No PDFs, No Co-editing On Underwhelming Apple iCloud

An anonymous reader writes "Apple's iCloud service has been a little overlooked in the bunfight for the iPhone 4S. When it was first announced some predicted it would wipe out companies like Box.net, DropBox and so on. As the NYTimes put it, "Maybe Apple will kill them all.' Box.net's CEO disagreed and it looks like he was right. You can't store PDFs and images on iCloud except with PhotoStream, there's no co-editing, and the document management interface is a shambles."

Comments

It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[OS24Ever]

Never in any presentation did apple commit to any of those features.

It's a personal sync service, backup service.

That's it. It's storage somewhere, it's a sync service for your photographs between devices, and in a bit it'll be a music service for yourself.

Never did they say they'd let you directly access it like DropBox. Nothing would stop someone from making a PDF reader that saved and wrote to the iCloud but this last round of Apple products & software updates has created this bizarre 'oh they're doing THIS' line of crap from these analysts and they make up some of the craziest crap.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Sprouticus]

Perhaps the reason analysts thought that is because there would be no point whatsoever of having a service that JUSt stores pictures and music when other out there do everything already.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Hatta]

A back up service that doesn't back up your PDFs? That's stupid, no matter what way you try to spin it. The RDF won't help you now.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Sockatume]

It's a blog post by a company trying to sell a cloud document editing and management product. What did you expect them to do when Apple started giving away the 10% of their product that 90% of their potential customers would actually use, for free?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Lou3000]

The iCloud is underwhelming for users like myself (and I would imagine everyone reading Slashdot). But I also think you're right, it isn't DropBox. It is really just a back end service for your iPhone's native photo, video, and document apps. It isn't so that you can share a document to be edited by a group, it is so that you can store a document and then edit it later on your Mac or iPad without e-mailing it or syncing. On the other hand, I sort of understand where this article is coming from. Apple separated iCloud as its own product. They didn't simply turn on "cloud saves," they set up a website for the services and have been playing up its features as a major selling point. DropBox and the like now need to convince users that they still have a spot on the iOS device and the iCloud isn't like their "cloud." And in truth, iCloud will push DropBox off of my iOS device, because iCloud is all I need and it is seemlessly integrated.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[OS24Ever]

I'm not trying to spin anything, I'm just saying that they never claimed to do that to begin with. Now, if you used the iCloud APIs and wrote an app that did, it'd work just fine. I haven't tested it extensively as I do not carry a lot of PDFs on my iPad, but the backup put the few that I had back into my iBooks when I restored, though I'm not sure if they 'restored' or were 're-syncd' as when you restore the iDevice it restores settings but apps & content are typically re-synced in my experience so far.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[cgenman]

Yes. How could analysts possibly compare iCloud to other cloud services. What cloud they possibly have in common? And Apple's talk of "automatic daily backups" should have been taken in the context of the iPhone, which as everyone who has one knows the iPhone "backup" is a skeletal husk of a thing.

I never really expected iCloud to amount to much (it is replacing 2 failed Apple cloud services, after all). And it is a first rollout. But even I was hoping for a little more in the way of integrated sync out the gate. Maybe just a cross-device Safari sync? No? Ok.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[ArrowBay]

I think there is a key phrase here: "yet". It ain't any of those things... yet. But once they have the basic infrastructure working, they can add them.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[smash]

Quite sure the story is bunk. It has documents sync, nowhere in the docco does it mention limitations on file type. You pay for your storage and you store your shit... unless there's documentation or some shred of evidence that PDFs in particular are excluded, this statement, as per the rest of the bs story, is bunk.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[DrgnDancer]

There's plenty of point for people who have more than one Apple device, or who want to manage their single devices without the need for a sync computer. I never got the impression that this was intended as a Dropbox killer. It's a remote sync and and device backup utility for iDevices and to a lesser extent music and media from iTunes on your computer. It's a useful way to seamlessly maintain certain devices and software, not a backup system for your computer.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Lumpy]

Again, how dare you bring truth and fact into this.

Did you not know that you are supposed to bash apple on every turn? Bash Bash Bash.. It's what the cool kids that cant afford an iPhone do.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Lumpy]

IT backed up the PDF files that goodreader had in it's data file area. so it DOES back up PDF files. I'm guessing the idiot that wrote the article is whining about some app that is poorly written, and everyone is simply joining in on the whining without any facts.

I havent checked in iBooks, but I am betting they havent released an update to that app to take advantage of iCloud yet. While Goodreader had a new version ready to go.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Shawn Parr]

If you use iCloud for backup it backs up whatever you tell it to. Whether your whole device, or just specific apps and their data. If you have an app that works with PDF files they will get backed up to iCloud.

GoodReader has an update to work with iCloud. I can upload PDF documents with it into iCloud. Yes, I just did it with an iPad, and it worked just fine.

I could then use GoodReader on any other iOS device to get access to those PDFs.

From what I've seen it is app specific, or at least company specific. So as an example Drop Box can't access your GoodReader files in iCloud, even though both can work with PDF files. But AutoDesk makes two different versions of Sketchbook, one for iPad, one for iPhone/iPod, and they see each other's files just fine.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[jo_ham]

Of course it backs up PDF files.

What, you think the story is telling the truth? Come on! It's a classic Apple bash story from a site looking for page hits and the slashdot trolls will fall for it hook, line and sinker and report this as "fact" from now on.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[znu]

Yeah, this article badly misunderstands what iCloud is for.

First, it's a backup service for iOS devices that eliminates the need to sync them with with a computer, effectively untethering iOS devices. And yes, if an app stores PDFs, images, movies, whatever, within its data store, iCloud will back them up. Once your iOS device is backed up to iCloud, if you happen to drop it in the ocean, you can go buy a new one, sync it to iCloud, and all of your stuff (with the exception of non-iTunes music if you don't have the $25/year iTunes Match) will simply come back.

Geeks like us have trouble understanding the value of a service like this to average end users, but it's huge. Most consumers, to this day, still don't have backups of any kind, and virtually none have off-site backups. Apple reportedly had lots of people coming into Apple stores who hadn't synced their iOS devices since first setting them up, and would therefore lose considerable amounts of data if device replacement was required. iCloud simply makes these problems go away for people. It makes off-site backups simply happen by default, rather than requiring the user to understand the importance of them and go out of his/her way to make them happen.

Secondly, iCloud a seamless sync service designed to be integrated into apps. With an iCloud-enabled version of Pages or another iWork apps, you can be working on a document on your Mac, grab your iPad and run out the door, and keep working on that document there -- even if you didn't explicitly save your most recent changes. You can add a reminder in the new Reminders app on your iPad, and seconds later it will also show up in the equivalent app on your iPhone. You can start playing a game on your iPhone, and your progress can be seamlessly synced to your iPad, so you can keep playing there from exactly where you left off. Third-party developers can add features like this to their apps using a trivially simple API, with no need to own/rent their own cloud infrastructure or write a single line of server-side code.

Comparing iCloud to Dropbox doesn't really make a ton of sense. The services are designed to do very different things. The only real overlap is in the instance of things like syncing iWork documents... but even there, the approach is conceptually different. Dropbox is "a folder that syncs" iCloud is a data sync service intended to be integrated by developers.

Describing iCloud as "underwhelming" is effectively a compliment to Apple. It's supposed to be invisible. A decade from now, non-savvy users will simply take it for granted that their data is magically propagated between their devices, and it won't even occur to them to think about the mechanism through which this occurs.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Duradin]

Why buy a good fillet knife when there are 100 blade swiss army knives that do everything?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Bill_the_Engineer]

Perhaps the reason analysts thought that is because there would be no point whatsoever of having a service that JUSt stores pictures and music when other out there do everything already.

You're right. No sense creating a new mp3 player since Creative, Sansa and Sony had products on the market. No sense creating a smart phone since Handspring and Windows CE were already in the market. No sense working on Linux since Unix already existed. /sarcasm

Technology progresses in an evolutionary fashion. Marketing wants us to believe that all advances are revolutionary. Occasionally some evolutionary advances warrant the "revolutionary" tag. I'm not saying iCloud is revolutionary. What I am saying is iCloud is an evolutionary advance from mac.com and MobileMe. Remember those? They existed before DropBox and other "cloud" services. Marketing will always spin it as revolutionary. The Apple ecosystem may be revolutionary but each individual part is mostly evolutionary.

Anyway, Apple saw a need to make it easier for their customers to keep all their Apple devices synced. Apple added services to their web offerings to solve this problem. The change of methodology used with this advance warranted the iCloud name change since MobileMe doesn't necessarily apply in all use cases (not to mention the word "cloud" is hot atm ).

I think the real reasons "analysts" got it wrong were because:

1. They are pundits and are just giving us glorified personal opinions.

2. The more sensational they make their predictions, the more eyeballs they attract to their sites.

Now I'm surprised about the article saying no PDF storage, because I thought iBook would take care of that. No to mention I have a "Documents & Data" option in my iCloud preferences. I have PDFs as books and I have it on both my iTunes and mobile devices... I'll have to test to see if it really works.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[timeOday]

Fair enough. It sucks, but they never said it wouldn't, so they aren't liars. You win.

Disclaimer: I have a long history of predicting Apple's products will fail, and they keep proving me wrong. I still don't "get" the iPad. So, who knows?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Kenja]

They also didn't say it wouldn't cold call your ex-girlfriend or photoshop penises on images of your grandmother. But its a reasonable expectation that it wont do these things just as it was a reasonable expectation that something called a cloud service would provide more then storage for a select list of file types.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[m.ducharme]

Well I can't speak for anyone other than myself, but iCloud (with the upcoming music service, if it comes) is exactly what I need. I don't need to store specific documents or edit them, I use Google Docs for that when I need it. Mozy handles my document backup/restore needs.

Just because you (or some analysts) don't see a use for it, doesn't mean that nobody can find a use for it. And further, although I like the idea of cloud services, I don't like putting all my eggs in one basket. Having choices is good, right? And not just choices in product, but in the way different products envision your usage, right?*

*Totally awkward sentence, written specifically to avoid using the word "paradigm.". Success? Failure? You decide!

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[harl]

So I can't personal sync or personal backup my pdfs?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[aztracker1]

I think it comes down to having 4-5 different vendors for a purpose that could, at least in theory, easily be serviced by one provider. I think that amazon's mp3 cloud is at least interesting, but I also use dropbox, and gdocs. It would be really cool to have them in one service, that integrated well. I think that many people were hoping to have that in apple's cloud service offering. Apple was/is in a unique position to offer that. MS has tried a few times, but floundered.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[muon-catalyzed]

Also those other services mentioned will sell you and your data to the advertisers, not iCloud, big difference.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Kirijini]

...So you're achieving synergistic use of multiplatform solutions?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Moofie]

So, it's underwhelming because a) it does exactly what Apple said it would do, and b) is seamlessly integrated on the devices Apple built, and c) doesn't do what Apple did not say it would do.

Wow. Tough crowd. What does it take to whelm you?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Widowwolf]

Get a Job you hippy and get away form those Occupy protests

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[ArhcAngel]

We'll get back to you on that Mr. Ballmer.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[SETIGuy]

Now, if you used the iCloud APIs and wrote an app that did...

I guess the question is, why would you bother? There are already cloud storage providers that utilize file system APIs to allow existing apps that aren't even cloud aware to do the same thing.

I guess I've always had that problem with Apple:

Fanboi: "Check out this new thing."
Me: "I'm already doing that for 20% less cost, and I don't have to do my banking through iTunes."
Fanboi: "But I started using iTunes five years ago, and I've been waiting for it to finish cataloguing my music collection since then, so I might as well use it for banking. Besides integration is good."
Me: "Why don't you use decent music software?"
Fanboi: "I have to use iTunes in order buy music from the iTunes store."
Me: "There are other music stores, and they're usually 20% cheaper than iTunes."
Fanboi: "If you have an iPod you should buy from the iTunes store."
Me: "Why?"
Fanboi: "It's integrated with iTunes. Plus they have the Beatles."
Me: "But iTunes sucks. And doesn't everyone who wants to listen to the Beatles already have all of their music on CD?" and so on.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Vancorps]

How are you modded insightful? You didn't even read the article otherwise you'd know the summary was Apple bashing while the article was actually pretty well balanced. The article talked about filetypes which you could edit and PDF is not one of them. The article did not say you couldn't backup PDFs.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[larry bagina]

Your problem with Apple is that you make up conversations that are 90% wrong?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Anonymous Coward]

I can Annotate PDF's with NeuAnnotate on the phone and the pad, both synced via JobsCloud... so again the article is 100% wrong.

Also Goodreader also lets you "edit" a pdf.. with annotation features. So even in your strafing twist, he is still right.

P.S. PDF is not supposed to be a editable filetype. so it makes the whole thing retarded in general, it's just apple bashing by people that have zero clue or education. Typical of android owners, they know nothing at all about computers and what filetypes to use for editing.

Also from looking at his moderation, it seems that the bulk of slashdot agrees with him and not you. Funny that :-)

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[X.25]

Never in any presentation did apple commit to any of those features.

It's a personal sync service, backup service.

That's it. It's storage somewhere, it's a sync service for your photographs between devices, and in a bit it'll be a music service for yourself.

So, iCloud is only a personal backup service.

That doesn't let me choose what to backup.

Good one.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[gauauu]

Again, how dare you bring truth and fact into this.

Did you not know that you are supposed to bash apple on every turn? Bash Bash Bash.. It's what the cool kids that cant afford an iPhone do.

It has nothing to do with not being able to afford an iPhone. It's instead a (possibly unfair) emotional reaction based on previous Apple behaviors that slashdotters have perceived to have affected them negatively. Remember when Microsoft was killing other worthwhile companies, abusing its monopoly, bribing governments, etc? When they were perceived as the "big bad bully on the block", slashdotters ripped on everything Microsoft did, even if they did something moderately useful at times.

Now, Apple is perceived as the big bad bully, for some good reasons and some reasons that may not be as good, including but not limited to:
- Not allowing developers to run their own code on their iDevices without paying Apple
- Trying to beat competition via lawsuits and patent wars
- Trying to silence bloggers via lawsuits (Source)
- Denying approvals for apps that make apple look bad (or are political, etc).

Now these things don't automatically make iCloud bad. But they make geeks angry. And human nature is, when you are angry at someone/something, you bash and downplay other things from that person that might be actually good. So yes, people are overreacting in their apple-bashing. But it has everything to do with perception of Apple as a company, and nothing to do with affording an iPhone.

Your "what the cool kids that cant afford an iPhone do" line shows that you too are more interested in fighting and bickering than having a rational conversation.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Algae_94]

Come on now, you've never talked with Fanboi? He has a killer stand up routine.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Bucky24]

doesn't everyone who wants to listen to the Beatles already have all of their music on CD?

Now THAT is a good point.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[awyeah]

Citation?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[awyeah]

My favorite feature: I don't have to manually transfer photos I take to my computer anymore like a digital camera. I take the picture on my phone, and the photo appears on my computer.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[JWW]

I agree. I was very interested in iCloud, but I never expected it to replace my invaluable dropbox.

iCloud is for my music, movies, contacts. Basically storage for my iDevices.

Dropbox is for my documents.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Grail]

Sure other stores might be cheaper in your hypothetical model, and fanboys are rabid looneys in your hypothetical model, but here's how it goes in real life:

If I want Sony music, I head over to Bandit.fm. Check out the prices for Gotye and Kimbra - the iTunes store is cheaper or the same price. If I want stuff that Sony doesn't have, I have to find the online store for that particular publisher. Or I could head to the iTunes store where the music I want is available at the same price.

The only thing I agree with you about is that iTunes is an unholy mess. I prefer the "good old days" when synchronising stuff between devices was done by iSync, and all iTunes was used for was to play music.

But as for your last example - does anyone still use CDs? Really?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[DJRumpy]

Why would you 'edit' a PDF in iCloud? The whole point is that any docs are immediately synced to any device. In other words they are stored locally. You edit it locally and the updates are immediately pushed to every device in your cloud.

Why would you want to 'edit in the cloud' with no benefit?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[sjames]

More like why buy a "fillet knife" that is just a pocket knife with 99 out of 100 blades snapped off when you could get either an actual fillet knife or a pocket knife with all 100 blades.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Vancorps]

I guess you missed the part where the article was comparing iCloud to Office 365 and Google Docs both of which allow you to "edit in the cloud"

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Mr. Slippery]

P.S. PDF is not supposed to be a editable filetype.

Adobe Acrobat X Pro software enables you to create and edit PDF files.

Foxit PDF Editor.

Nitro PDF Professional editor.

Edit PDF files with PDFescape.

Sometimes, thirty seconds with Google can keep you from saying really stupid things.

Typical of android owners, they know nothing at all about computers and what filetypes to use for editing.

You may submit your apology to me and my Samsung Epic at your leisure.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[tehcyder]

doesn't everyone who wants to listen to the Beatles already have all of their music on CD?

Now THAT is a good point.

But by that argument doesn't anyone who wants to listen to any band already have all of their music on CD?

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Tran]

As soon as I saw that in the article I quit reading. Seems to me they where comparing, hmm well, apples to oranges.
I don't see how on-line office suites should be comparable to on-line storage space, just as the post below points out, and I noticed while previewing this reply.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Bucky24]

I think you misunderstand the argument that SETIguy is trying to make. His point is that anyone who actually wants to listen to the Beatles is old enough to have already bought all their albums on CD before this whole new-fangled iTunes came out.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[Maritz]

Typical of android owners, they know nothing at all about computers and what filetypes to use for editing.

As opposed to... who? iPhone owners? Pretty odd thing to say. I imagine the majority of both sets of users are fairly non-technical.

Re:It just proves analyst are complete idiots

[SETIGuy]

Or I could head to the iTunes store where the music I want is available at the same price.

Or you could head to amazon.com where most of the songs that are $1.29 on iTunes are $0.99 and the songs that are $0.99 on iTunes are $0.79. Except the Beatles, who are iTunes exclusive.

But as for your last example - does anyone still use CDs? Really?

I think you missed the point. If you've got all the Beatles CDs (I do) you've already ripped them to MP3s and you don't need to buy them from iTunes or anywhere else. Same for anything else you've already got. So who cares which online store has the stuff you already have? Online music stores are for stuff you don't already have. Except, of course, for the idiots that have to rebuy their music because they can't figure out how else to get it on their iPod. I know people like that and surprisingly they aren't all in their 70s.

Duh

[Anonymous Coward]

iCloud was not meant to address collaborative cloud document working. That functionality was never mentioned or even hinted at. Stupidest article ever.

Re:Duh

[SETIGuy]

And bets on how long it is before Apple de-lists the DropBox iPhone app because it duplicates functionality?

Re:Duh

[Bucky24]

I'm sure this has been addressed before, but if Apple delists an app, does that mean it is automatically uninstalled from user's devices?

Re:Duh

[Duradin]

No, you just can't get it from the app store anymore.

I have a number of apps that were pulled for using private APIs which still work (haven't tried them on iOS 5 yet) and can be restored to any of my devices from my iTunes backups.

Re:Duh

[TheGreek]

And bets on how long it is before Apple de-lists the DropBox iPhone app because it duplicates functionality?

It's pretty hard to collect on a bet for "never."

Re:Duh

[SETIGuy]

Yeah, cause its never happened to anyone else before...

Re:Duh

[TheGreek]

Yeah, cause its never happened to anyone else before...

Last fall, Apple released their App Store Approval Guidelines. The relevant guideline—the only place where the word "duplicate" appears in the guidelines—is quoted on Stackoverflow:

Apps that duplicate apps already in the App Store may be rejected, particularly if there are many of them, such as fart, burp, flashlight, and Kama Sutra apps.

If you were to write and submit your own app that connected to Dropbox, it might get rejected. Given the number of third-party Facebook apps and Twitter clients still available on the App Store, however, I think that unlikely.

Plus there's no no shortage of web browsers on the App Store.

I feel pretty good about Dropbox never being pulled for "duplicating functionality."

Re:Duh

[Moofie]

That just doesn't make any sense. iCloud is even less like dropbox than Mobile Me, and Mobile Me and Dropbox have coexisted on my phone for a good long while.

You are making up things to get angry about. that's not healthy.

Can't win

[Anonymous Coward]

On the other hand, if Apple had positioned iCloud as an app service (eg. Google Apps) or a generic file locker (eg. Dropbox) then everyone would cry foul at how Apple was trying to use its market position with iDevices and Macs to force competitors out of business. (OMGWTFBBQ! Monopoly!! Microsoft!!!1!!)

iCloud = Cross-device media syncing
Google Apps, Office Live = Office apps in the cloud
Dropbox = Network Filesystem for the rest of us

Yes, there's some overlap, but mostly they're separate services. Choice and competition folks; it's a good thing.

It's a framework for apps to use

[JonMcL]

I'm no expert, but isn't it a framework for both iOS and Mac Apps to use? Out of the box it does very little, except for a few Apple functions that are already taking advantage of it (Safari's "Reading List" for example). But if someone wants to create a PDF editing tool, you just use the iCloud API to store your PDFs. Then the Mac version of the PDF editing tool can access the same file as your iPhone version. Or your iPad can do the same. It's a storage device that apps have access to. It is not a storage device that you will browse for files in. Also, each app will only have access to it's own data.

Re:It's a framework for apps to use

[sandytaru]

Then it was never any competition to DropBox or Box.net at all, really.

Re:It's a framework for apps to use

[mbkennel]

Until next year when Finder uses it.

Re:It's a framework for apps to use

[TheGreek]

Then it was never any competition to DropBox or Box.net at all, really.

Yes. In very much the same way that the iPad was never trying to compete directly against the featureset of netbooks.

I don't get Apple

[mark_reh]

The interface to the iPhone is via iTunes. I tried to put a pdf on my wife's iPhone for her because she couldn't figure out how and I couldn't figure out how to do it via iTunes either. Finally, a friend with an iPhone told me the easiest way to do it is to email it and use the phone to grab the emailed file. Doesn't Apple think that people use their phones for anything but listening to music and looking at photos? Oh yeah, there are all sorts of apps, but how does anyone who works for a living get business related stuff on and off the phone?

The software is still called iTunes ferschissakes. If you're in anything but the music business why would software called iTunes seem to be the right choice? It sounds like something you'd sell to college kids so they could load their phone with pirated music.

Re:I don't get Apple

[smash]

iTunes is deprecated and no longer required

Re:I don't get Apple

[Anonymous Coward]

Err, I dunno what you were doing wrong, but PDF's show up as Books in iTunes, its a simple drag and drop, and then view them in iBooks on your phone.

Re:I don't get Apple

[JSombra]

Doesn't Apple think that people use their phones for anything but listening to music and looking at photos? Oh yeah, there are all sorts of apps, but how does anyone who works for a living get business related stuff on and off the phone?

Oh apple knows people use there phones (and their other products) for other things besides music and photo's...but here is the important thing for any apple product user to remember...,

Apple do not and never will care about business users and their needs/requirements

Any use you get from your apple product for your business is an unintentional side effect, not the result of apple intentionally trying to meet a business users needs

Want to do actual work? Then buy a work tool not an expensive toy/gadget (Little helper...if it's by Apple it's not a work tool...they don't make things like that)

Re:I don't get Apple

[Altus]

If you want to get a PDF into the iPhone via iTunes you do have to go through 2 steps, I don't know why that is, but what you do is drag it into iTunes as a book and then sync it to your phone. You can't drag it directly onto the phone apparently. I'm not sure why this is, but I would say it is easier than emailing it to yourself.

Re:I don't get Apple

[tlhIngan]

If you want to get a PDF into the iPhone via iTunes you do have to go through 2 steps, I don't know why that is, but what you do is drag it into iTunes as a book and then sync it to your phone. You can't drag it directly onto the phone apparently. I'm not sure why this is, but I would say it is easier than emailing it to yourself.

It's non-obvious, but possible.

If you're using iBooks, you have to have "Manually manage music and videos" checked. This turns off syncing of music, videos AND books. Then you can drag and drive your music/videos/PDFs/epubs straight to the device listed in iTunes. If it's not checked, then its synced and you have to add it to your library first (because sync only works with library stuff).

The downside is, well, it's manually managed. It means iTunes will not sync it back after a restore operation, so you have to manually copy the stuff back (just drag and drop). The upside is you can add stuff from any iTunes library - it doesn't sync, so adding music/videos/books happens from any iTunes on any PC without wiping the device.

If it's a PDF reader app like GoodReader, then you click on the device in iTunes, head to the Apps tab, and scroll to the bottom. Select the app from the list and you can drag and drop to the box on the right of the list (app file area). Other readers feature FTP/HTTP/WebDAV servers.

Re:I don't get Apple

[itsdapead]

The interface to the iPhone is via iTunes. I tried to put a pdf on my wife's iPhone for her because she couldn't figure out how and I couldn't figure out how to do it via iTunes either.

Yes - its one of the weak spots of iOS.

Doesn't Apple think that people use their phones for anything but listening to music and looking at photos?

Possibly they think that the one method of exchanging files between devices that almost everybody can cope with is by sending an email. Which works well.

Alternative solution 1: install DropBox on the iPhone - the only limitation is that the iOS iWork apps can't save modified files *back* to DropBox, so you have to email them back once they're edited. OTOH I've seen people get really confused once they start *updating* files on DropBox, so maybe that's no bad thing.

Alternative solution 2 (for the more techie inclined): Run a WebDAV server on your Mac, or even on a NAS box or at a web hosting sewrvice. Many Apps (including iWork) can connect to WebDAV. In fact, all the "iOS file sharing" feature in Lion Server does is to enable a WebDAV share (...and then gives you frack all guidance on what to do next, so don't waste your money - there are plenty of HowTos on how to enable WebDAV on regular OS X).

Re:I don't get Apple

[The Phantom Mensch]

The interface to the iPhone is via iTunes. I tried to put a pdf on my wife's iPhone for her because she couldn't figure out how and I couldn't figure out how to do it via iTunes either. Finally, a friend with an iPhone told me the easiest way to do it is to email it and use the phone to grab the emailed file. Doesn't Apple think that people use their phones for anything but listening to music and looking at photos? Oh yeah, there are all sorts of apps, but how does anyone who works for a living get business related stuff on and off the phone?

This was one of the "features" of iTunes that Apple put in place to placate the piracy crazed record labels. Dragging and dropping MP3s from computer to iPod and back again through the file system was regarded as a piracy enabler and the record labels wanted to at least keep it from being so easy that any 13 year old noob could do it. That is, after all, their target market. Apple went one step farther and extended that process to every kind of file on the i[Pod|Phone|Pad]. Then as the iTunes market matured they've been relaxing those restrictions just a bit.

Re:I don't get Apple

[keytoe]

Err, I dunno what you were doing wrong, but PDF's show up as Books in iTunes, its a simple drag and drop, and then view them in iBooks on your phone.

To be fair, while this is easy, it isn't exactly obvious. It requires you to understand that the document conduit that iTunes provides is segregated by application.

Re:I don't get Apple

[fermion]

This must have happened a long time ago because now it is simply a matter of dragging the PDF to books in itune, then syncing to iBooks. For small files, it is still simpler to email. Not that iTunes is not crap. It is. I don't use the Apple video store very much simply because iTunes is such crap.

From what I can tell, the nice thing about iCloud is that it takes the items that use the most space, music, and stores it for no additional charge. Presumably this costs Apple nothing because they just keep one copy that streams to everyone, but it is an advantage over drop box. To store music online with dropbox I would have to pay over $200 a year.

The other documents do not take that much space. All my online documents is about 10 GB, while my music libray is more like 30 GB. I can store most of all my documents on mobilme for $100 a year, but can't store music because it costs too much. Now I can.

I can use drop box to store half of my documents for free, but that presumably brings no revenue to drop box. The amount they want for 10 GB is prohibitive. As far as online documents, the best thing for that is Google, at least in terms of a free solution. It is collaborative, and you can store pretty much anything you want.

Umm, it's also an API...

[awrc]

Apple never claimed they were going to offer that stuff.

However, Apple *has* provided an API that provides iOS 5 apps with a cloud-based key-value store that *applications* can use pretty much however they want to. There'll be a lot of interesting iCloud functionality appearing over time, but don't expect stuff like co-editing because that's not what the service is intended for.

Note that I'm currently less than delighted with iCloud however - for such a big deal, flagship, gosh-wow product, for iCloud mail (both via IMAP and the web-based version) to be dead as a doornail less than 24hrs after launch is pretty poor.

Its ok, I'm sure Jobs will save...

[orphiuchus]

...Oh wait. Damn.

Obligatory

[ArrowBay]

No co-editing. Less space than Amazon EC2. Lame.

Re:Back to My Mac and SSH.

[smash]

Yes

Competitor

[mu51c10rd]

While I own no Apple products and use none of their services, I find this article to have no content. Why would a competitor praise their service? As a CEO of Box.net, it is his job to say why his service is better than Apple's. We can argue amongst ourselves whether those omissions noted are important for a cloud service or not, but this article has no point.

Re:Competitor

[jo_ham]

Not only does it have no point, it's factually incorrect. You can back up PDFs to iCloud till the cows come home.

I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[American AC in Paris]

Apple: We're coming out with a new product. It's a pill that'll give you surprisingly good night vision.
Apple Zealots and various talking heads: Oh. My. God. The iPill will CURE CANCER.
The Other Zealots and various talking heads: Pssh. Will it make my headaches go away? Will it stop indigestion? I just can't see how anyone would want this where there are so many better pills already on the market.

months pass

Apple: Here it is: The iPill. Take one, and you can have 20/20 vision in the dark for an entire month.
Apple Zealots: Oh. My. God. This is soooo disappointing! And it doesn't even cure cancer! We thought it was going to cure cancer!
Other Zealots: Hah! Oh, Apple's really screwed themselves this time. All this stupid pill does is give you night vision! Big deal--you can get night-vision goggles that can be turned off, are half the price and don't need to be swallowed! You idiots really missed big time on this one!

months pass

Apple: The iPill has sold over ten bajillion units, and we've made more money on it than god raised to the god power. Night vision goggles are now considered obsolete. Soon, we'll release the iPill 2, which will add the ability to see into the ultraviolet spectrum.
Apple Zealots: Yaaaaaay! Finally, a cure for CANCER!
Other Zealots: ARRRGEGHRHRHGA People are such fucking stupid SHEEP

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[orphiuchus]

Well, if you replace revolutionary medical breakthroughs with stupidly easy to use interfaces and streamlined packaging for features we've already seen, you've nailed it!

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[Anonymous Coward]

iCloud is just a convienant way to sync data across your apple devices. That's it. Any moronic assumption it's dropbox is just fantastically stupid!

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[Jetsurf]

Don't forget the curved aluminum and glass bottle!

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[interkin3tic]

It's not specific to apple. Any technology news these days seems to be gossip based. The nexus prime, a few weeks ago everything that came up in a google search was "Nexus prime: Verizon exclusive!!!" This seems to have been based entirely off the fact that the FCC cleared the verizon version first. The galaxy S2 on AT&T, the release date on every page mentioning it said September 18th. September 18th came and went without the phone. No one at samsung or AT&T had ever mentioned a release date, it was entirely rumors taken as fact.

I suppose it might have something to do with the quality of journalists in tech news. I guess if you're not good enough to get hired at a popular science or CNN, phone blog.com might be hiring.

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[kannibal_klown]

Well, if you replace revolutionary medical breakthroughs with stupidly easy to use interfaces and streamlined packaging for features we've already seen, you've nailed it!

True, some of the features are pretty basic and, well, comparing ANYTHING to the cure for cancer is kind of rediculous.

But in some ways, his humorous analogy is quite apt.

I mean, take the iPhone4S release / announcement. People were assuming it would have bigger screen, new case, new screen-tech, could teleport you to the Enterprise-D, cure male-pattern-baldness, and use LTE on AT&T's non-LTE network. Instead it was just a basic performance upgrade, IOS5, and Sirii.

It's the hype machine: the apple-fans eat it up and the anti-apple-zealots hate it. The funny thing is, the "hype" is mostly Apple sitting on a chair and grinning as everyone else in the world generates the hype themselves.

The problem is, hype generates a big let down for the people that buy into it. And for the people that want no part in it, a large amount of annoyance followed by a smug 'Ha Ha' to the people that bought into it.

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[Kenja]

But only for a limited sub set of the term "data".

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

My favorite bit is people operating on bad 'facts' then pointing at others shouting 'Reality Distortion Field!!!'

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[SETIGuy]

Don't forget, you need to get authorization to take each iPill through the iTunes store. The authorization will be downloaded into the pill using a cable which costs $200, and will be usable for nothing else. Apple was considering using USB, but the company was worried that might cause excessive convenience.

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[dfghjk]

I think you got that story a little wrong.

Apple introduces the iPill that provides 20/20 vision. Apple's customers respond that there are many solutions to 20/20 vision and that what we really need is a cure for cancer. Apple responds that you definitely do not want a cure for cancer because it might compromise 20/20 vision. Fanbois proclaim that 20/20 vision is the only thing preventing a perfect life and only Apple is genius enough to think up a solution.

Apple then introduces the iPill v2 which offers 20/20 vision plus the ability for others to add cures for other maladies. Soon after, a 3rd party, most likely one already developing for similar platforms for the last decade, extends the iPill v2 to cure cancer. Apple profits not only from sales of the iPill but also through a 30% cut from 3rd party efforts by monopolizing distribution. Fanbois proclaim Apple's vision for an extensible iPill platform as revolutionary despite Apple's initlal refusal to do what everyone else had done for years.

Apple then introduces the iPill v3 that includes it's own cure for cancer reverse engineered from the 3rd party solution. It then bans the 3rd party solution and introduces a marketing campaign where it claims to have invented the cure for cancer despite all its competitors also curing cancer through the same solution Apple banned. Curing cancer, after all, was their vision the entire time and it's CEO is the world's greatest humanitarian. Sadly, it's CEO dies of cancer shortly thereafter because, despite his visionary genius, it turns out he had never even taken a pill prior to inventing the iPill and didn't understand how or why people used them.

Re:I Think I've Heard This Story Before

[krizoitz]

You win the internet sir. Bravo.

Wait...

[galfridus73]

Random anonymous readers can basically whine about a non-issue and get a story on /. now?

I've been away for too long. And, clearly, the current /. management wants to make sure I, and other old time readers, stay away.

I think it's time for Taco, Neal, and Hemos to come back and clean house, because this isn't responsible in any way, shape, or form.

Re:N not M

[Enygma42]

Obviously his M amd N keys are nixed up om the keyboard.

Re:Bwahahah

[jhoegl]

You guys have no idea how badly CEOs and Boards want their technology to host your crap.
They see "the cloud" as a "Web 2.0".. (or 2.5 depending on who you ask) short term money maker.
They see Amazons success and want to invest in their own cloud, but not by much. So it is outsourced to people who have no idea or concept of what it actually entails. Of course, neither do the bosses who want it.
So this is no surprise and it wont be the only company that fails this badly at launch. I know of a few that are worse than this.

Re:just proves excuse-making fanboys are idiots

[iggymanz]

A storage/cloud service with crippled functionality by a company with billions of dollars to spend is always mockable, no matter what the vendor promises the customer. Oh, and Jobs is dead, no one with vision to oversee beating and maiming the little chinese children that make your next fashion accessory.

proves slashdot readers include complete idiots

[Anonymous Coward]

It has documents sync, nowhere in the docco does it mention limitations on file type. You pay for your storage and you store your shit...

Nope. You pay for your applications' storage and your applications store their stuff.

Apple made it *very* clear after the iCloud announcement that iDisk was going away and iCloud wasn't going to provide a comparable interface to let a user store files. While someone could undoubtedly use the iCloud APIs to write an application that lets you store files of your own choosing (i.e. an iDisk-replacement), it's a good bet Apple would refuse to approve the app precisely because it would be an iDisk replacement.

Re:proves slashdot readers include complete idiots

[tlhIngan]

Apple made it *very* clear after the iCloud announcement that iDisk was going away and iCloud wasn't going to provide a comparable interface to let a user store files. While someone could undoubtedly use the iCloud APIs to write an application that lets you store files of your own choosing (i.e. an iDisk-replacement), it's a good bet Apple would refuse to approve the app precisely because it would be an iDisk replacement.

There are apps that turn your iDevice into a "thumb drive" - files accessible via iTunes, WebDAV, FTP, HTTP, and maybe even SMB. Oh, there's also a TFTP server too. If iCloud backs up that app's files, it's effectively an iDisk, and there's tons of those apps in the App Store.

And many more have that capability (HTTP and WebDAV servers are the most popular), and can often hold arbitrary files since iTunes nor the app does any checking unless you try to open it. Many office apps support that as well.

Re:proves slashdot readers include complete idiots

[iluvcapra]

It's a good bet Apple would refuse to approve the app precisely because it would be an iDisk replacement.

I suppose it's by this rationale that the Dropbox app has been forbidden for a year now. Oh wait, that never happened.

Re:proves slashdot readers include complete idiots

[tyrione]

It has documents sync, nowhere in the docco does it mention limitations on file type. You pay for your storage and you store your shit...

Nope. You pay for your applications' storage and your applications store their stuff.

Apple made it *very* clear after the iCloud announcement that iDisk was going away and iCloud wasn't going to provide a comparable interface to let a user store files. While someone could undoubtedly use the iCloud APIs to write an application that lets you store files of your own choosing (i.e. an iDisk-replacement), it's a good bet Apple would refuse to approve the app precisely because it would be an iDisk replacement.

Those apps that read PDFs and whichever one you have assigned a particular PDF to has those assigned PDF files attached to the app. I've got hundreds of PDFs in iBooks. They are all backed up in iCloud.

Re:proves slashdot readers include complete idiots

[smash]

So me turning on "document sync" in my icloud control panel on my mac just didn't happen, then?

Re:Nice Article...

[Exitar]

Let's see what the OP links to: NY Times, an iCloud competitor and a cloud computing site.
Probably you used to classify news sources about Apple into two categories: Steve Jobs/"some random dude on the Internet", so now only one category is left.

Re:Ob

[Voyager529]

Apple's already going all pear shaped.

iCarly predicted this years ago.

Free reskin of MobileMe

[roothog]

Looking at the OS X preferences panel for iCloud, it just looks like a rehash of MobileMe (which was just a rehash of .mac). I'm flipping back and forth between the preferences pages for iCloud and for MobileMe, and they seem to offer nearly identical services (though MobileMe costs money).

Re:Free reskin of MobileMe

[Sockatume]

That's because iCloud is a superset of MobileMe. MobileMe is being phased out.

Re:Free reskin of MobileMe

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd say that iCloud is more like a subset of MobileMe. As a paying subscriber to MobileMe, I'm going miss the iDisk, web hosting and iCal support for PPC based Macs (Leopard).

So it had better be free.

Code Master

Re:Free reskin of MobileMe

[ColdWetDog]

That's because iCloud is a superset of MobileMe. MobileMe is being phased out.

And here is what REALLY frosts me about Apple. You are correct - but Apple is saying fuck all about exactly how this works or doesn't. Yes, you need iOS 5 to run iCloud (stupid, but their call). Will Apple say anything specific about whether or not you can use MobileMe (which, after all, is supported for another year) on iOS 5 and if so, exactly what are the issues (if any). They do this ALL OF THE TIME. Really weak answers to anything substantive. It's as if, for everyone other than the developers at Apple, if it doesn't 'Just Work' they get all confused and tell you to delete something and reboot (sounds vaguely familiar somehow). Or they just stare at you over the phone in wonderment.

Wandering through the angst and tears of lost souls on the various forums, if Apple has actually mentioned this, it sure is well hidden. I think Apple pistol whipped themselves (again) with the rollout. No significant support. Not enough capacity. Lame.

Re:Ob

[Pieroxy]

Pear-shaped? Where did you infer that from?

/. Moderators

[dhermann]

Even a light reading of the article reveals that iCloud is an impressive service but not targeted at business or enterprise users (shocking), a fact which the OP (who clearly does not like iCloud and/or Apple, in general) noticeably neglects to mention. If Slashdot is a news site, and news should objectively divulge facts, then I have to wonder why such a blatantly slanted article summary has once again been allowed to be posted. If you want me to not like iCloud, just draw attention to the shortcomings of the product, don't paraphrase a reasonable review into "is a shambles".

Re:/. Moderators

[Chelloveck]

Even so, Apple has some 'splaining to do. I upgraded my Mac to 10.7.2 yesterday, which includes iCloud. I don't have any other iDevices, and I don't want my stuff uploaded anywhere. I opened up the iCloud prefs to specifically say DO NOT WANT. I logged in and unchecked all the boxes.

Today I open it up again. Surprise! Contacts, Calendar, Bookmarks, and Documents & Data are all checked, even though I specifically unchecked them yesterday. What's more, when I go to uncheck them again I get this:

"If you turn off Documents & Data, all documents stored in iCloud will be removed from this Mac."

WTF?!!? Yesterday I said don't do that, but they went and did it anyway. And now they're threatening to delete it all if I have the gall to tell them "NO!" again?

So what exactly has it stored in "the cloud", anyway? What does "Documents & Data" encompass? My home directory? My ~/Documents directory? Just files made by certain apps? If so, which ones? I can't find anything that actually tells me what it means. (And clicking the little (?) help icon just takes me to the "Content not available; you're not connected to the Internet" page in the help viewer. Um, yes, I am. But it's nice to see that the Mac is still "just working".)

Clicking the "Manage..." button doesn't show that any files are actually stored by iCloud, so I went ahead and unchecked everything. Again. Maybe it'll stick this time. Maybe it won't. Gosh, the cloud is exciting!

Re:/. Moderators

[dhermann]

I had problems upgrading my iPod touch and iPad to iOS5 as well, but this is not the problem talked about by the OP and not my main concern about the biased article. I recommend making sure your backup is safe before proceeding, and wish you the best of luck.

Re:Bwahahah

[Gilmoure]

Apple's E-World online service in the 90's? And even their ongoing kludge of .Mac that this cloud is supposed to replace/fix hasn't really been up to Apple ease-of-use/slick experience.

Wow, how low has slashdot fallen?

[Froomb]

Anonymous rantings snarkily purveying incorrect information given the dignity of a slashdot posting? "News for nerds"? Or just another gizmodo-like Android fan site? Is it any wonder the number of readers here is plummeting?

Re:Wow, how low has slashdot fallen?

[tyrione]

Anonymous rantings snarkily purveying incorrect information given the dignity of a slashdot posting? "News for nerds"? Or just another gizmodo-like Android fan site? Is it any wonder the number of readers here is plummeting?

Most people above 30 have moved on from Slashdot. I check in but it's the least viewed site I visit.

Re:R.I.P. SJ

[MobileTatsu-NJG]

Apparently the Haterade drinkers copied the technology and are performing a live-fire exercise.

Re:Bwahahah

[bonch]

They were thinking that they'd provide a free data syncing service for first-party and third-party apps, and that's exactly what iCloud is. Who cares if the NY Times claimed it might kill DropBox? It wasn't intended to.

Who moderates these posts??

[Anonymous Coward]

/. is really going downhill... Apple never claimed there would be co-editing (or editting AT ALL) on iCloud, and saying it does not allow "PDFs" to be stored is absolutely ridiculous...

There's an API (do ppl still know what that means around here?) that allows you to write an App that makes use of iCloud storage... The service became official YESTERDAY, so it's quite natural that most apps aren't making use of it yet.

So yeah, there WILL BE apps that let you store PDFs and random images that aren't in your library and game saves and whatever else you want...

In fact, I prolly should go write one in 30 min and charge a $ for it, eh? lol

You guys need to review how articles get posted here, seriously...

Re:Who moderates these posts??

[onefineline]

Yes. thank you for writing this. It's like no one even bothered checking what the post said. Just inflammatory flamebait.

Why a person uses a special purpose device...

[CrankinOut]

Ask any butcher and he'll tell you:

You buy a special purpose knife (shaped handle, long blade, slightly curved, thin blade) because it's the right tool for what you're doing (filleting).

Try filleting with a 100 blade swiss army knife and you'll create lousy cuts, wear your hand out holding all that bulk, and likely cut yourself in the process.

So, a specialized service or function generally is optimized for that activity.

Re:Why a person uses a special purpose device...

[Sockatume]

I think Duradin was being rhetorical.

Re:Why a person uses a special purpose device...

[CrankinOut]

Sorry if I missed that. It's been a day where subtlety has been lost on me!

Re:Why a person uses a special purpose device...

[mjwx]

Ask any butcher and he'll tell you:

As an ordinary person who uses knives to open boxes, pry off obstinate panels, remove loose threads and cut small hoses and cable ties,

By that logic I need a box cutter, prying knife, thread removing knife, hose severing knife and cable tie removal knife.

Why do I need to carry around 5 knives when 1 Swiss army knife (or leatherman) will do all that and more amicably?

So, a specialized service or function generally is optimized for that activity.

Icloud is not specialised at all, in actual fact it's a more limited version of Dropbox, being limited does not make it specialised.

Re:Why a person uses a special purpose device...

[Moofie]

Dropbox doesn't do anything that iCloud does.

iCloud doesn't do anything Dropbox does.

iCloud does nothing bad to Dropbox.

iCloud is free mobile me without the Dropbox functionality. Why is this a bad thing?

Re:Why a person uses a special purpose device...

[tehcyder]

As an ordinary person who uses knives to open boxes, pry off obstinate panels, remove loose threads and cut small hoses and cable ties,
By that logic I need a box cutter, prying knife, thread removing knife, hose severing knife and cable tie removal knife.
Why do I need to carry around 5 knives when 1 Swiss army knife (or leatherman) will do all that and more amicably?

You don't because there is no need for something like a "cable tie removal knife" as any knife can do that. But your pocket knife is not a good substitute for a chef's knife, hunting knife, saw or axe.

No PDF? This would disagree (maybe)

[bryan1945]

Here-
http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4942
2nd question down. I think you need iWork to do it (maybe?) Dang help piece is all over the place.
Don't you just love new stuff?

Re:Bwahahah

[aztracker1]

I have to agree. MS had a few chances now, and keep changing/transfering/rebranding their cloud storage offering. I've been a very happy dropbox user since early on... I keep my (encrypted) portable keepass, and a truecrypt volume for the stuff that I want secret.. the rest is documents I just want access to wherever I am (synced to several of my computers)... It just works, and does it surprisingly well. It would be nice to have an "Enterprise" version, where a company can act as a host for a version of that, for synchronizing websites/servers, and desktop clients. I know windows can use remote profile directories, and it works okay, but not as quickly, or smoothly. I also no that rsync does a good job, and use it, again not as smoothly.

Considering that apple has always been a champion of a "just works" philosophy, it is a bit odd to see them falter here.

Re:In other words

[mosb1000]

Apple has a long history of screwing up this kind of service. They've released .mac and mobile me, and that's just what they've done in the last decade. If you're an innovator, you're not going to get every product right.

Re:Bwahahah

[SETIGuy]

Of course! Apple never fails at anything. They just didn't want to succeed in the first place.

goes back to measuring the time constant for the decay of the reality distortion field.

Itsdapead's conflicted copy

[itsdapead]

But I also think you're right, it isn't DropBox

...and I've seen people get into a right knot with DropBox when its used as anything more than an alternative to emailing files. Its a great fallback when trying to exchange files that are too big to email, but its not much good for collaborative work.

Creating a sharing/syncing/collaboration service for editable files that won't confuse the hell out of Apple's target non-techie customers is a non-trivial exercise. (Hint: syncing and sharing music/video/books - even emails and, to some extent, photos - is rather easier, because for 90% of users those files are immutable).

Re:Bwahahah

[jhoegl]

Its too distorted. We are doomed... DOOOOOMMMMEEEDDD

"No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."

[onefineline]

n/t

Re:"No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."

[jedidiah]

...and that revision of the device actually flopped.

So this is a nice self-nuke you have there. You're just too blindered to notice or acknowledge.

Re:"No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."

[Bucky24]

Since when is a nomad a unit of measurement?

Re:"No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame."

[onefineline]

The device flopped, you say? Actually, you say "that revision" of the device flopped. But it wasn't even a revision, since that was the first version ever released. According to Wikipedia, there were 376,000 iPods sold in the first year. Oh yeah, and that was when it was only available to Mac users. Hmm, that doesn't sound like a flop to me, but maybe since I'm so "blindered", I just don't get it!

Oh no, wait, you're just a fucking idiot. And so is the person who gave you a +1.

Re:N not M

[Quiet_Desperation]

Think before you mess with the pink?

It isn't rsync.

[Brannon]

You won't be able to understand what it is until you stop trying to think of it as rsync.

Re:It isn't rsync.

[harl]

Why are you posting this to me? I'm using the GPs words and asking for clarification.

Why are you attacking me?

BEST COMMENT EVAR

[hellfire]

I think you captured the state of Apple's relationship with the media and general public perfectly. Bravo! I hope you get 1 million mod points.

easy to say when it will have a "dropbox"

[mbkennel]

Exactly. On phones and pads, notice that regular people don't think 'filesystem'. Why should they?

As far as I can tell, that's the most important conceptual change distinguishing a "post-PC" device, not a touchscreen.

Sometime later, say MacOS Liger or something, iCloud will talk to MacOS Finder and then files will be shared in a dropbox, because iCloud will support the natural things that a filesystemish OS does because there's a client for it.

Idiot Author

[Gaerek]

I've looked and looked at Apple's information about iCloud, and no where have I seen any of these features mentioned. iCloud is simply a personal, lightweight backup/sync solution for users. It's not meant to be an enterprise level doc sharing interface. Considering that there were very few solutions available that do what iCloud does before it was introduced, I'd call it a pretty amazing product. There are plenty of enterprise level backup solutions that have the features mentioned in the article. Why would Apple even bother messing with that? What they did makes perfect sense, and it's the perfect product for what it's intended for. Let's also not forget that it's brand new. Features can ALWAYS be added.

No PDFs. No Co-Editing. Lame.

[tehcyder]

We all know where this one's going.

Re:None of that matters

[TheSpoom]

Awww, butthurt Apple fanboys are moderating. How cute. My karma is nigh invincible.