Customer Reviews

iPhone for Work (Books for Professionals by Professionals)

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Supposedly this is not a book for just any iPhone user, it's for "busy professionals", meaning people who want to use their iPhone in their line of work. It covers the basics of iPhone in hardware and software, the built-in apps, getting additional apps, connecting to corporate email systems and more. For example, connecting iPhone to a corporate Microsoft Exchange system naturally takes up quite a bit of space, and if you use that technology at work that's a good section to read. The author has taken on a formidable task with big goals, and unfortunately I don't think he's quite accomplished what I think he set out to do. For example, chapter 16, "General business applications", starts on page 307 out of around 330 pages. That seems awfully late in a book aimed at business professionals. Another example, information about developing iPhone apps, occupies only two pages and consists mostly of a list of resources. I'm not saying there should be detailed information about developing apps, but surely it deserves more attention than that in a business-oriented book. The book was clearly written in the US primarily for a US audience, which shows in some sections, like maps, since in our part of the world (Middle East), getting directions with iPhone doesn't work. Overall, this book is a decent all-around introduction to iPhone for anyone who is just starting to use Apple's smartphone, but it falls short in the business aspect.

The aim of this book is definitely for those skeptics business users who just jumped from the Blackberry on the iPhone train, or they are thinking about it. Being an advanced user myself, I probably couldn't fully appreciate it, but I am sure that a not too tech savvy person who's more interested in getting the exchange service to work, will love this book. I will definitely lend this book to some of my friends who are still dubious in switching their company from a BB environment to an iPhone one. The only negative point (but being a printed book there's not a lot to do about it) is the third-party apps section, that because of the nature of the iTunes store. Even if only a smaller portion are quality business related apps, every day about 400 new apps appear in the Apps Store, so it's impossible to be always updated on the new apps and softwares.