Amazon.com has said all along it plans to release a Kindle application for Apple's new iPad, even as it battles Apple for dominance in the young electronic book market. Amazon has a web page up promoting its upcoming Kindle app for tablet computers, including the iPad, though the company doesn't say exactly when the app will be available.

The New York Times reports Amazon was not given an iPad for testing, indicating the app may not be ready for release right away when the iPad launches April 3.

From the Times:

“We have actually developed a tablet-based interface that redesigns the core screen and the reading experience,” said Ian Freed, vice president for Kindle at Amazon. “Our team had some fun with it.”

The Kindle app for the iPad, which Amazon demonstrated to a reporter last week, allows readers to slowly turn pages with their fingers. It also presents two new ways for people to view their entire e-book collection, including one view where large images of book covers are set against a backdrop of a silhouetted figure reading under a tree. The sun’s position in that image varies with the time of day.

Amazon says the Kindle app for tablet computers "will include Whispersync technology, which automatically synchronizes your last page read, bookmarks, notes and highlights across your Kindle and Kindle compatible devices including PC, Mac, iPhone and BlackBerry."

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