Is Writing a Thesis on an iPad Do-able?

[syd430]

The comments about adding an external keyboard are misleading. Try making dozens of tedious edits by reaching your hand out every minute or so and targeting the cursor/selection on a touch screen. It's a real pain.

 

[Medic311]

The comments about adding an external keyboard are misleading. Try making dozens of tedious edits by reaching your hand out every minute or so and targeting the cursor/selection on a touch screen. It's a real pain.

jailbreak to use BT mouse

 

[palpatine]

The comments about adding an external keyboard are misleading. Try making dozens of tedious edits by reaching your hand out every minute or so and targeting the cursor/selection on a touch screen. It's a real pain.

Hi. As said before, the keyboard shortcuts make a mouse largely unnecessary. I rarely touch the screen while I am editing.

 

[Davidkoh]

But ....

you'd want a bluetooth keyboard. Typing on the screen is only good for short notes.

I think you could structure quite complex docs using Tex Writer
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/tex-notebook/id552717222?ls=1

Note this does not constitute a rec for the app as I haven't used it. However if it supports full Tex then you should be able to structure pretty much any academic doc.

I find TexPad much better tbh. I love how everyone in this thread who talks about advanced text editing not being possible on the iPad later go on to saying that you need Word or similar programs. That is still basic text editing, LaTeX is an advanced form and honestly someing I thought everyone in higher education was aware of. I cant imagine the pain of writing my thesis in Word, might as well have written it in the iPad standard notes program.

The comments about adding an external keyboard are misleading. Try making dozens of tedious edits by reaching your hand out every minute or so and targeting the cursor/selection on a touch screen. It's a real pain.

Why not use the keyboard shortcuts?

 

[palpatine]

I love how everyone in this thread who talks about advanced text editing not being possible on the iPad later go on to saying that you need Word or similar programs. That is still basic text editing, LaTeX is an advanced form and honestly someing I thought everyone in higher education was aware of. I cant imagine the pain of writing my thesis in Word, might as well have written it in the iPad standard notes program.

In my opinion, Word is pretty advanced, and there is a reason why it is pretty much ubiquitous on college campuses and in the business world. Pages is advanced as well, but doesn't really measure up to Word -- I only use it because it is the only app on the iPad with footnotes (create, view, and edit).

If you thought everyone in higher education knew about LaTeX, then didn't you ever wonder why almost no one outside of the sciences was using it? Or, did you not go over and visit the humanities folks

LaTeX is very impressive, and I would recommend that anyone with "difficult" layout issues (formulae, archaic languages, uncommon languages, etc.) take a look at it. I know a few people in the humanities who use it, and it may be worth the effort to familiarize yourself with it. For many, though, it will be overkill.

In my case, Apple's Notes program was a bit too simple, even for me (writing in plain text for all but the last stage), because you have no control over fonts, no integration with apps like Scrivener on the Mac, and until recently you couldn't even sync across devices. You can sync now, but it is iCloud, and iCloud has already lost my data from Pages, so I am not terribly keen on trusting my dissertation to Apple without lots and lots of backup (I duplicate each day's work and put a copy into Dropbox just in case -- of course, I also have Time Machine backups as well).

 

[rcp27]

In my opinion, Word is pretty advanced, and there is a reason why it is pretty much ubiquitous on college campuses and in the business world. Pages is advanced as well, but doesn't really measure up to Word -- I only use it because it is the only app on the iPad with footnotes (create, view, and edit).

I don't know if newer versions of word are any better, but when I was writing up (2007-8), the tales I heard in the common room from people trying to write a PhD thesis in word were alarming. Things like word documents crashing and being un-openable if they were longer than a certain (not long enough) limit, with a work-around being to split the thesis over multiple documents inducing deep pain in getting page numbers and references to sync between them. I will never forget the person who announced that she had finished her thesis, just needed to get the bibliography sorted out, and that would take "a couple of days". For me, getting the bibliography right involved typing "bibtex" a couple of times.

Unless it has significantly changed, Word is an absolute disaster for writing a thesis (including in humanities).

 

[palpatine]

I don't know if newer versions of word are any better, but when I was writing up (2007-8), the tales I heard in the common room from people trying to write a PhD thesis in word were alarming. Things like word documents crashing and being un-openable if they were longer than a certain (not long enough) limit, with a work-around being to split the thesis over multiple documents inducing deep pain in getting page numbers and references to sync between them. I will never forget the person who announced that she had finished her thesis, just needed to get the bibliography sorted out, and that would take "a couple of days". For me, getting the bibliography right involved typing "bibtex" a couple of times.

Unless it has significantly changed, Word is an absolute disaster for writing a thesis (including in humanities).

It is actually pretty nice right now. A colleague of mine is using it right now for his thesis, and it is serving him well. Other colleagues in the past have used it without issue.

In the old days, Word was a little unstable, I lost a bit of data, and it was always a good idea to split up chapters. You are right. Also, trying to navigate three or four-hundred pages was difficult to do, and the document scrolled / rendered pages very slowly. Nowadays, even on the iPad, Pages can jump right to the end of my dissertation without a problem.

My only issue with Pages is that it doesn't do well with images and the like, and the formatting of these looked wildly different than the document on my MBA. For this reason, I waited until the final stage to put all of the graphical elements and complex formatting into it. This is why I say I did "most" of my dissertation on the iPad. 90% or more of the process was there, but in the end, unless I was willing to give up the additional complexity, I still needed the MBA for part of it. Still, that is a couple years of writing on the iPad!

As for LaTeX, it is definitely a great way to write, and would allow someone to get even more use out of the iPad IF they were willing to ride the steep learning curve

 

[chinchillas]

Bumping this to ask your opinions now that iOS is so advanced and (I think?) allows for multiple simultaneous windows. Is it possible on an iPad Air 2, 128 GB to have folders of PDFs-images-docs on the "desktop" and consult them while Word is open, as well as Chrome (or Safari) with many open tabs?

Also: how good/bad are those Logitech keyboards/covers?

 

[Night Spring]

Bumping this to ask your opinions now that iOS is so advanced and (I think?) allows for multiple simultaneous windows. Is it possible on an iPad Air 2, 128 GB to have folders of PDFs-images-docs on the "desktop" and consult them while Word is open, as well as Chrome (or Safari) with many open tabs?

Also: how good/bad are those Logitech keyboards/covers?

There is still no "desktop" in iOS. You can keep PDFs in apps, and organize them within folders inside the app. And yes, now that there is multitasking, you can see a PDF and Word document side by side. But you are limited to two open apps at a time, and you can't have two Word documents open side by side, at least not yet. Safari and Chrome, yes, you can see one tab of those apps alongside Word, and you can have multiple tabs "open," but you will see only one tab at a time.

Haven't used any external keyboards, so can't comment on that.

 

[temna]

There is still no "desktop" in iOS. You can keep PDFs in apps, and organize them within folders inside the app. And yes, now that there is multitasking, you can see a PDF and Word document side by side. But you are limited to two open apps at a time, and you can't have two Word documents open side by side, at least not yet. Safari and Chrome, yes, you can see one tab of those apps alongside Word, and you can have multiple tabs "open," but you will see only one tab at a time.

Haven't used any external keyboards, so can't comment on that.

Can you have two Word documents open by having OneDrive open on one side and Word on the other?

 

[conan-kun]

I emailed Mendeley and they say multi-tasking support is coming in their next iOS version. So that would let you have Word on one half of the screen and Mendeley on the other.

 

[Night Spring]

Can you have two Word documents open by having OneDrive open on one side and Word on the other?

I believe so, but I haven't tried this myself. Both apps need to support multiview, and I'm not sure if they do or not, as I don't use those apps.

 

[palpatine]

I believe so, but I haven't tried this myself. Both apps need to support multiview, and I'm not sure if they do or not, as I don't use those apps.

I suppose it all depends on what kind of work you are doing and how you want to get it done. If it is an either/or question, the Macbook is hands down the winner, in my opinion, because it has a fully functioning operating system (OSX), a beautiful retina display, and a full range of powerful software (I have found DEVONthink, Scrivener, and Word 2016 to be pretty nice). Besides handwriting and reading PDFs, there aren't a whole lot of occasions when I feel like I'd be better off with the iPad.

If you are already using a Mac, iMac, MBA, or MBPr at home, and the iPad is an additional device, then I don't see any problem. I've particularly enjoyed using Scrivener (OSX) + notesy (iOS). Now that you have iOS with a split screen (finally), it is pretty easy to write with a PDF open on one side and your text on the other. I think you can open a non-mutli-screen app first and then open the one with support second if they both don't support the feature yet.

iOS is still terribly limited,though, so I don't think I would want to entirely give up OSX. Frankly, it is a pain to work with for any complicated task, and the better the Microsoft Surface Pro gets, the less convincing the whole low-power mobile argument is. But, technically speaking, it could be done, depending on how willing you are to discover and use workarounds for various activities. Perhaps undergraduates in the humanities would be able to get away with it, because there wouldn't be too much need for complicated formatting (at least, in my discipline), and they probably haven't amassed enough data yet to need search applications (I prefer HoudahSpot as a front-end for Spotlight) + external drives.

Personally, I tend to write a lot now on the Macbook with the iPad in portrait mode next to it (doing it right now, in fact). I considered (and still sometimes think about) getting a Surface Pro, but I do like to have my PDFs open on a large screen (the iPad), and I couldn't do that with the Surface. It's not a huge difference in weight to bring both devices around with me, and I'd sure miss OSX -- using the Surface Pro 3 for a while was not entirely satisfying. The only temptation for me with the iPad Pro isn't as a replacement for my Macbook, but as a way to view my PDFs at an even larger size.

 

[sdz]

Hello all, I have been writing my thesis on an Macbook Air which got dropped and is too expensive to fix. So I am debating between getting a regular MacBook and an iPad as a replacement.

The problem of course isn't the iPad's memory, but the typing function. My question is: How difficult is it to type for one or two hours at a time on the iPad? Is the screen to small for text docs?

Also, I read somewhere that typing on the same plane as the screen feels unnatural. Do you find this to be the case?

Thanks for your advice.

forget it. Buy a macbook / or any notebook.
iPad is a toy for a lot of people.

 

[Night Spring]

forget it. Buy a macbook / or any notebook.
iPad is a toy for a lot of people.

Not necessarily. Just wrote an urgent letter for my work on the iPad Pro. Sure, the iPad doesn't do everything my desktop can do, but it's a pretty useful tool that enhances how I do my job.

 

[sdz]

Not necessarily. Just wrote an urgent letter for my work on the iPad Pro. Sure, the iPad doesn't do everything my desktop can do, but it's a pretty useful tool that enhances how I do my job.

For writing letters a Macbook is much better. Or a 300$ windows notebook. That is an absurd use case for an iPad (pro).

 

[BoneHead001]

For writing letters a Macbook is much better. Or a 300$ windows notebook. That is an absurd use case for an iPad (pro).

Totally disagree. The iPad Pro is more than adequate using the SmartKeyboard and Apple Pages. Pages can do anything Microsoft Word can do and you can export the Pages document out as a Word document.

 

[sdz]

Totally disagree. The iPad Pro is more than adequate using the SmartKeyboard and Apple Pages. Pages can do anything Microsoft Word can do and you can export the Pages document out as a Word document.

You don't need to tell me that. I am earning money using the iWork Suite. I personally think its a capable office suite. BUT don't forget an iPad Pro with Smart Keyboard costs about 1300€ / 1200$ -- why wouldn't you rather have a nice Macbook? More horsepower, more freedom, and a much much better physical keyboard.

 

[palpatine]

For writing letters a Macbook is much better. Or a 300$ windows notebook. That is an absurd use case for an iPad (pro).

With a BT keyboard, there isn't any significant difference between the two. There are plenty of use cases where the iPad alone is just fine. Writing a thesis is one of them, with caveats, as I mentioned above. Fortunately, Apple makes plenty of products, and we can get the one that suits us best. Typing on the iPad without a BT keyboard is doable, but not terribly pleasant, or recommended for a thesis. Still, it can be done.

 

[BoneHead001]

You don't need to tell me that. I am earning money using the iWork Suite. I personally think its a capable office suite. BUT don't forget an iPad Pro with Smart Keyboard costs about 1300€ / 1200$ -- why wouldn't you rather have a nice Macbook? More horsepower, more freedom, and a much much better physical keyboard.

That's true. I had a full loaded rMB (1.3Ghz, 512GB) and it was $1700. My iPad Pro (128GB LTE) with SmartKeyboard was cheaper at $1250.

 

[BoneHead001]

Yes, the rMB does do more with OSX, but I was looking for more of a media consumption unit that was cheaper with LTE connection.

 

[sdz]

With a BT keyboard, there isn't any significant difference between the two. There are plenty of use cases where the iPad alone is just fine. Writing a thesis is one of them, with caveats, as I mentioned above. Fortunately, Apple makes plenty of products, and we can get the one that suits us best. Typing on the iPad without a BT keyboard is doable, but not terribly pleasant, or recommended for a thesis. Still, it can be done.

I can strongly recommend NOT to write any kind of scientific paper on a toy like the iPad.
This is more or less a software issue not a hardware issue. (ok, I personally would get crazy using an iPad for writing a scientific paper BUT the iPad would be a great companion for the research of information: for example reading papers, books, websites etc.)

 

[palpatine]

You don't need to tell me that. I am earning money using the iWork Suite. I personally think its a capable office suite. BUT don't forget an iPad Pro with Smart Keyboard costs about 1300€ / 1200$ -- why wouldn't you rather have a nice Macbook? More horsepower, more freedom, and a much much better physical keyboard.

I'd get an iPad Air over a Pro, if it's just for writing, but there are reasons to choose an iPad over a Macbook. The iPad allows for drawing, handwriting, portrait view (reading), and allows for you to only bring along the keyboard when needed. Personally, I use both the MB and iPad, but everyone has to choose the best kit for their situation. Sometimes, it won't be the MB.

 

[palpatine]

I can strongly recommend NOT to write any kind of scientific paper on a toy like the iPad.
This is more or less a software issue not a hardware issue. (ok, I personally would get crazy using an iPad for writing a scientific paper BUT the iPad would be a great companion for the research of information: for example reading papers, books, websites etc.)

I'm in the humanities. I don't know what the difference is between a scientific paper and a history dissertation, but it seems like both could be done, with the caveats mentioned above. I don't think there are many use cases where the iPad is absolutely wrong. If push comes to shove, it can even run a Mac remotely.

 

[sdz]

That's true. I had a full loaded rMB (1.3Ghz, 512GB) and it was $1700. My iPad Pro (128GB LTE) with SmartKeyboard was cheaper at $1250.

It's just a bother that Apple doesn't include LTE into the Retina Macbook.