Apple has posted their 85-page iPod touch Features Guide online which covers many features and may give some hints as to future iPhone enhancements and capabilities (keyboard language support, etc.) coming via future software update(s).
The Guide covers:
• Getting Started
• Basics
• Music and Video
• Photos
• iTunes Wi-Fi Music Store
• Applications
• Settings
• And more
See the Apple’s iPod touch Features Guide (6.8MB .pdf) here.
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so why was the email function removed? also widgets would be fairly useful one would think…
The Camel Times will have to wait while I gen up on the itouch, or is it ipod touch?
iPod touch is not “always connected” like iPhone.
Use web-based email like .Mac or Gmail or whatever to check your email via iPod touch when in a Wi-Fi hotspot.
If you really want iPhone’s mail and widgets features, get an iPhone.
Product differentiation is an art that Apple mastered long ago.
Looks like I’m gonna have to buy an iPod Classic for now and wait for rev. 2 or 3. It’s just disappointing how Apple is “differentiating” this so much from the iPhone. Plus our campus network requires WPA enterprise username:password, which is currently unsupported. What a bummer, I really want one, but with only 16 gigs and it not connecting to wifi 80% of the time I’d have it with me, I just can’t justify the touch over the 160gig classic.
They still should let you change your calendar events
Because its an iPod that is designed to play music and videos – not a communications device.
You want email – get an iPhone!
Why doesn’t it support Vista Home Basic? Not like I’d ever use such a disgusting operating system, but still, there are those people who’ll be bothered by that. I’m gonna blame Vista, personally. It’s quite funny, actually, I work at Office Max, and not a day goes by where we don’t have someone come in complaining about something not working with Vista. Like this guy, bought a brand new HP Vista computer, and a brand new HP printer, and the printer didn’t work with Vista, and he couldn’t understand why his HP printer didn’t work with his HP computer. I tried to keep the “That’s Vista for you”s to a minimal.
MW-felt, as in, I felt you all needed to know about how crappy Vista is, if you didn’t already
first it was i just want the iPhone to play videos and music. i wish they didn’t ship it as a brick. Now they give that to you and people complain it doesn’t do email or have the widgets. The reason they don’t give you that is because they already have that product out, and it is called an iPhone. So buy one instead of making excuses about why you shouldn’t.
@ Petey: “You want email – get an iPhone!”
But, then you have to pay for the data plan, which ends up being $500 more over the next two years. When I all I want is the ability to write email or even just notes, $500 is an expensive email device.
It would be trivial to add a notes program (and ideally an email program, but I understand product differentiation). That would make it so much more useful. Now, it’s just limited to giving you information instead of receiving information from you.
MDN word – almost, as in the iPod Touch is almost good enough, but lacking in it’s ability to receive input.
I wish I could get an iPhone. But that will not be possible for a while in many countries outside the US. Therefore the iPod Touch without the phone part is the only way to go for many of us. But no full iCal and other apps do not really make us happy.
@OMG: “The reason they don’t give you that is because they already have that product out, and it is called an iPhone.”
iPhone is expensive when all I want is the ability to write email – I don’t even need to send it right way, I can wait until I have access to wi-fi.
Intentionally taking away features to justify another product is very annoying. Apple could trivially add notes or email to the iPod Touch, but they are intentionally crippling it to encourage you to pay substantially more for a lot of other features I don’t want. It’s a lot like how cable companies bundle lots of channels together to make it seem like a good deal, when in reality, I only want 5 of them.
Quevar,
What part of web-based email don’t you understand?
@ Force Quit: “What part of web-based email don’t you understand?”
The part about how I can’t write e-mails on a train that has no wifi and send them when I get to work.
Quevar,
Dude, just load up as many compose and/or reply pages as you wish in Safari before you board the train using multiple browser pages and leave them there.
You’ll be all set to write emails on a train that has no Wi-Fi which you can then send when you get to work.
Or just sit around pretending that a brand new product has had features “removed” when it hasn’t.
Whining is no substitute for using your head.
@Quevar
“Intentionally taking away features to justify another product is very annoying.” – you’ve said this twice in this thread and it’s not quite accurate. Nothing has been taken away from this product. It doesn’t have a feature that you want. Apple has put communications in it’s iphone, and kept the ipod as video and music only. You can sync your calendar and addressbook just like before. But you’re asking a music/video product to ADD a feature that was never intended for it. Nothing has been removed from the iPod Touch.
My god!!!! 85 pages to learn out to drive this thing…..Printing right now…
@ Force Quit: …”just load up as many compose and/or reply pages as you wish in Safari before you board the train using multiple browser pages and leave them there.”
The demo units tend to crash after about 3-5 pages and I really don’t want to write several e-mails and have Safari crash before I send them. Why not just let me save it to the flash memory?
@ Jim – TIV
People originally were calling for an iPhone without the phone and now people are claiming that the iPod Touch is just that. It’s not because it also lacks any other sort of way to input and store information on the device itself. Apple intentionally did not add (to be more precise) this functionality into it to make it more differentiable. That makes it very unappealing to me and the iPhone isn’t worth the additional price given my circumstances. Given the price per features, neither of them is worth it to me. I truly would like an iPhone that lacks only the phone and keeps the email and notes apps, plus a way to add items to my calender. I think they are both fabulous products for many people, but they don’t meet my needs.
I understand that the Touch is an iPod and they have traditionally not allowed input, but that frustrates me and is the reason I will not be buying one – it doesn’t do what I want it to do. I don’t expect Apple to add that functionality, but if they did, I would buy one that day.
Then, Quevar, you’re one of the three people on earth who are not served by either an iPod touch or an iPhone. I suggest you look elsewhere for your needs if Apple isn’t offering a product that you like. Good luck with that.
They really should let you add calendar events. It’s just silly that they include a calendar that you can’t change when the device has a keyboard. What’s the difference between that and the contacts which you CAN add to?
I understand the email thing. But the dumb calendar is silly. Syncing the calendar from the computer is hardly better than just printing it out and carrying it in my pocket…. Actually printing it is better, cause I can write in the pages.
You have to have wifi for Safari to work, you have to have wifi for the iTunesWifi store to work and and you have to have wifi for e-mail to work. What’s the difference? Disabling Mail really does seem quite pointless and I’m a rabid Apple fan from the Mac SE days.
Webmail is more cumbersome than Mail, just like having to use a browser as a storefront is more cumbersome than using iTunes as a storefront.
If people can’t figure out that Mail doesn’t work when you’re not in a wifi hotspot, they probably won’t be able to figure out why Safari doesn’t work when you’re not in a wifi hotspot.
Unless there’s some “agreement” with ATT, I’ll be really surprised if the Mail and Calendar thing isn’t fixed within six months. Those are really pointless limitations.
When creating a new product, work of art, writing a book, building a web site or any number of creative endeavors you have to decide when it is done. You allow some time after it is ‘completed’ to review, you wonder should I do this, should I add that but at some point in time you have to say lets go with what I’ve got. Very rarely does an artist think their work is perfect, ask most any (after a couple of drinks when inhibitions are lessened) and they will say well maybe I should have done x or y. Of course software to a great extent has changed the paradigm, once a painting is exhibited it is done, once a book is printed there’s no going back. Not absolutely a new paradigm though, for example when doing a window display one may adjust after some time. Rarely, very rarely, is a work
perfect, especially in the eyes of its creator.
The iPhone doesn’t do this, the itouch doesn’t do that, well for a lot of people they are perfect, for many more they are great. Sure input is welcome but don’t get hung up over it, buy it or not. You can be 99% sure that the folks at Apple have considered what you want and for some reasons, more complex than most imagine, the answer is not this time around. Version 2 or a software update may get you what you want, which would be nice I’m sure.
LOL, another sad attempt by Apple to try and make the iPod Touch competitive in our Microsoft dominated world. Good thing too, because with Microsoft manuals, each and every page from 1 to 1000 are chock full of usable information. Not fluffy stuff to try and make the PDF files have more pages so that it looks powerful. I’m sure Apple triple spaced most of the sentences and added a lot of fancy gibberish to fill up to 85 pages. Then most Apple Fanboys all feel impressive with their mostly fluff 85 pages of how to use an iPod Touch.
You with hands-on experice on iPhone:
How necessary is the autocorrection/prediction in entering text with the virtual keyboard? “if you trust the keyboard you can really fly”
iPod touch has only English (U.S. and UK), French and German dictionaries.
Will the keyboard still be usable when writing in Italian, Spanish or other local European languages?
http://www.apple.com/ipodtouch/specs.html
Languages
English, French, German, Japanese, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Traditional Chinese, Russian, and Polish
International keyboard support for English, UK English, French, German, Japanese, Dutch, Italian, Spanish, Danish, Finnish, Norwegian, Swedish, Polish, and Portuguese
Dictionary support for English, UK English, French, and German
Interestingly, at least Scandinavian, German and French sites do not say anything about International keyboard support or Dictionary support:
http://www.apple.com/no/ipodtouch/specs.html
Languages
Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Finnish, French, German, Greek, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Simplified Chinese, Spanish, Swedish, Traditional Chinese and Turkish
Additional language support for display of song, album, and artist information: Bulgarian, Croatian, Romanian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian and Ukrainian
But this discrepancy is probably just a localization error by Apple; also, these international sites don’t mention WiFi in specs. (between Video and Headphones on the U.S. site)
To ALL the whiners bitching about this feature and that no being what YOU think it should be, bla bla bla….
Sit down & STFU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Show me another device that competes with the iPod Touch, iPhone, iPod etc…
[waiting…..]
didn’t think so… so I repeat…. Sit Down & STFU!
Can we move on now?
MW= “company” As in “don’t like the iPod Touch? Then start your OWN company and make a better device”!
Thanks none of us ever thought of all that stuff
Guys You have to look
I have made a review for the new Palm 500 vodafone which will compete with the iphone.
Which is being released,
have a look LOL
what is that I hear???
Babies crying?
So it’s bitching and whining to mention that you wish the iPod touch had additional features? You fanboys are entertaining and I’ve own nothing but Macs since 1986. I live in an area ATT doesn’t serve. I’d love an iPod touch with MAIL and notes and being able to add iCal events.
The product doesn’t serve my needs, I won’t be buying. There are more than 3 people who wish the same. Apple loses sales, it doesn’t matter to me, I’m not a shareholder, but to mention such doesn’t make any of us whiners, or Microsoft groupies. I understand that internet civility died two days after the ‘net was invented, but some of you people really need to get a life.
Apple will only add features that are requested. This is a mac discussion thread, we have similar likes and share a common passion, but apparently I ask too much of some of MDN’s visitors (and well, MDN kool-aid drinking many times) to have a civil discussion on such points.
So Quevar, I agree with you. But my hunch is within a year these features will be added to the “touch” and we’ll be buying one with more memory and we’ll be glad we had to wait.
quit your bitching
http://www.hacktheipodtouch.com/
it is OSx
… can I get you a tissue?
“Apple will only add features that are requested” And this IS the best place to ask for such features, seeing as Apple uses MDN as a research site for it’s products… here is a tip… try posting your feature wish-list on Apple.com….
man winhers
Some advice to people who would like to see , New features or Products Improvements.
First if you want a product improved, Start with recognizing fist and thanking what it has.
I think most people are smart enough to know it would be nice to have mail without you asking.
We should, or could be discussing how it could be improved but also allow for apple to have the two products kept separate,
If you need recognize they problems of apple selling both iphone and ipod with all features, to make a useful ferrtaure request contribution.
we need to think about what can be done as a practical solution for apple. We could make this a think tank for apple.
We have some smart people here and we can think of ideas to maintain great products but a working business also.
LOL.. These trolls just don’t understand. As Apple Users, we have no idea what we want or need. Steve will decided.
It was the same thing. I thought I wanted a non glossy monitor. But Steve says I don’t need it so – I don’t…. I thought I wanted a mail program as I haven’t used web based mail, but it Steve says i don’t need it, as Apple users it’s our OBLIGATION to accept it and like it.. Woooo Hoooo Steve!!!
The trolls who don’t understand that need to go buy a Junky Dell, or Junky Palm, or Junky something else…. They need to leave here and leave us alone…
they may use this site for research .
Gow is cool , leave him alone he just wanted to ask for new features, however there are so many people asking for these now from less educated people, so he is given a bad reputation.
Steve will be retiring soon, so I am unsure what will happen.
A mac-fan,
I think most agree there is a need for product and macuser input but I think we need to have realistic balanced debate rather than what sometimes seem like a rant of all things wrong, no matter what.
It may not be that bad here but on some blogs, and forums it is.
I would like to know what you think needs to be done if apple could.
Ta : =}
A Mac Fanboy
really
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What could be done reg imac screen, example can a Matt screen be made from Glass?
also, mail will be coming please don;’t to many people,. I thing this was pressure from AT&T;to keep the to products quite distinct.
i did not want ot mean to insult your other bloggers.
some of you guys are just rude ignorant a**holes plain & simple…
grow up and learn some manners and realize not everyone on MDN is from the US (although I AM American, i live overseas)… about my original post…
i don’t live in a country where iPhone will be offered in the foreseeable future and was just commenting that if they loaded the iPodtouch with OSX and wifi… having Mail and some widgets would have been great for me… NOT bitching JUST an observation and personal preference… No need to call me a whiner or cheap bast@rd. Since this product will be shipped worldwide i’m sure EVERYONE in a non-iPhone country is thinking the same… So actually, perhaps my view applicable to 4.5 billion people SHOULD be weighed in to offset those of you 250 million living in the US. MW: “across” as in hands across the ocean… Peace the f*ck out!!!
hotinplaya,
thanks for the link to http://www.hacktheipodtouch.com/
i will order my iPodtouch right now.
MW: “girls” as in some of you need to get more girls in your life… lighten up and find positive outlets for your angst… SHEESH!!
@ STFU: “To ALL the whiners bitching about this feature and that no being what YOU think it should be, bla bla bla…. Sit down & STFU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Show me another device that competes with the iPod Touch, iPhone, iPod etc…”
Are you saying that there is no point making it better since it is already better than what is out there? That is exactly what I hop never happens to Apple. They put out great products and then make them better over time. Just because it is great now does not mean it couldn’t be better. That is why I often give my feedback to Apple products. I love them, but there are definitely areas they can improve. And, from what they’ve been doing lately, it does seem like they listen.
STFU said: “To ALL the whiners bitching about this feature and that no being what YOU think it should be, bla bla bla….
Sit down & STFU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Show me another device that competes with the iPod Touch, iPhone, iPod etc…
[waiting…..]
didn’t think so… so I repeat…. Sit Down & STFU!
===========================================
I get a real chuckle out of the whiners and bitchers like STFU who whine and bitch about other whiners and bitchers. Thanks STFU, your hypocritality makes me laugh.
@solid: FINALY someone that gets the point!
OOOOOOooooooh the lunacy!
Flame On!
Some people have suggested getting MobileMail.app on the touch by copying the iPhone app. I see two problems with this:
1) No email sync through iTunes
2) No control for email in the touch’s settings (preferences) app
I imagine people will figure out something here (maybe use the iPhone settings app, and somehow have the touch pretend to be an iPhone to iTunes?) But it’s not obviously easy.
>Quevar wrote: The demo units tend to crash after about 3-5 pages…
The iPhone Safari crashes quite often as well. Two windows open is already shaky ground. It’s hit or miss though. Sometimes it works with 5 pages open, sometimes 2 is all it takes to crash it.
Plus, it gets pretty slow and unresponsive from window 3 on up.
@MPC Guy
“Plus, it gets pretty slow and unresponsive from window 3 on up”
Isn’t this to do with the vast amounts of virtual memory most OS X apps seem to demand. I’ve never upgraded my iMac memory and it’s not uncommon for the system to need upwards of 2Gb virtual memory. Perhaps the iPhone would benefit from more memory now that memory is getting cheaper and chearper?
whine whine whine!
i’m thinking of buying one just to EXPERIENCE the touch screen. My gawd some people have no idea how amazing this technology is. A UI with accurate physics for scrolling.
Then again, in 1984 it was all “how can a serious computer not have cursor keys?” (there were a couple of serious flaws in the original mac–that was not one of them.) Of course when it got cursor keys, the next whine was…