Reading through the “flame wars” that often flare up in the comments section following controversial online posts can be both disturbing and amusing. Following an article on tablet computing, one comment contributor stated “just face it, the iPad is only a toy!” Often times the iPad I’ve used for the last six months has been a nice toy however it has also turned my Windows 7 Laptop into a desk top. I now leave it at the office and choose to work from home or on business trips using the tablet.
As I’ve mentioned before, instant on, and a 10 hour battery life are the features I enjoy the most, but there are several applications that for me have made the iPad an Enterprise tool and more than a toy.
Email, Contacts and Calendar: These apps easily connect and integrate with our Exchange system at the office and provide the first level in making the iPad useable as a business tool
SharePlus Pro from SouthLabs (www.southlabs.com) cost: $9.99. My company deployed MOSS 2010 (SharePoint) last year. I moved all my documents from my network drive into SharePoint. SharePlus allows you to connect to Lists in SharePoint and synchronize them to the iPad giving me access to my corporate documents online or in offline mode. You can set up background synchronization and control the parameters such as the lists and file sizes to synch. Southlabs continues to develop the product and has good customer support.
Bria Softphone (www.counterpath.com) cost: free. Last year my company rolled out a VoIP phone system based on the Asterisk Open Source PBX. By trunking our Asterisk servers we have 4 digit dialing to our offices worldwide. Asterisk works with the SIP protocol which is supported by the Bria Softphone. Using the built in VPN capability of the iPad, I can use the Bria phone to place calls to phone extension in our global network.
Jump Desktop (Jumpdesktop.com) cost: $14.99. Occasionally, I need to connect to a network application on our corporate Windows system. Jump allows you to make a remote desktop connection from the iPad to another PC or a Terminal Server. The application has nice features, redirects audio to the iPad and works with the Blue Tooth keyboard.
IT Tools (Kevin Koltzau) cost: $4.99
Recently, I was having trouble accessing an application behind the company firewall from the iPad. I wanted to know the network address of the iPad to help me troubleshoot the connection problem (I have a background in Network Engineering). I also wanted to ping different hosts to diagnose what was blocking the connection. IT Tools lets me see the network address assigned to the iPad and run various network diagnostic tools.
These are just a few Apps which allow me to get more out of the iPad. I know there are many other Enterprise applications out there, but for now, these do the job for me.
What Enterprise tools do you use or do you think the iPad mainly a toy?
