iBank for iPad 1.0 quick look.

     iBank for iPad is out, and available now in the app store!  Unfortunately, at the minute, that's about all the good news there is.

     Firstly a quick rundown on iBank.  iBank is one of a number of finance tracking software packages, if you're interested in the finer details you can take a look at http://www.iggsoftware.com/ibank/.  Briefly though, in my opinion, it's an interesting piece of software which tries really hard to have a pleasing aesthetic, and does so with a fair amount of success.  It also has some simple, but interesting, touches that I like.  For example on a net worth report it'll tell you if you're trending towards saving more or spending more money.  But it has some really odd limitations as well - no real landing or home page where you can see everything at a glance.  No calendar view.  No way to have a report which graphs which categories you've spent your money on in prior months.

     iBank for iPad continues along the same vein, but in a far more extreme way.  It does things in a very pretty way (for a finance app).  It has some neat little features.  But many of the basics are horribly overlooked, or indeed absent.
     Firstly syncing.  The iPad version syncs with the Mac version.  Well, kind of.  It syncs transactions & accounts.  It doesn't sync budgets.  It doesn't sync reminders.  This means that you kind of need to either use one or the other.  Do not buy the iPad version thinking it'll provide a convenient supplemental way to manage your Mac iBank accounts.  For example, marking off bills (scheduled transactions) as paid on the iPad while sitting on the couch would seem to me to be the perfect use case for iBank on iPad.  Without being able to sync all your existing scheduled transactions though....  It's not going to happen.  Same goes for budgets, they don't sync.  (I personally find setting up budgets in any finance application very annoying, so I'm certainly not re-doing it for the iPad version of iBank.)
     Ok, so if you give up on syncing and think of iBank for iPad as a complete replacement for the Mac version - does it fare any better?  Well, there's a wizard for setting up a budget and scheduled transactions all at once.  Good idea, saves some work.  The basic home/landing page on iPad is fairly basic - but it's still a step up from that available in the Mac version.  It's a bit slow when updating transactions.  (At least on an iPad 2)  Entering some types of data is pretty clumsy - there's no calendar to choose a date from, you can only type in numbers.  Reports are...  Well, "missing" would be the best description.  A finance app that doesn't let you compare your net worth for the previous year?  Or the total of all your savings accounts.  Or a breakdown of income vs expenses.  Or pretty much anything else you might want to track your finances for?  Interesting design choice that one.

     To be fair, for each individual account you can see a graph of the total amount at the start (or end?) of each month.  For a six month period.  Or eight months if you use your iPad in landscape mode.  You can't change to weeks.  You can't change the scale.  You can swipe backwards and look through any previous block of six/eight months at a time, but that's it.  Also under the budget screen, you can see your total ingoing/outgoings in the same limited manner.
     Limited is really what springs to mind whenever I try and use this app.  Due to the lack of desktop syncing functionality it doesn't make a very good addition to the desktop client.  Due to it's lack of reporting options it doesn't make a very good stand alone option.  I think it kind of makes it a bit pointless in its current incarnation.
     Hopefully in six months time once Igg Software has done some updates it'll become a useful tool.  As it stands currently it's nothing more than an interesting tech demo of what they want their iPad app to be.  At $15 I'd say this makes it a very unwise purchase.
     I'm actually surprised they released it as is.  I know there was a lot of pent up demand for an iPad version of iBank but I can't imagine that charging people $15 for software that's in this state is going to give customers a positive opinion of the company.

Garmin ANT+ for iPhone & Premium Heart Rate Monitor.

     First of all, let me say that it's Garmin's choice to call it a "Premium" heart rate monitor, not mine.  I can kind of see why they went that way, the "Garmin Elastic Heart Rate Monitor" does sound a bit cheap and nasty.  However, it is a little bit silly and I wish they had of come up with a better name to differentiate it from their old "Rubbery Plastic Heart Rate Monitor".  Now that gripe is out of the road, on with the review.

Garmin ANT+ iPhone Dongle & Premium Heart Rate Monitor

     I've only been playing with the heart rate monitor for a few days, but I have to say I'm pretty impressed with it so far.  It couldn't have been any simpler to set up and get started using it.  Start the Garmin Fit app on the iPhone, go to Settings -> Sensors and then scan for the Heart Rate monitor.  After it's found it the first time it seems to pick it up whenever you start the app and put the monitor on.

     I've never used a heart rate monitor before, so I'm sure to have very rose coloured glasses when looking at the experience... That said though, I love it.  It's comfortable enough that you don't even notice it's there once you start exercising.  Well, that's not totally true - if it's still damp when you put it on you'll know it's there until its warmed up!  (Garmin recommend rinsing the strap in water after every use, and washing it after every five.  Dry sweat leads to salt which leads to rapidly wearing elastic I'm guessing.)

     I always have a bit of a tendency to push myself too hard when doing any sort of exercise.  Having the heart rate data there with you on a run or a ride really helps me to keep that in check.  (Side note, don't trust any calculation for maximum heart rate.  All the methods I've seen have quite a bit of scatter, up to +/- 20BPM.  That's a lot when you're trying to target an exercise zone that's ~15BPM wide)

     I was concerned about the dongle sticking out of the iPhone (as I don't usually use an armband or anything, I just stick the phone in a pocket) but I've been for a few runs now and it's been rock solid, never been knocked loose.  It feels solid once it's inserted into the iPhone as well, which inspires confidence.

     I have found though, that since I'm wanting to know what my heart rate is while I'm exercising I've taken to holding it in my hand more as I run.  I do have an armband case for the phone as well, but that's not too convenient to see while running either.  The armband case works great for strapping the phone onto my bike though, and it makes a pretty neat cycling computer.  (You can also get cadence sensors that'll communicate with the Garmin Fit app, but I've not tried one.)

     The Garmin Fit app is...  Well, it's pretty much the same as any of the other running apps.  (Runkeeper, Nike+, etc)  You can flick through a couple of screens of data during a run.  Look at previous activities after a run.  Sync your activities to a website to do further analysis/comparisons.  You can't share via FaceBook or Twitter from within the app, but from the Garmin Connect website you can share via nearly any service imaginable.  If you're into that sort of thing.  (Who on earth would want to see what my heart rate was last time I went for a Jog?)  It's not a free app, but at 99c it's hardly going to break the bank.

     The one thing I wish that the Garmin Fit app was heart rate alarms.  If it could be set to vibrate & make noises when my heart rate got too high or low I'd go back to just sticking the phone in my pocket and forgetting about it while running.  (The Garmin 310xt can do this.... It also has a RRP of $379, so I'm not rushing to buy one.)

     The other negative is that the dongle and HRM only work with the Garmin Fit app (despite that they apparently use the standard ANT+ communications protocols.)  That's only a minor disappointment though, unless you're loving using nike+ for it's "power song" feature or something along those lines.  You can sync your run data between at least the Garmin Connect, Runkeeper & Nike+ online services, (I know because I do) which further lessens the importance of the app used to record your activities in my mind.

     In short though - I love it, I'd recommend it to even the most casual of exercisers.