What is Digg?Sponsored by Travelzoo
Take Advantage of Ridiculously Low Holiday Airfares view!
travelzoo.com - Flights $52 and up for Thanksgiving, Christmas & New Year. But move on it now.
230 Comments
- AeroSquid, on 07/16/2008, -8/+110it took them 10+ years to get a second button on their mouse so this copy paste business can wait a while longer.
- RATM4EVER, on 07/16/2008, -47/+148Stop trying to stick up for apple.
They didn't listen/care about your concerns...I don't see why that would warrant them this credit. "It's not easy" my ass....what's so hard about putting an icon of a scissor on the bottom corner of the touch keyboard? Then it turns to a glue dabber when pressed....Or some other trendy icon I'm sure apple can conjure up.
Go ahead, bury me. - hydroplane, on 07/16/2008, -17/+76Who needs functionality when you have shiny plastic and loud commercials.
- Retnuh730, on 07/16/2008, -0/+45This is a great concept of how it could be done, not to mention how hilariously creepy the iphone guided tour guy is in here.
http://www.vimeo.com/266383 - tomz17, on 07/16/2008, -14/+43"It's not there because it's not necessary." --or-- better yet "It's not there because the product is designed so well that it doesn't need it"
*****.
It's the same lame apologist story whenever someone mentions the single mouse button asshattery apple has pulled over the years.
There IS a compelling functional advantage to having copy and paste. I use it all of the time on my HTC touch. So why should apple do it? BECAUSE it makes LIFE a little bit EASIER, is stupid simple to implement, and detracts nothing from the iphone! - Diggnabbit, on 07/16/2008, -18/+47I think the article has a point. What gesture/tap/drag or whatever would work well for copy/paste? How to select text (or anything else) on the iPhone is a tricky question. I think you'd have to create a pop-up menu or something to allow you to pick a "select" tool. Which would be a pain, and particularly hard to implement system-wide.
- inactive, on 07/16/2008, -6/+32I have a treo 700w and use copy/paste at least once a week. mostly to copy and paste a phone number, or copy something in a text message.
But if they're talking about only working on what's most important as far as programming goes, I'd say picture messaging would be pretty high up there - alcimedes, on 07/16/2008, -3/+27Since there's no specific gesture that means "copy" or "paste" you'd think Apple would just pick something and run with it. I'm hearing a lot of excuses, but if Apple gave a crap they could figure out a way to make it work.
Just seems like a really odd option to hit the cutting room floor. Copy/Paste is one of *the* original functions computers/word processors could perform. You'd think they'd have put more effort in to retain that stuff. - YouGotDugg, on 07/15/2008, -7/+29Copy and paste would be great. I was so used to the blackberry. Hopefully they will have an update to add it in the future.
- TheUngod, on 07/16/2008, -9/+30Many of you are missing the point of copy/paste. It's supposed to be a timesaver and make things easy. You shouldn't HAVE to retype things, or recall phone numbers, or send an entire link as opposed to a snippet of a page. There is no justification to not have copy/paste, I'm sorry. Just because you paid hundreds of dollars for the thing and it's missing basic functionality doesn't mean you have to defend your purchase. It's a missing feature which should be there...end of story.
- CobaltBlue, on 07/16/2008, -14/+34Wow. I love apple fanboys. They can excuse apple of anything.
- Diggnabbit, on 07/16/2008, -1/+20Really? You think that only power users have any idea about copy & paste? That's a pretty broad definition of "power user."
- StevesJobs, on 07/16/2008, -6/+24Did anyone here read the article? Most of the above comments are 'copy and paste would be awesome.'
- slochewie, on 07/16/2008, -3/+20i use copy and paste all the time. thank god I have a blackberry
- jsully, on 07/16/2008, -2/+19Here's a good mockup someone did last year
http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/09/fake-iphone-cut ... - teh_techie, on 07/16/2008, -0/+15Thanks for your helpful insight into this story!
- brundlefly76, on 07/16/2008, -0/+15Yeah with Apple fanboys they play down every feature it doesn't have - until it arrives, and then its like Apple invented it.
But I have an iPod Touch and would LOVE to have copy and paste.
Copy and paste would be great and very useful on the iPhone, just as it is on the Blackberry. - Stevo23, on 07/16/2008, -13/+26Blah blah blah..."designing a UI for copy-paste is hard!"
Not if you had right-click, it wouldn't be. - LoudNoise, on 07/16/2008, -11/+24I like how the interface is missing a fundamental text editing feature, yet so many people continue to rave about its usability.
- jsully, on 07/16/2008, -5/+17Why stop with the iPhone? Why bother having copy and paste at all on a computer?
Well, what if I'm giving friends directions to my place via SMS. Instead of copying and pasting I need to type it out every time. What if I want to send someone a phone number in my address book? What if I want to move a number from the mobile field to the work field? There are hundreds of obvious uses for copy/cut/paste on the iPhone. The iPhone is a "Breakthrough Internet device", and a revolutionary mobile phone. While you can argue that it's not the biggest deal in the world, you surely can't argue away the utility and usefulness of copy and paste. - thejokell, on 07/16/2008, -9/+19That IS easy. Oh wait, I already drag and release to scroll. Now it will highlight too? But how do I know when it does what? And what about when I don't have a keyboard - where do I click that small key?
Oh right - it's not that easy. - zephc, on 07/16/2008, -11/+20Agreed - for just about everything that can be done with copy/cut/paste, there is an alternative to do it. I think the primary argument for it is text editing. Woe to anyone who has to do extensive text editing (typing more than a couple paragraphs) on a PDA/phone.
That said, my ideal interface would be some unique finger press/hold that would pop up a large pie menu with just copy, cut, paste, and 'save clipping'* as options, with the appropriate ones grayed out based on the pasteboard server's state.
* For those unfamiliar, OS X lets you drag selections of text to your desktop as text clippings, which I use quite often. The only similar functionality I have seen on Windows is in Wordpad, where dragging a text selection to the desktop makes a file out of it, which itself opens in Wordpad. - kraetos, on 07/16/2008, -6/+15In a lot of places on the iPhone where copy and paste would come in handy, there's a more than adequate replacement. If you get texted a phone number, you can call it or save it right from there. If you want to email someone a link, you can do it right from the browser.
I don't think there are too many places were copy and paste would really come in handy. For the most part, Apple's anticipated the places where you might need it and offered a faster alternative. - AdamFromMyspace, on 07/16/2008, -0/+9Press and hold..
- worminater, on 07/16/2008, -1/+10Instead of complaining of a missing feature; "no one needs that feature anyway". lawl
- mediaphile, on 07/16/2008, -6/+15Easier than pushing the "mail link to this page" button?
- macsox, on 07/16/2008, -5/+14Finger size? Finding the insertion point? Carrying between applications?
Why, if it's so simple, didn't they just do it then? Spite?
And, I must obligatorily ask - did you read the article? - chadlewis76, on 07/16/2008, -3/+11PocketPC/Windows Mobile has had very intuitive copy+paste gestures for years. It's not difficult at all. Buried as inaccurate.
- MrMongoose, on 07/16/2008, -0/+8Try forwarding a text message to another friend. Took maybe 5 keypresses on my dinosaur nokia, impossible with my iphone. Absoloutely aggravating.
- AdamFromMyspace, on 07/16/2008, -1/+9My 3650, N70, and N80 have copy/paste.. comes in handy all the time, even though the UI recognizes phone numbers and URLs. And the 3650 came out in 2001. Neener!
- caitlinwoodward, on 12/04/2008, -0/+8single mouse button asshattery. hee.
- bcr8u, on 07/16/2008, -1/+9viewmymessage.com
- ElSnuggles, on 07/16/2008, -1/+9Wait, you mean you expect the comments to be based on the content of the article? Perhaps you are mistaken, but this is digg, not slashdot.
- akeldama, on 07/16/2008, -1/+9You're right, it's so mind numbingly difficult, no one could have possibly figured out a way to copy and paste on an iphone using gestures, not even the great Apple!
http://www.engadget.com/2007/08/09/fake-iphone-cut ... - akeldama, on 07/16/2008, -0/+8Ever had the need to copy and paste snippets of email? How about moving phone numbers from one field to the next, or addresses? Copy an address and past it to an email? Do you enjoy typing your WPA key into your iphone for wireless connectivity? I don't know about you, but typing this:
D1.jHr2@@,(S{[5gYV3Fe4(qu))*X"7!}5;b0s0xSg4RM5yDIF{$9Nb!WgAE|,
on the iphone keyboard instead of copy and paste is akin to torture! - ravage86, on 07/16/2008, -0/+8You should post an article about how you used to have the old iPhone, but found it worthwhile to upgrade to the newer one. I'm sure a lot of people will be interested in your unusual situation.
- trejrco, on 07/16/2008, -3/+10I have had my BlackBerry two days and have copy/pasted several times already ... I did this frequently on my old 700W as well ... useful, to say the least.
- inactive, on 07/16/2008, -0/+7Why add it now, when you can just put in on one of the next 3 or 4 models they'll be releasing over the course of the next two years.
- TheUngod, on 07/16/2008, -2/+9You should work for Steve Jobs advertising department
- Blizaine, on 07/16/2008, -0/+6yeah, implementing it will be a challenge for Apple.
I was thinking they could allow you to press and hold on the screen for 1 or 2 seconds, next to what you want to copy, and then pop up a special highlighter magnifying glass. Then you could drag right or left to highlight a section of text. Once highlighted, pressing and holding on the text would pop up an context menu for copy/paste. - sammyc53, on 07/16/2008, -1/+7ditto. i use it a lot
- diabulos, on 07/16/2008, -0/+6Retnuh730's link gives you an answer to that 'ooo, ahhhh, it is hard, what about the UI, it is an Apple product, it is sacred...don't you dare criticize it.....' for God's sake, the Palm had it, even the Newton I think had it...c'mon, its the old 'if Steve Jobs does not think you need it, then you don't need it, you just didn't know it' game if the Iphone was a Samsung product or a Sony product people would be shredding it to pieces and the Mac heads eulogizing on how Apple would make a far better device.
Proud owner of a 1st gen Iphone. - roosterjm2k2, on 07/16/2008, -5/+11Your comment was so dumb I actually took the time to login to reply.
Objective-C has NOTHING to do with the copy/paste functionality.
Jesus, the things know-it-alls will say - waydee, on 07/16/2008, -5/+11If my old Sony Ericsson K800i can manage copy/paste i'm sure the iPhone can.
Buried as ***** Apple apologist spam. - akeldama, on 07/16/2008, -1/+6Ever had the need to copy and paste snippets of email? How about moving phone numbers from one field to the next, or addresses? Copy an address and past it to an email? Do you enjoy typing your WPA key into your iphone for wireless connectivity? I don't know about you, but typing this:
D1.jHr2@@,(S{[5gYV3Fe4(qu))*X"7!}5;b0s0xSg4RM5yDIF{$9Nb!WgAE|,
on the iphone keyboard instead of copy and paste is akin to torture! - ninjasquirrel, on 07/16/2008, -1/+6My Nokia N800 has copy and paste implemented in what is probably the best way I've seen for mobile devices... you select the text you want, then tap a button on the on-screen keyboard that brings up a context menu with "Cut", "Copy", "Paste" and "Select All". I really can't understand what's so hard about implementing something like this, although the iPhone really doesn't handle multitasking anywhere near as well as the N800 does (having two web browsers open at once, for example).
- waydee, on 07/16/2008, -0/+5Do you never notice your own fanboyism? come on, accept some constructive criticism for once.
- MrMongoose, on 07/16/2008, -0/+5This guy thought it through pretty well:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXgsQhiGeag - inactive, on 07/16/2008, -0/+5multi-touch
- WomensUnderwear, on 07/16/2008, -1/+6wow, you sure have your head up your own ass
-
Show 51 - 100 of 239 discussions
Browsing Digg on your phone just got easier with our enhancements to the 
© Digg Inc. 2009
— Content created and posted by Digg users is