Holiday reflections

Posted by MadaboutDana
Dec 29, 2014 at 01:52 PM

I’d entirely agree with Stephen that the most sensible solution to Franz’s dilemma is an external keyboard. I’ve been using a Logitech keyboard with my iPad 2 for years, and it has revolutionised my writing life when I’m out and about. Santa has now given me a brand spanking-new iPad Mini Retina for Christmas, so I’ve turned to a Logitech K810 multi-device bluetooth keyboard, which allows me to use both my iPads simultaneously. The keyboard supports up to three devices, each with its own dedicated Bluetooth key, so I’ve got my iPads linked to keys one and two, and my iPhone linked to key three. Geek heaven! (Although now that, thanks to Apple, I can use my iPads to answer my phone and send SMS messages, I don’t really need to connect the iPhone at all!) Two iPads together still weigh less than most notebook computers, and if you use a battery-powered portable server (e.g. a SanDisk Connect wireless drive, but there are many others out there), you can exchange data between the two devices very easily. Some apps also run their own WiFi servers: Notebooks, for example, has a very acceptable WebDAV server built in!

But exchanging data between iPads isn’t really the point. I now use my very slow iPad 2 (stupidly, I upgraded it to iOS 8.1.2, which has slowed it down significantly) almost exclusively as a reference machine, on which my various dictionaries and document repositories (including my FoxTrot index) reside. The iPad Mini 2 is rapidly becoming my main writing machine - ridiculous, you will cry, it’s only got an 8-inch screen! Yup, but it’s such a good screen you honestly don’t notice when you’re typing away in one of the many extremely capable iOS writing apps (my current favourites are 1Write and Editorial, although there are various others like OmniOutliner that occasionally surge to the front of the field). And it’s very quick, too. And I asked kind Santa to gimme a device with 32GB of memory, which IMHO is now the bare minimum for an iOS device.

I use rotating cases with both machines, allowing me to position them in either portrait or landscape positions. When I first saw these things, I thought they were ridiculously cumbersome and silly. But such is the competition for iPad accessories that there are now whole ranges of modern rotating cases that are extremely light, well-made and inexpensive. I put my Logitech keyboard in its own case, and carry the whole lot in an ultralight backpack (actually dating from the time I still used my beloved AlphaSmart Dana – a much better option for typing, incidentally, than a Psion Netbook, interesting though the latter are. You can still obtain AlphaSmart Danas on eBay – they run PalmOS and can host up to two SD cards; they also have WiFi). Many a happy hour has been spent in Starbucks, meetings and other venues typing away on my iPad 2. I’m looking forward to enhancing the experience with my iPad Mini 2!

There’s a significant market niche here for somebody, incidentally. The first person/company to design a sleek, elegant iPad case that can house two iPads plus a Bluetooth keyboard will probably make a fortune, mainly from pretentious businesspeople like moi… It would probably have pockets for the very latest, state-of-the-art styluses and battery chargers, and possibly also for wireless servers, MiFi devices (which I also use, and in fact can be used as wireless servers with SD cards if you’re not too fussy about security), etc. And still not weigh much more than a standard notebook!

Cheers!
Bill