iPad on the road, by Emily Winslow
I’m on the road right now, doing everything I can in my book’s first month to nudge it along. I’ve been VERY lucky that it’s been front-tabled in Borders. I’ve been doing events at various indies, and am meeting with book clubs too, which is a real pleasure.
I didn’t want to lug my laptop around with me; it’s too precious and fragile. So right now I’m typing this on an iPad.
We got an iPad because my sweetheart is a gadgety guy. I don’t think he could not have one. Our excuse was that I needed it for the photos I showat events. We’d compared all kinds of photo frames, and the iPad does that job a lot better: great resolution, doesn’t need to be plugged in. And it’s a multi-use laptop replacement! Sort of.
It’s kind of driving me crazy.
Okay, this what I love:
It shows my pictures great.
It lets me keep up with Facebook and gmail and my blog (http://emilywinslow.wordpress.com).
I really need to be in contact with people, coordinating all these travel and event plans, and I can do it in a portable way. In case you’re wondering, a touchscreen keyboard pops up onto the screen whenever the need for typing arises. It’s fab.
But the keyboard lacks:
Arrow keys!!!!! Moving around in the text without typing depends on touching the text with your finger–which is fine, if the text is showing. Sometimes the text is bigger thethe window, and there areno scroll bars. I still haven’t figured out how to cope with this.
It also lacks a keystroke for “paste.” When you touch your text a certain way, you get the opportunity to “copy” it. I cannot figure out how to paste it anywhere.
I’m so crazy-busy that I haven’t tried it as an ereader yet. But if I was choosing an ereader, multi-use would sure be tempting to me.
Conclusion: I’m glad I have it; it’s better than lugging around my laptop.
I don’t know how easily I’ll be able to view this post fully or get around it to edit it. So I guess the typos herein will be part of the review in their own way!
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