HI All, Catherine has posted before on this list about liking "iA Writer" as an accessible word processing app for the iPad. At the time of the earlier discussions at the end of last year and the beginning of this year, this app was only available for the iPad. However, in March the developers of this app, Information Architects, Inc. -- the "iA" initials for the prefix in the name of this app, made this app universal so it could be run on any iOS platform, and so that you could sync documents that you create between iPhone and iPad and, if you have the desktop iA Writer app for the Mac, with that, too. Further, iA Writer implements Dropbox and iCloud syncing, like a number of note taking apps, but it is unusual in letting you use both Dropbox and iCloud syncing at the same time. This doesn't mean that the same document can be synced to both Dropbox and iCloud, but it does mean that you can organize documents that you want synced to Dropbox and those you want synced to iCloud within the same app.
Since an increasing number of list members seem to be getting iPads, it seemed appropriate to mention iA Writer again. This app is designed to have a really simple interface --- no settings or complicated interactions. The only set up you do is to link to your Dropbox or iCloud account if you want to sync documents to these accounts instead of only using local storage on your device. The app features an extended keyboard with an additional top row of keys, and can be used in either portrait or landscape mode on any iOS device. The keys and controls are well labeled, and have incorporated feedback from VoiceOver users. The iPad format for this app is still nicer to use than the format for the iPhone; iA Writer was clearly originally designed for the iPad. The current version of the iPhone version does not have the counter for words and characters that appears in the app on the iPad. For the iPad, the buttons at the top of a document you created are (from top left to top right): "File Browser", "Export", "Create", then the document name at the top center, which you can double tap to edit and change, since this is a text field, "Counter" (which reports number of words and characters), and "Focus mode". The extended row of keys at the top of the iPad's keyboard support navigation to the left and right by word and by character, as well as punctuation. These keys are labeled: "Go to previous word", "Go to next word", "hyphen", "semi-colon", "colon", "apostrophe", "smart curly quotes", "smart parentheses", "Go to previous character", and "Go to next character". Using the "Go to previous word" or "Go to next word" keys is like pressing the Option+Left or Right arrow keys on your Mac or on a paired Bluetooth keyboard for your iOS device, or using the rotor and flicking to navigate by word. If your insertion point is in the middle of a word, it moves you through to the beginning, or end, of that word, and VoiceOver announces the letters you pass over in either direction. If your insertion point is at the beginning of a word, the "Go to previous word" key will move you to the beginning of the previous word. The "smart curly parentheses" key types a left parenthesis the first time you press it and a right parenthesis the second time you press it. Composing and editing with the iPad is very nice, since I can touch the section of text above the virtual keyboard and move my finger up or down to move by lines, and the insertion point moves to the beginning of these lines. Then I can use the "Go to previous word" or "Go to next word" keys to navigate through the line by words. If you have your rotor set to "characters" you can simply flick up or down to navigate by characters instead of using the "Go to previous character" and "Go to next character" keys at the right end of the extra top row of the keyboard. When I'm navigating this way, I usually run my finger up and down near the left edge of the iPad, so when I bring my finger down to the keyboard I easily touch the "Go to previous word" and "Go to next word" keys. If I'm making spelling corrections or changes, it's convenient to have the "Go to previous character" and "Go to next character" keys just above the delete key at the right side of the keyboard. If I want to check the word and character count, I move my finger up to the heading for the document and flick right to the counter. I don't use the "Focus mode" button in the top right corner. That's a visual thing where only the current three lines of a document are displayed, to allow the reader to concentrate their attention on them. If you use focus mode, you can't do any of the gesture navigation in your editing. I haven't used iA Writer on the iPhone very much, but I have to say that it's not as nice as the experience on the iPad. There's no character and word counter because of the more limited screen space. The top row of keys is: "Go to previous character", "hyphen", "comma", "semi-colon", "question mark", "period", "apostrophe", and "Go to next character". (For those of you not familiar with the iPad keyboard, there is a comma and a period key to the right of the "m" key on the bottom row of letter keys, similar to regular keyboards. And using the shift key with these keys gives you the exclamation mark and question mark. There is also a "Hide keyboard" key in the bottom right corner, and a second "more numbers" on the right side of the keyboard, between the "Hide keyboard" key and the space bar.) The other thing that's annoying is that when I want to get the keyboard out of the way to review the full text, I end up having to double tap the documents button in the top left corner and open the document again without the keyboard. There's a space between the "semi-colon" and "question mark" in the top row of the keyboard that sighted users can use to pull down the keyboard, but I'd have to use a double tap and hold, then pull down. And most of the time I'd end up hitting the question mark key when I try this. Still, this is a recent addition, and the developer has been working on VoiceOver improvements (mentioned in the latest update notes). The other recent improvement is folder organization options for iCloud. (Haven't checked this out yet.) I can't really recommend using this on the iPhone yet, but the iPad interface is quite nice. This app is also only $0.99. Here's the URL at the App Store: • iA Writer by Information Architects, Inc. ($0.99 universal binary works for both iPad and iPhone) http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/ia-writer/id392502056?mt=8 You can also read more about iA Writer in this comparative AppAdvice review, "The Writing App Is Mightier Than The Sword" by Christine Chan, April 7, 2012: http://appadvice.com/appnn/2012/04/app-showdown-the-writing-app-is-mightier-than-the-sword HTH. Cheers, Esther <--- Mac Access At Mac Access Dot Net ---> To reply to this post, please address your message to [email protected] You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Mac-Access forum at either the list's own dedicated web archive: <http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/mac-access/index.html> or at the public Mail Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/>. Subscribe to the list's RSS feed from: <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/maillist.xml> The Mac-Access mailing list is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus and worm-free! 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