Back in October I purchased an application called Restaurant Reservations which provided users with an interface to select restaurants from the Open Table database and make reservations using Open Table's mobile web site. A couple weeks later that application was removed from the App Store.
Last week Open Table released its own iPhone application which you can download for free. It is a great application which makes it easy to locate nearby restaurants which have open reservation slots.
There seems to be a bit of a misconception in the reviews. People are expecting the application to work like the full web site. The iPhone application is designed to get you a reservation at the closest location based on your GPS/Cell/WiFi location or a location you enter. It then lists availability sorted by the establishment closest to you. This differs significantly from the web site which allows to search for establishment by different criteria, read reviews and once you select the restaurant you want, you then look for reservation availability. A few reviews also chided the applications for not providing directions, it does give you the opportunity to get directions via Google maps once your reservation is confirmed. And with the iPhone new firmware 2.2 Google maps allows you to choose directions by car, walking or transit which is great in the city...
You can argue one way or the other and Open Table should probably implement both work flows, but for now this is a very welcome application and it works well for me. I have placed it on the coveted first home page since I know I will use it often.
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