>I have a client who is interested in moving to using an IPad 2 for >some of his work. He travels frequently and spends many hours on a >plane. He is considering purchasing a dock/keyboard for the IPad so >he can write (MS Word) wherever he is in tight space. He would also >like to use the IPad for presentations and hooking it to an external >monitor and using PowerPoint. I bought the Apple freestanding wireless keyboard. Without that, the iPad would be useless to this fat-fingered speed typist, especially since the built-in virtual keyboard did not think we needed cursor keys (navigating within a word is almost impossible without the standalone). With it, it's kinda-sorta-almost good enough to use instead of a laptop (and even toting the keyboard, it's much more portable). > >I wanted to know if anyone is currently doing this and if there are >any drawbacks,issues (other than the small keyboard size)? The keys are pretty standard sized; there's just a lot less extra space surrounding them. And no number keypad, of course. Two issues to be aware of: First, the keyboard can turn on the iPad when you think it's asleep, and you can arrive somewhere with a lot less battery than you thought you had. And second, not all software supports it. DocsToGo is really weird, because it supports the keyboard in the spreadsheet and slide modules, but not for the word processor! What were they thinking? So I do my word processing in Pages, which is not my favorite interface. > My biggest concern is data transfer to and from the IPad. I know >that you can use Itunes to transfer data but I was curious as to >what other folks out there are using. My research on the web has >turned up that there seems to be some drawbacks to various forms of >transfer. I'm looking for thoughts and suggestions. To go from my Mac to iPad, I either e-mail myself the file or use Dropbox. To go from iPad to Mac, either Dropbox or syncing through iTunes (good to do once in a while so the software can update). Oh, and one other thing you should know: It can be really tough to select and copy text from a web page in Safari. It can be done (most of the time) but it's not intuitive and it's hard to control. > >I was thinking about ICloud. Can anyone comment on this service? -- _________________________________________________ Shel Horowitz - 413-586-2388/ shel at frugalfun.com -->Join the Business Ethics Pledge - Ten Years to Change the World, One Signature at a Time (please tell your friends) <http://www.business-ethics-pledge.org> Marketing consulting * copywriting * publishing assistance * speaking How to market ethically/effectively: http://www.frugalmarketing.com Ethics Blog: http://www.principledprofit.com/good-business-blog/ Books: http://www.frugalmarketing.com/shop.html _________________________________________________