iOS 4 pushes the iPhone deeper into the mobile office market – or does it?

The latest update to Apple's mobile OS is well and truly out, but how useful is it for a businessperson on the move? 

Apple's iPhone initial release took the smartphone market by storm. Can iOS 4 keep up the pace? // Supplied

THE new iOS 4 has been kicking around for a couple of weeks now, and it represents the biggest change for the iPhone software to date.

However, if you use your smartphone as a productivity tool, instead of a gimmicky internet device, the ability to change your wallpaper probably isn't the greatest reason to update your iPhone 3G or 3GS to the new operating system.

Pictures: The small business pros and cons of iOS 4

So what does the new software offer that is actually useful? 


The Big Idea: Multitasking

Yes, the iPhone 3GS can now do more than one thing at a time, although it’s not true multitasking in the same manner as on Android or Nokia phones.

If an application doesn't use the 'Special Set of Apple Approved Multitasking Processes', they are simply 'frozen' when you quit them, instead of running in the background.

For most small businesses, a main use of multitasking is being able to use internet call services like Skype while doing other things on your phone.

We can’t say if this works, mostly because Skype hasn't released an app yet that makes use of the new capability.

Which brings us to one of the most glaring shortcomings of multitasking: the fact that it requires app developers to update their software to make it work. Most developers are onto it, but there are some notable exclusions.

In fact, multitasking on the iPhone is slow and not all that efficient.

The only way to close a 'frozen' or multitasked app is to double tap down the home button, flick through the inevitable mess of frozen Apps, find the one you actually want, double tap it and hit the delete button.

Still, at least you can do it, which is better than the previous alternative (unless you use a 3G, in which case you can't use it all) . That's not necessarily saying a lot, though.


Unified Inbox

The new inbox organisation brings all of your inboxes, whether they be Exchange, Yahoo, Gmail, or a different kind altogether, all into one inbox, arranged purely by date received.

You can still view them inbox by inbox if you like (and if you receive a lot of emails in one inbox and few in the others, you might not use it all that much), but mostly it's a welcome feature.

It's also aided by threaded conversations, where messages with the same subject and between the same group of users are grouped together in an email 'thread', instead of having 12 emails on the same subject cluttering up your inbox.

If you get a tonne of emails a day as part of your job, then it certainly keeps you from being overwhelmed by a stream of replies about where you should have lunch that day.


Multi Exchange

Got two Exchange email accounts? Then you’ll know how much of a pain it was to have to delete one account if you wanted to sync the other. 

This newest update means you no longer have to do that.

The iPhone can now truly be a centralised mobile hub for all of your email accounts, not just some of them, and it makes the device just that much more useful as a work tool.


Search

Spotlight - the search bar for finding things on your phone that appears when you flick left of your first app page - can now also be used to search the internet or just Wikipedia.

It's not quite as fantastic as it sounds, though; hitting the 'Search Safari' button still opens up a browser window, and just automatically starts the search. Same for Wikipedia.

Still, that's a few button presses saved, right?


Folders
If you’ve got several pages worth of apps, Folders will let you condense them down to one or two pages without having to actually delete anything.

When you make a new folder - by simply dragging and dropping one app on top of another - the iPhone is fairly good at guessing the category you want for the folder, such as News, Entertainment, Games, or Finance.

For those of us who meticulously placed applications in categories on each page previously, it's not a huge addition, but the space-saving alone makes it a worthwhile add.

If you take it as a whole package, the standard of Apple's mobile software has taken a step up with iOS4, but it does so a little half heartedly.

While the email features are a definite improvement, especially for business users who need to juggle multiple accounts while they're on the move, additions such as the new search, and especially multitasking, aren't quite as useful as they should have been.