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> But if you need to run Xcode, VSCode, WebStorm, or Intellij than as far as I can tell the iPad is a no go. > It's expensive. After buying a powerful pro mode

> But if you need to run Xcode, VSCode, WebStorm, or Intellij than as far as I can tell the iPad is a no go. > It's expensive. After buying a powerful pro model, a decent keyboard, and a pencil the price ended up being MORE than a laptop I could have used for even more coding activities. 5m of research could have shown this... i think this product is only good for artists who needs a specific ipad app or someone who really needs a writing device to use with Apple specific app only. or if you can expense it at work.

musicale 3y ago
> 5m of research could have shown this... Indeed > i think this product is only good for artists who needs a specific ipad app or someone who really needs a writing device to use with Apple specific app only. or if you can expense it at work. Procreate (with the Apple pencil) is definitely a killer app for the iPad. The iPad is also amazing for musicians, particularly in terms of the wide variety of excellent synth (Animoog, Sunrizer, Korg and Moog apps...) and music production apps (Gadget, Cubasis, Logic...) And it's great for sheet music (ForScore). It's a nice gaming device as well. I particularly appreciate card games like Monster Train or digital board games like Ticket to Ride, but there are also some great RPGs, strategy games, action games, Apple Arcade, and many games with controller support. Although I've written code on it (Swift Playgrounds, Pythonista...) and have enjoyed writing text in landscape mode (Pages), the iPad's creative/fun apps are the ones that make me keep coming back to it. That and reading stuff on the web, and magazines in Apple News+. Netflix looks surprisingly good on the iPad screen, but the 4:3 aspect ratio isn't a perfect match for modern shows or movies. It's also my gym youtube player. Sadly the duolingo iOS app is marred by excessive ad interruptions and an energy system, but the web app works well on a touchscreen.
oneeyedpigeon 3y ago
Of everything I've tried, the ipad is still by far my favourite media consumption device. Browsing the web using touch is an absolute joy and the thin, large screen form factor is really convenient. It's just a shame they're so expensive and fragile; I'm waiting a few years now before I can justify buying another one.
- criddell 3y ago
  My iPad is my favorite computer to use by far. It's five years old now and I'd buy a new one if I could find some reason to do so. My problem isn't that it does so little but rather that it does everything I want it to do. Articles like this one never feel very genuine to me. It would be like buying a Honda Civic and then complaining that you can't really carry 4x8 sheets of plywood with it.
411111111111111 3y ago
But it's still a bad fit for artists too, as they're not gonna need the hardware of the pro. It's way too overpowered/expensive for what iOS permits you to do. The normal iPad or iPad Air for media consumption are already perfect, the Pro version remains as a bad market fit
_pigpen__ 3y ago
code-server works really well on the iPad. Make a web-app and you have VSCode as pretty much a full citizen. (Except of course you need a network connection and a remote system.) When I’m traveling light, this is an excellent solution. That said, no one should buy an iPad foremostly to code on.
- wildrhythms 3y ago
  No, no it doesn't work really well. iOS Safari aggressively suspends tabs in the background. So when you switch from editor to webpage, it will often suspend your editor, forcing it to refresh when you flip back to it and you lose the ssh connection, debugger, or whatever else you have running. And if you're debugging a front end in a certain state, it will suspend that, and refresh it when you return, losing that important state. Very infuriating experience. I tried for months to make my iPad Pro an acceptable dev environment, both locally and remotely via code-server, and the OS just isn't there (yet). Maybe someday.
czx4f4bd 3y ago
I don't know, when I impulse bought my iPad Pro a few years ago to supplement my laptop that stopped charging, I did about 15 minutes of research and found a lot of people claiming that you can comfortably code on an iPad Pro. That turned out to be completely untrue for my use cases, but it would've taken a lot more than 5 minutes to figure that out. That said, the iPad Pro is my biggest mistake I've never regretted. I've used mine every day since I bought it and I love it. It sucks for coding but it's great for handwritten notes, typed notes, drawing, music production, casual web browsing, mobile games, watching YouTube, controlling Spotify remotely, etc. It's a perfect companion to my regular laptop and a great travel device when I don't want to take my laptop with me. Even the lack of a full OS is an upside for me. iPadOS hinders multitasking enough that it ends up being a more focused device than my normal laptop.
- adastra22 3y ago
  There's a lot of people in this thread mistaking "Pro" for meaning "Developer." The iPad sucks for writing code. But there are tons of professional things you can do on it. I use it more than I use my laptop. What differentiates the iPad Pro from the regular iPad is/was its high refresh rate display, which makes the Apple Pencil much more responsive, and True Tone color. These are definitely Pro-level features. Just not developer-Pro.
- AmericanChopper 3y ago
  > That turned out to be completely untrue for my use cases, but it would've taken a lot more than 5 minutes to figure that out. Couldn’t you figure that out when you noticed that it doesn’t have any IDE you’ve ever heard of, and no compiler or runtime for anything? I know there are iPad for coding advocates out there, but it really doesn’t even take 5 minutes to figure out that the developer experience is completely terrible, as evidenced by the lack of any developer tools.
  - czx4f4bd 3y ago
    My use case didn't require an IDE. My main intent was to remote into my batteryless laptop, so in principle the iPad didn't need much functionality of its own. That said, I don't know what you mean by "the lack of any developer tools". There are absolutely code editors, IDEs, SSH clients, and even runtimes for iPadOS. There are also lots of web-based IDEs and editors now, even self-hostable ones like code-server. Obviously I wouldn't have bought mine if those didn't exist.
jroseattle 3y ago
This. Plus, going a step further... Development using those IDEs are not well suited to inputs from anything other than a keyboard (or keyboard-translator.) Too many functions tied to keys and such. I'm uncertain why anyone would think this somehow magically changes because of the tablet form-factor.
eterevsky 3y ago
I think it's great as a large format ebook, especially if you want to read graphic novels. Also it's great for a musicians to display sheet music.

musicale 3y ago

> 5m of research could have shown this... Indeed > i think this product is only good for artists who needs a specific ipad app or someone who really needs a writing device to use with Apple specific app only. or if you can expense it at work. Procreate (with the Apple pencil) is definitely a killer app for the iPad. The iPad is also amazing for musicians, particularly in terms of the wide variety of excellent synth (Animoog, Sunrizer, Korg and Moog apps...) and music production apps (Gadget, Cubasis, Logic...) And it's great for sheet music (ForScore). It's a nice gaming device as well. I particularly appreciate card games like Monster Train or digital board games like Ticket to Ride, but there are also some great RPGs, strategy games, action games, Apple Arcade, and many games with controller support. Although I've written code on it (Swift Playgrounds, Pythonista...) and have enjoyed writing text in landscape mode (Pages), the iPad's creative/fun apps are the ones that make me keep coming back to it. That and reading stuff on the web, and magazines in Apple News+. Netflix looks surprisingly good on the iPad screen, but the 4:3 aspect ratio isn't a perfect match for modern shows or movies. It's also my gym youtube player. Sadly the duolingo iOS app is marred by excessive ad interruptions and an energy system, but the web app works well on a touchscreen.

oneeyedpigeon 3y ago

Of everything I've tried, the ipad is still by far my favourite media consumption device. Browsing the web using touch is an absolute joy and the thin, large screen form factor is really convenient. It's just a shame they're so expensive and fragile; I'm waiting a few years now before I can justify buying another one.

criddell 3y ago
My iPad is my favorite computer to use by far. It's five years old now and I'd buy a new one if I could find some reason to do so. My problem isn't that it does so little but rather that it does everything I want it to do. Articles like this one never feel very genuine to me. It would be like buying a Honda Civic and then complaining that you can't really carry 4x8 sheets of plywood with it.

411111111111111 3y ago

But it's still a bad fit for artists too, as they're not gonna need the hardware of the pro. It's way too overpowered/expensive for what iOS permits you to do. The normal iPad or iPad Air for media consumption are already perfect, the Pro version remains as a bad market fit

_pigpen__ 3y ago

code-server works really well on the iPad. Make a web-app and you have VSCode as pretty much a full citizen. (Except of course you need a network connection and a remote system.) When I’m traveling light, this is an excellent solution. That said, no one should buy an iPad foremostly to code on.

wildrhythms 3y ago
No, no it doesn't work really well. iOS Safari aggressively suspends tabs in the background. So when you switch from editor to webpage, it will often suspend your editor, forcing it to refresh when you flip back to it and you lose the ssh connection, debugger, or whatever else you have running. And if you're debugging a front end in a certain state, it will suspend that, and refresh it when you return, losing that important state. Very infuriating experience. I tried for months to make my iPad Pro an acceptable dev environment, both locally and remotely via code-server, and the OS just isn't there (yet). Maybe someday.

czx4f4bd 3y ago

I don't know, when I impulse bought my iPad Pro a few years ago to supplement my laptop that stopped charging, I did about 15 minutes of research and found a lot of people claiming that you can comfortably code on an iPad Pro. That turned out to be completely untrue for my use cases, but it would've taken a lot more than 5 minutes to figure that out. That said, the iPad Pro is my biggest mistake I've never regretted. I've used mine every day since I bought it and I love it. It sucks for coding but it's great for handwritten notes, typed notes, drawing, music production, casual web browsing, mobile games, watching YouTube, controlling Spotify remotely, etc. It's a perfect companion to my regular laptop and a great travel device when I don't want to take my laptop with me. Even the lack of a full OS is an upside for me. iPadOS hinders multitasking enough that it ends up being a more focused device than my normal laptop.

adastra22 3y ago
There's a lot of people in this thread mistaking "Pro" for meaning "Developer." The iPad sucks for writing code. But there are tons of professional things you can do on it. I use it more than I use my laptop. What differentiates the iPad Pro from the regular iPad is/was its high refresh rate display, which makes the Apple Pencil much more responsive, and True Tone color. These are definitely Pro-level features. Just not developer-Pro.
AmericanChopper 3y ago
> That turned out to be completely untrue for my use cases, but it would've taken a lot more than 5 minutes to figure that out. Couldn’t you figure that out when you noticed that it doesn’t have any IDE you’ve ever heard of, and no compiler or runtime for anything? I know there are iPad for coding advocates out there, but it really doesn’t even take 5 minutes to figure out that the developer experience is completely terrible, as evidenced by the lack of any developer tools.
- czx4f4bd 3y ago
  My use case didn't require an IDE. My main intent was to remote into my batteryless laptop, so in principle the iPad didn't need much functionality of its own. That said, I don't know what you mean by "the lack of any developer tools". There are absolutely code editors, IDEs, SSH clients, and even runtimes for iPadOS. There are also lots of web-based IDEs and editors now, even self-hostable ones like code-server. Obviously I wouldn't have bought mine if those didn't exist.

jroseattle 3y ago

This. Plus, going a step further... Development using those IDEs are not well suited to inputs from anything other than a keyboard (or keyboard-translator.) Too many functions tied to keys and such. I'm uncertain why anyone would think this somehow magically changes because of the tablet form-factor.

eterevsky 3y ago

I think it's great as a large format ebook, especially if you want to read graphic novels. Also it's great for a musicians to display sheet music.