I tend to be an early adopter. I’m not a camp-out-in-line-to-get-it-the-first-day guy but I tend to be in possession of the latest device before most folk. Part of me tells myself (and my wife) that I neeeed to stay up to date. It’s part of my job. It’s for my career. The truth is I just can’t resist for very long. My friends and colleagues know this about me and tend to come to me for advice on the latest gadget or web site. When it came to the iPad I was not going to be a guinea pig. I was going to wait for the front-facing camera and the non-AT&T (read.. working) 3G model. I really did try. And I did hold out almost until the second generation (I’m counting the iPad 3G as the 2nd gen.. sue me!)

What did it for me?  A combination of things.

It really is a New Platform. I design software and it’s important for me to understand how people use that software, where they use it, and on what sort of devices and in what ways.

It’s a legitimately usable Digital Sketchpad. I am a visual thinker and communicator. If I don’t have a pad in my pocket there’s about a 100% chance I’ll be drawing in the air with my fingers as I talk, either trying to understand something or communicate it. When I started to see some of the sketching apps and what people were doing with them, I knew I had to be part of it.

It’s also an eBook reader. I love to read, and I love to do it on the subway… when I have a book on me.

It’s awesome in the kitchen. I like to cook. I have about 20 recipe books and a stuffed folder of olive oil soaked handwritten or printed recipes.

The iPad lets me do all of this on a little slab of glass. I know lots of people like to go right for the swiss army knife metaphor but that’s not quite how I see it. My mind goes right to the concept of tabula rasa, or blank slate.

It’s a device that has the potential to be filled with capabilities that will allow us to do things we haven’t even conceived of yet.

Of course it comes with a set of apps that allow us to email, read, surf the web.. already an impressive set of capabilities. I guess it’s hard to call it a blank slate.

Adding a set of well-known apps quickly brings the utility up several notches to the point where you’re doing much more advanced things and starting to get the nature of the new platform and what it can do.

I’ve had mine for a few months now and by now I have a pretty good set of apps and am getting much more facile with it in everyday use. I’m going to give you a tour of how I’ve set mine up and how I use it. It’s a constantly changing picture.

Home Page

Go-To Apps

The apps in the tray or dock are always visible so always available. My selection here is pretty straightforward.

Mail – Yup. I read lots of email on the iPad. I read it. I write it. I forward it. All that stuff.

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Twitteriffic – For now my Twitter client of choice is Twitterriffic. It’s free. It works. I like it. I’m not reviewing every app I use here, just giving you a peek into my choices and how I combine them to make my iPad sing.

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Safari – Probably the most used app on the device. I know there are a few alternatives but considering Safari’s integration with so many other apps and that it works just fine I probably won’t be switching to another any time soon.

App Store – There are two reasons the App Store gets task tray placement. First, I hate when I install an app or update and it closes itself and snaps me over to the app I just installed or updated. To combat this I put it in the tray so it’s only a click away to get back into the store. The other reason is… I spend a lot of time in there. I likes me my apps.

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Thinking & Ideation

It’s because of these apps I truly love my iPad. It hasn’t (nor will it) replace paper and pen but it is becoming a first-line tool for digging into a problem and trying to come up with ideas. I use two apps that correspond with the two most important steps in my process: sketching and mindmapping.

Adobe Ideas I absolutely love this app. It’s easy to use, easy to share, flexible but not overly complicated. This is what I break out instead of a sheet of paper when I’m alone or in a discussion.

It’s this app that puts the pad in my iPad.

Popplet – This is my favorite mindmapping app right now. It’s not a “traditional” mindmapping app, if such a thing exists. It calls itself an app for “sharing visual ideas.” I like that. As with Adobe Ideas, it is simple to use and ideas flow quickly. There’s not a lot to figure out and it’s flexible enough to help me wrap my head around things.

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Productivity

These apps expand what I can do with the iPad as a device. There’s not an easy, general, universal way to manage and share files on the iPad but I’ve found this combination of apps lets me do pretty much what I need and want to do with my stuff.

Dropbox – If you don’t already know about Dropbox and you aren’t using it on your desktop and/or laptop you are missing out. Dropbox functions simultaneously as an online backup and synchronized file store across all of your devices. It’s as indispensable on the iPad as it is on my other computers.

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GoodReader – GoodReader not only works as a PDF, text, picture, audio, video, and office file viewer (Microsoft and iWork) but it also acts as a de facto file system, sharing tool, and it allows you to browse the web and download files for offline viewing. It is, as its name states, a good reader.

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Evernote – Besides Evernote’s utility as a never-forget-anything tool, I use it as my simple text editor. It has the added bonus of also syncing with any other device you have the app on. I have it on my iPhone, laptop and desktop. I forget.. um… less stuff with this setup.

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Reading

Even if the iPad didn’t do all the other things it does, it works as an ebook reader and that is a great thing. I am not a zealot on either side of the paper versus digital debate. I love books and paper and bookshelves and libraries. Love em. I also love always having a selection of books on me and being able to download a new book on a whim without having to go to a store or wait for a box to arrive (not always so easy for some of us city dwellers.) I’m also gonna call BS on that study that says people read slower on electronic devices than on “real” books. Not only has that not been my experience but I’ve been reading way more now that I have the iPad than I was before. But that’s just me.

Kindle – Amazon has lots of books at good prices (better than Apples iBook store) and the Whispersync technology that synchronizes our position across devices (iPad, iPhone, desktop) is really nice for when I’m reading a book on the iPad but I can’t get a seat on the subway and I want to continue reading on the iPhone. The biggest downside of the Kindle app, and buying books from Amazon in general, is that it’s not easy to share them. I know it’s possible, but it’s not easy.

iBooks – For now the Kindle app is by far my go-to reader app. Apple’s offering is really nice and the flippy page thing is cool but the books are way too expensive. It’s big advantage over the Kindle app is that it can read PDFs.

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* Side note on reading apps. I thought Barnes and Noble’s reader had potential, especially since it has sharing functionality but when I bought a book on it (shopped, purchased, downloaded) it turned out that the book was not yet “ready” for the iPad. I had to call and verify this in order to get a refund, which they pointed out was a one-time courtesy even though there was no way to tell in advance if a book would not be readable on the iPad. This turned me off so much I uninstalled it. Sorry Barnes & Nobel. My preference when buying books now is to buy from a seller that offers print and electronic versions bundled. Rosenfeld Media and O’Reilly are my two favorites because of this.

Feeds

Keeping up with the many feeds I follow is sometimes a losing battle. Between social media feeds, shared articles, and the 20-50 RSS feeds I subscribe to I spend a lot of time scanning, bookmarking, sharing, starring, and hopefully reading a ton of great content. These particular apps rise above the fray when it comes to consuming that content. They are inspirational as well as functional.

FlipBoard – In a nutshell, FlipBoard takes content from feeds and presents it in beautiful magazine layout style. I must confess, I haven’t gotten to use it yet for its advertised use, to read shared Twitter and Facebook content, because initial interest has overwhelmed their servers. I do use it to read the twitter feeds from a few sources (The Onion, Datavzs, Good magazine, and Smitten Kitchen) I’m on the wait list to import my social feeds.. when that happens I may love this app even more..

Guardian Eyewitness – This is a page one app just because it’s so damned beautiful. It’s a simple app.. One picture a day. Big. Beautiful. You get a description of the photo and a pro-tip on how the picture was composed or shot.

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Pulse Newsreader – This newsreader is just a joy to use. In the current version you can subscribe to 20 feeds. You can import from Google news but it does not sync. The beauty of this app is how they display the articles in thumbnail image format with a row of pics for each feed. It’s snappy, snazzy, and will only get better when it can sync with your Google news account.

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News

Besides books, feeds, and web pages I consume a fair amount of news on the iPad. This collection of apps serves it up in a way I can’t get on a web page and there are a couple of twists I really like about this set.

Newsy – Newsy is a neat little news aggregator that presents video recaps of stories that are in the news. What I really like about it is that it references, and links to, the source materials and usually presents multiple different points of view on the stories. It’s debatable whether or not an unbiased news source exists (I think not) but this at least gives me access to different, and sometimes opposite, views on the same story.

NYT Editor’s Choice – Solid presentation of Times content on the iPad. I have my problems with the app as it stands but I know the crew over at the Times will continue to improve it. As it stands it’s an interesting take on the lean-back sort of interaction with the news.

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. Bloomberg – The Bloomberg service is an amazing beast. There is such an incredible amount of content in such a wide range of areas, finance or otherwise, that it can be overwhelming. If you’ve ever seen a Bloomberg terminal you know what I’m talking about. However, their iPad offering gives a glimpse at how satisfying easy access to their information can be. While it is a tiny fraction of the information Bloomberg offers financial pros, this app is inviting to use and easy to navigate.

Financial Times – I had no idea what I was missing until I flipped through this app on someone else’s iPad. I thought “What do I need to read the Financial Times for?” Well, besides the fact that I design software for the financial industry, this app is a huge step in the right direction towards what newspapers can be on the iPad. I’m not saying it’s the final destination but it’s a step in the right direction. And the content is really good too.

The Weather Channel – Truth be told, I actually use three different weather apps. What can I say? I’m a geek that way. The Weather Channel’s app is my first choice though. It has a nice simple and clear local conditions & forecast section and access to the video clips for your local area, region, and country. The map section isn’t the best. For that I prefer WeatherBug‘s map. I go to WeatherStation when I just want the current details in their full, simple glory.

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Answers & Information

In a slight shift from the consumption apps above, these two apps are almost magical. They are the sci-fi Star Trek apps I thought about as a little boy (along with the much anticipated facetime for iPad that I’m sure will arrive a little sooner than my bank account cares for.) These apps harness and focus the information in the internet tubes to squirt out answers and information with fire hose like efficiency. They kinda blow my mind.

Wikipanion – To be fair it’s wikipedia that provides the juice here. I’ve just found Wikipanion to be the cleanest, simplest way to navigate this amazing resource.

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Wolfram Alpha – Wolfram Alpha is really amazing. They call it a “computational knowledge engine.” What is that? Well.. I’m not totally sure but it does some amazing stuff. Ask it a question involving math, finance, geography, food, history, and see what you get. It also has an amazing calculator and you can ask questions in plain English. This is another service that will only get better (when we all figure out how to use it.)

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Planning & Communication

If you have an iPhone or you manage your calendar and contacts in the cloud (that means online) the iPad provides a pleasing take on interacting with your calendar and contacts in various ways.

IM+ Lite – I don’t do a ton of instant messaging on the iPad but when I do this app does the job. My biggest problem with using the iPad’s virtual keyboard is I constantly hit the ‘B’ button instead of the space bar. It’s really annoying. Know what I mean b?

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Contacts – When set up to sync with an iPhone and an online contact list this is a serviceable pleasant contact app. Not much to say here. You got it. You use it.

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Calendar – The nice thing about the calendar app is that you can sync with multiple online calendars including exchange and google. There are some minor problems, like not being able to select the color of a calendar’s items but hey… it’s a calendar and it works.

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Second Page

Design & Drawing

These apps are for when I’m doing a little heavier duty design work (to the extent that I’d be doing that on my iPad versus paper or my laptop.) It doesn’t happen often but these tools make it possible and kind of enjoyable.

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Omnigraffle – I use Omnigraffle on my laptop & desktop when I’m designing stuff. The app is nice to have in a pinch but I’ve only used it in a rudimentary way for wire framing and diagramming. A really nice feature is that you can email docs back and forth between the desktop and iPad version. I’m waiting for Dropbox integration (along with everyone else who uses this app.)

SketchBook Pro – When I want to get seriously artsy with my iPad I go to SketchBook Pro. It has way more features than Adobe Ideas. Brushes, textures, layers, you name it. Take a look at the SketchBook Flickr group and see what people are doing with this app on the iPad. Amazing.

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Penultimate – Penultimate is a nice little sketching app that literally replaces the Field Notes I usually carry in my back pocket. Well.. not literally.. digitally. You know what I mean. This is my scrap paper app for notes and ideas. It lets you keep separate notebooks for different purposes and it’s really easy to use. What I like most about it is that if you use a stylus it somehow knows when your palm is on the screen and lets you write semi-normally.

iBrainstorm – This is a new app to the second page. It’s a combination sticky note / whiteboard kind of app (though it uses a corkboard metaphor. This needs a little rethinking since most of us dont mark up our cork boards with sharpies.) It could be useful for card sorting. I haven’t used it much yet but I think it has promise.

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Printing

Yes. You can print from the iPad. It’s not perfect but this little app can make it happen.

Print & Share – This app lets you connect to any shared wi-fi printer directly and any printer at all if you install some software on a host machine. It’s not perfect but you can print email, photos, images, web pages, and contacts. It has come in handy a few times for me.

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Movies & Television

I’m still not totally used to how much I am able to do with this thing. In the movie and TV realm I’m still getting used to having so much at my fingertips. With these five apps I am the master of all moving pictures.

IMDB – The Internet Movie Database is another of those outstanding resources like wikipedia. Anything you want to know about movies, actors, TV shows… IMDB should be your first stop. The web site has always been only OK to me but the iPad app is great. This is another fine example of how different the same content can be on different platforms. It’s not perfect but it’s definitely a go-to app..

Netflix -I’m still amazed at what I get for my measly $10 a month to Netflix. This app may have been a major straw on that camel’s back when I was deciding whether or not to make the iPad purchase. This may be my second or third most used, or at least valued, app. I can stream movies and TV shows to my iPad with this. Wow. Still… wow. Love it. A lot...

Flixter – Movies, by Flixter, is a great app for seeing upcoming movies or what’s in theaters now. Just about any time I’m planning a movie trip I pop open this app. It’s got integrated Rotten Tomatoes reviews, you can buy tickets, watch trailers, all the good stuff.

Videos – Apple has split out the movie, video, and TV watching from the iPod app to this little guy. I don’t often buy video content from the iTunes store but when I do this is the app to watch it in.

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Yahoo Entertainment – This is a really impressive little app for getting TV listings and checking out Yahoo’s other entertainment content. I have to admit, I only use it for TV listings and hardly ever check out the other two sections (Entertainment News and Today’s Videos) but I also have to admit that I prefer to see what’s on TV with this over my DirecTV DVR’s built-in guide.

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Music

I don’t really listen to all that much music on the iPad. When I’m home I use my music server. When I’m mobile I use my iPhone. It’s great to have these apps available and maybe if I ever live in a space large enough to not hear music in every room I may change my tune. For that eventual day, these apps are a good start.

Pandora – I really like Pandora a lot. I didn’t get the whole social-music-DNA-learn-what-I-like thing at first. Now it’s pretty much all I listen to. The iPad app is a lot like the iPhone app (both of which I prefer to the web site) but on the iPad the pictures are understandably prettier.

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SoundHound – This is a really cool app, not just for the standard listen-to-the-song-playing-and-tell-me-what-it-is functionality, but with this one you can sing (or try to sing) a song and it *may* tell you what it is. (Your mileage may vary. I can’t sing.)

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Food

The day I got my iPad I was at my in-laws’ house and there was a group of us trying to decide what food to order. I opened up the web page of the restaurant we wanted to order from and passed around the iPad for everyone to have a look at the menu. It was quite cool and a bit of an eye-opener for the skeptics. It worked a lot better than crowding around a screen or taking turns sitting at a computer for the places for which we didn’t have a menu on hand. My food app skills have improved since that day and now I can order, cook, and shop with all kinds of iGoodness.

MenuPages – What a great service this is. This is the only non-native iPad app on my first two pages. I’m looking forward to the day they come out with an iPad version. Until then I suffer through the expanded iPod version.. fairly satisfied.

Epicurious – This was one of the early superstar apps that made it to all the commercials and excited a lot of people about the possibilities of the iPad in the kitchen. I’m a big fan and it works well in my kitchen. Love this app.

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Grocery iQ – Grocery iQ is my one and only shopping list. The best part about it is that it syncs with the app on my iPhone so I can enter items in either app and always know the complete grocery list. It does lots of other really useful stuff too, like scan barcodes on items to add to the list, associate items with stores, learn the location of items as you shop so your list goes in order if you walk the same way through the store, and it does something with coupons I haven’t quite figured out yet. Another highly-used app, especially on the iPhone.

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iPod Stuff

All that remains on my second page is the standard iPod things. If you have an iPod or iPhone you know how often you go to these tools. They’re bread and butter apps.

Photos – I don’t use the iPad much for photo viewing, at least through this app. The only thing I really use it for is taking screen shots (press the screen-lock button and the center button at the same time). In fact, I took the screen shots of these two pages this way and did the outlines in Omnigraffle. I know there’s a USB connector for easily loading photos onto the iPad. Maybe when I get a real camera (I still use the iPhone as my only camera) I’ll behave differently. I think this can be a really nice way to share photos. Until then it’s a little used app for me.

Maps – Google’s map is another breakthrough watershed service we all sort of take for granted already. Directions, traffic, mass transit, satellite view… all truly amazing stuff. While I go to the desktop or laptop when I need directions or to the iPhone when I’m on the move, the iPad as a great way to look at the map with someone else, or a group. This too was one of the first things I did with the iPad on day 1. It was an experience that opened my eyes to the real differences we interact with each other through this platform.

Jumbo Calc – The calculator is no longer a standard app on the iPad like it was on the iPod and that’s a shame (especially for the math-challenged like me.) This is a super-simple, big-button calculator that… calculates. That’s it. Love it. And… it’s solar powered!

Settings – Yes, having access to the settings is something that comes up regularly. At least for me. Usually it’s related to joining Wi-fi networks. I didn’t get the 3G model, and I’m happy for it. I usually use the iPad at home or in a place with a connection. When I’m in neither of those situations I have a mobile hotspot that works like a charm.

iPod – Oh yeah… the iPad can do everything the iPod can do.

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That’s it

Except for my third and fourth pages. I haven’t yet fully checked out the iPad for gaming (not much tine for games lately) but the few I’ve tried are really fun and I think there will be great strides made in this area soon. Like I said, this configuration is always changing (I literally changed it twice while I was writing this. Recreating the screen shots was fun.)

Please let me know if you have any comments or app suggestions. I don’t profess to be an expert in evaluating these apps and I am no reviewer. This is just the set and configuration that’s working for me and making me very happy with my shiny glass slab. Hope you enjoy yours. If you don’t already have one… get one.

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