Kzoom wrote:
"They have always been, from day one, purely touch devices"...which is why they have had an interface for an external keyboard from Day One? Because typing on a featureless piece of glass eliminates the ability of touch typing, and is therefore inherently slower and less productive? And therefore, won't sell?
Same idea with a mouse versus my finger. There's a time and place for using each. I've used desktops (which Apple still supplies with a mouse), Android tablets (mouse and keyboard, no prob) and iPads, both Pro and Mini (using my fingers to locate and move text.)
It's just easier and, especially, faster to locate and move text using a mouse. It's far more precise than a finger, both to land and to use to highlight a block of text. I can't see through my finger, so I either must wait for the circle to magnify what/where I'm 'touching', find the cursor in that circle, then adjust my finger, or I must make the font large enough that I can hit the right location without waiting for the OS to catch up. Of course, this costs content space, as this reduces the amount of on-screen text by a factor of three or so.
There are other failings of the no-mouse idea. I can think of two more just now. But the idea that a half-inch wide hunk of oily meat, pressed to a piece of featureless glass is a substitute for the precisely designed cursor a mouse generates for the sole purpose of locating a single point on a screen is ludicrous.
Hmmm...
I learned the tools given to me from the very introduction of the iPad.
I forced myself from the beginning to learn to use the built-in iOS keyboard.
I have been using iPad software, virtual keyboards since the first iPad in 2010.
I’ve managed to become pretty fast and proficient using it for many years and I have gotten even faster with word/vocabulary suggestions being activated as my iPad has, over the many years, learned most of my common vocabulary words and I also, utilise keyboard phrase shortcuts to type short phrases to type out whole sentences and/or short paragraphs.
By using the software keyboard, I have, also, made extensive use of iOS’s software keyboard trackpad feature that turns the entire iOS software keyboard area into a giant trackpad that controls the iOS insertion point "I" beam cursor by doing a two-finger single tap to activate this trackpad feature that has been part of iOS since iOS 9.
You can place insertion "I" beam anywhere you want, then use the delete key to delete a letter and/or replace a letter in a word.
If you use two-finger double tap within the keyboard area, you can highlight words, lines of text or entire paragraphs for editing.
Another even more powerful third party software keyboard I use, also, with iOS default virtual keyboard is a software keyboard called Padkeys.
PadKeys - Number Row Keyboard by Natural Designs Software, Inc.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/padkeys-number-row-keyboard/id975022995?mt=8
https://padkeyskeyboard.com/
Padkeys adds a lot easier and quicker access to commonly used symbols and offers the addition of separate I-beam navigation keys, as well as a great array of other useful keyboard features.
Even though I have a separate Bluetooth keyboard, I hardly use it as it is noisy and I have to set up my iPad in a way to be able to use the keyboard in my lap.
It is just faster, convenient and easier for me just to use the built-in iOS virtual software keyboard and I don’t have to lug around any extra hardware other than a stylus or two in my pocket or iPad/laptop carry case for sketching/drawing/writng.
