We like the clipboard motif, although you can choose two others.

Bento for iPad can't sit in just one box; it's both a complementary tool for the like-named Mac database and a stand-alone app. As a Mac Bento extension, the iPad version syncs those records so that you can interact with data anywhere. As a stand-alone app, Bento lets you craft databases from scratch--or with built-in templates--without ever touching a Mac. However you use it, iPad Bento lacks a few key features of the Mac edition. But the portable Bento includes nearly every basic function. Combine those basics, and you can create sophisticated ways to manage and review information.

Bento for the iPad is more about the data than formatting databases. While its layout looks clear, you'll see everything in an entry as a long list. You can hide fields that aren't important and change their order, but we wanted the app to take better advantage of the generous screen size, such as supporting multiple pages for a single entry or horizontally arranged fields.

At least Bento supports many common media formats. So you could tap a video within your recipe database to watch a cook's technique, view images embedded in records, or listen to audio clips. This can help add interest to entries; for example, we included photos of bathroom fixtures in a home-renovation database. But in some situations, such as instructional videos, this flair is even more functional. Most major formats are supported, but PDFs, strangely, are not.

You can choose to create databases with only the iPad, including tapping into 25 templates. These can help get you started building a to-do list, keeping detailed contact entries, cataloging your belongings, and more. Bento can even reference Address Book entries, send email, load web pages, and perform a few other tricks to harness power from other apps.

But Bento succeeds most as a mobile extension of the full, Mac version. In that case, synced databases retain calculations created on the Mac, iTunes-esque "Smart Collection" sorting, and other additions. (You can't create those functions directly on the iPad.) Without those tools and a more versatile layout, this isn't quite the portable, feature-matching, direct Bento translation we had hoped for.

 

Bento for iPad omits a few important features and doesn't take enough advantage of the screen size. But the productivity-driving database software's soul is intact; Bento still catalogs and sorts data in ways that can organize your world.

Bento for iPad 1.0
COMPANY: Filemaker
CONTACT: www.filemaker.com
PRICE: $4.99
REQUIREMENTS: iPad; iPhone OS 3.2 or later.
Works well as a stand-alone database builder. Carries synced Bento data anywhere. Organizes nearly anything. Directly displays web pages and media files.
Can't interact with or display iCal events and to-do lists. Can't display PDFs. Limited layout options. Synced databases retain data only, not formatting.