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When I travel with an iPad and leave my laptop computer at the office, one of the few features that I sometimes miss is the ability to create redline edits to a document.  I could use apps like Pages or Documents to Go or Quickoffice to view or revise a Microsoft Word document, but to make my edits obvious I would have to enter the new text and then manually highlight my text in yellow so that the other attorney could see what I added, and even then there was no easy way for the other attorney to accept my edits.  For serious edits I often had to resort to using LogMeIn to connect to my work computer from the iPad and use my work computer to make the edits in MS Word with the track changes feature enabled.  Fortunately, those days may be coming to an end.  Yesterday, the iPad app Office² HD from Byte² was updated to add support for true MS Office track changes support, so I bought a copy of this $7.99 app to try it out.  Unfortunately I’ve run across a few bugs in this app, but the track changes feature is implemented quite well.

The app has a nice layout.  You can view a list of your documents and organize documents into folders.  The app doesn’t include Dropbox support, but you can use the Dropbox app and then the “Open in…” feature to open a document from your Dropbox in Office² HD.  [UPDATE:  As pointed out in a comment, the app does have support for Dropbox, Google Docs, SkyDrive, Box and other services.  I didn’t see it the first time I looked for it.]  When editing a document, the standard features are all there to format text, highlight text, change the font or font size, etc.  Strangely, all of my documents showed up in the app with Helvetica as the font, even though the app seems to support Times New Roman and that is what I used on my computer.  Even so, after editing a file and then sending it back to my computer, I once again saw Times New Roman as the font on my computer.

Office² HD is more than just a word processor.  It can also review and edit Excel spreadsheets and PowerPoint presentations, and in my simple tests last night it did so quite well.  But I focused last night on track changes support for Word documents because that is the main reason that lawyers will consider purchasing this app. 

The website for Office² includes this full explanation of the track changes feature, but it works pretty much like you would want it to.  Tap the tools icon at the top right of the screen and tap the last option, Track Changes.  In the next window, you can turn on the track changes feature and then decide how you want to view the document, either the original (without any of your changes shown), the original with redline indication of what is changed, the final document with all of your changes shown as if accepted, and final with markup so that you can see what you have edited.

In the following appeal brief, for example, I am using the final with markup view.  I inserted a few words (The Supreme Court explained) and they are shown in blue and an underline with a black line in the left margin to show that a change is there.  Next I deleted a sentence, and the main body of the screen shows the text without that sentence but a bubble on the right shows where I made a deletion and what I deleted.

The bubble on the right is small and a little hard to read, but you can simply tap once on the bubble to enlarge it.

The final with markup view is also useful if you want to review the changes in a document that someone else has edited.  As you can see in the last picture, from the bubble you have the option to reject or accept a change.  You can also tap on an edit and from the popup menu choose to accept or reject that change.  Also, there is an option under the tools menu to accept or reject all changes in a document.  Thus, another attorney can create redline edits in a document and send them to you for review, and using Office² HD on your iPad you can accept or reject each of those edits, make whatever additional edits are necessary (with the track changes feature turned on if you want to make it obvious what you changed), and then you can send the document back.

The track changes feature alone would make this a great app, but this app has other powerful features.  For example, Office² HD lets you export a document to PDF format.  I’m not aware of any other app that lets you create a PDF from a Word document on the iPad itself.  [UPDATE:  A reader tells me that iAnnotate can export from Word to PDF, but I haven’t tried that app so I cannot confirm this.]  Also, Office² HD is one of the rare apps that lets you create and view footnotes in a Word document.  Quickoffice doesn’t support footnotes at all, and Documents to Go lets you view footnotes but not add them.  Unfortunately, even Office² HD doesn’t support editing or deleting footnotes.  Moreover, I found that when I added a footnote in Office² HD and then later viewed the footnote in the document on my computer, the footnote had two question marks instead of a space between every single word.  (I reproduced this bug in several different documents.)  I’m thrilled to see that Office² HD attempts to go beyond all other iPad apps in handling footnotes, but clearly more work is needed. 

And since I’m mentioning problems, let’s get to my major gripe with Office² HD, and it is a big one.  This app crashes more than any other app I have ever used on an iPad. Documents of around 25 pages or less on letter size seemed to work without incident, but for larger documents, such as a 27 page appeal brief and a 38 page appeal brief, both on legal size paper, the app crashed so frequently that I frankly lost count.  I’m not sure if the problem was the page size, the fact that the documents were on legal size paper, or just the fact that these were long documents with lots of footnotes and formatting, but the crashes were a real problem for me.  I even restarted my iPad to clear the memory and then started editing a document, and the crashes still happened.  And when the app crashes, you lose all edits made since the last time that you manually told the app to save your work, so unless you get in the habit of saving every few minutes, you can lose work that will take a while to recreate.  I deal with large and complicated documents in my practice almost every day, so I was annoyed to see these crashes.  Ugh.  My hope is that this problem will be fixed in a future update, but for now, you need to be cautious when working with longer documents.

In this review, I focused on the iPad version because word processing on an iPad is superior to using the small iPhone screen, but the company also sells Office² for the iPhone and it also now has the track changes feature and the other features I noted above, including the ability to export a Word file to PDF format.  It is harder to edit a document on a small iPhone screen, but it does work in a pinch, and with Office² you can now make redline edits when you are on the go.  Note that when I edited large briefs on the iPhone version, I experienced the same types of crashes that I saw with the iPad version.

Later this year we may have more options for editing a Word document with track changes support.  I know of one other app developer who is currently working on this feature for another app, and there are fresh new rumors that a version of Office from Microsoft itself will be out this November, and if that happens perhaps we will see a Microsoft-sanctioned option for track changes support.  (Before you starting counting non-hatched chickens, note that earlier this year there were rumors that Office for iPad would be out in March of 2012, and that obviously didn’t happen.)  But for now, there is only one app in town with the important track changes feature for litigators who want to make or review edits in briefs, transactional attorneys who want to revise contracts, or anyone else who wants to take advantage of the track changes feature in a Word document. 

Click here for Office² HD for iPad ($7.99): 

Click here for Office² for iPhone ($5.99): 

I usually talk about adding apps or accessories to your iPhone or iPad to make it more useful, but we shouldn’t forget that sometimes all you need is a book.  Thanks to modern self-publishing tools, it is possible for anyone to create and publish a book that you can easily read on your iPad without finding an agent or signing with a traditional publisher.  I recently wrote about how California attorney David Sparks self-published the ebook Paperless, and Sparks plans for that to just be the first in a series.

Brian Owens is a docketing professional in the Atlanta office of an AmLaw 100 firm. As someone who often calculates deadlines in different jurisdictions, he thought that there would be a demand for an ebook that covers the basics of court rule on date calculations and provides the rules for calculating deadlines in federal court and all 50 states.  The result is the $10 ebook Calculating Court Deadlines: 2012 edition.  Owens sent me a free copy of the iBooks version of the book to review (which requires the iPad; it does not work on the iPhone), but I see that it is also available in Kindle and Nook formats.

Unlike the Paperless ebook that David Sparks authored, Calculating Court Deadlines doesn’t take advantage of all of the bells and whistles that one can add to a modern iBook such as video, sophisticated graphics, animation, etc.  This ebook just contains little more than the basic text.  Having said that, it provides the information that you need if you are a national counsel, in-house counsel, or someone else who wants to have a resource on your iPad with date calculation rules for all U.S. jurisdictions.

The book starts with a basic overview of the concepts relating to calculating legal deadlines such as calendar days versus court days, how to handle the last day when it falls on a holiday, adding additonal days for service, etc.  The book then has a chapter for federal courts followed by a chapter for each of the 50 state courts.  In each chapter there is a summary of the rules for calculating dates in that jurisdiction, the full text of each of the applicable rules, and then a series of examples that applies the rules.  Chapters also include links to the appropriate court website that will open in Safari when tapped.  Here is an example of one of the Louisiana pages in the ebook:

I suspect that most attorneys, paralegals and legal secretaries are only concerned about the rules for calculating deadlines in their own jurisdiction, and (hopefully) they already know those rules well.  But if it would be useful for you to have the rules for all jurisdictions, this ebook is a way to have all of the rules that you need at your fingertips.  I can’t decide if $10 is too much for this ebook; it includes much less content than the $5 Paperless, but on the other hand this ebook is written for a much more narrow audience.

Click here for Calculating Court Deadlines on the iBookstore ($9.99): 

Click here for Calculating Court Deadlines on the Amazon Kindle store ($9.99).

Earlier this year, I started writing a monthly column for the TechnoLawyer BigLaw newsletter.  My columns address topics related to the use of iPhones and iPads in midsize to large law firms.  If you work for such a firm, this is a great (and free) newsletter and I encourage you to sign up for a free subscription.  I’ve enjoyed writing my articles, and I’ve enjoyed reading a bunch of other great BigLaw articles.

The first article I wrote for BigLaw discussed the usefulness of iPads for attorneys and whether this means that law firms should buy each of their attorneys an iPad, similar to what Minneapolis firm Bassford Remele did as I noted in this article from August of 2011.  If you weren’t a subscriber when my first BigLaw article was first published on January 17, 2012, you can now read it on the TechnoLawyer website.

Although my law firm doesn’t purchase iPads for attorneys, we now have around 100 iPad users and that number is steadily increasing every month.  I suspect that most of you have seen more and more iPads at your law firms, too.  Last year’s ABA Technology Survey revealed that around 13% of lawyers used an iPad.  We should see this year’s numbers in about a month or so, and I have no doubt that we’ll see a significant increase.

The All Things D conference, run by Walt Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal, took place this week.  This was the only conference that Steve Jobs spoke at in recent years, other than the Macworld Expo and Apple presentations.  His presence was noted in the form of tributes and frequent references by the other speakers.  I reference a few of those today, along with other news of note from the past week:

• [UPDATE 6/11/12:  You can now view the entire Tim Cook presentation on the All Things D website.]
• Steven Levy of Wired is one of my favorite tech writers, and he wrote a great article:  All Things D is Haunted by the Man Who Isn’t Here.
• Apple CEO Tim Cook gave the opening keynote at All Things D.  It was an interesting presentation that signalled that we will soon see big improvements to Siri, Facebook integration with the iPhone, and maybe even something new from Apple in the TV space.  Jordan Golson of MacRumors wrote a good liveblog as it happened, as did Jason Snell of Macworld.
• Macworld also published an edited, near-transcript of the highlights of Cook’s presentation.
• Ina Fried of All Things D reports on a tribute to Jobs by Ed Catmull of Pixar and Larry Ellison of Oracle.
• When I wrote about the Wacom Bamboon Stylus duo earlier this week, little did I know that so many other people would be talking about styluses at the same time.  I updated the end of the article to note that Serenity Caldwell of TechHive and Macworld published an article in which she also named the duo the best stylus for writing.  Additionally, I see that Charlie Sorrel of Cult of Mac named a number of “best of” styluses and concluded that the Bamboo Stylus is the best stylus for drawing.
• J.D. Biersdorfer of the New York Times reminds us of the helpful multitasking gestures that you can use with an iPad.
• If you use TABS3 for time entry at your law office, you’ll be interested to learn that you can now use Bellefield’s iTimeKeep app to enter your time on mobile devices.  I watched a demo of this app in action at ABA TECHSHOW this year and I was very impressed.
• Andy Ihnatko of the Chicago Sun-Times reports that you can finally buy an iPhone that uses no-contract, pre-paid plans thanks to Cricket, although it isn’t available in all cities.
• You can use Apple’s Cards app to create and send a paper card from your iPhone or iPad.  It wil be beautiful, but it won’t have the personal touch of handwriting.  Alex Heath of Cult of Mac reviews Thank You Pen, an app that creates beautiful cards and then uses a room full of machines with real pens to create the appearance that you hand-wrote your cards.  Interesting.
• If you like casual games, Bejeweled has long been one of the best.  There is finally a version for the iPad with great retina display graphics for the third generation iPad.  I bought it and have had a lot of fun with it, and so has my six-year-old son.  Click here for Bejeweled HD ($3.99): 

  

• And finally, here is a fun video from magician Simon Pierro that shows how the iPad can quench your thirst:

I’ve recently published many posts discussing iPad styluses, apps that let you write or draw and PDF management apps — all tools that make it easy to create a digital signature on a document.  This led a friend of mine who is an attorney to ask me last night about the role of digital signatures in the context of a notary.  A high-quality digital signature might even look better than a “real” signature made by a pen on paper.  Can a person just sign a document on their iPad and then e-mail the document to a notary?

This is an issue of state law that will vary from state to state.  For example, in Louisiana we have something called an “authentic act” which refers to signing a document in the presence of two witnesses and a notary.  La C.C. art. 1833.  The Louisiana Supreme Court held in Hardin v. Williams, 478 So. 2d 1214 (La. 1985) that it was insufficient to have the notary just outside of the room in which the signing took place even though the notary knew the parties.  If being in the next room isn’t enough, I suspect that e-mailing a digital signature to a notary would never work without a change in Louisiana law.

The National Notary Association published an article last year called Personal Appearance In A Digital World in which they take the position that the person signing must always physically appear before the notary so that the notary can see the person, check the ID, etc.  The article critiques a Virginia law which apparently allows appearance before a notary via video and audio conferencing.  A FAQ on the Commonwealth of Virginia’s website explains:  “While the signer must still appear personally before an Electronic Notary, beginning July 1, 2012, an approved Virginia Electronic Notary may perform acts online using audio-video conference technology.”

New Orleans attorney Ernest Svenson, who publishes the PDF for Lawyers website, has written about digital signatures several times.  For example, late last year he mentioned the new Adobe EchoSign eSignature app for the iPhone and iPad that is supposed to allow the creation of legally-binding electronic signatures.  But I’m not sure what that has to do with notarial requirements.

As you can tell, this is an area of law that I know very little about, and I would never pretend that the links that I included above are representative of the full — and I’m sure emerging — body of law in this area.  I am interested to learn more, so if any iPhone J.D. readers would like to share what they know on this issue, I encourage you to post a comment.  In the meantime, if any of you plan to ask me to serve as a notary, I encourage you to bring your iPads, styluses and drawing apps so that we chat about the latest and greatest technology … but when it comes time to sign the document, I’m going to hand you a real pen.

A few weeks ago, I reviewed the Wacom Bamboo Stylus for iPad and concluded that it was my favorite stylus for writing notes on an iPad, well worth the almost $30 that I paid for it on Amazon even though you can buy good styluses for much cheaper.  After I posted that review, Wacom sent me free sample of the Wacom Bamboo Stylus duo for iPad.  The advertised difference with the “duo” version of the Bamboo Stylus is that it also includes a ballpoint pen.  I predicted in my review of the Bamboo Stylus that the duo would probably not appeal to me because I am not a big fan of the ballpoint pens that are typically included with a stylus.  I was correct; I’m not a big fan of this pen either, although as noted below your personal preferences may differ from mine.  But I do see some other advantages of the duo, especially the length, that might tempt you to spend the extra $10 and purchase the Bamboo Stylus duo instead of the regular Bamboo Stylus.

Design

The Bamboo Stylus duo, like the original Bamboo Stylus (which Wacom is now calling the “Bamboo Stylus solo“) has a fantastic weight and feels great in your hand.  Unlike many other styluses which feel cheap, the Bamboo Stylus line has the appearance and build of a premium product.

The duo only comes in black, unlike the original version that is available in six colors.

The tip

The key advantage of this stylus is the tip.  As I noted in my review of the original version, the Bamboo Stylus duo has a fantastic tip for taking notes on an iPad using an app such as GoodNotes because it feels great on the iPad screen but it is smaller than the tips on most other styluses which provides the sensation of being more precise.  To be fair, I should note that apparently not everyone agrees with me.  Georgia of the iMore website recently reviewed four styluses and wrote that the Wacom Bamboo Stylus tip was a “disappointment” because she found it “completely mushy” and said that it provided “almost no push-back without excessive pressure.”  I strongly disagree.  I like the feel of the tip against the iPad screen and I’ve never felt that I had to apply excessive pressure.  For another viewpoint, Ellis Hamburger of The Verge recently posted an extensive review of all of the top styluses, and wrote that the Bamboo Stylus is the “best stylus you can buy for your iPad” adding that the “tip of the Bamboo, which is smaller in diameter than its peers, is the killer feature here.”  As for the tip being mushy, he wrote:  “Like the rest of the rubber tips I tested, this one’s mushy and doesn’t provide the hardness I’m looking for from a writing utensil. But ultimately, it’s the most precise and more importantly the most predictable stylus of the group.”

If you don’t think that a rubber tip is for you, I strongly encourage you to check out the fantastic BoxWave EverTouch Capactive Stylus that I reviewed earlier this month.  But if you are okay with a rubber tip and want something precise, you’ll love the tip that is on the original Bamboo Stylus and the Bamboo Stylus duo.

The pen

The distinguishing feature of the Bamboo Stylus duo is the included pen.  Simply remove the cap and the pen is exposed.

You can place the cap on the stylus end of the pen and I doubt that anyone else would be able to tell that you are even using a stylus.

If you are going to include a pen in a stylus, this is a great way to do it.  My gripe with the pen is that I don’t like the way that the ink looks.  I find the point to be too fine and I find the ink to be too light.  I almost feel like I am writing with a pencil.

To be fair, this may simply reflect my personal bias.  I’m not a big fan of ballpoint pens in general.  I prefer the very dark blacks that you get with a rollerball pen.  I often use a Mont Blanc rollerball pen that I received as a gift when I graduated law school in 1994, or else I will use something far less expensive but still excellent such as a Sanford uni-ball MICRO or a Pilot Precise v7 Rolling Ball.  But even if you like ballpoint pens, your writing with the duo will be thinner and lighter than you might be used to.  Here is a sample of the Bamboo Stylus duo versus a more standard ballpoint pen (the Kensington Virtuoso Touch Screen Stylus with Pen) and two rollerball pens:

But now that I have complained that this is not my favorite pen, I have to admit that it often doesn’t matter what kind of pen you have, you just need something to jot a quick note.  With a normal iPad stylus, you are out of luck.  With a product like the Bamboo Stylus duo, you have the pen in case you need it.  Nevertheless, if the pen was the only distinguishing feature, I’d probably just get the regular Bamboo Stylus and use the $10 I saved to buy a bunch of inexpensive pens and keep them at my desk, in my briefcase, at home, etc.

Length

However, the pen is only one difference.  A key difference between the regular Bamboo Stylus and the Bamboo Stylus duo is that the duo is almost a half an inch longer.  The regular Bamboo Stylus is 120 mm (about 4.75"), and as I noted in my original review, in my opinion that is just barely long enough to be comfortable to use.  The duo is 131 mm when used as a stylus (about 5.16") which is much closer to the length of a normal pen (around 5.25").  The following picture shows the regular Bamboo Stylus (top), the Bamboo Stylus duo (middle) and the Kensington Virtuoso Stylus for Tablet (bottom), another excellent stylus.

As I have been testing out the duo, I’ve found that I prefer the longer length, so much so that it is a reason that it does make the duo worth the extra $10.  It just feels more like I am using a real pen.  Strangely, I don’t see that Wacom even advertises the length of the duo as an advantage.

Better wear and tear?

I see one other possible advantage of the duo over the regular version, but I’ll admit that I am speculating here.  I noted in my original review that some people complain that the tip on the Bamboo Stylus is too delicate and can tear with use.  Because of where the (removable) clip is located on the original Bamboo Stylus, you are likely to apply pressure at the same point of the tip every time you use the stylus.  The clip sits in a groove so it always stays in the same spot.  But with the duo, because the entire top is removable and the clip is part of the top, the clip can rotate and over time wil be in many different positions on the stylus.  Even if you always hold the duo the same way in your hand with the clip against your hand, you’ll be applying pressure to different parts of the tip over time.  My theory is that this will better distribute the wear and tear around all points of the nib on the tip so that the tip itself will last longer.  I don’t plan to conduct an experiment to test this hypothesis to see if it holds up, but it seems logical to me.

Conclusion

People will have different opinions on styluses, but in my opinion, the Wacom Bamboo Stylus line is the best stylus you can use with an iPad if you are planning to take notes in a meeting, in court, etc. using an app such as GoodNotes.  The weight and finish of the stylus feels great in your hand and the narrow tip is fantastic.  [UPDATE:  I see that Serenity Caldwell of TechHive and Macworld published an article today in which she also names the duo the best stylus for writing.]  The original version of the stylus, now called the Bamboo Stylus Solo, costs about $30.  That is a lot of money to pay for a stylus, but I think it is worth it.  If you spend an extra $10 for the $40 duo version of the stylus, you get the pen (which I don’t particularly like, but perhaps you will, and it could be handy in a pinch) and you get a longer stylus (which I love) that might even hold up longer before you need to replace the tip (although who knows).  Either way, you’ll have an excellent stylus that works great with the iPad.

[UPDATE 8/11/13:  There are a lot of great styluses for the iPad, but after over a year of using this stylus and many others, the Bamboo Stylus duo remains my favorite.]

Click here to get the Bamboo Stylus duo from Amazon ($31.99)

Click here to get the Bamboo Stylus duo from Wacom ($39.95).

My sister got married last weekend and with all of the family activitiy, there was no time for me to publish In the news last Friday.  Thus, in this 150th edition of In the news — didn’t we just have the 100th edition? — I am highlighting some interesting stories from the last two weeks.

• This week was the LegalTech West Coast conference.  According to an article by Monica Bay of the Law Technology  News, there was a lot of focus on the iPad.  (Sounds similar to what I saw at ABA TECHSHOW earlier this year.)
• Florida attorney Katie Floyd writes about how to save an iPhone after you spill water on it.
• Tampa, Florida attorney Jenny Byars Gribbin of Fowler White Boggs had an idea for an iPhone app to manage lists for busy parents.  The result is the app Mothern Belle, and Gribbin was profiled by Margaret Cashill of the Tampa Bay Business Journal.
• Carol Gerber of Attorney at Work compiles iPad shortcuts useful to lawyers.
• Massachusetts lawyer Robert Ambrogi reports that the North Carolina Bar switched from Casemaker to Fastcase, in part because Fastcase has a great iPad app.
• Adam Lashinsky wrote a great cover article for Fortune on how Tim Cook is changing Apple.  It’s a good read.
• Joshua Topolsky of The Verge wrote an interesting article for the Washington Post about how so few companies outside of Apple are coming up with innovative designs for their tech products.
• I often write about people using Find My iPhone to locate a stolen iPhone, but Alex Heath of Cult of Mac writes about a woman who used the iCloud Photo Stream service to do the same thing after her iPhone was stolen on a Disney cruise.  The iPhone thief was an employee of the cruise ship and he used the iPhone to take pictures of himself and his friends — which were promptly uploaded to the woman’s iCloud and appeared on her computer.  Based on the pictures, the thief was apprehended and was fired.
• Ben Worthen of the Wall Street Journal wrote an interesting article about young children using iPads.
• Kevin Tofel of GigaOm writes that if you get internet access from cable companies Bright House Networks, Cablevision, Comcast, Cox Communications or Time Warner Cable, you’ll soon be able to access a bunch of Wi-Fi spots across the country.  Initial access will be in New York, Los Angeles, Tampa, Orlando, and Philadelphia.
• Ken Shirriff analyzed what makes up an iPhone charger.  It’s more sophisticated than you might think.
• David Pogue of the New York Times discusses tracking smartphone data usage.
• Pogue also reivewed the Jawbone Big Jambox and the Bose SoundLink Wireless Mobile Speaker, Bluetooth speakers that work with the iPhone.
• The App Store has been around for four years, and Federico Viticci looks at those lat four years for MacStories.
• Georgia of iMore reviewed several iPad styluses, including the Bamboo Stylus that I like so much.  I disagree with several of the opinions in her article (including her take on the Bamboo Stylus), so it is a good read if you are looking for a different perspective from mine.
• Borys Kit of The HollyWood Reporter reports that Aaron Sorkin (of The West Wing and The Social Network fame) is writing the screenplay based on the Walter Isaacson biography of Steve Jobs.  I’ve seen it reported elsewhere that Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak will a consultant on the film. 
• Harry McCracken of Time compares the two upcoming movies on Steve Jobs.
• Geri Drelling of LawyerTechReview writes about one judge’s use of an iPad in court.
• Simon Sage of iMore recommends his favorite free iPad games.
• And finally, there was a short but very nice tribute to Steve Jobs at the recent 16th Annual Webby Awards with tributes from Presidents Clinton and Obama, Bono and others.  It is worth watching, and you can watch it in this clip from CNET:

As the school year comes to an end and Summer is about to start, I find myself looking forward to water activities with my kids:  swimming pools, the beach, water slides, etc.  Activities that involve water are usually not good for the iPhone, but earlier this month at the CTIA Wireless convention in New Orleans, I saw two products that make your iPhone waterproof.  I tried out both products with the aid of company representatives working at booths so I did not get a chance to do “real world” tests, but both booths featured iPhones being dunked into aquariums over and over again and, as far as I could tell, the iPhones held up great.

driSuit

The first product I saw was the driSuit.  This is a case made for the iPhone 4 and 4s.  You place your iPhone inside the case, close two locks to seal it, and then the iPhone is waterproof.  Here is a picture from the website:

And here is a picture I took at CTIA of iPhones working while they are submerged in an aquarium:

The screen portion of the case actually has two membrames with a gel in between.  You need to touch the screen a little bit harder than normal for the gel to make contact with the screen, but it does work quite well.  With the driSuit, you can use your iPhone while you are skiing, snowboarding, fishing, snorkling, etc. without fear that water will damage your iPhone.  The iPhone camera still works even when it is in the case.

There is a small space behind the iPhone where you can store a credit card, room key, driver’s license, etc.

The case costs $60.  You can get a wrist band that also floats for $10 and the company sells waterproof headphones for $20.

DryCASE

A similar product that I saw at CTIA is the DryCASE.  Unlike the driSuite which is made specifically for the iPhone 4/4S, the DryCASE is a bag that comes in different sizes and can hold lots of different devices, including the iPhone and the iPad.  The company has been making waterproof protection for casts and prosthetic limbs for the last 13 years, and decided to use the same technology to protect iPhones.

To use the DryCASE you place your iPhone or other item inside of it, plug in the included headphone jack, seal the top, and then use the included one-way pump to remove the air.  This creates a vacuum.  You can then plug a pair of headphones into the port on the outside of the bag (or use waterproof headphones sold by the company).  You can use the iPhone touchscreen or camera through the bag, and the company has tested it to depths of 100 feet. 

As you can see from the above picture, the iPhone at the right had been underwater for 2 hours and 41 minutes when I saw it.  They kept the iPhone in that bag throughout the CTIA show for several days and it continued to work underwater. 

The case has a black band on the back of it so you can attach the DryCASE to your arm.

I was told by company representatives that your iPhone doesn’t work well as a phone when it is in a case, although you can use the speaker phone in a pinch.  However, if you plug in a pair of headphones with a microphone you can use the phone that way.

The retail price is $39.99.  You can buy it for less at Amazon, but DryCASE tells me that if you instead get it from a retailer or from the DryCASE website you get a one year warranty.

Both of these products look like great solutions for bringing your iPhone with you to the beach, the pool, etc.  The driSuite seems to provide a little more protection and is a great fit for the iPhone 4/4S, but the DryCASE is half the price and very versatile because it can be used with devices of multiple sizes.

Click here to get the driSuit from the manufacturer ($59.95)

Click here to get the DryCASE from Amazon ($28.77)

Click here to get the DryCASE from the manufacturer ($39.99)

Just over a year ago, when I still used the first generation of the iPad, I reviewed an innovative product called the FreeOneHand, a device that fit around the four corners of the iPad and provided a handle so that you can hold the iPad in one hand.  It quickly became one of my favorite accessories for my iPad, and I continued to use it with the iPad 2, even though it wasn’t a perfect fit (for example, it covered up the camera).  There is now a second generation version of the FreeOneHand that works with both the iPad 2 and the third generation iPad.  It combines everything that I loved about the original FreeOneHand with a design that better fits the newer iPads and with a new collapsible handle.  Ever since the company sent me a free review unit of this $40 product a few weeks ago I have rarely removed it from my third generation iPad.  I love this iPad accessory.

The company sent me the white version of the new FreeOneHand, but it also comes in black.  Since I use a black version of the iPad, that is the version I would have selected if I had purchased this item myself, but the white version looks fine too.

Like the original, this version fits around the four corners of the iPad.  To use it, you first slide the side of your iPad with the home button into two of the corners, then you snap each of the other two corners around the iPad.  Because the iPad 2 and third generation iPads are thinner than the original iPad, the second generation of the FreeOneHand is slightly harder to attach to the iPad, but you get the hang of it quickly.

Once your iPad is in the FreeOneHand, there is a knob on the back of the iPad that you can easily hold with one hand in multiple positions.  Holding the iPad by this knob is much easier on your hands than holding the iPad just by the sides.  Because less effort is required, you can hold your iPad with just one hand and for much longer before your hand experiences fatigue.  If I have a long deposition or brief to read on my iPad, the experience is much better when I can hold my iPad with the FreeOneHand.

There are two primary ways to hold the device, both of which are shown off in these two pictures from the FreeOneHand website that I used with my review of the original unit.  The first position is to slide the knob between your fingers.  The second position is to put your thumb through the holds and grip the knob.  I find myself alternating between both positions.

Here I am using the first position with the new FreeOneHand:

I also like using the FreeOneHand when I am giving a presentation with my iPad or when I am using it in court.  The FreeOneHand gives you a much better grip on your iPad so that it is far less likely to slip out of your hand.

The second generation FreeOneHand has cut-outs to accommodate all of the holes and switches on the iPad 2 and third generation iPad, plus a hole for the camera.  But the best new feature is the collapsible grip.  With a simple push you can make the grip almost completely flat.

My main problem with the first version of the FreeOneHand is that it took up a lot of space when traveling.  The collapsible handle solves this problem completely.  I now keep my iPad in the FreeOneHand almost all of the time, and when I travel back and forth to work I simply collapse the handle and slide it into the Tom Bihn Ristretto bag that I take back and forth to work every day.

One final improvement in the new FreeOneHand is that the knob itself is more rubbery.  Thus, you can use the FreeOneHand to prop up your iPad at an angle on your desk and the more rubbery knob provides enough friction to keep the iPad in place when you tap the screen.  (The prior version would slip.)

The new FreeOneHand works with the Apple Smart Cover.  I usually remove the Smart Cover completely when I am using the FreeOneHand since it just gets in the way of the FreeOneHand, but I like that I can easily attach the Smart Cover to protect the glass on my iPad when I slip it into a briefcase or the Ristretto.

The FreeOneHand is a fabulous device that makes it much easier to hold your iPad in one hand for an extended period of time.  The new collapsible grip is great for when you want to slip your iPad into a briefcase or bag, and allows me to keep the FreeOneHand on my iPad pretty much all the time.  If you like to lean back in a chair or a sofa and hold an iPad with one hand, I suspect that you will love the FreeOneHand as much as I do.

Click here to get FreeOneHand (second generation) ($39.94).

It wasn’t long after I started using an iPad that my wife saw how useful it would be to have her own.  Earlier this year, I upgraded to the third generation iPad, which meant that we became a three iPad household.  Having two children in the house (age four and six) made it easy to decide what to do with the extra iPad.  There are lots of high-quality apps designed especially for young children to help with spelling, math, etc.  Indeed, my son’s school even has an iPad lab that the children use, and the school has a good list of recommended apps.

Although I only let the kids use the iPad when I am around or at least nearby, I was still nervous about letting them handle an iPad that could be broken with just a single drop on the ground, so I’ve always limited them to using the iPad in one spot on carpet or on a bed.  Recently, however, iPad accessory manufacturer X-Doria sent me a free review unit of a product called the Widge.  This $40 product is a protective cover and handle for the iPad 2 and third generation iPad that makes the iPad much more safe for kids.

The unit itself is made of foam rubber and is wrapped around the iPad.  Once inside, the iPad is very sturdy and won’t come out unless you manually take it out.  The website for the product says that it is “squishy.”  I wouldn’t go quite that far because it holds its shape well, which I consider a plus.  But the substance definitely has some give, making it easy to grip and also providing protection for the iPad if it is hit on a side. 

The name “Widge” is a play on the fact that it has a wedge shape.  Thus, this case has a built-in stand that props up the iPad at a slight include, perfect for using an app.  You can also flip it over and prop up the iPad like a screen for watching a video.  Note that you cannot stand up an iPad in a portrait orientation in the Widge, but I saw my son play several games of checkers (a portrait-only game) with the Widge on his lap and he didn’t seem to notice much that the Widge placed the iPad at a slight angle.  To the contrary, I think he liked having something around the iPad that made it easier to hold.

Speaking of holding the iPad, the back of the Widge has a built-in handle.  This provides an extra grip and makes me feel much less nervous to see my child carrying an iPad.

There are holes at all the right spots so that you can charge the iPad when it is in the Widge and so that you can use the camera and hear the speaker.  There is also a hole for the headphone port and the switch on the side.  For the volume buttons and the Sleep/Wake button, the Widge covers those buttons but makes it easy to still use them because of indentations in the foam rubber.

Finally, there is something about the shape or color of the Widge that makes the iPad seem more fun.  My kids both like using the iPad when it is in the Widge, and I feel more at ease with the extra protection.

If you are looking for a way to make your old iPad 2 more kid-friendly (or if you are letting them use a new third generation iPad), the Widge is a great product.

Click here to get the Widge on Amazon ($39.99).