On the road with the iPad – an academic’s perspective: Part 4

After a lovely week with my family in Klagenfurt, Austria, I have now arrived in Madrid and attending the Spanish Relativity Meeting (ERE2011) at Physics department of the University Complutense. Over the next few days I will have to finish a number of research papers with collaborators who are also at this meeting (using Tex Touch – see Part 3 of this series for a review of this impressive application) and prepare my talk for Friday’s plenary session. My iPad is therefore going to have to perform exceptionally well if this week is going to be a success!

I prepared the bulk of my talk using Keynote on my Mac before leaving Cape Town, but I still need to add some additional slides and do some basic editing before I am satisfied that the presentation is ready.

Having had quite a lot of experience with Keynote over the last few years, I was pleasantly surprised with what I could do with the iPad version. It may not have all the bells and whistles of it’s bigger brother (a more limited range of fonts and transitions), but it does have all the functionality one needs to put together quite complex presentations. I won’t spend any time here discussing these basic features as there are already many articles on this topic. What I want to focus on is something which is of critical importance to anyone having to give technical talks which involve presenting mathematical equations and plots of experimental data. Can this be done on an iPad. The answer is …. absolutely! Recently, while looking at various PDF annotation apps, I found one that takes snapshots of portions of a PDF document which can then be copied into other apps like Keynote!

PDF Assistant allows one to chose a portion of a PDF document, copy and then paste it into a slide in Keynote in much the same way as one does using Preview on a Mac. Once the image is in Keynote you can resize it as required. In this way, equations, pictures and plots can be imported directly from research papers into slides that make up your talk.

Having prepared your presentation, the next problem is getting it up onto the big screen. If you have an Apple Digital AV or VGA adapter you can connect your iPad directly to compatible projectors, displays, or HDTVs. To navigate between slides one can either tap the iPad screen or use the iPhone as a remote control together with the Keynote Remote app, which connects with the iPad over Wifi or Bluetooth. Both the iPad and the iPhone remote app include an enhanced presenter display with an adjustable layout that lets you show the current and upcoming slides or the current frame and presenter notes. As yet there are no third party USB remotes available and any such future product would have to be bundled with the AV/VGA adapters because of the lack of additional USB slots on the iPad.

At many conferences and workshops, organizers require participants to upload talks in PDF format to a computer in the venue in order to make the changeover from speaker to speaker as smooth as possible without wasting valuable time and hitting projector compatibility issues. On the iPad this can be done in three ways using the iWork share and print function. Sharing by email was not possible because the size of the PDF version of my presentation is too large (about 30 MB) and sharing via iWork is aimed mainly at collaborations. This leaves iDisk. The day before my talk, I will export the PDF presentation to iDisk and send a shared link to the file to the conference organizers. It’s important to note that all three options require an internet connection and luckily most international meetings nowadays provide free Wifi. Without it I would be in deep trouble and the only option available would be to connect my iPad directly to the projection system at the conference, with the danger of compatibility issues.

In summary if you accept the scope and limitations of Keynote for the iPad and use it together with apps like PDF Assistant, you won’t be disappointed. It really does a good job of creating excellent quality, professional looking presentations.

Location:Calle Camino de las Moreras,Madrid,Spain

On the road with the iPad – an academic’s perspective: Part 3

One of the most important tools for anyone involved in the mathematical sciences is LaTeX, a high-quality typesetting system designed for the production of technical and scientific documents. LaTeX is the de facto standard for the communication and publication of papers and other research outputs and without something that can handle such documents on the iPad, I would struggle to do many of my day to day working tasks. In principle it is possible to use notes or other text editors to do the writing, but, in order to get the end product – a beautifully typeset PDF document, one would have to send the LaTeX file to an external computer via FTP or email, login to that machine using a terminal emulator, run the document through a LaTeX typesetting program like TexShop and finally transfer the resulting PDF document back to the iPad via email or FTP. Not much fun, since one typically runs LaTeX many times while writing a document. The iPad keyboard is also not ideal for writing LaTeX code, with it’s endless back slashes and dollar signs!!

The arrival of Tex Touch was therefore welcomed with much fanfare, at least by me! This amazingly innovative app provides users a range of specially designed keyboards with many of the standard LaTeX commands built in as one click shortcuts!

This solves the problem of typesetting in LaTeX. What about the all important step of compiling the text file to produce the final print quality PDF document worthy of publication in a leading international journal?

The answer is one word “The Cloud”. What the developer has come up with is a beautiful cloud computing solution to the LaTeXing problem. Users can set up an account on the TeX Cloud server, a free service provided by the developer. A simple tap of the TeX button on the right hand side of the editing screen sends the file up to the cloud. A few seconds later the PDF file is sent back and can be viewed by tapping the PDF button.

It’s as simple as that. Tex Touch even integrates with Dropbox which gives you easy access to your latex documents and files can be shared via email from within the app. There are however some limitations. Although pictures (for example encapsulated postscript files) can be uploaded to the TeX Cloud for processing with the LaTeX document, the resulting PDF file does not display the embedded pictures. According to the developer, this is a feature which will be added in future updates.

In summery, TeX Touch is a very welcome addition to a growing suite of productivity applications for the iPad and absolutely essential for any mathematical physicist on the move.

Location:Calle Camino de las Moreras,Madrid,Spain

On the road with the iPad – an academic’s perspective: Part 2

Initially the iPad was launched as a content consumption device rather than a tool geared towards content development, indeed, I remember being incredibly disappointed after Steve Jobs gave his keynote presentation which launched the era of tablet computing for the masses. “It’s just an oversized iPod touch”, I remember saying. However, since using this device for almost a year now, I have changed my tune somewhat and it is why I am confident that this three week experiment will be successful.

If the iPad is to be used as a worthy laptop replacement, it has to be able to work with files. I need to be able to create, edit save, copy, print and compress files. I need to be able to open and send email attachments. The problem is that the iPad doesn’t have a traditional file system for storing data. The native iOS method for dealing with files is frankly, extremely clumsy. The way it works is to handle them on an application specific basis from within iTunes. When the iPad is tethered to my Mac, I can click on the apps tab, and scroll down to view a list of the apps that are capable of file sharing. Then I can add files to each one – an absolute pain!! Furthermore, this method does not help you in any way if you want your iPad to be your primary computing device as it is for me at this very moment. I can’t fly back to my Mac every time I need a file!!

The problem is that files are stored inside the application that created it. For example if I write a letter using Pages it remains ring-fenced in the Pages app. Without my Mac running iTunes, the only way of opening this file in another application such as DocsToGo would be to share it with myself via email, iWork.com or iDisk and all three options require an internet connection which may not always be available. It would be more efficient to have one central file repository on the iPad where I can copy these things and any apps that need the file can access it.

So given the fact that I do not have my Mac with me and I am not always connected to the internet, what is my solution to the filesystem problem, without resorting to jail-breaking my iPad?

I use a combination of iFiles, a nice app for managing files on the iPad together with two cloud based storage services – Dropbox and iDisc. There are many other options available for example Google Docs, Box.net and SugarSync but my combination seems to work very well.

iFiles has all the functionality most users will ever need. Among it’s many functions, one can create directories, move files around, compress and archive flies and connect to all the major cloud services. With the exception of iWork documents, files of a given type can be opened in the associated application worked on and then saved back to iFiles via the “open in” function.

iFiles can also be mounted as a filesystem on a Mac or PC connected to the same wifi network, allowing easy transfer of documents to and from the iPad. Before I left for Europe, I simply transferred all the documents I needed for my trip onto my iPad and anything else I need I can always access from my Dropbox.

When Apple’s iCloud becomes available later this year as part of IOS 5, it will provide another online storage option. iCloud will have a number of advantages not present in other cloud-based services. It will be integrated into many of the default apps of iOS 5 allowing seamless synchronization and backing up of music, apps, books, email, contacts, photos and calendar events. The hope is that this functionality will also be incorporated into third party apps as this would provide a complete solution to the file management problem.

On the road with the iPad – an academic’s perspective: Part 1

I’ve arrived at the airport and done the unthinkable… I’ve left my laptop at home! The time has come to see whether I can manage my working life on an iPad, while on a three week tour of Europe combining a number of academic visits with a short holiday in Austria. There has been much written about this already (see for example Tony Bradley’s “30 Days with the iPad”), but as far as I know there is nothing yet from the perspective of a roaming academic.

As an astrophysicist, my work is rather varied. I will require the iPad to do a range or tasks, from preparing and giving seminars, lectures and conference presentations, writing papers with mathematical equations using LaTeX, a professional typesetting package used almost universally by mathematicians and physicists, writing letters, signing documents with an electronic signature, preparing budgets, reading and archiving scientific papers, accessing preprint archives and journals, together with the usual emailing and social-networking. That’s a tall order and although I am not entirely convinced that I will be able to manage, I hope that in three weeks I will be able to report that from now on my laptop will remain where it currently is – firmly grounded on my desk at home. And then there is of course writing this blog, so this is a good topic to start with.

There are many blogging utilities out there and available through the AppStore, but, with the ability to easily embed pictures and do basic HTML formatting without any fuss, BlogPress is still one of the best and the one I have chosen to document my iPad experiences over the next three weeks. WordPress is also not bad, but it lacks the ability to easily position images in the text and there are no HTML shortcuts.

In order to write this blog I will have to do a number of things beyond just writing plain old text. I will have to take screen shots of the various tools I use, manipulate (rotate, crop, enhance the resulting images and import them into my blog. For those not familiar with this feature, screenshots can be taken by simultaneously pressing the home and on/off buttons, with the resulting image stored in the camera roll. For editing images I use Photogene.

This excellent app may not have all the bells and whistles of professional photo journalism software, but it does all the basics needed to put the finishing touches on images (such as my screenshots) for blogs and for sharing on social networking sites.

The combination BlogPress and Photogene turn the iPad into a perfectly functional blogging device able to produce good quality posts with imbedded images, which can be published directly from this device. BlogPress has the added advantage of having Facebook and Twitter integration which allows one to automatically announce the publication of your post to your friends and colleagues.

Finally, to close off today’s post, I need to say a few words about typing on the iPad’s virtual keyboard. To be perfectly honest, for short stints, it’s perfectly adequate, but if you really want to be productive and prefer something much closer to a laptop experience, invest in Apple’s bluetooth keyboard and one of the many third-party iPad stands. A good lightweight option is one produced by Belkin. Alternately, Apple’s smart cover also provides a good solution to this problem.

Over the next few weeks, I will review a selection of apps that I use to produce academic content on the iPad and hopefully answer the question whether it really is possible to leave that laptop at home. If you have any comments and want to share similar experiences please email me at dunsby@gmail.com

Blind Gully……quite literally

Many people here complain about the Cape Town weather, but not me – I love, the wildness of winter and the unpredictability of spring, the sound the driving rain makes on the old Victorian tin roofs and days like this, when quite unannounced, the skies clear, the temperature sores into the 20s and the mountain reappears from the gloom. So, this morning, a little later than normal, I packed my rucksack, picked up Ritu and Amare from the “Towers” and set off for Camp’s Bay on the Atlantic side of the peninsula to one of the most popular trailheads in Table Mountain National Park.

Since settling in Cape Town, hiking the “Tabletop” has become a Sunday morning ritual for me. I suppose it’s a bit like going to church, not that I am in any way a religious person – being brought up in Belfast during the 70′s and 80′s put me off organized religion for good – but, for as long as I can remember, being high up in the mountains seems to resonate with what could be losely described as my inner soul.

Today’s route, “Blind Gully”, at a little over 1000m, is one of the highest passes on the Atlantic side and takes you within striking distance of the cable station. For some reason the route is not that widely known (at least to the casual hiker) and is not signposted from the main path. We headed up from Theresa avenue, taking the well worn shortcut to the pipe track, turning left towards Kloof Nek. The path follows the standard Diagonal route up to a rocky step and a short scramble.

At this point one has to pay attention and take ones eyes of the stunning views of Camp’s Bay. The trick is to locate a cain that marks a rather faint path to your left. The Diagonal route, which is much more distinct goes the other direction, so if you find yourself on an excellent path five minutes after the step, you’ve gone the wrong way!! We headed towards the gully, the path rising steeply. Winter rains have caused some erosion, so a bit of repair work would not go a miss. Amare, one of my PhD students and of Ethiopian origin, raced ahead, and perching himself on top of a boulder looked down as Ritu and I slogged up the path below, feeling somewhat genetically disadvantaged! Just below the top of the gully, there is a short, slightly exposed scramble. If you have a head for heights continue, if not, now would be a good place to call it a day and head back down. We continued and arrived at the “saddle”, separating Blinkwater Ravine from Porqupine Buttress shortly after 10am.

We were now in two minds what to do. Mist had moved up Blinkwater ravine and blocked the view towards an important boulder marking the start of the traverse along a bushy terrace connecting the saddle to the top of Blinkwater ravine and the main path. We had almost decided to turn back when the mist cleared enough for us to see where we had to go. From the saddle, we followed the path to the right, below the left side of Porqupine Buttress and across to the boulder. The path along the terrace is rather narrow and there a number of points where the drop into Blinkwater ravine will give your adrenal glands a bit of a workout. It helps that there is a line of bushes to your left which acts like a psychological barrier between you and the abyss. The traverse takes about twenty minutes and finishes near the top of Blinkwater ravine. From here it is a short distance to the main path and here you have a choice. Turning left takes you after a short climb to the top of Platteklip Gorge, the main freeway to the top of Table Mountain.

We turned right and headed for the Valley of the Red Gods, so named because in the early days of the South African Mountain Club, a member is said to have quoted Rudyard Kipling, “The Red Gods call me out and I must go”, as a explanation of his desire to be alone, while his friends headed for the near by Club hut. From here the descent was down the well worn

Kasteelspoort path, past puffing French tourists, back to the Pipe Track and the start of the trail. It was time for lunch!

Map of the route

Download to view 3D in Google Earth or Download the GPX file  for your GPS

For more pictures and maps, click here to visit my Everytrail page.