New Multi-Touch iWork on the Horizon: New York Times

[Paul Daniel Ash]

The New York Times reported in an article Saturday on a claim that Apple has been working "for the past couple of years" on a multitouch version of iWork for the rumored upcoming Apple tablet. The newspaper says the tablet will be controlled by a complex vocabulary of gestures that was developed by FingerWorks, a company Apple acquired in 2007.

The assertions came in the middle of an article in the Times on the new generation of tablet or tablet-like that are on the market or soon to be released, including the Kindle, the Alex, the Que proReader and the IdeaPad U1 Hybrid. While the existing devices that are known about use more familiar control techniques, the Times, quoting a former Apple employee, said that Apple's forthcoming tablet will use a completely new multi-touch interface.

The tablet should offer any number of unique multitouch experiences - “three fingers down and rotate could mean ‘open an application,’ ” said one former engineer, who asked not to be named because Apple demands secrecy from all current and former employees.

Another engineer interviewed by the Times said that the company had "spent the past couple of years working on a multitouch version of iWork," Apple’productivity suite that includes Pages, a word processor, Numbers, a spreadsheet application, and Keynote, a presentation program. The Times notes that this would indicate that Apple indeed intends the tablet to be a general-purpose computer that can be used to create and edit documents, it said, "rather than a more passive device for reading books and watching movies." Several strands of rumors over the past year have indicated that the "killer app" for the tablet would be as a device for reading books and magazines, and watching TV programs and movies.

With the reports on the street price of the tablet remaining in the $700 to $1000 range, Apple may be looking to market the device as more than a large iPod touch, as some rumors have indicated.

image via Apple

[Melech518]

We will know by the end of the month...

[rhekt]

HEY IM SECOND! as i digress..../multi touch is definately the new frontier being included into everyday applications. even though it has been around for more than a second or two. this is obviously exciting to see incorporated into larger and more frequent scales.

[rwin84]

minority report here we come...