1024x768 or Go To Hell!

My screen resolution, combined from both of my displays, is 3040x900. I’m currently fitting 4 applications on these two screens at their most comfortable sizes. Now imagine if each application was forced to expand to maximum screen size. 3040x900 Safari wouldn’t be too bad, but imagine a 3040x900 Adium window! Or a 3040x900 Tweetie window. Right now my Tweetie window is 355x782, and it’s probably too big as it is. What would it do with ten times the pixels? It would be a horribly inefficient use of screen space and a challenge to developers to make decent use of the display.

This is the situation, however, that the iPad is in.

The problem is best exemplified by Twitterrific. Look at the huge entry area. Why should a Twitter app be forced to have a text entry area more suited for Pages? I know the alternative is much scarier, but I’m not satisfied with either solution.

This will probably mean that the best iPad Twitter application will be TweetDeck, as it has all sorts of panels and options to make proper use of the screen. For those who don’t need the extra functionality, however, it’s merely a cleverly disguised waste of screen space instead of the obvious waste that Twitterrific users suffer through.

How could this problem be solved? Variable application sizes won’t help - replacing poorly used space with blank space is no solution, and they can fake that already if they wish. Variable application sizes with multitasking support and tiling applications on the display might work, but it would be one heck of a challenge to implement on iPhone OS, where even copy and paste required no small amount of thinking to implement properly.

What do I think would be the best solution? Dashboard for the iPad. These simple applications don’t need much in the way of resources to run in addition to screen space - why not make them widgets? Double-tapping the Home button could bring the dashboard up - iTunes control can be one of the widgets so that the double-tap for music buttons functionality isn’t lost.

I’m sure there are problems with this solution somewhere, but I can’t figure them out yet. I, for one, think this would be a great addition to the iPad.