Can I hack or jailbreak to get the arrow keys? (+flash?)

[DaveSt]

To be fair guys, almost every online and printed review I can recall reading about the iPad mentions the issue of Flash (including the non-tech publications). I honestly don't have an axe to grind one way or the other, and I am disappointed to hear when people are upset to discover Apples lack of flash support after they purchase an iOS device, but there is a great deal of commentary on the subject in the wild which isn't that challenging to stumble upon.... Just my opinion of course.

I don't disagree that there is a lot of commentary about the whole Flash vs. Apple debate to be found. However, there are a lot of people out there that have no idea what that even means. It's one of those things lots of people are learning about the hard way for better or worse.

 

[col.bris]

Dear Col, were life so simple! I know we are way off topic already, but what the hell!

Where I live, there are around 30 million computers, privately-held or available to the public in internet cafes. Around 50% are still XP based, 10% are Windows 2000, 20% are vista - although from anecdotal research, about half of these have been reverted to XP again. The newer 20% are Windows 7 and the remaining 10% seem to be a hodgepodge of Macs and other curious devices. Many of my (wealthier) customers also have iPads, but many others are opting for the Android devices starting to come out because of the limitations of the iPad they say. Except for those with iPads, so far as I know everyone has flash players on their machiens. And I don't know of anyone - other than a few IT afficiandos - who consider upgrading to Windows 7. XP works fine, vista doesn't. And XP is free. Most new computers are sold without O/S to keep the price down ($400 instead of $650 for a new entry level laptop), and nearly everyone still has access to the old XP installations CDs*. I don't know about Apples, it's popular for those who can afford it, the number one reason being... "it's pretty".

The beauty about people who own Apple devices is that seem to be happy to pay extra for good products, so I might just make a special "Apple" version of my courses and charge extra to cover the extra development costs.

I was hoping for a more straight-forward solution: maybe a hack or patch I could supply; or a way to produce web content that is browser and platform independent.

As you say, that will only happen sometime in the distant future when everyone has HTML5 and all the digital movies and audio content have been converted to the new (yet again) standard(s).

Thanks for your help and advice. At least I know now that it can't be done simply. Or that flash might still be the solution, but that only the iPad (or Apples?) will be the odd man out. I'm guessing that the "Apple Philosophy" is to deliberately set itself apart from the mainstream by refusing to endorse the dominant standards. I know Microsoft and Sony do this as a matter of course - and then come up with their own standards that everybody else has to comply with. So kudos to Apple for standing up for itself (I suppose)!

* There are places where Windows 7 can be obtained for free but the cost of the license is only 1/3 of the problem. Taking time to upgrade is the main problem, plus the fact that Windows 7 requires that you upgrade the hardware also, or at least put in (a lot) extra RAM.

I understand totally that you have restrictions your problem is most of your customers are stuck in the past running older technology and either cannot afford the upgrade or don't want to and for most part they are happy with your web site for training as it works fine. Then along comes the latest whizz bang technology like the Apple iPad and all of a sudden things don't just work the same. Unfortunately either you cater for the Apple iPad, iPhones and iPod touches all of which your clients can use to access your sites assuming they have access to wifi or find an alternative product to recommend may be a droid tablet or a net book. The issue with that is you cannot dictate what your users purchase. I wish you the best of luck and I also admire your support fore your users and hope at some point in the near future you find a compromise to you your problem and can continue offering your product regardless of what platform they use.

 

[thormcse]

Apple

My apple stuff is pretty. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't but it always pretty.

 

[iPaciMac]

dude...some cars use diesel...some are electric/gas hybrids, some are flex-fuel...

and I'm -not- saying that anyone deserves to be berated for simply not knowing, but if you're in a situation where you can just buy a $400 or more device without worrying about if it's perfect or not then I say don't worry about doing research, but if you're like me and you need to be pretty sure that your $400 is going to be spent wisely then yes, I say you need to do research and learn some terminology and technology

 

[DaveSt]

dude...some cars use diesel...some are electric/gas hybrids, some are flex-fuel...

lol .. I knew when I posted that would be the response.

 

[Superbike81]

The fact is, the only current and reliable solution for your problem is to get rid of the iPad and either use a laptop, netbook, or one of the new generation Android Honeycomb tablets. With Android you can use Flash and install different software keyboards which have arrows built into them. That would solve both of your problems, you wouldn't have to ask your customers to change anything, and would be the smoothest route for you to take.

 

[Schmitty2364]

wow if this dude has an opinion how about you guys not flame the crap out of him, man even if he comes off rude to you, do you really gotta be rude back??? wow.... is this gamefaqs????

 

[SShadow]

Swype... I want Swype for my iPad... I'm spoiled on my Droid.

 

[Superbike81]

Satie is pretty good, but I prefer SwiftKey. Either of them would be a welcome addition to the iPad.