Recently, Apple unveiled their portal for WebbApps designed and built for the iPod Touch and iPhone. I thought I’d review 10 of these, from different areas of the WebApp portal.
Note: Links to the actual webapps are in the images, click the image to go to the app
The Facebook iApp is the first to be featured on the Apple website. I didn’t actually have a facebook account, so i signed up. Oddly enough, the iApp doesn’t have a “Sign Up” feature, so I had to to Facebook.com and sign up there. This seemed like an unnecessarily long and drawn-out process, and took far longer than i had originally thought.
Once I was logged into the app, the site was very responsive, and quick to load. I found the tabbed interface simple, and easy to use, and allowed me to navigate quickly. there were 4 main tabs:
- ‘Home’, giving me news-feeds and events notifications
- ‘Profile’, with contact info, photos, and ‘wall’ – a function where I could post miscellaneous messages
- ‘Friends’, with ‘Status’, ‘Online’, and ‘Photos’
I had no problem getting around, and the Facebook app even had a search function that updated a la Google Suggest, updating with each keypress. The other good use of Javascript was the secondary tabs, which slide like a curtain left.
Whilst i had no problem getting around and interfacing with this ‘webapp’, i still felt that i was ‘on the outside looking in’. If you are already a facebook user, and just want to check up on your account and do some basic interaction, i would recommend this for a place in your bookmarks. however, I wouldn’t recommend this app for first-timers, especially without a sign up feature.
Final word: Not for everyone, although this may be a godsend for facebook addicts on the move. Not so much a webapp, this felt like a normal website – shoehorned into a small screenspace.
