Omni Group plans several app ports for iPad
updated 05:10 pm EST, Fri February 12, 2010
Four apps likely by year's end
Touring Macworld 2010, MacNN has interviewed Omni Group CEO Ken Case about plans for the company's apps, including porting them to Apple's iPad. Case expects OmniFocus for the iPhone to be ported to the iPad at launch, though initially just as a resized iPhone app. Also coming to the iPad are OmniGraphSketcher, which focuses on sketching and graphing, and OmniGraffle, which diagrams visual objects and can be used for basic web design.
The hope is to have both of the latter titles ready for the iPad launch, although if not, Case is determined to have at least one ready with the other following quickly. OmniGraphSketcher is currently expected to be first. Looking further out, Case expects OmniOutliner to be iPad-ready in six to nine months, with a fully-developed OmniFocus due by year's end, in the same timeframe as OmniPlan for iPad.
Case anticipates the cost of the iPad apps to be within 40 percent of the Mac software's pricing. The CEO has also revealed that OmniOutliner 4.0 is coming soon to the Mac, with a rebuilt outlining engine, featuring zooming text and smart-match text completion. OmniPlan 2.0 is also in the Mac pipeline, with new collaboration features for tracking project changes across multiple users. The two updates are forecast to arrive in the third quarter of the year.
Fresh-Faced Recruit
Joined: Oct 1999
Great News!
I use OmniFocus (Mac & iPod touch) and while the iOS version is quite usable (and extremely handy!) it could certainly benefit from more screen real estate.
With additions to the iPad software arsenal like iWork the OmniApps, it's looking to be far more versatile than I'd have expected. I'd love to see a mobile version of Vectorworks. Maybe even Google SketchUp or something.
I'll be curious to see how using a Bluetooth keyboard will be.