Using the iPad isn’t exactly rocket science, but there are a few tricks which may not be so apparent from the out start (especially if, like us, you were so eager to get going that you didn’t take the time to read the manual!).

So here for you, dear readers, are some handy iPad tips and tricks which you may find useful…

1. Open Safari Links in a New Page

Remember that you can load multiple webpages in Safari simultaneously. So, if you don’t want to leave your current page, you can open the link in a new window (like tabbed browsing, but without the tabs).

To do this, instead of just tapping the link, press and hold it until you see the option to “Open in New Page”. Hit this, and Safari will open a new window and load that link.

To manage the pages you have open, or to return to another page, look to the top of the browser and you’ll see an icon that looks like two overlapping boxes or pages. Press the icon and you’ll be presented with all the pages you have open. From here you can tap any of the “X” buttons to close an individual page.

2. Activate AutoFill in Safari

The AutoFill option is a great time saver as it automatically remembers your usernames and passwords for services. However, make sure you only have it activated if you know and trust anyone who is likely to use your iPad.

To activate it, ensure your details are saved in “Contacts,” then head to “Settings,” choose “Safari,” and click “AutoFill”. Then set both options to “On” and select your file from “Contacts” in the “My Info” field.

3. Quick Mute Your iPad

The one gripe many people have is that the iPad has no “mute” option. However, you can still quickly silence your device by pressing and holding the down volume button — this drops the volume down to zero in about two seconds.

4. Make Use of the Home Button

The iPad’s “Home” button will take you to your homepage if pressed once, but it has a few other functions worth knowing about as well.

To access these functions, go to “Settings,” press “General,” then choose “Home.” Here you can select which function you’d like a double press of the button to carry out, such as opening up “Spotlight Search” or accessing the iPod.

From this area in “Settings” you can also set “iPod Controls” to “On,” which means that when you have music playing and you’re in another program or app, a double press of the “Home” button will bring up basic music controls.

5. Use your iPad as a digital photo frame

You probably know by now that the iPad doubles as a digital picture frame. You can access this function a few ways, but what’s the easiest way?

When you wake the iPad, look to the right of Slide to Unlock and you should see a flower. Click it. This will randomly start playing the photos contained in the Photos application on your device.

GA tip: Toggle the speed in Settings and try turning off “zoom in on faces”—it tends to make your photos a little grainy.

6. Take giant screenshots

It’s on oldie, but a goodie! Push the top (power) and home buttons at the same time for half a second. The photo (at 768×1024 resolution) will be stored in your photo library.

7. Super Fast Webpage Scrolling

You’re all the way to the bottom of a blog but you want to read a story back at the very top. Don’t repeatedly drag your finger across the screen – it looks silly and is inconvenient.

Instead, tap the title bar once and you’re right back on top of the page!

8. Preview More Of Your Mail

Did you know that you can set your mail to preview more than two lines? Although you can also do this on the iPhone, the feature is a lot more useful on the iPad – primarily because it is larger and you can skim several emails without opening them.

Go to “Settings”, “Mail”, “Contacts and Calendars” and select “5 lines” under “Preview”.

9. Put 6 apps into the dock

By clicking and holding on any icon until it wiggles (just as you do to rearrange apps), you’ll unlock each app’s position. Then just drag any two additional apps into the bottom tray. Easy peasy!

10. Download the iPad User Guide eBook

Did you know you can download the official Apple iPad User Guide as an e-Book?

Although available in Safari’s pre-loaded bookmarks, for offline access to the guide simply search for “iPad” and download it for free from the iBooks store.

The device will be RIM’s first entry into the tablet market and will run on a new operating system devised by QNX, a company RIM bought last year, as opposed to the BlackBerry OS used on its mobile phones.

The independent global publisher of Vogue and Wired will launch its first two iPad apps for both titles, as well as iPhone apps for GQ and Brides.

Existing print advertisers with Vogue and Wired will automatically have their ads applied to the iPad versions, available on iTunes from early November. Extended commercial opportunities – including a rich-media, interactive and AR option limited to around six advertisers per app, as well as an ’intermediate level’ option that can link directly to advertisers’ websites and other digital properties – will roll out later, according to publisher of Condé Nast Digital Jamie Jouning.

Condé Nast research for the iPad launch claims that 50% of its magazine readers have “some first-hand experience of the iPad”, with 18% of Wired readers owning one.

Condé Nast’s websites generate more than 350m gross impressions a year and claim more than 2m unique users across all magazine sites. The publisher has claimed that cross-media revenue in 2010 increased by more than 60% from 2009 and now accounts for almost 20% of its total display revenue.

Apple is currently soaring on the sales success of the iPad, and the consumer technology giant has smashed Wall Street expectations after profits surged on strong demand for new products – including the iPad.

The company, which sold almost as many of its new iPad tablets as Mac computers, said revenues jumped 61 per cent to $15.7 billion (£10.3bn) in its second quarter. Profits rose 78 per cent to $3.25bn. So far, it has sold about 3.3 million iPads during its first three months on the market.

While it remains to be seen if the iPad’s initial success can be maintained, it is possible that this nifty device has the potential to be a game changer in computing, and the way in which we browse and design for the web.

The launch of the iPad can be seen as a significant step towards the advancement of consumer computing, locking away the complexities of a powerful operating system beneath a streamlined, polished user interface. Although the iPad is a fully portable device, it’s totally different from a laptop, and boasts a large touch screen and 10 hour battery life. This makes it the ultimate tool for enjoying the web. So, with the iPad being different from everything that has come before, how should you approach designing for it?

Should conventional design for desktops apply? Or should designers draw on insight provided by mobile projects? We predict that from the launch of the iPad will emerge a new design hybrid, one which combines aspects of desktop and mobile design.

However, whether the iPad is able to change the world or not, is not the issue of this article. The fact of the matter is that the iPad is here and that, with 3.3 million of them already sold, we must design for the web whilst keeping it in mind. So, what do we need to consider?

Bright screen

The iPad is so bright that long term use can fatigue users. Therefore designers should consider colour contrast. Perhaps use light greys instead of white and dark greys instead of full on black. The backlit iPad screen is not ideal for long term textual consumption, so do your users a favour and mix up photos and video to make for a less strenuous experience.

Pixel density

The device’s pixel density, combined with screen dimensions that lie somewhere between a desktop and mobile phone, mean that neither downscaling desktop sites nor upscaling mobile sites is ideal.

Links and Hover Effects

Most important is the fact that the iPad is a large touch screen device. This is a fundamental long term difference and a move from mouse to finger. Just think, there are a number of complexities in rendering an interface that defines hover and mouse in/mouse out features on a device that has no pointing mechanism!

As the primary method of user interaction with the iPad are the fingers, all those hover effects that were favourable for pointer-based devices will be a hurdle in user experience on the iPad. As, when using a finger and touching the screen, you loose the hover state.

Also the links can no longer be concealed in a text and left for the user to dexterously click upon. Therefore you might want to resize the links so that the user experience does not suffer. Also consider the concept of mousing (and Fitts’ Law). Will users be as accurate with their finger as a mouse cursor?

The Fold

The iPad changes the nature of the fold. The ability to change orientation makes the fold exist twice – and in two different places. Hopefully, this will stop people worrying about whether users will scroll because, if there ever was a device that makes people want to scroll, the iPad is it.

Device orientation and fluid width design

As some iPad apps lack consistency between modes (sometimes only some features are available in landscape mode) it would not be advisable to have different designs for different orientations. Two designs may also confuse users when they switch modes. It’s also worth thinking about how a user might hold the device and the fingers they may use to navigate a site.

As the iPad has no right way of viewing websites, you can view pages either in landscape or in the portrait mode. But for the designer that means two completely different layouts for which to design. It is for this specific reason that the iPad highlights the need for smart fluid width design. Using a smart combination of CSS and Javascript the User Experience can be made to improve drastically.

HTML5

Every new Apple mobile device and every new Mac (along with the latest version of Apple’s Safari web browser) supports web standards including HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript. The iPads strong support for web standards may also benefit designers in another way, especially with the release of the OS4. Apple’s iAd platform is based around HTML5, which offers opportunities to anyone well versed in the technology. Revealed by Jobs last April, iAd aims to provide media rich in-app mobile advertising that (according to Apple) will provide the emotion of TV with the interactivity of the web. With Google openly adopting HTML5 for Youtube, it is only a beginning of the things to come with HTML5.

Additional benefits

Although unconventional in interface terms, the iPad is a good citizen when it comes to webs standards. Safari for iPad is one of the most advanced, standard compliant browsers around. Also, WebKit (an open source web browser engine and also the name of the Mac OS X system framework version of the engine that’s used by Safari) is the only browser engine. WebKit is appealing to designers because they know exactly what they are designing for and don’t have to worry about how a design may appear on a range of different browsers. This allows for more focus when creating an iPad specific site.

Two sides of the argument

Designers are not united regarding optimisation for the iPad. Some say that there is no need unless iPad users are your core audience. However, if you can make something look good on the iPad, it is likely that it will look good on a desktop too.

Others say that designing specifically for the iPad will mean that users are not left in the lap of the Gods. Removing the need to zoom to read text, or ensuring that text links are large enough to be easily ‘clicked’ by a finger will remove a barrier between the users and your content. You don’t want uses to have to constantly adjust viewing behaviour because your content does not arrive formatted for easy consumption.

Nevertheless, it would be bad practice to develop a website specifically for the iPad platform – just as we no longer create sites specifically for the Mac or PC. Think of the iPad as another step in the evolution of the way in which we design for the web. As with every new device that comes out, we must take into account the subtle differences and play to its strengths and weaknesses.