Category: Member

## Some F/U

In the [last iPad Report](https://brooksreview.net/2017/01/ipad-report-011617/), I talked about building a small app within [Workflow](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/workflow-powerful-automation/id915249334?mt=8&uo=4&at=1l3v36d). One of the issues I cited was the inability to pull from something like a `csv` for my lists, and instead needing to build the list again inside Workflow. As I feared, I was wrong and this can be done, it’s just that — like with most things Workflow — it’s rather opaque. (Workflow needs someone working there full time explaining how to build things, they would double their sales.)

Ari Weinstein (co-founder of Workflow) reached out to me on Twitter to tell me just how to do it. He provided [this sample Workflow](https://twitter.com/AriX/status/821074770141642752). The Workflow pulls from iCloud Drive and then parses the text file as a list (with new items being on their own line). This should be able to work with a `csv` too, but I’ve modded my `csv` too much to test, but I did try with a text file and it was magic.

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## Building an iOS Workflow App

One thing I used to do a lot on my Mac was to build small apps inside Keyboard Maestro which would help me accomplish really tedious shit. That’s something which is considerably harder to do on iOS — requiring you either use [Pythonista](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pythonista-3/id1085978097?mt=8&uo=4&at=1l3v36d), and thus learn Python, or use [Workflow](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/workflow-powerful-automation/id915249334?mt=8&uo=4&at=1l3v36d) and deal with a clunky UI and a limited tool set.

*I’m not bitter, I’m just disappointed.*

Still, I wanted to build one of these little apps this past week — both to see if I could actually build it, and secondly to help me out with a fun little idea I had. The idea was very simple: I have three different lists of things and I want to be given a random items off of the specified list. Nothing earth shattering, and something I could easily do on my Mac.

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## Drawing Apps

For a couple of months there has been one post I have been putting off writing, this post, about drawing/writing/note apps for the iPad Pro. One of my key uses of the smaller 9.7″ iPad Pro is as a writing tablet during meetings/calls/research — using it as stand in for my trusty Baron Fig.

I’ve tried many, but certainly not all, of the apps which could fit the bill as a sheet of paper for my Apple Pencil. To answer the immediate question as to which is best, all I can say is that it very much depends on what you want and need to do with these apps. Instead let me share thoughts on the apps I currently have on my iPad Pro:

– [Inkflow](https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/inkflow-visual-notebook/id519524685?mt=8&uo=4&at=1l3v36d): this app has some of the more compelling screenshots in the App Store, but it falls short of them in practice. The UI is clean and simple, and the icon is solid. The choices of writing tools is minimal, but still useful. I love how quickly the app launches and is ready to go, how I can easily add pages to any of the “books” the app uses to organize things. There is also not a lot of pressure sensitivity in the app, which is good if you don’t want to pay much attention, but bad if you want things to look nice. I look at Inkflow the same as I do a Field Notes: it’s not the greatest, but it’s really handy and holds a lot of random shit. Inkflow stays on my home screen as a tool to capture the random things you might find in my Field Notes.

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## I Can’t Use an iPad, But Thanks

Last week, I published [this article](https://brooksreview.net/2016/12/evovling-ipad-desktop-usage/) on the overall state of desktop iPad usage. The best part about publishing articles like this is fielding the myriad of questions which inevitably hit my inbox — while I can’t get to them all, I do try to read them all. Here’s the most common email/DM/tweet response I got:

> I do XYZ thing every day, and because of that it’s rather obvious I can’t use an iPad. I think iPads are amazing and I love to screw around on my iPad, but my Mac is essential. I wish I could use an iPad, but it’s just not an option for me/most people who aren’t writers.

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## App News Reading

A couple of months ago we moved into a new house, different location, different style, but more importantly for the purposes of this post: bigger, and two stories. Our old house was all one story and thus we couldn’t ever spread out very far from each other. In the new house, we can, and we do.

Practically speaking I knew this would be different, but I didn’t realize the impact it would have on my morning routine. That took over a month to settle in to something new, and now that I have — more than ever — it has become apparent to me how little I use my iPads in the morning.

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### Using the iPad Pro in Portrait

If you take a moment to think back to the first iPad, you might remember Apple shipping a keyboard stand accessory for it. *Macworld* has an [entire article](http://www.macworld.com/article/2984018/input-keyboards/apples-first-ipad-keyboard-and-the-power-of-the-portrait-display.html) about it, but the important part was that the stand *only* held the iPad in portrait orientation. I think that broke a lot of people’s minds at the time, mine included.

Many people speculated of iPads with dock connectors on both portrait and landscape — seems like such stupid speculation now, but at the time a lot of people would have put money on that happening. With the iPad Pro and the Smart Keyboard Cover, Apple changed things: making an iPad keyboard which *only* works in landscape.

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### Some Updates

This past week was a massively busy one for me, so today a little bit different of a format is needed. I want to update you on two of my latest adventures.

#### iPad Keyboard

I published my review of the Pok3r [here](https://brooksreview.net/2016/12/the-pok3r/), and in short it’s fantastic. If I am at home, and writing, you can be certain I am writing using the Pok3r. I could not be happier with this keyboard and even though I take a hit on battery life — it is all worth it.

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## A Year iPad Only

A little over a year ago, [I wrote in a post](https://brooksreview.net/2015/11/the-full-ipad/) about going to the iPad Pro as a full time computer and made this prediction:

> The iPad Pro right now might not be for you, but come this time next year, I am guessing we will be seeing a lot more people starting to shift their computing to iPads.

It’s now been that year, and I think you know where I am going with this — there has indeed been a lot more people picking up the iPad as either their primary, or only, computing device. Not the wave I had hoped for, but a far greater amount of people than my most pessimistic parts expected.

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### The Question

“So can you actually work from an iPad?” I hear that question a lot from friends and family, and I usually annoy them with my response. I respond with a version of “I only own iPads”. Which is my way of saying: yeah, I work only from an iPad.

It’s not the answer people want to hear though, what they want to hear is “you probably can’t” or “no”, and sometimes “yes”. Telling most people they can work from an iPad challenges too much of their knowledge about the way the world works, and they can’t easily grasp it. So telling them it’s not something they have to worry about, is the equivalent of the “it’s not you, it’s me” break up line.

Also it helps get you out of a series of questions if you respond they can work from an iPad: what about X, what about Y, what about Q, what about X but in E way? And on and on they go.

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This past Saturday I received the Pok3r mechanical keyboard for my iPad setup. My initial impressions of this keyboard are very high — I *think* this maybe the keyboard for my iOS setup. I’ll have more to report on this in the coming weeks, but I will say that my shift away from the Smart Keyboard to a mechanical keyboard seems to have been the right move on the surface of it. But also a costly one, as I am now trying to find out how to get one of [these keyboards](https://thevankeyboards.com/products/minivan-keyboard-kit?variant=23068593411).

On thing I do need to point about about the Pok3r is that it can be powered (with backlight) from of the non-powered USB Camera Connection kit. This greatly simplifies the setup and overall aesthetics of having a mechanical keyboard and iPad Pro.

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Welcome to the first of many, weekly reports on iPad Productivity — a new bonus for members of the site. First: thank you for being a member. Just the fact that one person, who isn’t my mom, is willing to pay to read my site is amazing.

### You Never Forget Your First Love

I’m afraid though, I have to jump right into the thick of it and address [this comment from Jason Snell](http://www.macworld.com/article/3140144/macs/what-the-touch-bar-tells-us-about-the-macs-future.html) — a comment I see all to often:

> Which is my way of saying, though the Mac will continue to evolve in the future, it may finally become irrelevant only when the iPad is capable of doing all the work people currently use their Macs for. And on that front, iOS still has a long way yet to go.

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