iPad Work Fails on iPad — a list.

[Digitalguy]

My M1 will regularly refresh Safari with only 4 tabs open. Only other apps I regularly use are Mail, Netnewswire, and eBay.

I have 4 iPad pros (not counting the old lightning ones), an A12x with 4GB RAM, an A12X with 6, a M1 with 8 and a M1 with 16. The 4GB one refreshes all the time, sometimes even with 1 tab open. The 6, 8 and 16 GB RAM ones are very similar, they refresh given enough tabs and time, but not always, sometimes they can keep several tabs open for days. I have heard different experience, but that's mine, not much difference for Safari if you have at least 6GB RAM.
That doesn't make me want to get the 16GB RAM M4, but maybe I should wait Apple Intelligence to see if that impacts RAM...

 

[henrikhelmers]

It is an issue with iPadOS that apps have to save any temporary state in case they’re getting killed in the background. While we all know why it came to be that way, […]

They do not have to do it this way, it is a decision by Microsoft to add extra security on some platforms and then failing to restore.

 

[thmsnt]

By late last year I have realised that the iPad has no place in my life, which is when I sold it and be a MacBook + iPhone only guy.

I'm of the same mind.

I tried using an M2 12.9 iPad Pro + MK for about 6 months last year as my main computer but ultimately traded it in and bought an M3 Pro MacBook Pro.

MacBook + iPhone is all I need.

 

[JamesMay82]

mail app on iPad doesn’t show total inbox count! That does my head in

 

[unobtainium]

Went to print off a program for a piano recital today (doing it for my tech illiterate mom, who teaches piano). Printed from the iPad and it came out tiny, like this teeny tiny four-age spread in the center of one page. Why?? Then I go over to my Mac and print the exact same file -- looks perfect. Do we blame Word or iPadOS? Either way it's another example of iPad failing at basic productivity tasks.

 

[toobravetosave]

ipads can do most things a computer can

just way slower
less efficiently
with potentially immense frustration

ipad lovers insist it’s a fully functional computer but they skip the part where accessing that “fully functional” device is a slow cumbersome headache for anyone who needs more than email, safari, or the few speciality art/media apps used as cudgel examples of how ipads are real computers too

 

[sockdoggy]

mail app on iPad doesn’t show total inbox count! That does my head in

Moving emails to folders in Mail is another one of those 10x time on iPadOS.

 

[yellowbunny]

Since people are giving excuses for iPad fails by blaming Microsoft, here's my experience with an M1 iPad Pro, a year or two ago --

I sometimes do translation work on Notes, during which I need to reference a PDF document, which I will have open in Files in split view.
Often times I'd have to find some reference on the web by switching out to Safari.

I guess you can guess what will happen at this stage -- Yes, the Files app refreshes itself and the PDF document is gone

No big deal -- I simply re-opened the document then.

Oh, but I need the website for reference again, so I switch out to Safari.
Guess what, Safari refreshes.

And the cycle repeats itself.

Last fall I was caught by the Stage Manager hype and tried working that way. It didn't work because Files app often hangs when in that mode, so that's fun

By late last year I have realised that the iPad has no place in my life, which is when I sold it and be a MacBook + iPhone only guy.

Just tried this on an M2 12.9 and it works perfectly without any refreshing...

 

[Apple_Robert]

Moving emails to folders in Mail is another one of those 10x time on iPadOS.

That is very strange and a problem I haven't seen before. I don't believe I have ever had a problem moving emails to a folder.

 

[Aka757]

ipads can do most things a computer can

just way slower
less efficiently
with potentially immense frustration

ipad lovers insist it’s a fully functional computer but they skip the part where accessing that “fully functional” device is a slow cumbersome headache for anyone who needs more than email, safari, or the few speciality art/media apps used as cudgel examples of how ipads are real computers too

I don’t really follow this argument. Even if all someone needs is email, safari, or art / media apps, does that mean that they don’t really need a computer? I mean ultimately a computer can be anything, right? There are those that need much more than iPadOS can offer for their usage, and those for whom iPadOS is more than capable of handling 100% of their workflow. It completely depends on one’s usage. I think it’s a little bit silly to reduce the iPad to one extreme, whether it’s “it can do everything” or “it can’t do anything”. It’s both to different sets of people, and that’s a great thing. And this is all coming from someone whose work will never be replaced by an iPad, and who uses a MacBook more than an iPad for personal use.

 

[rkuo]

I don’t really follow this argument. Even if all someone needs is email, safari, or art / media apps, does that mean that they don’t really need a computer? I mean ultimately a computer can be anything, right? There are those that need much more than iPadOS can offer for their usage, and those for whom iPadOS is more than capable of handling 100% of their workflow. It completely depends on one’s usage. I think it’s a little bit silly to reduce the iPad to one extreme, whether it’s “it can do everything” or “it can’t do anything”. It’s both to different sets of people, and that’s a great thing. And this is all coming from someone whose work will never be replaced by an iPad, and who uses a MacBook more than an iPad for personal use.

I think the point is more that traditional PC's and computers evolved from the ground up to "do everything". iPad's did not. You can go over your own workflow with a fine toothed comb to figure out if an iPad will work ... or you can get a computer and be pretty damned sure it will work because everyone doing that job has grown up doing it there already.

Paraphrasing something I remember Joel Spolsky saying ... a lot of app clones can duplicate 90% of MS Office's functionality fairly quickly, but it's the last 10% that gets them ... and everybody has their own set of requirements for that last 10%. That's where the decades of iterating on a piece of software on a full fledged OS come into play.

 

[Apple_Robert]

I think the point is more that traditional PC's and computers evolved from the ground up to "do everything". iPad's did not. You can go over your own workflow with a fine toothed comb to figure out if an iPad will work ... or you can get a computer and be pretty damned sure it will work because everyone doing that job has grown up doing it there already.

Paraphrasing something I remember Joel Spolsky saying ... a lot of app clones can duplicate 90% of MS Office's functionality fairly quickly, but it's the last 10% that gets them ... and everybody has their own set of requirements for that last 10%. That's where the decades of iterating on a piece of software on a full fledged OS come into play.

That is a good point. The problem on MR and other Apple nerd places is that too many people expect the iPad to be something it isn't and then get mad when certain tasks can't be performed at all or as seamless as on a Mac. I think that the iPad has gotten a bad rap for far too long due to the aforementioned rhetoric and because of that, a lot of People are overbuying MBP when daily tasks could be done on the iPad and keyboard.

The Files app works on the iPad. However, it doesn't do some thing I would like to do in a more straightforward forward. I asked for advice on here and was directed to an app called FileBfrower Pro. I downloaded the app, saw that it could meet multiple tasks being done on my MBP, and made the $15 purchase. Some on here would say that I shouldn't have had to purchase a third party app. Such a retort would be apropos if Apple created the iPad to be a MBP replacement. That kind of scenario happens all the time and I would guess a lot of people on here and elsewhere don't do what I did and just disregard the iPad completely.

Granted, a lot of people on here have workflows that can't make use of the sole iPad device role and they know it and still complain about the iPad. I think people here need to get their expectations in line with the devices ability before they go complaining about the inability of the iPad.

 

[rillrill]

I am more interested in things people do with iPad Pro, workflows, and how it is adopted. I remember a post by some iPad app developer who used tools to bypass Mac. I have adopted the same workflow, and my iPad test pad no longer needs MacBook Pro to edit code or run tests. Overall I love working on myipad Pro with out being tied to my desk, its just more portable.

100% this. There’s a podcast called iPad Pros that is very good at going into this very thing. Some of the episodes are truly inspiring for iPad centric people.

 

[Apple_Robert]

100% this. There’s a podcast called iPad Pros that is very good at going into this very thing. Some of the episodes are truly inspiring for iPad centric people.

I just followed in Apple's Podcast app. Thanks for the mention.

 

[richpjr]

That is a good point. The problem on MR and other Apple nerd places is that too many people expect the iPad to be something it isn't and then get mad when certain tasks can't be performed at all or as seamless as on a Mac. I think that the iPad has gotten a bad rap for far too long due to the aforementioned rhetoric and because of that, a lot of People are overbuying MBP when daily tasks could be done on the iPad and keyboard.

I'm not sure people getting mad is the best description. More like frustrated because some things that should be pretty straightforward to fix or polish haven't and it makes certain workflows slow, clunky or impossible.

 

[rkuo]

That is a good point. The problem on MR and other Apple nerd places is that too many people expect the iPad to be something it isn't and then get mad when certain tasks can't be performed at all or as seamless as on a Mac. I think that the iPad has gotten a bad rap for far too long due to the aforementioned rhetoric and because of that, a lot of People are overbuying MBP when daily tasks could be done on the iPad and keyboard.

The Files app works on the iPad. However, it doesn't do some thing I would like to do in a more straightforward forward. I asked for advice on here and was directed to an app called FileBfrower Pro. I downloaded the app, saw that it could meet multiple tasks being done on my MBP, and made the $15 purchase. Some on here would say that I shouldn't have had to purchase a third party app. Such a retort would be apropos if Apple created the iPad to be a MBP replacement. That kind of scenario happens all the time and I would guess a lot of people on here and elsewhere don't do what I did and just disregard the iPad completely.

Granted, a lot of people on here have workflows that can't make use of the sole iPad device role and they know it and still complain about the iPad. I think people here need to get their expectations in line with the devices ability before they go complaining about the inability of the iPad.

I'd like to see more progress on iPadOS and the apps as much as any of those folks, but I've come to the conclusion that no amount of iteration on iPad apps will make them fully functional touch equivalents of their macOS counterparts. The gulf is too vast and the mouse/keyboard UI paradigm, among other things, is simply too important to making those apps as powerful as they are.

I'm actually quite happy with iPad's and iPadOS. The fact that I want one device to run both OS's is a compliment to the iPad.

 

[iPersuade]

First, sorting by which date? Access date? Modify date? Creation date? Second, recent tab recents everything, not just any particular folder. Neither of them are ideal.

First, sorting by which date? Access date? Modify date? Creation date? Second, recent tab recents everything, not just any particular folder. Neither of them are ideal.

That answer is clear from the post. The poster wanted to sort by recently edited documents. You can sort by date (edited) by particular folder, too. True, you can’t sort by created date, but that’s not what the post I replied to asked.

 

[iPersuade]

Probably Sorry, I confused english terms and have my ipadOS set to german so my son can use it. Point was: On the mac you have "Date added", "Date created", "Date modified" and "Date last opened" - all of which I use for work. On the iPad you don't get those.

I guess we can all agree on that the files app could be better.

Agreed there is more fine grained search options on macOS. In my case, I’ve been able to find everything I’m looking for with the options available in the Files App. But I’d welcome more robust options in the app.

 

[richpjr]

Agreed there is more fine grained search options on macOS. In my case, I’ve been able to find everything I’m looking for with the options available in the Files App. But I’d welcome more robust options in the app.

Someone just pointed out in another thread that you can now format a drive in iPadOS 18 - progress!

 

[Apple_Robert]

Someone just pointed out in another thread that you can now format a drive in iPadOS 18 - progress!

 

[iPersuade]

Someone just pointed out in another thread that you can now format a drive in iPadOS 18 - progress!

I saw that, too and tested. It works great.

 

[iPersuade]

Sorry. I didn’t see that you posted this already!

 

[xxFoxtail]

Lol, I probably would've just used two iPads for this. 😂 Of course, that doesn't help if you need to copy/paste data from one file to another.

I've never used two iPads side by side before, but does Universal Clipboard not work between two of them? I suppose it probably depends what you're copying, but I use this feature between my Mac and iPhone all the time.

I'm of the same mind.

I tried using an M2 12.9 iPad Pro + MK for about 6 months last year as my main computer but ultimately traded it in and bought an M3 Pro MacBook Pro.

MacBook + iPhone is all I need.

Sadly, I did the same thing last year. After using the iPad Pro as my main computer on and off since 2018, I kind of decided it's getting these new features at a snail pace. Most recently being that formatting a drive update - should have been available the day the system was able to accept external drives.

I use my iPhone 14 Pro (plus a Clicks Keyboard case or bluetooth keyboard) as my main computer now, and my M2 MBA for when I need a larger screen or extra power for something. The iPad worked fine for the most part, but I just wasn't happy with it anymore.

 

[rui no onna]

I've never used two iPads side by side before, but does Universal Clipboard not work between two of them? I suppose it probably depends what you're copying, but I use this feature between my Mac and iPhone all the time.

Good question. I honestly don’t know as I’ve never used that feature.

 

[Digitalguy]

Most recently being that formatting a drive update - should have been available the day the system was able to accept external drives.

Yeah, some people justify this snail pace by saying Mac is much older etc. That's nonsense. The lack of attention given to basic things like these and the fact that these basic features take years to arrive is frustrating and shows that Apple is not giving iPadOS the priority it deserves after a great start with iPadOS 13.