I think in the spirit of trying to make things work, and also challenging myself a bit, I’m going to try to use the iPad 2 as a writing/blogging tool as often as I can. Let this post serve as the first-ish example of that.
I say -ish because I’ve already done at least one or two with the iPad 2, but that was before. Now, I’m going to take it more seriously and consider it more of an experiment, or test , then I did before.
One of the first questions to ask when embarking on a journey such as this is do I use the built-in keyboard on the iPad 2 or do I use an external one? It’s an important question because, to be honest, my fingers do get kinda sore when using just the iPad 2’s touchscreen keyboard.
However, that may be more a function of the fact that by the time I start using the iPad I’ve already been typing for a few hours. Maybe my fingers would hurt no matter what? I suspect they would.
So, with that in mind I think I will try to use the touchscreen keyboard for now and see how it goes. I’ve got an extra Bluetooth keyboard I could use but that sorta defeats the purpose of using the iPad if you have the also lug around a keyboard.
At any rate, I’ll know soon enough if my fingers can’t take it and then I will consider other options. Fortunately, as I discussed in an earlier post, the rest of the writing/blogging experience shouldbe pretty good on the iPad 2.
I guess I’ll find out.
In case you’re the sort of person who likes to know the more technical, nuts and bolts kinds of things, I’m going to list the tools I will be using during this experiment. Here they are:
Apple iPad 2 (of course) – Apple’s device excels at so many things and has a battery that lasts a long time. It has become an indispensable part of my daily work (and fun).
Blogsy – This is the primary blogging app I’m using. It allows for complete control over posts and offers the ability to insert photos and video. Pretty much everything you need and pretty easy to figure out and use.
IResize – This is a great app that allows you to resize images to fit in a blog post or other writing. You can load any picture from your Photos on the iPad and change the size, resolution, etc. and then save the changed version for use in other apps like Blogsy.
IAWriter – This app let’s you get back to basics and just write. It removes distractions and lets you focus on the words. Plus, it syncs with Apple’s iCloud and its own OS X desktop version to allow you to work on whatever you want and have it available on the iPad or your Mac with whatever changes you’ve made already there and synced.
Other tools:
Pages – Appple’s own writing App is pretty good and I used it quite a bit before IA Writer and Blogsy came into the picture. Now I use it less frequently, especially as oit doesn’t support sync across the mobile and desktop versions using iCloud as IA Writer does. At least not yet.
FDX Reader – Sadly, my favorite screenwriting app Final Draft doesn’t have and iPad version yet. I’ve been assured one is on the way, but until then, I still need to use the MacBook Air when I want to write in Final Draft.
However, I can at least read scripts in Final Draft format (instead of PDF) on the iPad by using the terrific FDX Reader app. This app allows you to load scripts written in Final Draft and saved as .fdx files and view them in their native format. Very useful and saves you the time and effort of saving scripts as .pdf files plus if your a writer on the go or collaborating with another writer it also makes it easier to quickly review the current draft.
So, this is my challenge and those are the tools of choice. Of course, figuring out what you want to do and choosing the tools to accomplish a task is often the easy part.
The hard part is doing the actual writing. I’m goin’ in, wish me luck.