Is Apple forcing users to abandon cut-and-paste on handsets?
I know this won’t be a favorable viewpoint, but I have to ask the same question that Matt Miller is asking: how big of a deal is it that there’s no cut-and-paste on the iPhone platform? I won’t argue the usefulness of such a feature, but in my year of iPhone ownership, I think I’ve really only missed cut-and-paste three or four times at most. Now don’t just answer off the top of your head: put some serious thought into your handset usage first. Of course, everyone uses their handset in different ways, so I expect opinions to vary wildly here.
As I sit and reflect on this "missing" feature, I find that it’s not really missing at all in the use cases I need it most. Certainly not on any regular basis. If I want to share a URL with someone, one of the most common times you want a cut-and-paste function, I simply use the "Mail Link to this Page" feature in Safari. I think the most recent instance of wanting cut-and-paste is when I wanted to e-mail a photo to Flickr. I couldn’t remember the e-mail address to send the image, so I had to hit the Flickr website and look it up. Cut-and-paste would have been handy there, but I worked around it and created a new e-mail contact with the e-mail address. Yup, I had to manually type it, but it’s a once and done thing. Now that I have "Flickr" as an e-mail contact, I don’t need to type it again.
Personally, I’m not missing the feature all that much and I wonder if Apple is really trying to get away from adding it at all. They drove consumers to abandon start abandoning floppy disks with the iMac ten years ago; are they at it again? If they are, can you live without "cut-and-paste"? Like millions of others, I have for the past year… all by Apple’s design. In fact, I suspect they’ll continue to improve the UI in situations where you might want to copy and paste data. Anyway, think it through and once you’ve arrived at your answer, hop over to Matt’s post: he’s taking a vote on the issue.
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The only time I miss it is when I need to paste a link in a blog post.
Personally, I consider cut-and-paste a “must have” feature, I often need to copy a small section of a web page into an email to illustrate a particular point and not having this feature available simply isn’t an option.
If I can find or suggest any workarounds for the specific needs in the comments, I will. Having said that, I can’t help with copying links into blog posts for James.
Jason, if you need to copy a small section of a web page into an e-mail, you could nav to the page in Safari and zoom in so that only your particular point is showing. Hold the Home and Power button to take a screenshot and e-mail that picture from the Camera Roll.
It is extremely important for me, and forces me to keep paying for my windows mobile phone on sprint until I can do it with my iPhone. I realize not everyone needs it, but it’s really not that complicated.
Band-aid solutions, Kevin, band-aid solutions. :P
I used Copy/Paste at least a handful of times on Windows Mobile phones over the past few days including copying product serial numbers while installing programs.
I also use it a few times a day on emails and links. Things that sure, I can get by without it, but it’s not always as efficient.
But then again, this is comes back to my #1 reason for disliking Apple. I’m not into the “Apple way is the only way” mentality. I like having options and different methods of doing things.
What about passwords? Now that there are a number of password wallet type applications, how are users getting passwords from their password wallet into Mobile Safari (especially considering that apps quit when you navigate away from them)?
Not sure about copy paste, but I think Apple is trying to stick it to the carriers and get people to email pictures instead of using MMS.
James,
Just a quick question… if you think Apple is trying to force us away from CCP, what do you think they intend to accomplish? Is it just to mold us into a different UI paradigm, or is there something else you think they intend to accomplish?
It makes a big difference but folks don’t realize it because they don’t see what it is keeping from them. Right now the iPhone doesn’t support multi-tasking. With a few small exceptions (live URLs for instance) applications can’t talk to one another. This means that there is no way to share information between applications on the phone.
So what happens when you find a great article on the web and you want to save some text from it in your favorite notes application? Or what about the contact information you want to email to a friend? Or the URL that you want to add to a list manager?
Not having copy and paste leaves you without a lot of really great innovation that software developers could be making. I certainly hope that Apple sees this and adds Copy and Paste in the future. I think you’ll see a lot more power in your favorite applications if they do.
Marc Tassin
Ilium Software
http://www.iliumsoft.com
Great article. I just don’t think its a priority. I’d much rather that Apple devoted resources towards making Safari more stable, improving Exchange support so it is seamless, and keeping the iPhone environment stable and secure. Cut and Paste is way, way down on the features list for me, right next to MMS (SMS and MMS are the telecom’s last gasp at screwing consumers with exorbitant rates-they both need to die)