Still looking for a favorite Twitter app for the iPad? Me too. If you don’t need all the bells and whistles and fancy a simple and fresh looking Twitter client, you may want to give Tweet Flow a look.
Tweet Flow is not going to match up to the everything but the kitchen sink, feature-rich Twitter apps (for iPhone and iPad) like Tweetie, Twitterrific, SimplyTweet and so on. It is a much more basic client, but with a few nice new twists and a very different sort of look to it. It’s also an iPad-only and custom built for iPad app.
Here are some of its key features listed on its App Store page:
– Beautiful interface and easy to use.
– Background will change depending on the local time (day or night).
– Portrait and landscape mode.
– Auto refresh every 3 minutes.
– Displays the screenshots directly in the tweets.
– Profile pages have personalized backgrounds.
And here are my quick thoughts and observations after using the app for a few days:
Fresh Looking
The app is very different and fresh looking, compared to most I’ve used on the iPhone and desktop. Timelines feature tweets rendered at BIG sizes, with very ample spacing around them as well. So you get a big taste of the app’s light, airy backgrounds at all times.
Individual tweets resize on the fly as you scroll through a timeline – they get bigger as they approach the top of the timeline.
Pretty much everything is sized at ‘go large’ sort of level. Here’s a popup of an individual tweet when double-tapped:
You can choose a ‘Classic Scroll’ view in Settings within the app. This makes each tweet in timelines the same size and takes away the resizing of tweets on the fly, but still keeps the big theme and generous spacing between tweets. I’ve found I much prefer the default view.
Gets The Basics Done
Tweet Flow lets you do most common Twitter actions easily. You can: type out and post a new tweet in a nice big input area, reply to tweets, send DMs, see timelines for Public, Public Replies, and Direct Messages, view your Favorites and your own Profile.
The app uses different color schemes for the three main timelines. Here is the Public Replies view:
When you pull up an individual tweet from someone, right from the big popup box you can tap to: retweet, view their profile, reply, reply as a DM, or add to favorites.
When retweeting you get to choose whether you want to do so in the official style or use the ‘old school’ way.
Lots of Power User Stuff Is Missing
^^^^Gratuitous ‘showing off Brandon’s new app’ pic :)
If you’re a Twitter power user, this is not going to be the go-to Twitter app for you. Here are just a few of its limitations that I’ve come across:
— Only one account is supported
— Doesn’t show conversation threads
— There’s no easy way to go quickly to the top of a timeline if you’ve scrolled down a ways. Tapping the status bar doesn’t work. This is a very basic one that needs updating soon.
— No search ability.
— No Lists support.
— No ‘Refresh’ function – you have to wait for its 3 minute refresh cycle.
Overall
Despite being something of a Twitter power user (I have several accounts, have been using it for years etc), I like Tweet Flow quite a bit.
I can’t see it being my go-to Twitter app unless it seriously beefed up its features – but it’s different and fun to use on the iPad.
For Twitter users with just one account and no great need for some of Twitter’s advanced features, I think this a very nice client for the iPad. And it’s free for now as well.
You can find Tweet Flow in the App Store now – and again, it’s a free app.
© patrickj for iPad Insight, 2010. |
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