More on my iPad experiences

Posted by jamesofford
Jan 3, 2013 at 08:07 PM

Good afternoon everyone:

I hope that everyone has had a good holiday season.

As you will recall, I bought an iPad a while back and solicited suggestions as to what software to load onto it. I thought that I would give a brief update, and also get some feedback from the group on a couple of things I am thinking of buying.

I now have loaded on my iPad the following:

Magicalpad-an outlining, notetaking app. It is nice for a variety of reasons, one of them being that like Onenote on windows, you can start typing anywhere on the page. Unlike Onenote, the ability to link these notes together is pretty good. Either by dragging them together into an outline, or using the mindmap component of the app to link them. It is my go-to notetaker on the iPad.

Papers-a program for organizing pdfs from the scientific literature. Works great, and it is where I read the pdfs now. No more printing.

Evernote-nice place to put stuff, links to my copy on my mac and on the net.

Mr. Reader-an RSS reader. Links to Google reader. This works very nicely. I had Reeder on the iPad, but I don’t like it as well as Mr. Reader.

Readability-I love this. Anything that I want to read other than scientific literature that will take some time gets shunted into here.

ICabMobile-a web browser. I had been using Safari, but some of the stuff that I have gotten used to doing in Firefox on the mac didn’t work. ICabMobile fits my workstyle better, and it has a bookmarklet already set up to send things to Readability.

Goodreader-this is a great PDF reader. Anything that I read that is a pdf but isn’t a scientific paper gets read in here. It integrates well with cloud services. I store my pdfs for Goodreader in Box.net

Box.net-My university gave me 50 gigs of space on Box.net. The iPad app works pretty well. As an aside, I also have iCloud space and space in Skydrive. If anyone knows about software like Primadesk or Otixo which runs on the iPad and puts cloud storage together, let me know.

Kindle-I have switched over from my Kindle to the iPad as my e-reader of choice. The iPad is heavier than my Kindle so a bit ungainly to use. However, the retina display is very easy to read. I haven’t tried it out in the sun(This is Michigan in the winter-we might see some sun soon, but I wouldn’t bet on it.)

Pocket Informant-Excellent calendar program. I used it back when it ran on Pocket PC, and it has only gotten better. I have several different calendars that I need to be able to see. My own, the calendar for meetings in the lab, equipment signup calendars-all of these at the University are hosted on Google Calendar, and Pocket Informant connects in to each of these with no problem. On my Mac I use Busycal and the two talk to each other well.

I also have iBooks and Newstand for reading other things.

So, I have most things covered.

I still don’t have an outlining program that I like. Magicalpad is a good note-taker, but it doesn’t do what I want it to do as an outliner. I mentioned the other day that I was trying out Neo on the mac, and didn’t really like it. I have since invested in Omnioutliner on the mac, and I like it. As we all know, it has some issues, but it works for me. Now, what to use on the iPad to link to it? The obvious choice is Omnioutliner for the iPad. However, I have read some things about Omnioutliner on the iPad that give me pause. Anyone out there have an experience with it that they would like to share? How well does it work on its own? How well does it sync with the software on the Mac? Anything else you can think of?

Finally, I am a big user of Devonthink on the Mac. It is my go-to place for storing stuff that I need to keep. Evernote works too, but I have gotten hooked on Devonthink Pro Office. Has anyone used Devonthink to go on the iPad? How well does it work with Devonthink on the Mac? Should I just start moving stuff over into Evernote? It’s the start of a new year-I can start the new year out in Evernote, but would like to know about Devonthink to go.

As another aside-I have read many postings here and on other sites complaining about the expense of apps for the mac and for the iPad/iPhone. I find that kind of amusing. Yes, some of the software on the app store is more expensive, but Omnioutliner Pro is only $69.99 on the app store, and with the university discount I got it for $49.99. I remember when software cost in the hundreds of dollars. Yes, $49.99 or $69.99 is a hunk of money, but you get a lot of power for that money.

Jim