November 11, 2011 What's on Binary's iPad - Productivity

I am an avid iPad user. At first I was skeptical that I would use it beyond the first few weeks excitement, but I have grown to use it everyday. The iPad has become a tool and I am expanding it more and more into my business work, especially now that the applications have finally started to adopt Cloud capabilities.

I thought I would list 5 Apps from a number of categories and what I use most in each. These are not reviews of any kind of endorsements just my personal preference and the reasons why. I'll scatter these posts over the next few days. I encourage if you do stumble across these posts, throw out your preferences, I am always open to new apps to try out I am not married to any of them... except for maybe Evernote.


Productivity Apps

Task Pro - If you are in any job with things to do, lists are a part of your life in some form. Getting them organized has always been a challenge, just do a search on tasks in the app store and you will get more than one return. Apple even added a task app to the core iOS 5 now. Task Pro is a tasks organizer but unlike the Apple iOS one, this has features that truly make it Pro. Task nesting, categories, priorities, repeat feature, and let's you know what's upcoming and overdue. Of course there is a nice notification feature to alert you when something is due. Use the cloud sync, which is a little clunkier than the native Apple Task app, and you can have your tasks across devices.

Evernote is the center of my cloud world. It's one of the few online services I pay for the full features and I will continue to do so. If you are using multiple devices and computers Evernote is your information hub. I actually won't try writing or productivity apps unless they have an Evernote sync feature. I have blogged about Evernote before and this service is becoming a staple in my online world as my Evernote collections are slowly turning into a good indexed database of information.

Dropbox is a great app to store files. 2GB for the free version is enough to store up the various docs, photos and backups. I primarily use it as a 3rd backup and not really for a primary storage location. I am trying to find more ways to use it but with the Apple iCloud, Evernote, and my PC the 2GB is limiting to push Dropbox to the max.

MagicalPad is my newest application for business use. I have been looking for a decent note taking, idea recording, and task list that's functional and easy to use in a meeting. After trying out the handwriting apps and busting out, then going to various other ones, I stumbled across this one. MagicalPad is designed to be built to your mind. So far I have templates for notes, idea mapping and planning. One really cool feature is from the MagicalPad website you can download and upload templates.

The last one is Chapters for iPad. This is purely a notebook of notebooks. You can use it as a journal or longer notations that MagicalPad is not made for. I use Chapters for writing biographies, situations, descriptions and dump large notes of processes and ideas for later review. Backup and export to Dropbox, Evernote and Google Docs makes it worthy to be in the rotation.

The great thing is that you can get all these apps, depending on the time of year and any deals, for about $6. That is a great investment if it's going to add to your productivity and organization down the long road.

Next Up - iPad Games

End of Line.

Posted in: Apple Inc,iPad,Software