Kayak and Mobiata transitioned their iPhone apps to the iPad and in the process both companies realized that developing iPad apps involved more than a quick revision or two, and provided some relative design freedom.
Kayak's free flight-search app for the iPad enables users to simultaneously view airline results, filtering tools and search histories, but lacks certain features of its iPhone apps, including hotel and car rental search, which the company says will be forthcoming.
Kayak Chief Architect Bill O'Donnell notes that it is more difficult to adapt a user interface from an iPhone to an iPad than it is from an iPhone to an Android phone or even to transition a UI from a desktop application to a Web app.
"The iPad has 5 times the number of pixels of an iPhone, and you really need to fill them in some way that makes sense to the user, is engaging and attractive," he says.
In some ways, Kayak felt it had a lot more creative freedom in developing the iPad app than it did for the iPhone.
"When we made our iPhone app, we had to scrunch our brains into a tiny 480x320 box, and hundreds of decisions were driven by this constraint," O'Donnell recalls. "Since the constraints no longer exist on the iPad, almost all of those decisions become wrong. Way wrong.
"So we really had to design another app, almost from scratch. This is why the iPad app is flights only for now, because it was just too much to rethink a year's worth of work in 60 days."
Hence, Kayak intends to rapidly roll out new features for its iPad app, including car and hotel search, as well as Kayak Trips.
And, O'Donnell confirms that Kayak is "hard at work" developing a much-anticipated mobile-booking capability, which could turn the traditional metasearch referral-only model on its head, in some respects.
Meanwhile, Mobiata, which focuses on developing mobile apps, unveiled its FlightTrack and FlightTrack Pro for the iPad. They can be downloaded for $4.99 and $9.99, respectively. (Incidentally, FlightTrack Pro syncs with TripIt itineraries.)
Mobiata President Ben Kazez says reformulating its iPhone apps for the iPad allowed the company to give users the ability to track an unlimited number of flights simultaneously.
"The huge multi-touch screen gave us a new design opportunities, which we really leapt on in creating FlightTrack for iPad," Kazez says.
Kazez says Mobiata had to gauge how to incorporate new animations into its apps for the iPad and "support for all device orientations -- even upside down."
"I think the lesson others could learn is that when developing [apps] for an emerging device, it is really more than putting a new 'skin' on an existing app," Kazez says. "Whether for travel or any other domain, developing an app for a new device requires a substantial amount of rethinking, considering the possible use cases and contexts."
Like Kayak, Mobiata readied its iPad apps for the iPad debut April 2, but plans on rolling out new features for upcoming releases.
Lonely Planet, too, introduced an iPad app, timed to coincide with Apple's launch of the new device.
Get ready for a slew of new travel-app launches for the iPad in the coming weeks and months.
In the interim, it doesn't hurt to chime in with a user review on iTunes about your favorite iPad app, as Kayak chief technology officer and co-founder Paul English did on April 3.
Under the headline, "Rock and roll," English wrote about the Kayak iPad app:
"This is the best app for the iPad.
"And the best travel app ever written. The coders behind this travel app include video game developers, musicians, a rower, a lock picker and a chief architect who can do 20 pull-ups:)
"OK, I'm the CTO of Kayak but I get no credit for this app."