The Inimitable Have Tex Blog

Still love it, and still use it a great deal. After living with it for a few months, some new thoughts:

– Best Albums is a great way to access Picasa Web Albums. I’ve recently added Picasa Tool to my Android phone, and an EyeFi SD card to my Digital SLR. Now I can upload all my pics over the air to Picasa, and access them from the iPad, which makes a great photo viewer. Maybe the lack of a card reader isn’t such a big deal after all.
– Bluetooth keyboard, I broke down and bought one. The onscreen keyboard, good as it is, is no substitute for the real thing. It’s a little heavier than my prior case, but means I rarely need my netbook on trips. Wish it had a scrollpad, it would be nice not to have to tap the screen to navigate, especially when filling forms that need scroll down. If the keyboard has a way of doing that, I haven’t figured it out yet, and, believe me, I’ve tried.
– Data on the go, customer calls me, needs a file I have on my server, go to iFiles, pick the file, choose send and either send it as a link or an attachment. Great when I’m out and about and the customer needs it right away.
– Data on the go, not on my server, remote into my desktop with Pocket Cloud, email the file, or upload it to server then email link.
– Travel apps, love Trip Advisor, helps me find hotels, restaurants, post reviews.
– Real estate apps, my wife and I are starting to look at possible retirement locations, Trulia and Realtor.com both have iPad apps that let you find property easily, map it out, and get a feel for what’s available. The open house feature on Trulia is cool, but often poorly maintained. The Realtor app has more complete listings, is more up to date, and has more sophisticated search criteria, but Trulia is more fun to use and manages pictures and map based searching better.

In the year since we started deploying cloud services to our customers a lot has changed. Here are some of the highlights:

- Mobile Access. When we started most access to cloud services was from a PC or notebook. Now access is frequently from a tablet or smartphone, so we’ve been spending a lot of time looking at viewers and editing tools that work on those platforms. iFiles for the iPad and iPhone is a great tool. If you need to edit, then QuickOffice works well.

- Data Security. So many sites have been hacked that people are much more concerned about security. We insist on secure access only, and deploy two factor security for those of our customers who wish it on Google Apps.

- Backup. We’ve focused on cloud backup, with local copies. Encryption in transit and at rest are important too. Egnyte is a great partner in this respect delivering all of that, plus mobile file access.

- Touch once, see everywhere. People won’t put up with doing things twice or more. A combination of IMAP and CalDAV let people manage mail and calendars once and be done. Send it from your phone and it’s in your Outlook sent folder. Set an appointment on your iPad browser, and it’s on your Android phone moments later.

- Cloud files, need to edit on your iPad and access later from your PC, that’s OK. Just need a little creativity to set up and it works fine.

- Business Apps. There are so many to choose from. Simple invoicing, accounting, CRM, industry vertical apps, you name them, they are out there. We often help our customers pick the apps that are right for them, then wean them off having us do all the setup!

So if you’re at the beach this summer and a little bored, check out some cloud apps from your iPad. I know I will, I burn easily so any excuse to stay out of the sun!

I’ve spent a lot of time and effort on Android. It’s a great operating system, I still love my Droid phone after eighteen months, and my Nook Color is a great e-reader, and, since the most recent update, a pretty decent tablet. I’ve also played around with other Android tablets in stores, including the Galaxy Tab and Xoom, but never felt the desire to buy one.

We recently acquired a customer that’s exclusively Apple, that I need to support remotely, without hauling my MacBook around. Apple launched the iPad 2, and Verizon had a bunch of 64GB gen1 wifi iPads for $500.00. As I already had a Verizon MiFi, I didn’t need a 3G version, so I grabbed one.

I was a little apprehensive about the price of iPad apps, and the lack of Flash for websites, but the app selection is truly amazing, and the quality is excellent. My iPad has become a constant companion. Here are some highlights:

• Email is a snap. Easy setup (much easier than Outlook, Mac Mail, or Android), and a great email client. I use my iPad to check mail more than any other device.
• Browsing, Safari is fine, but try Terra. It emulates Firefox and IE, and while it won’t do Java or Active X, it really works pretty well at giving the full web experience.
• Remote access, Wyse Pocket Cloud to access my PC, and Mac. On the PC it’s really intuitive,  lets me manage any desktop or laptop I put the (free) remote client on. Mac client is great when it works, but crashes a lot. It uses gmail for authentication, so you don’t have to poke holes in firewalls, or pay $15-20 per month per PC for the privilege. Once logged into my PC I can remotely support my managed service customers, anywhere I can get a Verizon signal. I also use iTeleport to support Macs, let’s me do anything on a Mac remotely, without the Pocket Cloud crashes, but Pocket Cloud is more intuitive when it works.
• Entertainment. Hulu Plus, Netflix, HBO GO, if that isn’t enough, you’ve simply got too much time on your hands. Streaming quality is great, and the iPad will give you at least 4 full length movies on a charge. You can do it 3G, but watch your data plan, and expect some “intermissions” for refilling the buffers.
• Books, iBooks, Kindle, Nook, what else do you need? Doesn’t do magazines though like the Nook Color.
• Music, iTunes, of course, plus Pandora, Amazon Cloud Player.
• News, all the major TV networks have apps. Special shout out for BBC, CNN and Pulse. Great interfaces and feeds
• Productivity. Quick Office. Is it everything you can get in MS Office, no, but what it offers for $15 is truly astounding.
• Cloud storage, you just have to try iFiles. I can access Google Docs, my Egnyte server, Dropbox, and lots of others right from iFiles. The built-in viewers are great. Now, if I could just get it to launch Quick Office instead of the viewers, I’d be all set.
• Games, wrong person to ask, but Angry Birds is fun, and I can feed my FreeCell addiction.
• Speciality interests. We have a bird feeder in the back yard, lots of entertainment. But if you want to know what the birds are, try the Audubon guides, $10-15 each or $30 gets all four. Great graphics, bird calls, and you can even record your own sightings.

Downers, there aren’t many but there are a few irritations:

• No multi-tasking. So when you click on the link in the email it launches the browser, so far so good, but it isn’t Terra, it’s Safari, and when you’re done, you have to relaunch email.
• No Flash. Apple has a large enough effect on the market that lots of sites with video/animation work, but not all, and it’s annoying when they don’t.
• No card reader/USB ports. You have to synch everything you want on it via iTunes. There are $50bn reasons why Apple wants it this way, but it still sucks!
• Too big/heavy. This is a little unfair, I like the large screen when I’m looking at email and web pages, but the thing is a pain in the ass to read books in bed. It’s just too cumbersome, and the darned screen keeps rotating when you try to get comfortable. I can’t get the screen lock to behave as I want.
• No keyboard, now I’m really being picky, but the on-screen keyboard is OK for short emails and doc edits, but a pain for creating copy. I’m tempted by a Zaggmate bluetooth Keyboard/Case combo, but as I told a buddy of mine, I already have a netbook .

So if you’ve been on the fence about an iPad, jump on in, the water’s fine.