

Will Apple remove the home button from the next-gen iPad and iPhone? - optiplex
http://www.networkworld.com/community/blog/will-apple-remove-home-button-next-gen-ipad-a

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ugh
I would be surprised.

The new gestures in iOS 4.3 are neither obvious nor discoverable. Will anybody
instinctively know that getting back to the home screen requires a pinch
gesture with five fingers? (Using more than one finger also precludes one hand
use and is awkward on an iPhone or iPod touch.) You can currently comfortably
use iOS without ever putting more than one finger on the screen. Zooming might
be less precise but double tapping works perfectly fine (edit and correction:
you need to double tap with two fingers to zoom out in Maps so this is not
entirely true). A departure from that principle would be weird.

These gestures are nice shortcuts but, I think, not much more.

I might be less skeptical if there was any credible evidence that Apple plans
to steal from Palm and Blackberry and will extend the touch surface onto the
bezel. That would allow for much more obvious and intuitive one finger
gestures.

That said, Apple does weird stuff from time to time. The iPod shuffle had no
buttons for a year. (At least Apple is also willing to correct such mistakes.
The current iPod shuffle regained buttons.)

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pistoriusp
Oddly enough, I asked 3 people in the office what they would do to close an
app on an iPad and they all did the finger crumble gesture.

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BigZaphod
The gesture is remarkably natural to use. I was surprised.

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jshen
I doubt it. My two year old can easily use an IOS device as they are. There is
no way she could do multi touch gestures. Disabled people can use them as they
are many couldnt do complex many finger multi touch gestures. I think apple
gets this.

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jinushaun
I hope not. I own an iPhone, Nexus One and a HTC Surround (WP7). I struggle
with the soft keys on my Nexus One everyday. I think they're absolutely
horrible. The soft keys on my HTC Surround is much better than the Nexus One,
but I still prefer my hardware home button on my iPhone.

That said, seems like I'm not the only one that thinks the Pre's off-screen
touch area is a good idea worth copying. But I can't imagine these four/five
finger gestures translating well to the small screen on the iPhone. There goes
one hand use...

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r3demon
Home button is a major inconvenience on an iPad for me, I just never remember
on which side it is, I would be totally happy if its replaced with a gesture.
On an iPhone its a whole different story.

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d2viant
That would get them an extra inch of real estate on the iPhone screen. That's
significant.

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BigZaphod
Fingers still need somewhere to go when holding it. It's not just the button
that defined the size of the border. However there's no reason to expect the
border couldn't be a bit more narrow without a button. They could also
possibly do something tricky with touch zones extending beyond the screen and
into the border so perhaps they could detect when fingers are wrapped around
near the edges and filter them out.

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Tycho
For the iPhone it could be an advantage, but since the iPad has/needs a
'bezel' area around the screen, there's not much point in removing it. Still
the gestures would be a good backup/alternative option.

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extension
This has more point on the iPad than on the iPhone. The iPad is big and heavy,
making it much more of a chore to reposition/flip it in order to find/press
the button. It's also very easy to hit the button by accident.

Double-clicking to switch tasks is especially difficult. The weight and size
makes it very hard to get the right muscle tension to press the button
rapidly. I often press it too slowly and get the home screen instead of the
task bar. I'm surprised that Apple even released it this way. Maybe the long
delay bringing multitasking to the iPad had something to do with this.

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thalur
How would you take screen-shots? Or more importantly, do a hard reset when it
crashes. I find the home button is also easier to use to wake my iphone than
the power button is.

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crander
My home button died on my iPad after six months. Warranty replacement.

