Internet Business Productivity

Part 7 - Simplifications and Annoyances - iPad as my main computer

As I mentioned in my last post about the "fun" aspect of the iPad, it's been a month since I really started using the iPad for most of my computer-related tasks and I've gotten some great feedback from all of you reading my blog and my tweets and shares. Now it's time to share the Good, the Bad and the Ugly about working on the iPad and how I've managed to simplify my work even more.

My Dropbox setup

As I mentioned in my post about clouds, on of the main storage options for me on the iPad is still Dropbox and I use it like this:

I have a main Dropbox account where I store all of my data and I access it mainly through the Dropbox app and Good Reader.

I set up a secondary Dropbox account that shares all of its folders with my main account and I use this account for most of the apps on my iPad. I just don't trust all the apps to have access to my main Dropbox account and all of my files. Only the files located on the secondary account.

What annoys me: Dropbox app on the iPad doesn't actually "sync" with the iPad. I mean, if you "star" some files, they'll be offline but you can't "star" folders to have really a seamless offline storage on the iPad. There is a 2-year old thread on the Dropbox forums about it and they still haven't done it. Seriously? I have a 64GB iPad and cannot sync the 5GB of Dropbox files to it? Why not?

My Evernote setup

Because of what I mentioned earlier, I use Evernote as my main cloud storage now. It has "offline notebooks" and syncs them beautifully. I'm now emailing lots of stuff to Evernote (more than I used to) as I prefer to store the info there and have it offline on my iPad whenever I want. The legendary search and OCR of Evernote works great, too and their iPhone apps (together with Food and Hello apps) help me get more stuff to Evernote and let me have the information at my fingertips at all times.

Side-note: Nozbe syncs with Evernote and we're working on a tighter sync with them to make sure I can make any of my notes "actionable" and "sharable" with others. Can't wait for that to happen.

What annoys me: Their iPad app has gotten a lot better over the years and I love it... but "processing" notes is not ideal. I cannot easily "move" my notes from my "inbox" notebook to their corresponding notebooks - need to edit the note first and then change notebook. This can be done a lot better (and the Mac app is better for it). Hope they'll improve it on the iPad.

Nebulous for writing

I got rid of Simplenote. It was cool when it lasted but when writing a note in Simplenote it got "accidentally" deleted when I was typing it (due to issues with their sync) I decided not to trust it anymore. Now I just use Nebulous for all of my writing. It works seamlessly with Dropbox and has great searching capabilities. I wish it synced with Evernote, too. Dropping Simplenote let me focus on Evernote and Dropbox as my main clouds now.

I simplified my blog posting routine: Now I write all my blog posts in Nebulous where they are saved in Dropbox automagically. The app has a "full screen" view, spell check and preview of the Markdown code which I use for typing. I send my blog posts directly from this app to my blog. Sweet :-)

What annoys me: Not much, lack of Evernote sync and "focus" mode of AI Writer. Other than that, it's great.

Other apps I frequently use:

Textastic for coding - I don't do much coding these days but when I do, this app does the trick. Very cool indeed. Works fast, is very stable. Nice.

Clipboard History - it's not ideal, it crashes at times and I need to switch to it to save stuff from clipboard (I wish it copied everything I copy to clipboard in the background but I don't think iOS allows for this). I just wish iOS had a full clipboard history built in.

TextExpander - I use built in keyboard shortcuts in iOS but for longer text snippets I use TextExpander. Many apps work with it, including Nebulous and AI Writer.

A note on keyboard shortcuts

Many folks asked me about it. iPad is not a PC. It's a touch interface and one can argue if the lack of keyboard shortcuts is a problem or not. I just don't like keyboard anymore. Yes, I love it for typing (just like I typed this blog post) but I don't use it all that much when I use the iPad. I prefer to use the iPad alone, type short things on the on-screen keyboard and just use my fingers to navigate and move around. Keyboard is an "additional thingy" to the iPad, it's not an integral part of it. Some of you might not like it. I love it and I think that this is the future of personal computing. That's also the reason why I went with the Zagg Flex Keyboard instead of any "cover with keyboard" - I don't want a "netbook" - I want an iPad.

Next up: Office, Browsing and Social Media

In my next posts I'll focus on these aspects of my "computing" life and why iPad excels in these and why I love working on it even more... stay tuned.

How did you simplify your iPad life? Which apps help you simplify your workflows?

Part 6 - Portability and Fun - iPad as my main computer

I'm back from my holiday trip and back after a long and tiring week of work (we just launched new Nozbe Desktop and new Productive! Magazine issue! Yay! :-) and it's time to get back to posting about my workflow and my new toy, I mean, "work device" called the iPad. This time we'll focus on iPad's real strengths - portability and fun.

A month has passed...

It's been more than a month since I picked up my new shiny iPad 3 and decided to do most of my work on this new device instead of my trusty Macbook Air. It was also the first time I went for a two-week trip without my laptop. Here are some thoughts on that.

iPad is very portable... duh!

It's not like I discovered something here. iPad is half the weight of my Macbook Air and half the size. This means I can put it into my man-purse and take it with me. No need for a full-blown backpack there. 10 hour batter life is exactly that - 10 hours worth of life - each 10% is one hour. Sweet and very long. On my trip (as I wasn't working a lot) I used to charge it every 3-4 days. When I'm back, I charge it basically every night. I don't use cables in between.

iPad is just more convenient when traveling

It's just not clumsy when I want to pull it up from my bag and use it. I take it in one hand, use the other to navigate and that's it. A lot more comfortable than using a laptop on a trip (try to hold a laptop on one hand and type with the other!). I don't need to sit. I can just stand (or walk slowly) and use it. Sweet.

iPad means more "fun" than "work"

When I pick up my laptop, I tend to think "work" and start opening up web sites, checking email, etc. When I pick up my iPad I firstly ask myself this question: "Is there anything I absolutely need to do now?" As I have my flows for work nicely designed on the iPad, if I don't need to work at this moment I simply open up Kindle app (for ebooks), Reeder app (for news) or Pocket app (for the articles I've saved) and start reading. And I usually use it in portrait mode, without keyboard and stuff. It just naturally transforms itself from a "work machine" to a "play machine" or simply a very versatile "reader device".

This was especially convenient on a plane. I'd use it at times with my Zagg keyboard to write things (i.e. "create") and then I'd just pick it up to read. A real Transformer :-)

I tend to use the iPad more now

This week has been crazy. We've been working a lot just to catch up, we've launched a few things and we've mainly succeeded. And the whole week long I preferred to just pick up my iPad to work instead of my laptop. I just enjoyed working on the iPad more... it's just more fun, I feel more and more productive on it every day now... and I hardly need my laptop anymore. We'll see in months to come, but I lean towards my iPad a lot more these days than towards my laptop. Strange feeling, you know?

Do you use iPad a lot these days, too? How do you use it?

Traveling America - Tips and Tricks

I live in Europe and I'm not American... but I do like to travel to the USA every now and then (usually two times per year). Mostly business mixed with leisure. When my friends want to go to the USA they ask me for tips and tricks. So I thought I'd write a blog post hoping, that my American friends (as well as my other European friends who also travel to the USA) who read this blog will add their tips in the comments. Please do. I'm by no means an expert.

Prices in America

Well, American currency is US Dollar and you're expected to use this "green" currency. What you will not expect when you come here for the first time is that pricing in the USA is "different". In Europe the prices you see are the final prices. If something costs 10 EUR, that's what you pay. Our VAT ("value added tax") is included in the price. In the USA the prices don't include the "sales tax" which varies in different states (or even counties) so if something costs $10, it usually costs $10 + ~ 8-10% sales tax which means it costs you almost $11 dollars. And the tricky part is that some shops do display final prices. But only some. Most don't. You'll find out what you'll have to pay only at the cashier.

Prices in the restaurants get even trickier. If you're ordering $10 burger, it will cost you that, plus sales tax plus a tip (aka. "service fee") of around 15%. Meaning a $10 burger will cost you at least $13 bucks. And it's not like in Europe where you give a 5-10% tip "if you like the service" - they expect you to pay 15% every time. If you want to pay the full price for your meal without sales tax and tip, get a $2 hot-dog from a hot-dog stand in Manhattan, NYC :-)

Other than that, prices in America for most goods are lower than in Europe, so once you've understood how the system works and don't feel ripped off by the taxes and tips, you'll enjoy better prices than on the old continent in the Euro-zone.

Renting a car

Distances in America are seriously huge so unless you're going to NYC-Manhattan with great metro-public-transport system, go get a car. Now this part gets tricky as there are many sites advertising great prices but many fail to mention the insurance. The car-rental companies make it even more difficult with various insurance options and it's easy to get lost. My basic health insurance for travels doesn't include car insurance in the USA and chances are your doesn't too, so make sure to purchase CDW (Collision Damage Waiver) with your car rental - it basically means you're not responsible for the car "at all" and it costs from $15-40 per day and many price-comparision web sites failed to mention it.

I've had many strange experiences with renting a car where I'd rent quite cheaply and then see I'd have to pay around $30 a day for insurance. That's why I recommend companies like Alamo where they put the insurance in the price right there. I've also had a car from Enterprise, Budget (where I overpaid for insurance) and others but I keep coming back to Alamo. Whatever company you choose, make sure it's pretty close to the Airport terminal and rent a car for the whole stay. It's very convenient to get from the plane to the car and later drive back and go straight to the terminal. And one more thing - get a big car - usually the price difference between compact and mid-sized or even full-sized cars is minor ($10-$20 for the whole stay) and it's really comfortable to travel in a bigger car.

When driving, mind the signs on the roads, especially when it comes to parking. They have "street cleaning" and some parts of the streets are parking only at certain hours. I learned this the hard way when they towed away my car - this lesson cost me $250. It's cheaper to spend $20 for overnight parking in a big city.

Hotels

As America is a car-friendly country, you can find a motel almost anywhere. Cheap motels (around $50 per night) can be really good at times, most are fully equipped and are relatively clean. If you're not on a budget, I recommend hotels around the $100-$150 price range which are really good. These "Inns" offer breakfast (more on that later) and very big rooms, mostly with flat-screen TVs and big bathrooms (and very often have swimming pools). If you choose "Hyatt Place", "Hampton Inn" or "Holiday Inn Express" you can't go wrong with either of them.

In big cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco or New York City... double or even triple (in case of NYC) these prices. It's a whole different world out there.

The motels and inns usually offer "continental" or "american" breakfast which basically means no veggies, but coffee, waffles, scrumbled eggs, bacon and yoghourts. Your most important skill will be to learn how to do waffles - I love it :-) Even though the breakfast is by no means complete, it's great to be able to wake up, go to the breakfast room and have some coffee and something to eat without dressing up and all of this.

Shopping

You might not consider traveling to the USA for shopping purposes but think again. This is a shopper's paradise. The electronic gear is cheaper (laptops, cams, Apple products) - just remember that there will always sales tax added to the price. Clothing is a lot cheaper than in Europe. As I'm trying to live a lot more minimalistic life now, I've basically given away my old clothes and buy only a little of each type of clothing... and I buy them in the States and I buy them from the best brands (quality-wise, I'm not a show-off :-) in the huge Outlet stores in the USA. Now I really enjoy my jeans, my polo-shirts, my pants, everything. Just find an Outlet Mall on your way.

To compare the prices let me give you an example: An original Polo Shirt from Ralph Lauren costs in Europe 100 EUR. In the States it's about $75 in Macy's, in the RL official outlet store it's $45 and in Marshall's Store (where they have many brands) it can cost $35 (~25 EUR). It's still quite expensive for just a shirt, but I have only a few of these and I love wearing them. Again, becoming a minimalist teaches you to buy yourself good things, but few of them and only the ones you truly enjoy wearing.

If you go to Macy's - you can find great prices there. First off, get yourself an "international traveller's card" - just ask any cashier - it's 10% off on almost everything you buy (after all the discounts) and shop around first in their online store. When you go to their store and see something that costs more than in their online store, they have to match this price. My wife does it all the time. And she loves purses from Macy's :-)

Cosmetics from companies like Clinique or Estee Lauder is half the price (compared to Europe) so if you use them, buy them in the States. I use after-shave from Clinique and it lasts me for half a year (and I shave daily) so I bought two for an entire year worth of shaving :-)

As for electronics gear, this is a paradise for me - they have more gadgets than anywhere else, especially if I need a certain type of thingy for my iPhone or iPad, I'll surely find it here. And I do. Usually Best Buy and Apple Stores are my travel points :-)

Internet connection

Most hotels offer some kind of Wi-fi connection, but it's usually crappy. But it works. Starbucks and McDonalds offer free Wi-fi and more and more coffee shops do that, too. Apple Stores have the best Wi-fi - I'm writing this post at an Apple Store in Los Angeles (in the Grove).

Do you have more tips for me?

That's it for now, in my next posts I'll focus on West and East Coast as I've travelled some here. If you've also traveled to the USA, please share your tips below in the comments! I hope my American friends will also contribute with their tips as they actually live here.

Part 5 - Traveling - iPad as my main computer

On Monday we landed in Los Angeles for our two-week vacation with my wife visiting West-Coast, Grand Canyon and other spectacular sites nearby. It's the first trip ever that I didn't take my laptop with me. Normally even though I wouldn't work too much (as I really want to spend this time with my wife), but as my laptop is (was) the center of my digital life (and I am a geek), I'd take it anyway. Now that I'm on my iPad only trial I just took my iPad. And nothing more. And I even planned the whole trip on the iPad. Here's how:

iPad is ideal for traveling... because it's so small

First let me tell you that iPad as such is ideal for traveling. Weights a lot less than my laptop (which is already an ultra-light Macbook Air!), needs less accessories, holds 10 hours on battery without any problem and can be turned on really instantly which is seriously amazing. It's a perfect travel computer as such. And when I want to read something, it converts to an ebook reader in an instant.

Great apps for traveling help you plan the trip

Traveling with an iPad? There are apps for that! Here are the ones I used:

• TripIt! - thanks to the suggestion by David Pogue of the NYT, this is the "mother of all travel apps". When I ordered our plane ticket, rented car, hotel... whatever, I'd always receive a confirmation email. Forward it to TripIt and it beautifully parses the emails and adds them to the app. Perfect. In my last post I mentioned why I love how the apps work with email.

• Booking - I've been always using Booking.com for booking hotels and the iPad app works beautifully, too. I stopped using the web site, only use the app now.

• FlightRadar24 and Flightrack PRO - both apps are great for following the airplanes, making sure we're not late and having up-to-date info about the flights. The latter syncs with my TripIt account which is really neat :-)

• Navigon and Google Maps - I use navigation on my iPhone (Navigon in Europe and Copilot Live in the USA) by an extra view of the maps on my iPad helps me plan a trip. Google Maps app on the iPad is still a joy to use.

• The Weather Channel - great app for watching weather forecast in various places at a time. Indispensable.

• Evernote - as Evernote is my personal brain, I forward my travel confirmations there as well, just to make sure I can access and search them anytime. It's a backup solution for me, although I prefer the view that TripIt offers me. But I still have the habit of sending stuff to Evernote just in case.

• Mercury Browser - I use this browser very often especially when ordering flights or cars as many web sites detect the iPad as a mobile phone and send me over to a crippled mobile site and won't even let me to go to their "normal" site. Mercury Browser has an ability to "imitate" I'm not on the iPad and it works.

• 1Password - I use this to store passwords across all of my devices. Works beautifully and this app is one of the essentials on the iPad for any type of browsing, especially accessing different travel sites with my credentials. Or my banking account.

What's the journey going to be like? Should be fun!

I'm only starting my two-week trip so I'll be posting later how iPad worked, but so far so good. The planning and preparation on the iPad worked beautifully. Now it's time to see how iPad substitutes my main computer on this journey. Fingers crossed!

How do you find traveling with the iPad? Any tips or apps I missed?

Seven years married to my best friend

Yesterday (Monday) exactly seven years ago me and my wife said "yes" and commenced our journey together through life as husband and wife. Suffice to say, we still love each other and currently we are celebrating our anniversary traveling only two of us (we left our 3-year old daughter with my parents). As every young couple we've had our ups and downs but I think that over the years what was the key to our successful (so far!) relationship was this: My wife is my best friend.

When Harry met Sally

This is our favorite movie as it's quite similar to our story in some sense... We met in high-school and instantly became very good friends. We both liked dancing, partying and going to the movies. We had many things in common. Yet we never "clicked" romantically. As we grew older our friendship matured. I had my share of relationships with other girls, my wife with other guys, we'd consult one another and help each other in trying times. All as friends. Even though I considered my friend "sexy" I didn't want to spoil this perfect friendship. We both didn't want that... but we eventually couldn't help it. We were falling in love and finally we stopped being just friends. We've known each other a little over 10 years when we got married. Crazy, huh?

A key to successful marriage is Friendship

In one of his blog posts Michael Hyatt writes the very same thing and he has more than 30 years of marriage to confirm that, but as we live in our relationship 7 years now and have friends who are couples (married and not... and not anymore) we have also noticed that love and sex are great (and they really are!), but at the end of the day, it's the friendship that helps you stay together every single day.

The worst that can happen is that you spend an evening with the person you like most

When my wife was doing an internship in an European Agency we would party a lot with our friends who were also interns and most of them were singles. They had to go out as much as they could... as their alternative was a lonely apartment. We partied a lot, but when we didn't feel like it, we'd always enjoy a quiet evening, because either way we were spending it with a person we liked the most anyway. And this is what counts.

Friends and buddies change... your significant other does not

Over the years I've had many good buddies, great friends and fantastic pals... but times changed, we moved, they moved, we keep in touch but priorities also change. My wife is still with me and she's still my best friend. And I do hope she's here to stay :-)

Learn to be friends if you're not yet...

We've seen couples base their relationships on different things than friendship... and it works OK for them short-term, but with years the fact that they don't share interests together and just plainly don't spend "fun" time together pays its dues. They start living separate lives. And I don't think it's ever too late to become a friend (and hopefully the best friend) of your significant other.

"She wants what's best for me and I want what's best for her"

These words aren't mine. My father (36 years married to my mother) said this to me before my wedding day when I asked him about his secret to a long, lasting and loving marriage. Everyone who knows my parents knows they live by this rule to this day. And they are best friends, too - even though they got married one year after they first met.

I didn't write this post to brag. I don't know what the future holds and I'm happy with me and my wife (and my daughter) and our small milestone today. I'm just happy that I'm married to my "sexy" best friend :-)

What's your key to a successful relationship?

Productivity with Jason Womack - video interview for Productive! magazine #12

Part 4 - Email, clouds and APIs - iPad as my main computer

The more I use the iPad the more I explore its "nuts and bolts". The more apps I try the less I need... and the more I appreciate the small, subtle things app designers have gone to actually make my new "productivity machine" better. In this part of my iPad-only saga I'm going to focus on several aspects of my iPad's apps:

Email. To zero. Every day.

When I wrote my first post on the iPad two years ago I didn't know it'd be so true. Processing emails on the iPad to zero is so beautiful. It's really great. I'm "touching" emails and processing my inbox to zero every single day. I love it. The best part is that my Mail application is not "asking for attention" in the dock, it's there when I need it... and I use it several times a day and it's a great experience every time.

Email integrations work, and help.

When you're on a desktop is so easy to drag and drop files to other apps, to desktop and take it from there... here on the iPad I start appreciating how many apps have taken a great approach to Email integration and enable me to "forward" emails to them. Evernote, Nozbe (of course!), Tripit, Buffer, Kindle... and many others. I find myself emailing other apps a lot more often than before... thus processing email to zero even faster!

I love the APIs of apps. They play so well together!

My favorite "content consuming" apps are Reeder, Tweetbot, Pocket (formerly Read-it-later) and well, Safari. Except for the last one, all are very tightly integrated with each other as well as my clouds like Evernote od Dropbox so this makes using them a breeze and making sure I don't lose the articles I want to keep or read later (for which the iPad is a beautiful machine, too :-)

Bonus - IFTTT = If This Than That

This service is like "one API to rule them (APIs) all" and I've already configured it to post all of my Instagram photos to Evernote, when I star an item in Twitter or Google Reader, send them to Evernote or Pocket... and other stuff. It's like an Automator for the web... and for my iPad. Works beautifully.

Bonus 2 - GoodReader - one app to integrate them all

I can't say enough about GoodReader - I thought wrongly that it's "only a PDF reader" but it's an app that integrates all the "files" on my iPad with my clouds and other apps. This is a must-have if you're serious about the iPad as your working machine.

Bonus 3 - Second Dropbox account

As I mentioned, one of my main clouds is Dropbox and I can't say enough about it. I store many files on my Dropbox account and need GoodReader to have access to all of them... but I don't need all of the apps to have access to my entire Dropbox account so I decided to create a second dropbox account which shares some files and some folders with my main Dropbox account. The second account is free with 2GB of storage but it's plenty enough for my needs and for the needs of the apps that sync with it. All of the folders I have on this account are being shared with my main account... so that I can access this second account from my main account but not the other way round (for all the files). This way I'm less "scared" when I give access to my Dropbox folder to all of the apps that ask for it.

The last bonus - iSMEStorage

To enable Dropbox to WebDav sync - which in turn gives me access to my Dropbox files directly through WebDav from the Pages, Keynote and Numbers apps, I needed to buy a $5 app called iSMEStorage - there is no subscription, just an "iOS only" plan where I can set it up to "translate" my Dropbox files to WebDav.

There are more tips coming

As I'm discovering my iPad only way I'm finding more and more subtle things that, once set up right, help me work more efficiently on my iPad and in many way more "focused" than ever before.

Do you have any tips for me? Do let me know!

Video of my dual-monitor setup for twice the productivity

This weekend I posted a new Productive! Show video - episode #43 where I'm showing my typical home-office setup before my iPad only experiment. I like dual-screen setup as it helps me quickly change focus and I'm sure that after my experiment I'll very often support my working on the iPad with an additional screen. For now, this is how my typical-pre-iPad-only setup looked like and why it's very productive:

Watch and comment on YouTube

I already discussed two-monitor setup on my blog before. Now in a video I'm showing you how it works for me. Does it work for you, too? Please let me know if you ever tried it :-)

Part 3 - Designing Flows - iPad as my main computer

Many people have asked me why I'm trying to go iPad-only when I'm so productive on the Mac and don't really need to go so far. Well, apart from being excited by the challenge and the new gadget, the other thing is to really re-think how I use my computer and why I do things I do the same way. I've already discovered in my last posts that I need to use different cloud services and also need to change the way I write which brings me to the real deal here: I'm really re-designing my "flows" or processes

The work is not a place to go, it's a thing you do - was my favorite quote when I was writing my master thesis years ago about tele-working... and the "PC" is also just a machine that should help us get our stuff done... unless we are in the "PC-manufacturing/repairing" business where the PC is our job.

My iPad-only work imposes constraints that make me re-think how I use computer every day

As you have seen in my post about writing - I have to "design" the way I do writing on the iPad and the Mac. I have to make sure there's almost no friction there and I focus on writing and not on "setting up to write". I want to get my writing done as easily as possible.

There are more processes to come

What I'm saying here is that over the course of next weeks you'll see more "flows" or "processes" on this blog where I'll be explaining how I do stuff on the iPad with the apps at hand. I'll be posting how I:

• do photo management and sharing with m family
• do videos for my show and for my family
• do coding
• do feedback loops with my team
• do email
• do reading
• do listening
• do everything else...

These all are completely new processes for me and I'm studying them to make sure I finally get them right, with as few apps and services as possible but also in the most focused way possible, too.

My iPad became my ultimate flow-management tool

Thanks to the fact that the iPad is so small, so full of great, focused apps, I can learn new processes and optimize the way I use my computer. And because there are no windows on the iPad, there are no distractions. It's a different beast but my guess is, that even if I do get back to work on my computer for 20% of my time, I'll be working on it in a totally different way than before, thinking about these processes a lot more.

Which flows do you use? How do you design your "processes" on your PC or your iPad or iPhone? Have you thought about your computer this way before?

Part 2 - Writing - iPad as my main computer