I love the iPad, I really do. But after having one for six months I sold it because, frankly, I wasn’t making enough use of it. One of the main problems was that it isn’t an ideal tool for writing and publishing blog posts—which is something I do every day. Judging by the universal acclaim for Apple’s successful device, I began to think maybe I was alone in having these reservations.
I was encouraged to see my view supported by Brett Kelly writing on nerdgap.com: The Broken Promise of Blogging on the iPad. I agree with him when he says that a post is almost never finished and ready to publish using only the iPad. Most posts include an image and almost all include a hyperlink—and both are a real problem when working on the iPad. Images can be added, but the seldom end up where you want them; and this means re-editing the post on a Mac when you get home. Adding a hyperlink is particularly difficult for me since I’m not very competent in HTML.
While the iPad, as the iPhone, is ideal for planning and drafting posts in plain text, finalising for publication almost always involves a Mac at some stage. That’s why I decided to not to carry around an iPad and, instead, turned to the almost-as-wieldy MacBook Air 11in.
Working on the Air is a breeze in comparison with the iPad experience. Blogging is made super easy under OS X with the highly praised MarsEdit application. After discovering MarsEdit recently I could no longer do without it. I can polish and fine tune my posts on the Mac and then upload the finished article without needing to work directly on the web site.
Technorati Tags: MacBook Air, iPad, Blogging