebook.com which is an improvement but still very buggy, or by just magnifying the Facebook iPhone app by 2x. Which just looks rubbish.

So go and take a look at Twitter on the iPad, Mr Zuckerberg, then take note...

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No Facebook Mobile phone, not even a Facebook iPad app

| Latest News | November 3, 2010

Facebook Logo

There isn't going to be a Facebook Mobile Phone.

But there is going to be some more mobile API's and software.

And that is er it.

Actually we are being a tad unfair.

They have announced some pretty cool stuff such as a Single Sign In for other mobile sites through your Facebook account.

The biggest bit of news for us though is a lack of news about a dedicated app for our favourite fruit flavoured Tablet.

Yep thats right no announcement on a dedicated Facebook iPad app. Mark Zuckerberg was pushed by the media on this subject. When brought up he responded with "The iPad's not mobile. Next question."

The questioner responded with "I think Apple would disagree." with Zuckerberg coming back with this:

Zuckerberg: "It's a computer. Sorry"

Erick Tseng: "The broader question is how do we scale to a tablet form factor without locking ourselves in."

Zuckerberg: ".....I don't want to be rude to Apple -- we all love Apple products -- but this is a mobile event and we want to stay focused on that. The iPad isn't mobile in the same way."

Interesting. I'm not entirely sure how an iPad app 'locks them in', odd language.

Earlier on in the presentation they stated they're aims to bring features such as Places that are already in the iPhone app over to Android. They plan to bring Android back in parity with their iOS offerings:

"We're also refreshing the Android app, which has traditionally been a little behind....Last year we had this idea that because we couldn't put together a full team to put the app together, we'd hire an outside shop. And right before we launched, Google bought the company! So that set us back a bit.....But now we're back to parity, we think."

You can find more coverage of the event over at Engadget

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