Ever since the original iPad went on sale, I’ve wondered how it would hold up to a day’s blogging. The answer, according to Ars Technica? Pretty damn well.
In a piece called Masochist me? An Ars writer’s iPad-only workday, Jacqui Cheng talks about how her productivity changed when using just an iPad and a Bluetooth keyboard instead of her Mac for work.
First, Cheng used Writing Kit, BeeJive and the free Alice IRC web app to both write content and keep in touch with her colleagues at Ars Technica.
The result? After getting over some workflow humps, Jacqui felt that using only the iPad actually improved her productivity.
Working on a tablet made it more difficult to constantly monitor everything that happens in a day, but there was a tradeoff: it was significantly easier to be productive when actually writing. In fact, I produced slightly more the day I worked on the iPad than on a normal day, and I didn’t miss any significant news—work-related or otherwise. I did feel as if I was somewhat disconnected from the world compared to my usual setup, but I wasn’t—I just couldn’t see everything at the same time, all the time.
That’s not to say there weren’t some drawbacks, specifically in quickly switching between apps when using a keyboard. Even so, it seems like this might just be something I should give a try.
