Copy and paste? Who cares?

Needs more Cowbell. With the accelerometer, I'm sure that will happen.

Kaiser-Machead's Chips Ahoy!

expects to be "dazzled" by software makers in the near future

The bedazzler app can't come soon enough!

@GeekyNerdGuy: @OMG! Ponies!: With the 2.0 firmware my 1st gen iPhone is crashing kind of a lot. About once a day, I'll be in a 3rd party application and suddenly the phone will be rebooting. It was pretty solid before and the occasional crash I attributed to jailbreaking.

itchytooth

@Mayor McRib: On behalf of scientists, I'd like to put in a vote for the calculator.

Perhaps the "priority list" factors in difficulty to execute as well desire to have. It could be a function of the programming structure that C&P is possible but just harder to do that it seems.

The Lab

any word on the early cancelation fine print from at&t? eventually i want an iphone, but at&t has no coverage in VT, and therefore won't allow me into a contract, so i want a friend in NH to get one, then cancel and i'll pay the cost of fees... but so far i've heard nothing as to the feasibility of this plan from anyone... so anyone know?

1timeonly

Which is why I will be jailbreaking my new iPhone as soon as I can to run iCopy. It's not a great solution, but it's still a solution. Fucking apple comes out with an amazing phone missing out on a very simple, yet very important feature.

igneous

They dont care because people will buy the iPhone regardless. After the offices get cleared of 100 dollar bills clogging their computers, then they'll get around to the fan service.

Luuey

@OMG! Ponies!: Every once in a while it will freeze up and go all funky. It's usually on that rare occasion when you get like a phone call and two texts all at the same time, and the computer basically craps itself trying to sort it all out.

Some of the new apps are pretty crashy, but aside from the reboots due to experimenting with those all weekend, I can usually go two or three weeks without ever having to shut the phone off and restart it.

GeekyNerdGuy

@OMG! Ponies!: My Curve crashes about three times per week.

I know the iPhone crashes every now and then, too, because I'm always the one people contact when they can't figure out how to reset it. Much less, however.

Gilbert

@rockstarjoe: Sold.

Gilbert

@Mayor McRib: Extremely well-put.

I use the very basic select/copy/paste features on my Curve often, but rarely use even the basic calculator.

But when I do procure my iPhone 3G, I suppose that in lieu of this very basic function I will simply make more of an effort to find the logs and squares of my future restaurant checks...

Gilbert

Does the iPhone crash? My BlackBerry Curve crashes. It locks up. Sometimes I need to pull out the battery and do a cold reboot.

Copy and paste is great. Not crashing is better. And for what it's worth, I don't know if BB OS 4.5 is any less crashy than 4.2 because it's vaporware.

And I don't give a damn about turn-by-turn. It's not iPhone iPhone; it's TomTom.

OMG! Ponies!

I bet they just can't figure out what gesture should highlight text. I vote for holding down your finger until the loupe appears, and the placing down a second finger and doing a two finger swipe left or right to highlight.

rockstarjoe

So copy paste technology takes way more resources than turn-by-turn navigation and office suite combined... but seriously you had a year to do copy paste and you didnt care, nice OS programing

purple_pillows

@Tek Elements: With all due respect, your company probably didn't have a $400 million weekend, so Apple might be doing all right setting priorities on their own.

jimothy

how about just regular old beaming of contact information, like the old Palms.... :)

drsphincter

You want a Mobile Office Suite?
It's called a laptop.

Although I think that copy/paste may have gotten mixed up on the list. I am sure it should have been much higher than say a scientic calculator? Don't get me wrong, the calculator is cool, but I would use copy/past even more.

Mayor McRib

... and how do we all rate the multi-tasking capabilities of the iPhone?

/what?

ANoel

Cut and paste is fine and all, but my contacts take forever to load.

And I don't even have that many, I sold all my friendships to pay for this phone.

leetXcore

Personally cut/copy/paste would save me way more hassle and time than turn by turn directions. I wish they'd hired my company to help with setting priorities for that list of dev projects. Of course a couple of companies will make more money off users if turn-by-turn directions goes live, not so much so for copy/paste. You think UI decisions are purely based on the user? Think again.

Seriously though, we do that kind of work. Just not for Apple (for now, anyway).

Tek Elements

That and the lack of a separate keyboard so you get more real estate to read what you're typing would probably lower the usefulness of a full blown text editor imho. You know I love these devices that try to do everything but I do wish that manufacturers would sometimes just go "No. This product is going to do a very short list of things but do them REALLY well." and leave it at that.

TheCyberBob

@GeekyNerdGuy: I reckon you're right.

itchytooth

Implementing a Copy & Paste system would mean having to create a clipboard system directly at the kernel. I could understand why Apple doesn't see that as a priority right now.

ripfire

@itchytooth: I think it's the apps more than the firmware. AIM, Remote, Twitterific, and Guitar Toolkit all seem solid. Everything else I've tried gets real freezy/crashy.

GeekyNerdGuy

How can copy and paste not be a priority on a smart phone? That's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. Hopefully, it'll "work it's way" into the next update. I'm happy with my iPhone but copy and paste should just be one of those expected features, especially for someone willing to give up their blackberry.

KeithJ

The App Store and the Crashing/Memory Leaks that are Windows Mobile are my main reasons for switching. They were so bad on my phone, that I am now paying about $20 more a month compared to my old plan on Sprint, just to get a phone that might actually make it through the day.

I was tired of fighting with WinMo, firmware updates, different apps, it was just a headache.

The iPhone apps sometimes crash, but less often, and I am giving them a break due to most of them being first release.

VulnoX

I couldn't have been happier. If Apple says, it must be true. Type on!!!

eismcsquare2

Why don't some nerds make a backround app to run a "copy and paste?"

gizmodohomepage

I got the 3g iPhone on friday and havent used the youtube app yet. Really don't have any interest in it. I only watch youtube clips when people send links to me

igneous

My BBPearl has copy and paste and i use it all the time to copy from email to planner. I'm surprised the iPhone has a calculator since they're taking simple tech out of the picture. lol

gizmodohomepage

Really? This isn't as high on the list as say... YouTube? Has anyone even used that app since the first week they had their phone? I'm sure there is a ton of highly useful code those engineers have written "for fun" but Steve doesn't think should be included. (ever read that book about the Newton?) It's already been coded. I don't think anyone needs an f-ing office suite on their phone but it would be nice to forward a text message to someone you left off the list! At the very least copy and paste it!

oliveboy

that may be the case, OR they just haven't found a simple enough way to implement it on the device yet... Something everyone pretty much wants is hard to believe they shoot it to the bottom of their list.

Gsnacks

@leetXcore:

I agree! I thought that it was just really glitchy on my phone. I noticed it initially when I was trying to use the letter quick-scroll (not sure what its actually called) on the right side of the screen, I thought it was just that feature was a little temperamental (It's actually fine.. provided contacts doesn't freeze up on me) but turns out contacts freezes a lot (I think I only have 200 or so contacts imported from Outlook?)

Oddly enough, it only freezes when I access the contacts app and not when I access it through the phone.

dwei

Further evidence that Apple doesn't understand the business customer...

wlovis

Cut and paste? Not a priority? I think you're right, @Primordial ... I think they'll come up with a Missing Features pack on the App Store for $40 a piece, including but not limited to Flash, Copy/Paste, Stereo Bluetooth, Disk Mode, streaming audio and video, Java, ...

Paul Dullford

Every good designer knows that you've got to live one irritating little flaw for the client/customer to bitch about and tell you to change, so they feel like they're important.

Besides, if they can keep the naysayers moaning about no cut/paste it keeps the spotlight off more serious issues -- like the current lack of iPhone optimized porn sites.

GeekyNerdGuy

Evolution/Open Office for iPhone?

TrafficGeek

You'd think a smartphone as "sophisticated" as the iPhone would have one of the most basic features in a typical smartphone, but I guess not. C'mon Apple, what are you thinking?

videoCWK

People, people...Apple is going to put the features that sell the phone, then later on once they have their 10mil phones sold they are going to give you an update with Copy/Paste, SMS, and Stereo Bluetooth for $20... of course.

Primordial

@rockstarjoe: I was about to say how dumb you were but then I thought about what you were suggesting and not a bad idea. I've been thinking of a 3 finger tap idea to put it into "Copy mode" then dragging a finger to highlight the text but you would need the loupe to see where the cursor was.

So for you sir I must yell an enthusiastic, "Brilliant!"

Late_Night

@igneous: I agree. Apple is just trying to blow off the cut/copy/paste feature...They should just go ahead and implement it already...

anti-hello-kitty

I don't understand why this is such a big issue. like the fact that the phone has GPS, WiFi, full browser, a simple/clean UI, a video/audio player isn't enough.

You want copy+paste? Buy a Macbook Air or a Palm Treo, the both weigh the same.

eddiearias

Off topic...but I read that ATT just like Verizon has a 5GB cap on their Unlimited data plan. If that's true how realistic is it to go over the cap with 3G and this new apps like MLB with video highlights, YouTube and so forth?

Primordial

@nychris: Is it beta? And if RIM did finally ship 4.5, they did a hell of a job of telling people about it.

OMG! Ponies!

@eddiearias:

It's sort of like how the Zune does quite a bit, but some point out that it doesn't have a clock.

Kyang

@OMG! Ponies! BB 4.5 OS vaporware? funny, I installed it on my BB 8800 2 weeks ago.......

nychris

@OMG! Ponies!: My iPhone3G has crashed/rebooted a couple times. Last night though, I turned on wi-fi and the screen scrambled and the vibrate function turned on. It stayed that way vibrating, scrambled screen, unresponsive buttons for 10 minutes before it finally rebooted itself.

3rd party apps are also pretty crashy. Not sure who to blame on those...

GenericWhiteGuy

@Primordial:

I have been using my iPhone for downloading apps, using YouTube, browsing the web, basically A LOT of stuff, since I picked it up around 1PM on Friday, and my current usage for data has been 2.6MB sent and 77.4MB received.

Some of the stuff I have done has been at home, or at places that have WIFI, which once you get an iPhone (I am just assuming you don't have one), you will find you use very often. Especially with how easily and quietly the iPhone hops onto WIFI networks.

I don't see the cap as being an issue, and I think I read somewhere its a pretty soft cap, meaning they won't shut you down right at 5GB.

Don't worry about it, I can't express how much I have been abusing the data connection on this lately, I am already at about 4 times my normal data usage from when I had my HTC Mogul for a whole month, so once things calm down (once I get over how awesome this phone is), it won't even be an issue.

VulnoX

In the whole time I have had a iPod Touch and now an iPhone, I never saw the need for a copy+paste function, EXCEPT the time when I wanted to mail some guys what my new phone number was... it was in my contact list in my iPhone, but I couldn't remember it.

So, I don't miss it, to be honest. Telephone numbers light up in Safari, e-mails...

And when I am typing a big essay I use my macbook.

But, I do think that Apple should implement one once there is a kind of Office App for the iPhone...

(gesture could be perhaps pinching (rather then zooming, reassigning the zooming function only to double tapping and stuff) or selecting the text, while holding one finger and 'pinch' to select the text you want to copy, letting go = submenu?

Paste = select where you want it, shake = paste?)

Neone

Yeah, this is a pretty disappointing response from Apple. I've been waiting for copy/paste for a long time. That, and a landscape keyboard whenever I tilt the phone.

Because of this lack of care for such basic features that are missing, I'm holding off on upgrading to the 3G model.

I hope that 3rd party apps can handle these features.

I'm waiting to see how the Garmin NuviPhone, as well as the Blackberry Thunder (Storm, or whatever) pan out. The HTC Touch Pro could be good as well.

iSmoteThee

@rockstarjoe: "I bet they just can't figure out what gesture should highlight text. I vote for holding down your finger until the loupe appears, and the placing down a second finger and doing a two finger swipe left or right to highlight."

Yo, dude, I gave that like a 5 second read and like 15 seconds of thought, and I must say, that is a GENIUS idea. I can't believe I didn't think of that shit. GENIUS!

TheSonOfKrypton

glossiness....is next to godliness.

silverghozt

But it's glossy!

Palestina

unbelievable.

at this point it's ludicrous that cut/paste is down on the priorities list. for a company that makes awesome products, apple can be incredibly infuriating. see also, non-removable battery, which is also retarded.

silverghozt

The defining iPhone scenario that underscores its two most basic missing features is:

A) you get an MMS message that includes a picture of some sort from a non-iPhone user. Since the iPhone doesnt support MMS, you get a (non-hyperlinked) URL to viewmymessage.com along with a username and password

B) You have to get a pen and paper to write down the username and password so that you can login to view the message.

Anytime a smartphone sends you running for pen and paper, thats failure. Seriously, even if they want to stand by their 'no-MMS' stance, at least send a link you can click on, that has the username and password passed in a hash or something. Making people visit a website that you have to use a complex id and pass that you cant copy and paste into the browser just seems like engineered cruelty.

pir8matt

@Kyang: To be fair, who has a Zune who doesn't have a cellphone?

@Gilbert: What are you people *doing* to your poor Curves? =( In the three months I've had mine it has yet to crash even once!

bluemonq

Yes, Apple also doesn't give a damn about MMS or video recording.

Apples philosophy lately has been somewhere along the lines of "We will tell you what you want and what you like and what you need and when you need it."

I am still baffled how Jobs proclaimed that Apple learned a lot from the first iPhone and MMS and copy and paste are not even in the 3G.

CutePuppyz

as it is, cut and paste would be the only way to get my Outlook notes into the fucking iphone. cutand paste is a fundamental part of an OS.. stupid elbastardos

Stacky Botrus

"lower on the priority list" becomes "They Just Don't Care."

I guess you never have had to prioritize anything in your life. Of course, if Apple would have waited until Copy and Paste was ready, folks would complain that Apple was taking too long.

Typical no win scenario for Apple -- people will find some reason to attack what they are doing.

mmeister

I agree with pir8matt. lack of mms is silly. It also needs to landscape every time you tilt the phone.

lack of cut and paste used to make me mad. But, maybe I am being reality distorted, I kind of stopped noticing. I mean...when do I have to cut and paste on my phone? Very rarely. And I do use my phone for more than just social stuff.

redkamel

@mmeister: Do you honestly think people would have attacked Apple for including copy and paste (not even cut!) over a scientific calculator?

bluemonq

Tell me if this wouldn't be a great idea for the copy and paste gestures.

1. Hold down finger til lupe appears
2. Press Home button with finger still on the screen. (which initiates highlight mode)
3. Now drag finger for the amount of text you want to copy.
4. Press Home button again to copy text to keyboard and exit highlight mode. (alert box can tell you that you did this correctly)
5. Next time you want to paste the text, double tap home button which will ask if you want to initiate your default Home button shortcut or paste the text that you have on your clipboard. Once the text is pasted, clear the clipboard so that the Home button can go back to it's default method of functioning. (whether you have it set to go to your homepage or to your favorites list)

I think this would be the most foolproof and easiest way to do it.

metalhaze

Leave it to Apple to take out the crunch out of a great product.

hisham

My approach for copy/paste (no cut):

Use current method of moving cursor with loupe and everything but draw a grey line under the text as the cursor is moved. To move the cursor just lift finger off screen as now, to select simply keep finger on screen and tap with a second finger to select then copy.

To paste simply hold until the loupe appears and tap with the second finger without moving.

Seems easy to implement and use to me.

sparx104

copy and paste is actually a pretty complicated thing to do. Especially when you start copying pictures, songs, pdfs, rich text, plain text, and whatever else from application to application. I understand that just having text would be nice but apple doesn't seem to want the phone to have any features that are much more limited than their desktop equivelant.

lladnar

@CutePuppyz: That's what good design is. You don't give the user everything under the sun. You make a bunch of judgment calls to get the feature list down to a number that allows you to build an elegant product. That's why there isn't a toaster built into my computer or a GPS unit on my desk fan.

Do I think cut+paste is a major oversight? Yes. Video and MMS? Hell yeah I want those.

However, the net result of all their decisions about features still turns out to be the best all-round mobile device out there, so you have to give them credit where credit is due. Blackberries have more features and are better for business, but for many, many people the iPhone is almost perfect.

If apple added all the "missing" features, you'd wind up with a bloated beast that was 10x more annoying to use and appealed to a minority of people (power users) while turning off the majority of people who just want something fun, easy and useful.

ppiddy

@jimothy:

Unfortunately Apple's stock price didn't enjoy the same success...

nickexperience

@rockstarjoe:
That's a nice idea and all... but did you test it before mentioning it? It's not as productive as you think. Once you put your 2nd finger on the screen... you block most of the text and it becomes very difficult to be precise on where to stop and get exactly the text you want to copy.

My suggestion is sorta like yours but makes it easier. Once the loupe appears... You tap with your second finger and that puts you into "copy mode." You release that finger and now you can use just one finger to highlight any txt. Once you have selected the txt you want... You tap that 2nd finger again and that releases you from "copy mode" and copies the txt.

Oh and by the way... Apple=Fail for thinking this is a low, low priority.

SkoGoody

fuck you apple. fuck you.

NateDiggy

How about this reason.

They're fuckin lazy.

All I hear is.. Oh, it's too hard, or we never got around to it.. Hallmarks of laziness.

Other companies can do it, why can't you?

KLanD

I bet you Steve Jobs owns some sort of sensible phone, like a Blackberry.

michaelleung

what the fuck is with all the "we want cut and paste"????The phone will already correct you on words u have already typed, and cut/past would involve highlighting as well, and that just would not work well. This is a much better addition. But..... why doesnt safari mobile work like regular safari where u just type in the website name without typing ".com" ?

tkohrs2002

@tkohrs2002: Cut and paste is not only for text, it's for files too.

KLanD