Cocoa Switch

Finding myself working from iPad more and more, including this blog, I wanted to share few tips on typing.

At first I would always connect my Applet Wireless Keyboard before working on long text however recently I found myself using on screen keyboard more. There’s many advantages when using software keyboard:

1. I can start immediately.
2. I can work on any surface at any place.
3. Quick Type suggestions easier to reach.
4. When I need to be quiet, I can disable sound.
5. When sound is on it is superior experience to mechanical sound because different keys produce different sound.

Typing on glass is entirely different experience. However I don’t think it is lesser experience, moreover I think MacBook keyboard will be replaced with touch screen eventually. I am finding typing on glass easier and easier. You don’t need to press on keys and I like it. The same reason I prefer keyboards with less travel. I think it’s a direction we going to. It just a matter of practice and you can be as much productive as with hardware keyboard.

There’s disadvantages also - less screen space which we can’t do anything about and text selection problem. Classic iOS magnifier glass selection is accessible but not fast enough. New 3D Touch gesture is amazing on iPhone but doesn’t work on iPad. iOS 10 introduced trackpad mode for iPad but I always couldn’t understand how to select text with it. Here’s some things I’ve learned from iOS 10

1. Pan with 2 fingers to move a cursor. That’s easy to do, reliable¹ and faster than using magnifying glass.
2. 2 fingers tap anywhere on the keyboard surface to select a word.
3. 2 fingers double tap to select entire sentence.
4. When text is selected, try to pan with 2 fingers to any direction to change selection.

The last 3 tips is amazing and makes typing on iPad much more enjoyable. They were not obvious for me.

You also can double tap on the text to select a word. It’s useful when keyboard is not present.