Just About Managing

Mac and iPhone Application and Game Development

iPad Support in SimCap

With version 1.3 of SimCap we've added support for capturing movies and screenshots from the iPad Simulator which was introduced with the iPhone SDK 3.2 Beta. While we're happy with the way it currently performs — we wouldn't be releasing it if we weren't — there are a few potential pitfalls which you should be aware of.

iPad Video is Large

That lovely large screen on the iPad contains just over five times as many pixels as the one on the iPhone. This means that as you capture video from the iPad Simulator, SimCap is having to transfer and process over five times as much data as it does when it captures the iPhone. We've added a scaling option to help you keep your output movie files a more manageable size, but you might find that your system still starts to struggle a little while recording — especially if it's getting on a bit.

We'd therefore offer the same advice that any other maker of video capture software does: in order to preserve your system's performance while capturing, make sure you're running as few other applications as possible.

The ‘Little’ iPad Simulator

On systems with screens of less that about 1200 pixels high — which includes most portables — the iPad Simulator runs in a reduced, half-sized mode when in portrait orientation. This is a weird beastie, and no mistake. For instance, you'll notice that multi-touch in not possible in this mode, which means that SimCap will not be able to capture multi-touch gestures.

We have also experienced (very) occasional problems when switching between full-sized landscape and half-sized portrait modes. In effect, SimCap looses track of the Simulator and captures a blank rectangle instead of the screen. We're trying to nail down a good fix for this, but in the mean time you're best bet is to open up the Deferred Preview Window — which you can find under the Windows menu — and check that after you flip the iPad Simulator the image is still being correctly captured. If it isn't, simply rotating to landscape and back again usually does the trick.

It Says Beta Right There in the Name

But rest assured that we're working on these problems and hope to have them ironed out by the time the Beta SDK goes full release and the iPad itself is launched.