Apple launches Infinite Notepad app for sharing with 100 friends [이앱!]

[이데일리 김혜선 기자] Recently, Apple added a new collaborative Converse app, Freeform, while rolling out an update to its latest operating system, iOS 16.2. The ‘Basic App’ created by Apple is famous for its excellent intuitiveness and solid foundation. Freeform has also been rated as well done since the beginning of its release.

On the 13th (local time), Apple announced the release of Freeform through the newsroom. In a word, it’s a ‘shareable whiteboard (between Apple users)’. You can write with your finger or Apple Pencil, and you can attach a notepad. Various arrows are also supported to show the relationship between each item during brainstorming.

There are also various file formats that can be uploaded by Freeform. You can use photos, videos, audios, documents, PDFs, website links and map location links, and you can freely use more than 700 built-in shape tools. You can also annotate what you wrote in the free format.

The most powerful feature is the “collaboration” feature. Freeform can collaborate with up to 100 contributors. Whiteboards can be shared with colleagues in real time and can be synced to MacBooks or iPhones via iCloud. You can even have facetime video calls with collaborators while you draw on the whiteboard.

◇ I did it myself, even across the Pacific ‘Real-time connection‘

If you open the Freeform app and create a new whiteboard, a vast whiteboard will appear. The hand-drawn memo app runs with a fixed horizontal and vertical size, but Freeform lets you continue your thoughts endlessly up, down, left, and right.

There are a total of five tools that can input information on the whiteboard: pen, notepad, figure, text box and file input. The pen tool is divided into text writing, writing, colored pencil, crayons, paint, eraser and selection tools. You can also drag the three-dot menu to position the pen tool where you want it.

In the case of a notepad, you can enter text or handwrite with a pen on it. The best part is that you can copy a notebook “style” and apply it to other notebooks. If you hit the three-dot menu, you can copy the style (background color, font size, etc.) applied to the notebook and apply it to other notebooks as-is. You can use the “Lock” function for the finished notebook.

The shape tool provides quite a few shapes by default. Basic shapes like rectangles, rounded rectangles and circles can be easily adjusted to roundness corners with your fingers. Also, you can add shapes from various categories like geometry, object, animal, nature, and food. The element that will probably be used the most in the figure tool is the ‘line’. You can specify multiple styles, such as circles and arrows, or change them to dashed lines. You can also draw broken lines connecting each element.

However, it was a pity that various fonts could not be applied. Only basic, Gothic and Myeongjo fonts can be used.

In the case of inserting files, live linking has not yet been applied quickly. The reporter tried Freeform with an acquaintance in Vancouver, Canada. Other tools, like stickers, shapes, and pens, showed up in real-time whenever the other person edited them, but the photo didn’t load with the “Add Image” message.

On the other hand, Freeform can export the created board as a PDF. Pages are exported as one sheet, not split. In the case of a video, the first image was output as if it were a photo.