Ease into the Switch

Is it possible for someone to use an iPad as their only computer? The short answer is “yes!” The longer answer is that all of the information we have about the iPad right now is still preliminary. Based on my current analysis I cannot see any reason that someone couldn’t use an iPad as their only computer.

But would you want to? Like any computer, it depends on what you’re going to do with it. Are you the type of person that mainly checks email and browses the web? The iPad is probably the best computer for you – I can’t imagine a better browsing experience on any other computer that is currently available. And, of course, you can download music, TV shows, movies, books, apps, and more directly from the iPad.

Likewise, people that are roadwarriors would also be well suited with the iPad. They get great browsing and email plus a very nice way to manage their contacts and what looks like the best user experience ever for keeping a calendar on a PC. Roadwarriors will also benefit from great prices on 3G cellular data service for the iPad and a computer that is always connected.

Of course there are people that can’t use an iPad as their only computer – for now. Some tasks people use their computers for are currently too complex for the iPad. For instance, graphic designers that use applications like Photoshop need to also have a Mac. Software developers need to stick with a PC that runs their developer tools. People with large music or photo libraries need more storage than the iPad currently allows. And people that edit photos or videos on their computer can’t make the switch. But, a lot of people don’t use their computers for any of that. And for those people, the iPad may be the perfect computer.

You’re probably thinking to yourself “why would anyone want to use an iPad as their only PC?” Because it’s better for them. It’s easier to use. They’re directly manipulating the interfaces instead of through two layers of abstraction – the mouse and the pointer. The screen is filled with the activity they want to focus on. They don’t need to bother with where to store files or how to install or remove applications. As easy as that is on a Mac, it’s easier on the iPhone and iPad. And they absolutely do not need to worry about any sort of system maintenance for the iPad like they do with their PC regardless of whether it is a Mac or runs Windows.

That said, there are a few questions that I have about the iPad when it comes to trying to use it as your only computer. I’m going to leave them in this article as open questions about the iPad and as I gather the answers I will write them up here.

Can it print?

Is there a way to backup the iPad other than syncing with iTunes? Will a Time Capsule work?

How well does the photos app work at cataloging photos imported directly into the iPad from a camera or SD card using the Camera Connection Kit? Can you touch-up your photos?

Retouching photos is something that can be easily added by a third party app since they all have access to the photo library.

Can you initially setup an iPad based with content and settings from your previous computer as you can with a Mac?

Can it sync with an iPhone or iPod?

Can it update its own OS without being connected to another computer?

It’s not an obvious feature of Mail, but it does support rules in a way that is similar to Microsoft Outlook. You can use rules to process messages as they’re received. This is very helpful for moving messages to a folder to get them out of your inbox, but still reserve them for reading later.

It’s easiest to create a new rule by selecting a message that is like the kind you’ll want the rule to automatically handle in the future. For instance, you may want electronic statements that you receive to all be moved to a new mailbox. First choose New Mailbox from the Mailbox menu and name it “Statements.” To set up a rule to move statements there, select one of the them. Then go to Preferences from the Mail menu in the menu bar.

The Rules tab of Mail’s preferences window

Select the Rules tab on the far right-hand side of the window. Choosing the Add Rule button will slide a sheet down from the preferences window. By default you’ll see one condition that specifies Any Recipient Contains something that is probably your e-mail address or whichever one appears on the to line of the currently selected message. You can work with this condition and add others. But, for the purpose of my example, let’s change the first part of this condition from Any Recipient to Subject. The text box will switch to the subject from the currently selected message. In my case, this is “Time Warner Cable Bill Statement” which is perfect but in some cases it may make sense to trim this text down to catch all the messages you intended. By the way, having this text box pre-filled is the reason you want to select an example message before setting up your rule. Selecting the right message first eliminates the need to type the values you want the rule to operate on in most cases.

The sheet used to create or edit rules

To finish setting up the new rule, specify the action you want performed. We want to move these messages to a “Statements” mailbox, so select it from the mailbox pop-up menu. Don’t forget to give this rule a description that will remind you exactly what it is for. Now choose OK and you’re done. Mail will ask you if you’d like to apply this rule to existing messages – you should, unless you have a good reason not to.

To confirm that it worked, simply go to the newly created mailbox in the left-hand pane of the Mail window and look at the messages that were moved. From now on any new messages matching the condition you set will be moved to this folder.

If you have other messages that you’d like to perform some sort of action on when you receive them, try setting up a rule for them now. The example I provided above is one of the more common actions. There are several others and you can even create custom actions via AppleScript to get really fancy.

There is a Mac-equivalent of the popular Windows command Ctrl-Alt-Del that is often lovingly referred to as the three finger salute. You just don’t have to use it anywhere near as often. If one of your applications isn’t responding, you can bring up its contextual menu in the dock by either right-clicking, control-clicking, or click-and-holding (clicking down on the mouse, but not up until the menu appears) on its Dock icon. This will allow you to choose the Force Quit command to… well, force the application to quit. But, there is another way as well.

Select any application and press the Force Quit button

You can also press the Command-Option-Escape keys on the keyboard to bring up a Force Quit Applications window. From this window, you can select the application that isn’t responding and press the Force Quit button. Pressing Command-Option-Escape again while this window is front-most will force the Mac to restart.

Taco Loco is an app that finds mobile taco vendors near you. Taco Loco locates taquerías without a permanent address such as trucks, carts, and stands – they often have the most authentic flavors. Simply fire up the app on your iPhone or iPod touch, and you’ll immediately see nearby taco trucks on the map.

If you haven’t already downloaded Tweetie 2 for your iPhone, you really need to. The second version of Tweetie brought with it a seriously refreshed user interface and reworked code behind the scenes. It brought all of the features you may have wanted from other Twitter apps (like being able to see previously refreshed tweets without a network connection as Twitterrific does) to the blissful Tweetie user experience. But, Atebits stepped it up a notch and made Tweetie fully persistent. Almost no matter what you were doing when you quit Tweetie, when you restart it later you’ll be at the same screen as if you never left.

Tweetie 2.1 just hit the App Store and has added support for native re-tweets, geolocation (on a per tweet basis), and lists. The best Twitter client just got better.