So Apple introduced the Apple iPad as a sort of easy to use touch screen computer that allows you to surf the web, play games, make documents, presentations and spreadsheets and some other stuff - but again, it isn't the same as using an actual computer. Google introduced their tablet version of their Android operating system with some tablets at this year's CES trade show - one called the Motorola Xoom ("Zoom") which will run Android 3.0 which is called Honeycomb. It will have a built-in browser that will surprisingly resemble the Google Chrome browser on computers, will have an extensive use of the larger screen for the home area, etc. Both Apple's iOS and Google's Android platforms look like great platforms for tablet computers but it remains more of a consumer device than something more productive that a computer is, for instance,

Microsoft seems to bet that tablets should be just different "PC form factors" and they have stated that time and time again when the online tech press have asked Microsoft about their position on tablet computers. I can see the usefulness of a Windows-based tablet computer but at the same time, the user interface is pointer-oriented, which means selecting anything small is a pain unless you have a stylus. And every tablet on the Market nowadays from Samsung and Apple, for instance, use capacitive displays that use fingers as the input method.

However, that said about tablets, iOS is still heavily different to operating systems like Windows and Mac OS X and is very limited or restricting. For instance, switching a lot between different applications is cumbersome - and iPad / iOS is not for creating a lot of productive content, too. The same can be said about Android, too.

One interesting thing is that Adobe are experimenting with tablets like the iPad and already have basic applications for the iPad specifically. Maybe in the future Adobe have basic versions of Photoshop or Illustrator for the iPad if they figure a way around the pixel imprecision of finger-based input. Who knows. What's for sure though, is that tablets are very popular right now and that companies like Google and Apple are sure going to be innovating in the software area - and in the very short term future!