- An Introduction to OneNote for iPad
- The OneNote for iPad 'Suite Spot' / What May Be Next for OneNote on iOS
The OneNote for iPad 'Suite Spot'
I included the admittedly awful pun in this section's title in order to highlight the fact that OneNote for iPad should be considered in the context of a suite of Microsoft Office and Windows Live offerings. Frankly, as a standalone application (especially at $14.99 to license a version that's not limited to working with 500 notes), OneNote for iPad isn't very compelling. Many other low-cost or no-cost iPad apps are available for basic note-taking, if that's your primary goal and if you aren't currently a OneNote 2010 user.
However, if you're a OneNote 2010 user and you also use an iPad, OneNote for iPad may be a useful option for scenarios in which you use OneNote today, such as those suggested by the previous examples. OneNote clients for iPad and iPhone may also entice OneNote 2010 users to explore Windows Live SkyDrive, a seamless and very powerful option for OneNote notebook storage, sharing, and synchronization.
What May Be Next for OneNote on iOS
While the initial release of OneNote for iPad is a useful extension to the OneNote product family, I hoped it would be more of a full-function OneNote client than an application that's essentially a super-sized version of the original OneNote Mobile for iPhone. As this time, I consider OneNote for iPad to be more of a hopeful leading indicator of what may come in a future version of OneNote optimized for tablet devices, rather than a compelling standalone iPad app. In my next post, I'll review additional aspects of OneNote for iPad that I think are lacking.
Peter O'Kelly is an independent software industry analyst/consultant focused on topics at the intersection of collaboration and information architecture. He has worked in product and strategy roles for Lotus Development Corp., IBM, Groove Networks, Macromedia, and Microsoft, and he previously worked as an analyst/consultant for Burton Group and the Patricia Seybold Group. Read Peter's blog at pbokelly.blogspot.com.