Because I take my iPad with me when I travel or do business out of the office, my computer never leaves my desk. For almost all of the tasks that I do out of the office (such as email, reviewing and annotating documents, giving presentations and working with my calendar) native iPad apps do everything that I need. But sometimes I need to use a tool that is only available on a “real” computer, and when that happens I use a remote desktop app to connect to my PC. There are quite a few good ones on the market, and for many years now my favorite has been LogMeIn. This week, a new app called Parallels Access was released that offers remote access to a PC or Mac with a twist: the twist is that the software you are using on your PC or Mac behaves, in many respects, almost like a native iPad app. Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal/All Things D likes it, as does David Pogue of the New York Times. I can’t remember the last time that the WSJ and the NYT both talked about a new iPad app on the same day, which tells you something about the appeal of this app — plus, many iPhone J.D. readers sent me emails this week to make sure that I heard about the app. Suffice it to say that this product has buzz. For a legal perspective, New York attorney and TechnoLawyer publisher Neil Squillante provides this overview. For an early negative review, Andy Ihnatko writes for ChicagoGrid that he had problems when using a Bluetooth keyboard. I’ve only used Parallels Access for 24 hours so it is too early for me to write a review, but so far, I’m impressed. It is more expensive than other remote access apps — $79 a year per computer — but you can use it with a PC for free for the next 90 days while they finalize the PC software (which has worked fine for me so far). You only get 14 free days to control a Mac. Stay tuned for my full review, but if you are ready to check it out during the free trial period, click here to download the free iPad app. And now, the rest of the news of note from the past week:
Dallas attorney James Gourley created the pi Mount,
an innovative and inexpensive ($9.00) product that elevates your iPhone
above a power adapter. It’s a neat idea, and since Gourley is a patent
attorney, it won’t surprise you that he has a patent on it.
In addition to reviewing Parallels Access, this week David Pogue of the New York Times also offered travel tips including using travel apps such as the excellent Delta and FlightTrack Pro apps. I agree with almost every one of his suggestions, except that I wonder how he has avoided taking off his belt in all of those TSA millimeter-wave scanning booths; the agents always instruct me that I need to remove my belt, and I’ve never gotten the impression that this issue is open for discussion. Do I look like that much more of a terrorist than David Pogue?
I like to listen to audiobooks when I workout, and while I prefer to use my 6th generation iPod nano to do so because I like the way you can clip it on a shirt sleeve, I know that many people prefer using an iPhone. Susie Ochs of Macworld reviews six iPhone apps that you can use when running. I haven’t tried any of them, but the one that makes you think that you are running away from Zombies is an intriguing way to add encouragement to your run.
Mike Wehner of TUAW reports that, according to the U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security, 79% of mobile malware is written for Android versus only 0.7% written for iPhone.
And finally, actress Charlene deGuzman wrote and stared in this short film “I Forgot My Phone” which provides a sobering perspective on excessive iPhone use. She explains the film in this post on her Tumblr page.
Katie Floyd is a litigator in Tampa, FL. She is well-known for being the co-creator and co-host of Mac Power Users, a fantastic podcast that devotes each episode to an in-depth look at a technology topic, sometimes an iPad or iPhone topic. She also writes on her KatieFloyd.me blog. Last week, she posted on her blog a review of the Kingston MobileLite Wireless, a $60 device that provides external storage for an iPad or iPhone but also includes many other features. It is a great review of an interesting product, so I asked if she would let me re-post it here. Of course, hopefully all of you are already reading Katie’s blog, but just in case you missed it, here is that review. A big thank you to Katie Floyd for sharing with iPhone J.D. readers. Take it away, Katie:
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I’ve always bought 16GB iPads. Some think that’s crazy, but for the 95%+ of my daily usage I don’t find the storage constraints of 16GB to be a problem. I’m not doing any major photography work with my iPad, storing my music collection or videos. However, I do quickly bump up against the 16GB storage limit when traveling. Then I like to load up my iPad with media-rich iBooks and video content to watch on the go. I also like to backup my photos taken with my digital camera to the iPad so if a camera is lost or damaged, the images are still preserved. Still, it was hard to justify spending an extra $100 – $200 on a larger iPad for those few times a year I need the extra space. I was looking for a better solution.
For a couple of years now companies have been making add-on storage for the iPad. I looked seriously at the Seagate Wireless Hard Drive at Macworld this year but with a price tag of $200 it was a little too expensive to justify for occasional use. My friend David Sparks recommended the Kingston Wi-Drive which he uses to add 32, 64 or 126GB of storage to his iOS devices. While researching the Wi-Drive on Kingston’s site I came across the MobileLite Wireless which seemed like a better fit for me.
The MobileLite is a few devices in one. First, it’s a wireless card reader that will transfer data between a memory card and your iOS (or Android) device. By comparison, the Apple SD to Lightning Adapter works with SD cards, but currently only for iPads. In addition to using an SD or MicroSD card for storage, the MobileLite also has a USB port that you can use to expand your storage options even further. Plug in a USB flash drive or hard drive to make that hard drive accessible to your iPhone or iPad. This potentially expands the storage space on your iPad by a couple terabytes if you’re willing to carry around a separate hard drive in addition to the MobileLite. Third, the MobileLite will work as a backup battery pack and can use its 1800 mAh battery to provide power to a USB powered devices in a pinch.
The MobileLite connects to your iOS device via Wi-Fi and requires the use of a free companion App available currently for iOS or Android. You can connect up to three devices simultaneously to the MobileLite which makes it great for sharing with family or colleagues. Before we left on vacation I instructed my family to download the MobileLite App for their respective devices and I loaded up an SD card with movies and TV shows. When we got on the plane I turned the MobileLite on in my bag and we were each able to connect and watch different programs from our various devices.
Importantly, you can configure the MobileLite’s wireless access from within the app. I was able to change SSID of the MobileLite and include a password to prevent other travelers from potentially accessing my files. Because an iOS device can only connect to one Wi-Fi access point at a time, you can configure the MobileLite to connect to other wireless networks and bridge the connections. Meaning I could save the Wi-Fi information for various access points within the MobileLite App and still have Internet access when connected to the MobileLite network. This allows you to share photos or documents from within the MobileLite App without having to first transfer files to your iOS device and then change networks.
The feature I like most about MobileLite is that you bring your own storage. This gives the device a much longer life expectancy because I have the ability to expand storage based on my needs. I can travel with a 16GB flash drive or SD card for a short trip, or bring along a 500GB hard drive to plug in via USB if the need arises. Because you bring your own storage, loading up content is as easy as plugging in your preferred storage device to a computer and dragging your content over. Although not required, I choose to organize my content into folders separated out by movies, TV shows, podcasts, and other media.
In my case, I choose to store my content on an SD card because once inserted the SD card was flush with the MobileLite and added no additional bulk. A 16 or 32GB SD card is fairly inexpensive now and was plenty of space for movies and TV shows while still leaving room for photos. I simply popped the SD card in my MacBook air, copied over my media files and they were immediately recognized when I put the card into the MobileLite and activated the App.
In addition to using the MobileLite as a storage device to stream content to my iPad, I also used it as a backup for photos I took throughout my vacation. The MobileLite App has access to iOS’s camera roll meaning you can save images to or from the camera roll and the MobileLite app. Before leaving on my trip I created a folder for photos where I intended to backup all our various photos. Each night, I would collect the SD cards from various family members and plug them into the MobileLite, using it as a bridge to transfer the days photos to my iPhone’s camera roll. From there I could view, edit, delete and share the photos as I desired. Once I had all the photos from a particular day transferred, I would put back in primary SD card back into the MobileLite and transfer all the photos from my camera roll to the MobileLite for backup. In the event we lost a camera or an SD card was corrupted, we always had a backup of the photos from the day before on the MobileLite.
The only complaint I had about the MobileLite was when it came to selecting large quantities of photos to move to or from the SD card. I found you either had to select all photos or select photos individually, there was no way to batch select a group. This may be more a limitation of iOS than the MobileLite but it was still an annoyance when transferring a hundred or more photos from an SD card each night. I tried one night just selecting all my iPhone’s camera roll and asking the App to overwrite the duplicates on the MobileLite, unfortunately this produced a warning message I had to tap for each and every photo it found a duplicate for making that process no easier. Hopefully this is something that can be in a future software update with the addition of a “overwrite all” option.
The MobileLite is about the size of a portable USB hard drive, and will easily fit in a travel bag. It recharges via micro-USB which is a standard these days meaning you likely already carry the cable in your bag and won’t have yet another proprietary charging cable. Battery life is claimed to be up to 5 hours but will vary depending on your actual usage. I was able to use the MobileLite for several hours at a time on the airplane and never got a low battery warning.
The MobileLite served all my needs and was a great value at $60 given the variety of uses. Especially when you consider the Apple SD to Lightning card adapter alone costs $30. While you can buy other wireless hard drive solutions to use with iOS I liked the “bring your own storage” approach used by the MobileLite as it keeps initial costs down and almost everyone has a spare flash drive of SD card they can use with it. While I was seriously considering upgrading the storage on the next iPad I purchase, the MobileLite has alleviated that concern.
The International Legal Technology Association (ILTA) is a peer networking organization for people who work in the legal technology field, such as the people who work in law firm IT departments. I know that the folks in my law firm’s tech department frequently take advantage of ILTA resources when seeking advice on selecting and working with hardware and software designed for the legal market and when recruiting new hires. ILTA just concluded its annual conference in Las Vegas, and at the conference ILTA and InsideLegal released the results of their eighth annual technology purchasing survey. The survey was sent to 1,232 ILTA member law firms with responses from 223 (18%) law firms, about 85% of which were U.S. firms. You can download this year’s report in PDF format here.
When respondents were asked to describe the most exciting technology or trend, two of the top three answers were mobility and consumerization. (The other popular answer was virtualization.) Those answers do not surprise me. I see more and more lawyers using iPhones and iPads, and most of them are buying their own devices and using them at work (consumerization).
BYOD
The consumerization trend is often called the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) movement. 85% of the survey respondents say that lawyers at their law firms can purchase their own laptops, tablets or phones, which is an 11% increase from 2012. Indeed, 24% of respondents let their attorneys do all three — bring their own laptop, tablet and phone.
Lawyer iPad use
I previously reported that the 2013 ABA Technology Survey reveals an increase in attorneys using iPads, with about 48% of all attorneys using a tablet. 86% of the ILTA survey respondents said that at least some attorneys at their law firms are using tablets in their day-to-day work. However, only 7% of law firms reported more than half of their attorneys using a tablet for work. This question was not asked in ILTA surveys from prior years so we do not know the year-to-year increase, but I presume that these numbers are higher than last year. Indeed, I’m sure that all of us see more attorneys using iPads in 2013 than we did in 2012.
In light of the BYOD movement, at first I was surprised to see that 58% of the respondents said that their firms purchase tablets. Looking deeper at the numbers, though, I saw that this doesn’t mean that ILTA-member law firms purchase tablets for everyone. To the contrary, only 4% of the surveyed law firms purchase tablets for all of their attorneys, and another 12% purchase them for attorneys only on a case-by-case basis.
For those law firms that do spend firm money purchasing tablets, all of them report purchasing iPads. The next most popular tablets are Android devices (purchased by around 22% of law firms purchasing tablets) and Microsoft Surface tablets (purchased by around 17% of law firms purchasing tablets). These results seem consistent with the ABA Technology Survey results which indicate that about 91% of all attorneys using a tablet use an iPad.
35% of law firms have a formal tablet security policy, and another 32% state that they have a formal tablet security policy in the works.
Lawyer iPhone use
The 2013 ILTA survey indicates that about 79% of law firms purchase smartphones for their employees. For those firms that purchase smartphones for their employees, 91% are purchasing iPhones. In light of the rapid decline in lawyer BlackBerry use over the past few years, I was somewhat surprised to see that 60% of law firms still purchase BlackBerries for at least some of their attorneys. Almost as many, 57%, purchase Android smartphones for some of their attorneys.
Apps
The ILTA survey is all about how law firms spend their technology dollars. Thus, the survey doesn’t reveal anything about what apps lawyers are using, but it does address who is paying for those apps. The survey reveals that 69% of law firms don’t pay for any apps used by their attorneys. The other 31% either provide an app allowance or reimburse specific types of apps, such as productivity or security apps.
Apple’s iWork suite of apps — Pages, Keynote and Numbers — are some of the best apps on my iPad. I use Pages, along with an external keyboard, to type documents, I use Keynote every time I give a presentation (I cannot even remember the last time I used PowerPoint), and while I don’t use a spreadsheet on my iPad very often, when I need one, Numbers works great. But because there are no Pages, Keynote and Numbers programs for the PC (they do exist for the Mac), in the past I would have to convert documents created on my iPad to use them on my PC at work. But as of this past Friday, Apple has now given everyone access to all three of these apps via Apple’s free iCloud.com website so you can now work with your Pages, Keynote and Numbers documents in the browser on any computer, Mac or PC. [UPDATE: Dan Moren of Macworld reports that due to overwhelming response, Apple is throttling iWork access for new users. If you don’t have it yet, hopefully you will very soon.] Simply point your browser to iCloud.com (it works best using Chrome on a PC or Safari on a Mac), login with your Apple ID and password, and you’ll see the new Pages, Numbers and Keynote apps in your browser.
For example, I can type some notes using Pages on my iPad, and then later I can simply go to iCloud.com on my PC, click on the Pages app, and all of the Pages documents on my iPad show up. I can double-click any document to read it or edit it on my PC, and then when I go back to my iPad any edits that I made on the computer are there on the iPad. You can also use iCloud.com to export a Pages document to Word or PDF format — something you can also do on the iPad, of course, but now you don’t have to pull your iPad out of your briefcase to do this and can simply do it on your computer.
For people who use Keynote to give presentations, the Keynote app in iCloud.com could be a life-saver. Hooking up an iPad (or iPhone) to a projector is easy if you have the right cable, but if you ever find yourself in a situation where that is not possible — perhaps you forgot the necessary cable at home, or perhaps the setup in the room is such that the projector is far away from where you will be standing and you need someone else to handle your slides from a computer – you can simply go to iCloud.com from any computer connected to the Internet and pull up your Keynote presentation. You can make any last-minute edits on the computer, and then you can enter presentation mode in Keynote on iCloud.com. If the computer is connected to the projector, then you can give your presentation without using your iPad at all.
The iWork apps in iCloud.com don’t have all of the features as the full apps on the iPad, nor do they have all of the features in the Mac versions of Pages, Keynote and Numbers. (Jeffery Battersby of Macworld notes the limitations.) For example, you cannot print from the web browser versions of these apps,
so you’ll need to do that from your iPad or iPhone, or email the
document to yourself (such as a PDF version) and print from your
computer. But the essential features are there, so it is easy to make quick edits. And frankly, I’m amazed that Apple could create a version of this sophisticated software that runs in the browser.
The addition of Pages, Keynote and Numbers to iCloud.com makes those iPad and iPhone apps even more useful. If you use the iWork apps on your iOS device, be sure to check out the new iCloud.com.
California attorney David Sparks has a recurring feature on his MacSparky blog where he asks people to share the apps on their iPhone home screen. This week, in an homage to Sparks, New York attorney and TechnoLawyer publisher Neil Squillante showed off the apps on his iPad home screen. He has some interesting choices so his post is worth reading. It’s been over three years since Sparks asked me to talk about the apps on my iPhone home screen, and a lot has changed since then. My current iPhone home screen apps include Vesper to track tasks, Tweetbot for Twitter, Feedly for RSS feeds, 1Password for my passwords and confidential notes, Fantastical for my calendar, Forecast for the weather (which is actually a free web app, not an app that you download from the App Store), FlickTunes for skipping through music tracks while I am driving, Facebook, plus the Apple apps Photos, Camera, Maps, Podcasts, App Store, Phone, Contacts, Settings, Messages, Music, Reminders and Clock. My dock currently contains Calendar, Safari, Mail and Launch Center Pro — although I might remove Launch Center Pro at some point soon because I use it less often nowadays. And now, the news of note from the past week:
British Columbia lawyer David Paul recommends iPad apps for lawyers for Canadian Lawyer magazine.
Speaking of California attorney David Sparks, he recommends Editorial, a text editor app for the iPad.
Josh Ong of The Next Web recommends 10 writing apps for the iPad, including Editorial.
Dan Frakes of Macworld recommends the best external keyboards for the iPad. I currently recommend two keyboards, both of which Frakes likes as well. First, if you want a keyboard that is part of a case for the iPad so that you can carry it all together as one, I think that the current best choice is the Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard Cover. Second, if you want a keyboard with full-size keys (which is my preference for typing), I recommend (and use) the Apple Wireless Keyboard along with the Incase Origami Workstation, which covers and protects the Apple keyboard plus provides you with an iPad stand.
And finally, we all know what Marimba sounds like, the standard ringtone on the iPhone. The band Mars Argo created a song around the Marimba ringtone, and it’s actually quite good. Here is the video. (via The Mac Observer)
One of the best iPad and iPhone chargers is sold by Apple and comes with every new iPad. The Apple 12W USB Power Adapter can charge an iPad slightly faster than the old 10W USB Power Adapter, the prongs fold down for easy storage when traveling, it works great with any iPad or iPhone, and it costs only $20 (or a few bucks less on Amazon). But it can only charge one device at a time, so if you need to charge multiple devices, you need to multiple power adapters and access to multiple plugs. For just a few bucks more, you can get Kensington’s new AbsolutePower 4.2 Dual Fast Charge for Tablets and charge two iPads and/or iPhones at the same time. Kensington sent me a free review unit a few weeks ago and I’ve been testing it out. While it has a few drawbacks, I’ve found it to be so useful that I recommend you consider this product if you are in the market for an additional iPad or iPhone charger.
USB chargers are almost a dime a dozen, but they are not all built the same. To charge an iPhone as fast as is safely possible, you need a device that can deliver 1.0 Amps. To charge an iPad as fast as is safely possible, you need a charger that can deliver 2.1 Amps. With anything less you get less than optimal results. For example, I have many USB chargers that provide only 1.0 Amps. They will connect to an iPad, but they only charge the iPad when the device is in sleep mode; if I am actually using the iPad, a charger that delivers 1.0 Amps can keep the iPad going but doesn’t also add more juice to the internal battery.
Although some dual chargers deliver 2.1 Amps to only one USB port, the Kensington AbsolutePower 4.2 delivers 2.1 Amps to both USB ports at the same time. Thus, you can charge two full-size iPads and/or iPad minis using just a single plug. If you instead plug in an iPhone, the AbsolutePower will deliver the 1.0 Amp required to safely give your iPhone the specific power that it needs. Note that you use your own USB cables; no cables come with this product.
The time that it takes any charger to recharge an iPad or iPhone is going to vary from test to test and from device to device. But to give you some rough estimates, in an hour, the AbsolutePower 4.2 would add around 20% charge to my third generation iPad and would add about 35% charge to my iPad mini. For my iPhone 5, an hour was enough to add about 65% charge. Thus, I could bring my iPhone up to 100% in less than two hours (depending upon the charge that I started with), whereas I would usually leave iPads plugged in overnight to get a full charge. These numbers are similar to what I see using the Apple USB power adapter, so you don’t seem to be losing anything by using the Kensington AbsolutePower 4.2 to charge two devices at once.
Only having to use a single outlet plug to charge two devices was sometimes useful at my home or office but was extremely useful when I traveled. I often find only a single outlet plug free in a hotel room, and with the AbsolutePower 4.2 I didn’t have to decide which lamp in the room to triage to make room for a second charger. Similarly, last week I was waiting for a plane in San Francisco after taking some depositions and I found a seat next to an outlet with two plugs but someone else was already using one. With the AbsolutePower 4.2, I was able to use the remaining outlet plug to add a significant charge to both my iPhone and my iPad at the same time so that I had power for both of my devices for the long flight back to New Orleans.
Because a device like this is so useful for travel, one of my two gripes is that this device could have been better designed for travel. I love the ability to fold down the prongs on the Apple USB Power Adapter and I wish that the AbsolutePower 4.2 shared that feature. What you can do is press a small button and easily slide off the two prongs. This does makes it easier to pack this charger for travel so that the prongs didn’t stick out so much in my bag — but I still wish I could instead fold down the prongs.
My only other small gripe is that the device itself is somewhat large. There were two times when I wanted to use this device but there wasn’t enough space around the outlet to do so. For example, one time, I was at a conference room table that had a pop-up drawer containing a plug which could not accommodate the size of the AbsolutePower 4.2 To be fair, however, the Apple USB Power Adapter is somewhat large as well and I have frequently encountered places where it similarly would not fit.
Overall, though, I have enjoyed using the AbsolutePower 4.2. Carrying one adapter takes up less space in my travel bag than two adapters, and as someone who frequently travels with multiple iOS devices, being able to charge two devices simultaneously using only a single outlet plug is quite useful. I wish that this device was even better designed for travel, but it worked well enough for me to want to use it again and again. The device costs $29.99 on the Kensington website, but you can get it for almost $20 on Amazon — just a few bucks more than the Apple USB Power Adapter that only charges one device at a time.
One of the best things that I did in law school was participate in a clinic. I was a part of Georgetown’s criminal law clinic where I had the chance to try jury and bench trials, one semester as a prosecutor and one semester as a public defender. And of course there are many other types of clinics devoted to all sorts of areas of law, all of which are a nice change of pace from memorizing cases. I was intrigued to see an article by Maria Clark of New Orleans CityBusiness about a clinic at Loyola Law School in New Orleans that teaches students to create law-related apps. The students wrote web-based apps, not native iPhone apps, but they look pretty useful on an iPhone. For example, the Multiple Bill Calculator lets you quickly calculate minimum and maximum sentences under the Louisiana Habitual Offender Law. Neat. And now, the rest of the news of note from the past week:
I like the title – “Paper or Plastic” – of an article by Philadelphia attorney Maria Harris in which she discusses attorneys no longer bringing tons of paper files to court and instead relying on PDF files. When I am in court, my GoodReader app with all of my documents is one of the best tools I have.
John Edwards of Law Technology News recommends apps for attorneys who travel. I’m taking depositions in San Francisco this week, and I used some of these apps during my travel, such as GateGuru and FlightTrack Pro. He should have also mentioned TripIt.
If you are interested in a an easily-accessible version of the Model Rules of Professional Conduct, the ABA released a $24.99 digital version of the 2013 edition that you can purchase in the Rulebook app. Last year, I reviewed the version of the Bluebook released for the Rulebook app, and I still find it very useful to have that citation guide easily available on my iPad.
Ohio attorney Will Harrelson discusses using an NAS server at your law firm to store files that you can access from an iPad in this article on Lawyerist.com.
I suspect that a large number of attorneys using an iPhone previously used a BlackBerry. Vauhini Cara wrote an interesting article in The New Yorker about the rise and fall of BlackBerry.
When will the next iPhone be announced by Apple? According to sources with a very good track record of predicting things like this, the announcement will be on September 10.
In addition to a new iPhone, Apple will release iOS 7 this Fall, the next version of the iPhone and Pad operating system. Rene Ritchie of iMore wrote a good preview of what we will see based on the information that Apple has made public. And of course, I’m sure that Apple also has some interesting surprises for the release.
Earlier this week, I reviewed a great iPad stand called the Stabile PRO. At least, that is what I should have said it was called; in much of my review, I called it the Stabile 2.0 by mistake, which is a different, less expensive version that lacks features such as a pivoting head. Sorry about the confusion. The Stabile PRO is the version that I have been using and that I recommend.
And finally, I often hear about folks getting a new iPad and giving their old model to their kids, but how about instead giving it to Rover or Morris? Sophia Hollander of the Wall Street Journal writes about iPad apps for pets to use. The article includes a video with scenes like this one. Must be a slow news day on Wall Street.
I love using my iPad at my desk as a sort of second monitor. I can look at emails on my iPad while I am doing legal research on my computer. I look at a document on my iPad screen while I am drafting a memorandum about the document on my computer screen. But it is awkward to look at an iPad flat on a desk next to a computer monitor, and even when the iPad is propped up by the Apple SmartCover or any of dozens of iPad stands that sit on a desk, the iPad is lower than my computer screen. But when an iPad is in the Stable PRO by Thought Out, it has the height of a computer screen, perfect for a dual monitor setup, and perfect for when you just want to look straight ahead at your iPad screen while you type on an external Bluetooth keyboard connected to the iPad. Thought Out sent me a free review unit of this stand a few weeks ago and I am somewhat surprised how useful it has been. I find myself using it every day, and it makes my iPad even more helpful in my office.
[UPDATE 8/14/13: Note that in my original review, I incorrectly called the product that I have been testing the “Stabile 2.0.” The product I reviewed is actually called the Stabile PRO. There is a different, less expensive product called the Stabile 2.0 which is lighter and has a fixed vieiwng angle. Click here for a comparison. My guess is that most people would found the Stabile PRO worth the extra $40 to have the better viewing angles and a heavier stand, but it is nice to have the option to get a $60 version or a $100 version.]
The Stable PRO lives up to its name. It is heavy (just over 3 pounds), made of steel, and very strong and sturdy.
The vinyl-covered pads on the “arms” of the Stable PRO securely and safely hold your iPad on the device. You can pivot the device to point your screen in lots of different directions, but there is a lot of friction so that when you are just touching the iPad’s screen to interact with the iPad, it stays put.
Note that I am using the device with the optional Grapple PRO
accessory. You don’t need this accessory — you can just sit your iPad
on the Stabile — but with the Grapple PRO attached, your iPad is held
snug in place so that there is no risk of it falling off or getting
accidentally knocked off. I recommend getting this accessory.
The iPad can sit on the Stabile in either portrait or landscape mode. And if you have the Grapple PRO accessory, it adjusts to work in either mode.
The design of the Stabile reminds of an Apple iMac computer. It looks very nice and is obviously well made. It even looks good from the back, which is important because people who walk in your office are likely to see this device from the back while your iPad is on your desk.
The Stabile PRO is heavy enough that this is not a stand that you would want to take with you when you travel. You’ll want to keep it on your desk so that you can easily set your iPad in it whenever you want to view or read items on the screen. Indeed, the Stabile holds the iPad at a perfect height for viewing and reading
items on the iPad screen. As noted above, it makes your iPad feel much
like an external monitor — except that you can lift your iPad off of the Stable whenever you want to use the iPad as a flat tablet.
The bottom of the Stabile PRO has flat non-skid black polyurethane 3M feet. They keep the Stabile PRO in one position so that it doesn’t slide around your desk even when you are pushing on the iPad screen with your fingers. They seem to me to be very well attached, but it is nice that you can buy cheap replacement feet if you need them.
The version of the Stable PRO that I tested is silver, which matches the back of the iPad and also matches the silver on the Apple Wireless Keyboard. It’s a great color. The Stabile also comes in black or white.
Thought Out did a great job with this product. I had no idea how helpful my iPad could be when placed in this position, and the product itself is well-designed and well-made. The Stabile PRO is a unique and very useful iPad stand.
South Carolina attorney Justin Kahn posted yesterday on his iPad Notebook website that Wacom Bamboo Styluses are currently on sale at Staples. There are three models available, but my favorite is the duo because it is the perfect length and it also includes a pen, just in case you ever need it. Here is a link to my 2012 review, and I’ll add that I have been using this stylus many times a week for over a year and it is simply fantastic. There are other great styluses on the market — I also like the Adonit Jot Pro and still use it from time to time — but the Wacom Bamboo Stylus duo is the one that I keep coming back to again and again. If you are just going to get one stylus to use with your iPad, I think that the Wacom Bamboo Stylus duo is the one to get.
I usually recommend using Amazon to buy a stylus because their prices tend to be the best, but I see that right now, the Wacom Bamboo Stylus duo costs $31.99 on Amazon while it costs only $29.99 (a $10 discount off of their regular price) at Staples. Granted, the $2 difference is not huge, any you may prefer to buy from Amazon anyway if you are a member of Amazon Prime, but since this is the lowest advertised price that I have ever seen for this best-in-class stylus, I thought that it was worth sharing the news that Justin Kahn discovered just in case you are in the market for a stylus right now.
By the way, the most common use for my stylus is to take handwritten notes on my iPad, and my current favorite app to do so is GoodNotes. I also use a stylus from time to time when I am annotating PDF documents with an app like GoodReader or more recently, the excellent iAnnotate app that I reviewed last week.
You can click here to buy online from Staples, or you can just pick one up at the store if there is a Staples in your area. I presume that this sale will last about a week, and if you are reading this post after the sale has ended, then your best best is probably to buy the Wacom Bamboo Stylus duo from Amazon. Wherever you get it, a good stylus is a very useful iPad accessory.
Earlier this week, Minneapolis attorney Lisa Needham explained on Lawyerist.com why she loves the GoodReader app. My last post dedicated to GoodReader was over a year ago, but in case anyone forgot, I love the app too. Indeed, I probably use GoodReader more than any other app on my iPad except for the Mail app, and it is one of my top recommendations for lawyers using an iPad. She also notes in her article that the “good folks over at iPhonejd.com” — those “folks” would be the triumvirate of me, myself and I — recently reviwed iAnnotate, but she likes GoodReader better. Frankly, I do too, but I use them for different tasks. For simple reading and annotating of documents, GoodReader is awesome. But if you need to do more complicated work with a PDF file, a more sophisticated app like iAnnotate or PDFpen or PDF Expert can manipulate and annotate PDF documents in ways that GoodReader cannot. And I also recommend that all attorneys get the Adobe Reader app because sometimes it can handle PDF files that other apps cannot, plus it is free so why not have it for just in case you need it. Enough about PDFs, let’s get on to the news of note from the past week:
It’s a good idea to be ready for power outages, especially now that we are in hurricane season. Last year I wrote an article with tips for using an iPhone during a lengthy power outage for the TechnoLawyer BigLaw newsletter, and it was recently posted on the TechnoLawyer blog. Check it out for my advice.
If you use ProVantage for your law firm time billing and financial management, you can now use Bellefield’s iTimeKeep to access ProVantage records on your iPhone and iPad as noted in this press release.
Jesse Londin of Law Technology News writes about Bike Crash Kit, a free app with tips for those who end up in a bicycle offered by personal injury law firm Flanzig and Flanzig.
1Password is one of the most useful apps on my iPhone and iPad. Read my review to find out why. The app usually costs $17.99, but it is currently on sale for only $7.99 — a great price for an incredible app. Click here to get 1Password:
David Pogue of the New York Times reviewed the new Moto X smartphone this week, the latest Android smartphone. I mention the article becuase in it he notes that there are more than 4,000 touch-screen phones available — including six different models of the iPhone and 3,997 different Android phones. Gulp.
I recently wrote about Wireless Emergency Alerts on the iPhone such as AMBER Alerts. This week, there was an AMBER Alert in San Francisco around 11:00 pm, and that was the first AMBER Alert that many iPhone users in the area had ever seen. It resulted in a lot of articles about these alerts, such as this one from Lex Friedman of Macworld. If you still don’t understand what these alerts are, I encourage you to read about them now so that they make sense to you when they occur.
T-Mobile started selling the iPhone in April, and John Gruber of Daring Fireball notes that as a result, T-Mobile gained customers last quarter for the first time in four years. Note, however, that as reported by Kevin Bostic of AppleInsider, T-Mobile insists that its new “Un-carrier” ad campaign is the real reason, not the iPhone. Regardless of who is right, I’m glad that T-Mobile users can finally buy an iPhone.
Long before the iPhone or the iPad, Apple sold the Newton. Mat Honan of Wired wrote a good article on the Newton’s lasting impact.
And finally, I’ve long been a fan of the great commercials used by Apple. I really like the current series of commercials called Photos Every Day, Music Every Day and the latest FaceTime Every Day, all of which you can see on Apple’s YouTube page. But you can also turn back the hands of time and watch this video of none other than Siskel and Ebert reviewing Apple commercials back in 1986. I miss those guys.
In addition to reviewing Parallels Access, this week David Pogue of the New York Times also offered travel tips including using travel apps such as the excellent Delta and FlightTrack Pro apps. I agree with almost every one of his suggestions, except that I wonder how he has avoided taking off his belt in all of those TSA millimeter-wave scanning booths; the agents always instruct me that I need to remove my belt, and I’ve never gotten the impression that this issue is open for discussion. Do I look like that much more of a terrorist than David Pogue?
