During the early days of iPad there were at least 10 reasons for not buying one. By December the utility of the iPad was already established and the only reason advanced for not buying an iPad was that an iPad 2 was in the making. April 2011 was the purported release. But here was my brother ordering one for me for my May birthday. Who am I to complain? He spent 700 Canadian dollars for the gadget including the 4 apps I asked him to preload. I told myself I am going to take this Apple product for a spin.
This is now the middle of March. The iPad 2 went on the market on March 11. I am both sad and happy. My iPad is already obsolete but I found that the iPad is a game-changer for me. When I was in law school during the first semester of 2010 I would lug at least 2 big law books each day. I did not attend school in the second semester due to my new responsibilities at work. But now that I have settled to the routine, I'll be going back to school next semester. But instead of my printed books, I will be carrying my iPad.
I have GoodReader for reading my pdf books. And I can annotate on the fly with it. For my note taking I am still weighing between the NoteTaker and NotesPlus . NoteTaker can annotate pdfs and e-mailing the result is very easy. I like the recording facility of the NotesPlus. Altho I am not yet sure if it can record clearly from the back of the class where I usually sit.
The new update of NoteTaker, which was not there when I first tried my hand on it, now allows me to use the keyboard for making notes. I downloaded the income tax return form from the BIR; opened it in NoteTaker, filled up a few boxes as a test, then e-mailed it to my Yahoo. Presto, I could print it on my networked printer. I could even affix my signature while in NoteTaker.
I think I could do the printing directly with AirPrint. But there was a little problem at the time. I'll work on it next time. I tested AirPrint before in Pages and it worked.
With voice recording, NoteTaker will overtake NotesPlus in functionality. Whichever comes first with a handwriting add-on gets my vote as my main note taking app in classes. But I know the add-on will set me back, or my brother who pays the app for me, by 2 bucks.
I also have the Pages for iPad but I now think I don't really need it. And it cost 9.99 dollars. I should have ordered instead the KeyNote for my presentation needs. It costs the same.
Games? My brother preloaded it, upon my request, with PG Uranus. But the children loved the free Angry Birds better.
Free books? Lots of them. There are many on the Apple Store itself. Or get them from Gutenberg Project.
Next time I'll talk about my wishlist for an upcoming iteration of the iPad, hopefully the iPad 3. iPad 2 does not have what I really need to make my notetaking more responsive. Until then, I am stuck with iPad 1.
