WritePad, an app from Phatware, is available for US$9.99 at the App Store.

What good is a pad if you can't write on it?

Although the iPad has the word "pad" in it, it isn't the kind of pad that recognizes handwriting, at least not out of the box. That technology can be added to the tablet, however, with software like Phatware's WritePad ($9.99).

The handwriting recognition of WritePad isn't perfect. In fact, it's not even as good as Dragon's speech recognition for the tablet. Nevertheless, the app fills a need. You can't always talk to your iPad because of environmental conditions. By the same token, there are situations where it's easier to write on the iPad than type on it.

With the recent release of version 4.0 of the software, an input area has been added. It looks like a portion of a yellow notepad and appears where the virtual keyboard pops into view on the iPad's display.

You can "write" in the input area with your finger or a stylus. I found the WritePad much friendlier to stylus input than digit doodles. My stylus of choice was the Pogo Sketch because its length is more comfortable for writing than some of the shorter sticks in the market.

Friendly Toward Mixed Printing

You can write in the program in either cursive or single-letter printing. If you print your letters, Phatware recommends choosing the "separate letters" option for the software. Of three writing styles -- cursive, block print and upper- and lowercase printin g-- I found the program's highest accuracy came with upper- and lowercase scribbles.

When using the input window, you can erase what you've just written by hitting the backspace button. That makes erasing cursive words easier than printed words because only a single printed character can be erased with a single backspace poke, while a whole word can be eliminated if it's scribbled in cursive.

As you finish writing a word, the program's best guess as to what it is will appear as text in a field above the input area. If the app guesses wrong, you can tap the text and a window will pop up giving you a set of choices for the text. Sometimes, though, none of the choices match your intended word and you just have to erase it and write it again. Worse, though, even when the correct word appears in the field, the software sometimes changes it to something else before you finish the phrase you're writing in the input area.

In Shorthand

Above the input area, you're given a set of tools for modifying what you write. There's a period key for punctuating sentences and calling up a menu of symbols, a blank key for erasing everything in the input area, a backspace key for erasing your last scribblings in the area and a return key.

If you have text in the input area, poking return will transfer the text to the document you have open. Each time you hit return and text is in the input area, the words are added at the point of the cursor in the document. That means you don't have to finish a sentence before you finger return. If there's no text in the input area, the return will advance the cursor to the next line in the document.

There's also a shorthand soft button in the tool set. When it's poked, a list of shortcuts appear that can save you pen strokes. Choosing "addr" from the shorthand menu, for example, will insert a name and address into a document.

Shortcuts can be created by selecting text on the screen and holding your finger on it. The cut-copy-paste menu will appear with a new addition that lets you create a shortcut.

In addition to user defined shorthand, there is a set of predefined shorthand shortcuts. They allow you to perform tasks -- like cut, copy and paste -- and insert items like dates, URL boilerplate (ftp://, www., .org) or even access the iPod's email program.

A New iPad Dimension

Sandwiching documents in WritePad are a pair of toolbars. The top bar has tools for managing documents, emailing them from inside the program and sharing them with other iPads using your network. It also toggles full document view, the input window, the keyboard and full screen input.

With full screen input you can write anywhere on the screen. Functions like erase and return are performed with finger or stylus strokes. I found that input method required a level of sweat equity that made it very undesirable compared to the intuitive input-window interface.

The software's bottom bar has tools for undoing and redoing actions; invoking the spell checker; toggling recognition mode among mixed capitals, numbers and spaceless Internet text; search; translate document into a foreign language; send mail and settings access.

As imperfect and sometimes challenging as WritePad is, it gives the iPad a dimension that can't be found in the tablet out of the box. It truly puts the "pad" in the iPad.