Category Archives: Mobile

My friend Antoine is into mobile technology – REALLY into mobile technology. His passion is rather infectious, and now he’s got me writing about it too!

Mobile Suite Showdown – Importing and Exporting

Posted on February 28, 2012 | Leave a comment

Productivity apps on the iPad continue to be one of the top selling points for the device. It’s no surprise, then, that there are several office suites available in the App Store. This post is going to explore the three main “all in one” suites which are available on the iPad – Documents to Go, Quick Office, and Office2 HD. Apple’s iWork is also available in the App store, but the “separate app” nature of the suite sets it outside the scope of this comparison.

Today we’ll be looking at the fourth, and final, comparison – importing and exporting. Each suite will be reviewed on both how they deal with data both on a local network and to the cloud.

Quick Office HD

One of the selling points for Quick Office is the ease of which documents can be uploaded to, and retrieved from, computers on the local network via a built-in file transfer interface. This setting can be toggled by tapping the gear button in the file screen and toggling the “file transfer” option. Turning the option on will reveal an ip address which can be used to acces files which are locally stored inside Quick Office. For additional (or, really, any) security an added authentication option can be toggled which will require users to input a user and password combination before connecting. It’s a good idea to make sure this is on. Once file transfers are enabled, users can access Quick Office’s files (for locally stored files only) though a simple web-interface, or by connecting to the server through the finder or windows explorer. In my experiments with Quick Office I found that the file transfer server will disconnect a finder connection when switching to another app on the iPad – this is probably a limitation of iOS.

Quick Office HD also has an impressive number of options available for storing documents in the cloud. Aside from the “big three” of Dropbox, Google Docs, and Box – Quick Office also allows to connections to Sugar Sync, Evernote, and several more. Connections to these services benefit from Quick Office’s excellent file managment tools, however features which are unique to each service are not implemented. This is especially true for the lack of “starred documents” in Google Docs.

Documents imported into Quick Office are handled well – even supporting elements such as outlines, which cannot be generated by the suite itself. Quick Office will also display unrecognized fonts in a default sans serif face without stripping the font information from the actual document. The suite handles spreadsheets well, but my two test presentations suffered from lost formatting and stripped animations.

Office2 HD

As with Quick Office, HD Office2 HD has a built-in file transfer option. This can be access by tapping the gear button in the lower left of the file management screen and toggling “Enable File Sharing.” Similarly, security can also be enabled for this feature. While Quick Office has a colorful and well-thought out web interface, Office2 HD brings up a plain list hyper-links with an upload button at the bottom of the page (which you will probably need to scroll down to reveal). It gets the job done, but it’s not fun to look at. If you are using the file transfer option for this suite connecting via the finder or windows explorer is a better option.

The available options for cloud storage are not as great as in Quick Office. The “big three” are present, as are some other players, but that’s it. The suite, however, adds the ability to connect to a service via webDav – so “roll your own” cloud storage is an option.

Importing files into Office2 HD doesn’t render quite as good results as Quick Office. Unrecognized fonts are displayed in a sans serif font (and retained when opened elsewhere). Outline lists, however, are not displayed correctly though, again, the formatting is retained when opened elsewhere. The application handles spreadsheets well, however, and has in previous months been able to handle files which caused the other two suites to crash. It retains most cell formatting, but cannot hide cells. My first test presentation displayed with moderate success. My second test presentation removed the gradient background and didn’t handle a bullet list very well. Neither presentation retained animations.

Documents to Go

Unlike the other suites in this comparison, Documents to Go makes use of a desktop application to handle local transfers. In one sense, this can be seen as a hassle, because it requires the downloading an application to transfer documents over a local network. On the other hand, Documents to Go removes the need to manually move documents between devices (as in the other two suites). Once installed, Documents to Go’s desktop application creates a folder which will automatically sync files across devices. For uses who want to sync only on their local network, this is a good option.

Documents to Go has the least available options for cloud storage out of the three suites in this comparison. It has the big three, and adds only Sugar Sync as an alternative (each suite also offers iDisk, but this product will soon be discontinued so it can hardly be counted). It does, however, offer some special hooks for GoogleDocs users (the previously mentioned “stared documents”) – this is a nice touch.

Files imported into Documents to Go are displayed nicely. Text is re-flowed for the screen and font information is retained. I sometimes noticed a glitch in the font for outlines when a document is created in the Suite and then uploaded to GoogleDocs, which is an error which should be addressed. Also, Documents to Go has a tendency to strip out paragraph spacing when information is moved through the suite. Again, this is a glitch which I’d like to see fixed. Spreadsheets imported well, retaining cell formatting and even hiding cells which had been hidden in GoogleDocs. One of my test presentations, however, caused the application to crash.

Conclusion

Each of these suites handles importing and exporting in slightly different ways. Documents to Go allows for local syncing, which is a plus, but the added step of installing a desktop application to do so is a non-starter for many. The local file transfer feature for the other two suites is a nice touch (though the web interface is prettier in Quick Office) but requires a manual transfer of data. Again, this is a non-starter for many users.

Each suite has the “big three” cloud storage services available, but Quick Office offers the most options of all the suites. To it’s credit Office2 HD has built-in webDav support, allowing users or organizations to set up their own cloud storage services. Documents to Go has the fewest cloud storage options available, but has some key features GoogleDocs users will appreciate.

The suites each do a credible job importing word processing documents and spreadsheets, but are dismal when importing even the simplest of presentations (really, don’t even bother). The parity of features for each suite makes it difficult to declare a “winner” in this category. As a GoogleDocs user I tend to lean towards Documents to Go, but users of other cloud solutions will be happy with any of the three suites in this comparison.

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Mobile Suite Showdown – Editor Features

Posted on February 22, 2012 | Leave a comment

Productivity apps on the iPad continue to be one of the top selling points for the device. It’s no surprise, then, that there are several office suites available in the App Store. This post is going to explore the three main “all in one” suites which are available on the iPad – Documents to Go, Quick Office, and Office2 HD. Apple’s iWork is also available in the App store, but the “separate app” nature of the suite sets it outside the scope of this comparison.

Each suite will be explored for file management, editor layout, editing features, and importing/exporting. We’ll primarily look at the word-processing features of each suite, but will also compare the spreadsheet and presentations modules for each app. Today we’ll be looking at the third comparison – editor features.

This installment of the series is going to be handled a bit differently. The same three suites will be reviewed, but we’ll break down the review for each module in the package – Word Processor, Spreadsheet, and Presentation.

Word Processor

This is the module I use most in any of these suites. Given that I have to write what amounts to a short reflection paper every week, this makes sense.

Quick Office

As was pointed out in the previous segment of this comparison, Quick Office HD attempted to create a simple interface which was pleasant to look at and easy to navigate. Unfortunately, the shortcomings of their interface choices also impacted the feature set they included in the suite. The word processing module can do basic character formatting, color and font changes, and simple paragraph formatting like indents and lists. It handles these tasks, decently and can interpret more complex formatting well when it’s imported into the suite, but there is no way to handle more complex formatting directly in Quick Office HD. There is no way to customize lists or add spacing between paragraphs. These are two features I use constantly, so their absense is something I feel.

Quick Office HD feels like a mobile editor, which is odd given their decision to present content in a page-layout view. It’s useful for editing existing documents, or creating documents with basic formatting, but it doesn’t seem to be designed for complex projects.

Office2 HD

For an inexpensive package, Office2 brings a lot of punch to the features debate. This suite handles all the basic formatting covered by Quick Office HD. It also, however, has an excellent slate of advanced formatting features. Paragraph spacing, line spacing, columns, manual breaks and tab stops, and full-fledged styles. While I gave Office2 HD poor marks for it’s cluttered interface, it seems the developers were busy adding an insane amount of features to their product. In addition the already listed features, this suite also allows the insertion of images and footnotes into a document. Something no other application in this comparison is able to do.

The desire to have desktop-level features in their application is admirable, and it is rather amazing to have so many options available on a mobile editor. Unfortunately, some of the features feel half-baked. When version 5 first came out, the suite was sluggish – leaving many of the advanced features buried behind a frustrated waiting game. Two iterations have passed since 5.0 was released, however, and the speed has gotten better each time. In fact, Office2 is actually faster on my iPad than Quick Office HD. Other features, however, still need some work. Hanging indents on lists have a tendency to disappear once a document is closed and re-opened.

This is a suite which shows much promise – but it still needs to work out some kinks.

Documents to Go

As with layout, this suite splits the difference between the other two in this comparison. It has many of the features included in Office2 except paragraph styles, images, and footnotes. In place of these omissions, however, Documents to Go adds an extensive array of list options. This includes a good range of multi-level lists for the creation of outlines. As this is a feature I use every week, it’s something I appreciate.

Unlike Office2, the advanced formatting features in Documents to Go “just work.” The only glitch I’ve discovered so far is the omission of paragraph spacing when a document is synced and retrieved from Google Docs. This is an inconvenience, and one which I wish would be rectified, but it’s not a show-stopper.

Spreadsheet

I use spreadsheets infrequently, but when I do they are an indispensable tool for my work.

Quick Office

The Spreadsheet module in Quick Office HD is slick, fast, and intuitive. Functions are easily accessed next to the editor bar, and some basic formatting is found in the main editor window – including the option to format cell data into a pre-arranged type. Other editing includes the ability to do simple borders, change cell color, and align cells both vertically and horizontally. In fact, the same “drag to align” interface which seems unnecessarily graphic in the word processor feels elegant in the spreadsheet. Merging cells and wrapping data in a cell is also easily accomplished.

Selecting multiple cells in Quick Office HD is also easily done. When a cell is selected, a handle appears on each side which can be used to drag a selection across multiple rows, columns, or both.

Office2 HD

The spreadsheet (called “workbooks” when you create a new one) in this suite has a great many features, all accessed through the buttons on the editor toolbar. Included among these buttons are quick borders, and button which will sum all the data in a column (I love this). Data types are found under a dollar sign icon, but advanced formatting is found under an unattractive “…” icon (again, the interface needs a little work). As with the word processor, the formatting buttons span between two pages.

Selecting multiple cells isn’t initially as elegant in Office2 HD as it is in Quick Office. A basic selection requires double tapping a cell and then dragging through the cells you want – a handle appears which can be used to adjust the selection. Alternatively, however, if you tap a single cell and then long-tap another cell a range can will selected (row, column, or box depending on where you long-tap). This would be helpful when trying to select a very specific data-set in a large spreadsheet.

Documents to Go

Documents to Go has an impressive array of functions which can be done with it’s spreadsheet, and can handle basic formatting to display it’s data. Borders, however, are missing from it’s tool-set – which I find an odd omission. The spreadsheet module of this suite, however, does add the ability to hide and unhide rows and columns. This is helpful, for example, when a spreadsheet is used to create a schedule – past weeks can be hidden from view to allow the quick browsing of data.

Selecting multiple cells in Documents to Go, however, is an exercise in frustration. The feature is accessed by double-tapping a cell and then dragging. There is, however, no handle present which can later alter a selection. On large spreadsheets, this creates headaches when attempting to select data.

Presentation

My initial response to anyone wanting to use the presentation modules in these suites is, “Just use Keynote.” As they are a bundled part of the suite, however, I include them in this comparison. I won’t bother with the screenshots, though, it’s just too depressing.

Quick Office

When thinking of the presentation module for Quick Office HD the word, “rudimentary” comes to mind. It has support for the formatting of basic shapes and text boxes – and that’s it. No builds, no backgrounds, no transitions. Just the text and shapes. The purpose of this app seems to be to display, and edit, imported slides rather than build new presentations from scratch.

Office2 HD

This presentation module includes a few more features than Quick Office, including the ability to set a background image. In addition, there are some included slide templates and to import images into slides. Builds, transitions, and compositing features (such as borders and drop shadows) are not included. I also find the presentation module to be a bit unstable, as it tends to crash when inserting images.

Documents to Go

If Quick Office was “rudimentary,” the presentation module in Documents to Go is “bare bones.” There are several simple templates offered when creating a new presentation, but once created the content of the slides can only be altered via an outline view! Speaker notes can be added to slides, in the slide-view mode – but I’m not sure why anyone would bother.

If you’re not importing slides into Documents to Go, it’s best to forget this module even exists.

Conclusion

In terms of sheer features, Office2 HD dominates. It’s advanced formatting for word processing documents, and several nice touches to it’s spreadsheet module, make it come out on top. Some of the features aren’t quite stable, however, so it might be best to save often when using this suite for content generation. Over all, Documents to Go comes in second due to a stellar word processing feature-set – but Quick Office’s spreadsheet module is also a tempting offer.

 

 

 

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Pleasantly Disrupted

Posted on December 19, 2011 | Leave a comment
I remember watching the initial iPad announcement and thinking, “Well, it’s kinda cool, but underwhelming.” It didn’t have a camera, and it really looked like nothing more than a big iPod Touch. As I already had an iPhone, I saw no need for “another device.” Then my neighbor got one to be his “take along computer” for his handyman business and let me play with it. I was shocked at how much I enjoyed using it. Manipulating the screen through touch was an emotional experience, and the experience of using the iPad felt nothing like using my iPhone. I was hooked.

Several months later, as we were wrestling with getting a device for my son so he could read the Bible and his books for school, we knew the iPad was what he needed (he’s significantly visually impaired). I generally kept my hands off, but I borrowed it from time to time to see how I would use an iPad in my pastoral work. Before the year was up, I knew this was a device I wanted to have. I saved up my Christmas and Birthday money, added some from my ministry reimbursements, and stood out in line last March to be among the first to get an iPad 2. It’s changed the way I do computing.

Initially I categorized my iPad as “another device.” It was useful, but for the majority of my takes I still opened up my MacBook and did my “serious” work. I continued to write my sermons in GoogleDocs, my video editing in Final Cut Express and iMovie, my blogging from the web-interface, and my presentations in Keynote’s desktop incarnation. I used my iPad for editing existing documents, quick references, and e-mail – “light” tasks that I could do quickly and the move on to other things.

Over the months, however, I noticed a change my my mental categories. More and more I found myself packing up my iPad when I went “out and about” to work, even when I was doing “serious” tasks. This shift was aided, no doubt, by my acquisition of an inexpensive keyboard and apps like Blogsy (the best blogging tool I have ever used). The real motivation for this shift, however, was the emotional attachment I have to the iPad. When I am using it, even with the keyboard, I have a sense of being more connected to the task on which I’m working. I used to say I loved the iPad because when I used it the wall between myself, and anyone with whom I happened to be collaborating, was removed. Three quarters of a year into my life as an iPad user, however, has revealed to me how using the iPad also removes the wall of separation between me and the content I create. I now see my iPad as my computer, and my MacBook as “another device.” The MacBook is a necessary device for storage, and for large projects and presentations, but it’s what I go to when I simply can’t use my iPad.

It was an unexpected transition, and this disruptive tool isn’t even two years old. I’m almost giddy as the thought of what’s coming next.

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The five year lag

Posted on August 19, 2011 | 2 Comments

The other day I had a brief twitter conversation with @johndyer (whom all my readers should follow) about technology in the Church. John often hears complaints that churches are “five years behind the rest of the world” technology-wise and, being a thoughtful technologist remind the complainers, “Look, its 2011 and George Lucas has JUST gotten Star Was on Blue Ray.” It’s a good point, the rest of the world is sometimes not as far ahead as we think.In our exchange however, I pointed out that the irony was that Blue Ray was a DOA medium anyway, so John may have picked a better example. His response was, “Doesn’t that make it a better point?” Again, he has a good thought, people are so keen on “catching up” that we end up running blindly into dead ends. I agree, which is why I think that John wasn’t really talking about the “five year lag” at all. Our conversation ended with me asserting that the real problem facing churches is not a five year lag in technology, but rather the continued assumption that technology is just another gimmick “to get young people in.” Full disclosure, the quoted segment made no appearance in our twitter exchange – I was thinking it, but didn’t write it.

As churches, we need to stop looking for “the next big thing.” It is a dead end which leaves us looking like the outcast in the corner who has no confidence in their social skills but keeps on shouting, “Look at me, look at me, I can be cool too!” We owe our Savior, and the world, something better than that. What we’re seeing now is not a fad to be latched on to until something better comes along. We are seeing a significant social shift in the ways people connect with each other that is literally re-mapping our brains. It is powerful, pervasive, and has been going on longer than we sometimes think (I’d argue the telephone started the transition in earnest when it started entering people’s homes).

There is much in this shift to be heralded. For example, the speed and accuracy which which information can be passed and acted upon is something to be marveled at. Yet there is also much to be cautious about. Our communications shift is having an effect on our ability to memorize information (accelerating a process which began with the Gutenberg Press). It also further blurs the line between “urgent” and “important” because all of our data seems to demand immediate attention. This blurring creates an inability to be “present” in any given situation, which creates problems for spiritual activities like worship and prayer.

If churches drop their tendency to see technology as just another gimmick, then we can deal with both the positive and negative aspects of our communications with much needed wisdom. For example, we can accept people’s packed schedules by moving our “meetings” into an online space like a private email list or forum. This would give people an opportunity to interact with ideas over time, and become part of their daily rhythm. On the other hand, we can make deliberate moves to slow worship and prayer down. Instead of succumbing to the “more more more!” ethos of our culture, we can teach people the beauty of the contemplative prayer traditions and the freedom they bring to our communion with the Triune God. As we engage the positive and negative aspects of our cultural shift perhaps we’ll stop complaining about a five year lag in the tools we use and start contemplating on how we can communicate the Gospel well in this world.

Thanks, John, for spurring my thoughts!

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The fall of a cultural icon

Posted on July 28, 2011 | 2 Comments

Monday night I went to a Borders for the last time. Well, the store signage said “Borders,” but it wasn’t like I remembered it at all. The cafe was closed, the friendly Borders staff was gone, and there were signs indicating the mark-downs available for any given shelf. In fact, there were no employees of Borders anywhere to be found, it seems that they’d all been replaced by the liquidation company. I don’t hesitate to say that the the experience was depressing – Borders has always been my preferred bookstore, and their cafe’s were always more cozy than Barnes and Noble.

A lot of pixels have been used to blame Borders’ demise on the rise of eBooks. I suppose there is some truth to that, the timing of the decision to close comes very shortly after the lackluster reviews of the Kobo Touch eReader came to light. It seems like that device was their last throw of the dice, and it failed. In reality, however, Borders’ demise strings back over a decade of completely mis-reading the writing on the wall when it came to cultural change. Borders just never “got” the Internet Age, and so they are relegated to a cultural footnote.

Borders first mis-judged people’s willingness to buy books online and have them shipped to their homes. After all, the purchase of a book has always been a strangely personal endeavor. Borders reasoned that people would much rather prefer to purchase books in a store, where they can page through them in person, than to get an unknown quantity of the net. This attitude led Borders to license out their on-line shopping to Amazon. They got a cut of the sales referred to from Borders, and didn’t have to worry about the hassle of managing a distribution network for on-line sales. At the time, they were correct. More people did prefer to buy their books in the store than pay Amazon to ship a book they’d never seen to their homes. The speed at which the culture shifted to feeling comfortable with shopping on-line, however, shocked everyone – especially companies like Borders. Amazon rather quickly started making a profit, offered an incredible buying experience, added reviews and book previews, and gained a reputation for having some of the best customer service anywhere. When the time came to renew the licensing agreement with Amazon for on-line sales, Amazon found they no longer needed Borders’ reputation to sell books. Borders eventually got into the game, but far too late – people didn’t associate “Borders” with “on-line shopping,” and their store gained little traction. Borders’ biggest brick and mortar competition, however, took an entirely different approach. Barnes and Noble merged the experience between their brick and mortar and internet stores. This approach, combined with many of the same features Amazon offered, allowed Barnes and Noble to thrive in the new reality – something Borders never managed to do.

When eBooks became a viable tool Borders repeated many of their same mistakes. Amazon and Barnes and Noble created their own devices and offered significant value to using them. Amazon’s Kindle had “whisper sync” and free 3g access to their store. Barnes and Noble’s Nook offered the ability to browse through books (or even read them) in their entirety when used inside their Brick and Mortar stores. Borders, meanwhile, failed to understand the need to control an eco-system in order to provide a value-added experience for their brand. They made their books available on a plethora of different readers (notably Sony), and lost the ability link their brand with eBooks. By the time they established Kobo as their “go to” eReader for the Borders brand (Borders owned a minority share in Kobo Books) they had, again, become an also ran. It was simply too late to save them.

The fall of Borders as a cultural icon should serve as a warning to other organization who are dealing the the current reality with their heads in the sand. The shifts were are seeing to online, mobile, and social content are not minor fads. They are significant cultural shifts which are altering the very fabric of human interaction and must be dealt with. Nor, as Barnes and Noble has shown, does this online reality mean we need to instantly abandon “traditional” methods. Barnes and Noble has fused their on-line and brick and mortal realities into a hybrid other brands are envious of – and rightfully so.

Will other organizations on the bubble pay attention to the fall of Borders and change their tunes? In particular, will churches and denominations pay attention to how rapidly Borders disappeared and develop a desire to engage our changing culture with a missionary zeal? I hope so but, if the last 40 years is an example of what we have to look forward to, most will never take the plunge.

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Vacations and Behavioral Change

Posted on July 14, 2011 | Leave a comment
in the 1790's "breaking news" was 2 weeks old

My how culture has shifted.

I love going on vacations for many reasons, but my favorite might be the chance to track the changing behavior-patterns of vacationers over time.  Yes, I’m a geek (and probably a nerd) – I can’t help it.

The first “vacation” I ever took with my wife was our honeymoon to Williamsburg, VA.  As we prepared for the trip we made sure that we had a camera to take pictures of our first trip there.  Being 1997, we got a simple point and shoot film camera.  During our meandering through the Historic Area, that’s what I saw everyone using.

We’ve been back many times over the years, and it’s been fun to see how cameras have shifted over the years.  In the early 2000′s I began to see a 50/50 split between digital and film point and shoot cameras.  By 2008 nearly everyone was using a digital point and shoot camera, with a smattering of people using their camera phones.  Last summer I still saw some digital point and shoot cameras being used, but I noticed more camera phones in use than in 2008.  This summer, the number of digital point and shoot cameras I observed being used was non-existant.  Most people were using either camera phones or pocket camcorders to capture their memories.  Also, for the first time, I noticed quite a few people using DSLR’s as their cameras.  There had always been some “serious” photographers out with their impressive cameras in Williamsburg, but they were always few and far between.  It seems that, as devices have converged into “the camera on hand” (usually our phones) photography as a hobby may be making a bit of a come back.  It doesn’t hurt that DSLR prices are dropping into consumer ranges, either.

Another trend I noticed over time was the use of computers in Williamsburg.  In 1997 you didn’t see a computer anywhere except the at the check-in counter.  As the years passed, and digital cameras came to the fore, laptops became commonplace.  As non-business types began to bring laptops, the Williamsburg hotels offered free internet (first wired, and then wireless).  This was the norm from the early 2000′s right up until last summer.  It was normal to see people in the lobbies, dining areas, and the pool tapping away on their laptop keyboards.  Between this summer and last, however, there seems to have been a radical shift in vacation computing, and one which happened a lot faster than the shift from film to digital cameras.  Seeing someone one a laptop suddenly became a rare occurrence – instead, tablets (specifically iPads) were everywhere. I saw them at the pool, in the lobbies, and in the dining rooms.  I even saw someone using a Xoom as his camera in the Historic Area.

Finally, this was also the first time I saw QR Codes in use (though this was at Jamestown Island, not Williamsburg).  The codes went to web-links which had more details on the different archaeological sites being presented on the island (and correctly formatted for mobile, well-done!).

What I saw in these shifts in vacation technology is a shift in our culture in general.  We went from analog to digital, wired to wireless, and local syncing to mobile sharing in the span of 14 years.  The way people record, store, and share their memories has completely shifted to lighter, faster, and more compact - foregoing physical media altogether.  From a geek’s perspective, it’s been fun to watch.  From a communicator’s perspective, it’s exciting to explore how to use this behavioral shift to reach out and interact with people.  From a pastoral perspective, it’s daunting.  Churches need to wake up to this massive shift in behavior and adapt to it.  After all, if people are now changing (or have changed) the way they store their important family memories – it means that they are most likely changing the way they “remember” data in general.  Here are some examples:

  • If people eschew physical media on vacation as an unnecessary encumbrance why do we insist on relying on overflowing bulletins to pass information to people?
  • If people are used to being able to share memories instantly while on vacation – why do churches tend to wait until “next month’s meeting” to share thoughts?
  • If presentations are being augmented through mobile technology – why aren’t churches using similar technology to illuminate our peculiar culture?  We could explain liturgy, the movement of the Church calendar, explain the current sermon series, explain the images found in stained-glass, and even explain the history of the building (if it has a history worth-telling).
These are just some of the thought I take from my vacation observations (many of which I shared before).  The use of QR Codes, however, might be a project that I experiment with this summer.

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The “meh” experience of sermon-writing on my iPad

Posted on June 30, 2011 | 4 Comments

Today I took the plunge and wrote my sermon on my iPad. It’s a “doable” experience, but not one I’d want to repeat over and over again just yet. Let me share my two biggest reasons why I don’t think it’s quite “there” yet.

  • There aren’t any windows. I know, on the iPad that’s a feature rather than a bug – but the nice thing about windows is the ability to look at information, and enter in data in another window without have to completely switch screens (or do so seamlessly). Also, I keep IM open while I’m working and I miss seeing my IM client there while I’m typing away. Most of my problems will be handled in iOS 5 this fall, switching apps seamlessly will be a simple swipe-gesture, and the new alerts set-up for iOS 5 will solve my IM dilemma. Right now, however, working collaboratively between processes is rather disruptive.
  • The writing apps aren’t quite up to snuff. I use Documents to Go as my word processor. It’s not awesome, but it does outlines, is synced to my Google Docs account (though it really should sync the doc automatically when it’s saved, rather than syncing only after the document is closed), and has a good set of features. It’s not as stunning to look at as Pages, but it actually has the features I need. The problem is, the keyboard support is pretty awful – the typical formatting shortcuts don’t work, and neither does the “save” command (which is needed, I lost whole paragraphs because the app didn’t suspend properly when I went to go search something in my Bible app). Also, would it kill Documents to Go to have a setting to enable typographic quotes? It just looks nicer. This writing experience needs to improve significantly before I move over to writing sermons on my iPad full-time.

So, that’s where I am. I could keep my MacBook shut down all week and just write on my iPad – but the disruptive way of collaboratively working between processes, coupled with weak apps for document generation, make it an undesirable option. I actually had considered using Google Docs directly on my iPad, but the desktop version is suddenly not working properly on my iPad anymore! I’ll keep looking for tools that make sermon-writing on my iPad a more enjoyable experience, and will revisit the process when iOS 5 comes out in the fall.

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Leaving the MacBook at home for fun and prophet

Posted on June 28, 2011 | Leave a comment

We drove out to pick up our daughter from my wife’s folks after worship on Sunday. As my day off is Monday we stayed over-night and hit HersheyPark on Monday. This isn’t unusual, it’s a ritual we do year after year. What was unusual, however, is that this time I left my MacBook at home. This isn’t to say that I was sans computer, I had both my iPhone and iPad with me. I didn’t miss lugging my laptop bag with me. In fact, my MacBook remained in my bag until Tuesday morning, when I carried it downstairs for my weekly ritual of translating Scripture. Then, after lugging it downstairs this morning I thought, “What would happen if just left it at home today? Can I do my work without it?”

So I left my MacBook powered completely down, in my laptop bag, at home. Honestly, there were very few moments that I missed having it. My biggest problem came, actually, with the Bible apps that I use on iOS: Olive Tree Reader and Accordance.

Now, let me be clear. I adore both these apps. Olive Tree has been making wonderful Bible software for the mobile realm for years, and Accordance on the Mac is an absolute joy to use (though their iOS version is less mature than Olive Tree’s for obvious reasons). I know people from both companies, and even hosted an Accordance training seminar this past spring. I also have significant money invested in each platform, though I did beta test for Olive Tree for a while and got access to some modules for free (full disclosure there). My problem is, for the most part, neither app works the way I tend to think.

One of Accordance’s great strengths is the ability to arrange the interface into a work-flow which is suited for the individual user. As such, I’ve got my MacOS Accordance install set up for me, myself, and I. The windows are all set up in the places where I expect them to be, and life is good. On iOS, however, every app is full-screen. Accordance for iOS has a rather slick split-screen function built-into it, but when I try to interact with the text (say, to add a user note) the interface gets completely in the way. For example, when adding a user note, the editor over-lays the text you’re commenting on! That doesn’t make any sense to me. A similar limitation for Accordance iOS is the lack of user tool support (though these should be arriving soon), so I can’t do my weekly (badly done) translation ritual in the app. Finally, Accordance iOS only syncs between a Mac and the iOS device. This may not seem like a big deal, but it’s rapidly becoming a deal-breaker for me. Why should I have to manually sync my notes files between locations in the world of dropbox? If I write a note on one device, it should be automatically pushed to my other devices. At least, that’s what I’m looking for now.

Olive Tree Reader, on the other hand, has excellent cloud support (both through evernote and their own cloud-sync service), allows you to edit a note in split-screen view, and doesn’t limit your notes to to verse commentary (as you can see in the screen shot). This means I can (poorly) translate the text while continuing to interact with the text. In a rather weird oversight, however, Olive Tree Reader allows you to edit notes which are attached to a verse in split-screen view, but if you write a new note in split-screen there is no way to assign it to a verse! So, as with Accordance for iOS, I’m stuck editing verse notes in an pop-up overlay. I work around this by adding a blank note for the verses I’m working on and then edit them. While it’s nice to have the flexibility to enter my notes this way, however, it would be nice to not have to do it at all.

When it comes to displaying notes, though, I much prefer the way Accordance iOS handles things. In Olive Tree Reader each note is an independent entry – each of which has to be opened on it’s own. I get the concept, as they wanted the notes to be able to be easily accessed in full-screen view. This set-up, however, makes it difficult to have a sense of an on-going interaction with the text – each note is it’s own entity, and doesn’t need to be associated with the notes which surround it. Accordance iOS, taking a cue from it’s MacOS roots, displays my notes in split-screen mode only, with the notes window automatically scrolling with the text. This scrolling behavior helps to create the sense of an ongoing interaction with the text as a whole, rather than each verse as in individual entity – it is truly a thing of beauty, as you can see in the screen shot. I like it so much that I’ve actually been writing my notes in Olive Tree Reader, and copying them into my Accordance notes (which I then sync back to my MacOS install). It’s not ideal, but then I’m able to function the best way for me.

Do I “need” my MacBook to do my sermon work anymore? No, I don’t – but I can’t deny that the over-all experience is still more flexible and ideal for my work-flow than the iPad (and if I didn’t have a keyboard it wouldn’t even be a question, the on-screen keyboard takes up way too much screen real-estate). If I could marry Olive Tree and Accordance’s different strengths into one app, however, it would be killer app if there ever was one!

To my friends and acquaintances at both these companies I offer my sincere thanks for all you do. I hope you feel my critiques are fair, my compliments genuine, and my thoughts helpful as you keep moving forward on your prospective projects.

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Posted in Geek, Mobile

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An Unexpected use for user notes

Posted on June 5, 2011 | Leave a comment

I don’t like printing things. To me, printing out materials for something that is going to be used one time and then tossed away is a waste of both paper and ink – materials I don’t feel like spending a lot of money on. For all my antagonism towards printing, however, even I have to admit that there are times where a printed sheet often managed to get out of the way better than having a few gizmos with me.

Funerals have been a particular conundrum for me. As far as I’m concerned, my job at a funeral is to offer a small glimmer of hope of Gospel and then get out of the way to help people express their grief. It’s a formula which works for me. For several years I was fine printing out my short order of worship for a funeral, using my iPaq/Palm/iPod Touch/iPad to read the Scripture passages. This worked ok, even though I felt like I was juggling too much. The arrival of the iPad on the scene, however, led me to cease the printing portion of the movement. Instead, I’d put the order on my iPhone (in Airplane mode) and read the Scripture from the iPad. I hated it. If I felt like I was juggling too much with a piece of paper – using two electronic devices felt like I was doing an acrobatic routine.

My biggest problem sprang from the reality that devices which were so good at getting out of the way were suddenly in the way. I’d have to wake one device, and then another, and suffer the odd looks that people would give when i unloaded multiple computers on to the podium. It wasn’t good.

My recent embrace of user notes, however, has now afforded me a solution. Olive Tree’s reader allows me to create a user note without linking it to a verse reference (which, ironically, is something I want to be able to add manually so I can edit user notes in two pane mode). This allows me to put the order of worship in a second pane, and access the Scripture readings in the first. I tried this at a funeral last week and finally found myself free of any sense of juggling. If you have an iPad, and you’ve been leery of using it in a pastoral context such as a funeral or wedding, you might want to give this a try.

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Posted in Mobile, Pastoring

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The freedom of immediacy

Posted on April 27, 2011 | Leave a comment

“I’ll e-mail it to you when I get home.”

Thus has much important data been lost in congregations all over the world. Most congregations, for better or for worse, are volunteer organizations. This means that, for better or worse, most of the people doing the work of the congregation have a life away from it. This often means that “regular life” distracts people from following through on tasks they are being counted on to accomplish. While many pastors, including myself, tend to offer complaints about this state of affairs — the truth is we often commit the very same violations. Usually we commit them in organizations other than the congregation we pastor, but we even commit them for “Church work” that tends to fall out of our normal realm of activities. Stuff just “comes up” and we forget. When this happens, it leads to some rather awkward board meetings.

Yet, we don’t have to “send it out later.” A link to a story, the results from research, the worship songs (order, lyrics, and music), meeting notes, event invitations, and even data analysis can all be done before we even get home. When you have a smart phone, tablet, or even a laptop (as long as there is wifi acces) whatever information was going to be passed on later can be passed on immediately. It’s becoming increasingly the case that other members won’t even have to get home before they receive the data, as they have mobile access to the Internet themselves. For tasks which need to be accomplished later, the same devices can be used to program reminders (both for the one assigned to the task and to for the rest of the group to encourage a task’s completion). This way, a great many of the communication which needs to be passed on between meetings can happen before a meeting is over, and even be presented in a format which encourages continued dialog.

This freedom also works for members of a committee or team who may not be present for a meeting, but can be available. If someone was to get a quote for a purchase but was unable to get to the meeting, for example, there is no need to shelve the proposal until the next meeting. Text messages can reach someone wherever they are, and replies can be easily sent back (Central Baptist got our quote for mulch via this method — I didn’t say it was exciting, just efficient).

Is there a downside? Of course. People are used to contacting me immediately which can be a pain when, like now, I’m on vacation. I might be IMing a friend, but someone from work can still chime in as well. My phone still rings, and I have to remember not to answer it when it’s a work related number. Text messages are still pushed to my device, and it’s difficult not to jump into something during my “down time.”. I said, “Hard,” however, not, “Impossible.” just like pastors from previous generations, I need to guard my times of rest. Sure it’s a difficult spiritual discipline to master, but it’s one worth striving for nonetheless. While might say that this always connected world makes it more difficult to find down time, I disagree. It is because I’m always connected that I am so free! I’m not chained to an office, or even a phone, I can to pastoral check-ins at any time of the day without worrying about intruding or interrupting a meal. I can discuss an issue, make a proposal, and come to a decision with people without needing to wait for a monthly meeting. I’ll take being always connected towards old-school church any day.

if you’ve discovered that, “I’ll get it to you later” really means, “I’m going to forget to do send this to you,” then perhaps it’s time to try something new. We can say, “How about you send it to us now?”. You’d be surprised at how freeing it can be.

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Posted in Mobile, Pastoring

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