My iPad Let Me Down [Shenzhennotes]

It wasn’t that in the past I was praising the iPad for being a fabulous travel computer. It still is-until it isn’t.

The qualities that make the iPad so great on the road still apply: long-winded battery life; lightweight form factor that doesn’t must be removed for security scans at American airports; an overly capable web browser, especially when complemented by selections from the App Store.

But when unexpected problems arise, the iPad doesn’t give some ways to route around them toward a solution.

I know if it’s God’s way of telling me I must buy a MacBook Air, but I’ve gotten myself into a bind here in China.

First off, I’m sick. I’ve clearly picked up some traveler’s cruft somewhere. I’m weak. My stomach is upset. Leaving the hotel room-even to only attempt to eat some breakfast inside the hotel restaurant-is taxing.

Plus I’ve got about 40 images from my DSLR that I must get formatted into something to post on Gizmodo. an easy gallery would do. It’s mainly Computerizing 101 kind of stuff.

But an unfortunate confluence of problems has made the iPad the inaccurate appliance for the job.

I can’t simply upload the pictures from the iPad to Gawker’s content management system-no filesystem on the iPad for an internet page to plug into. I will be able to’t email the photographs from the Photos app to myself, as for some reason it wants to connect the RAW files to the email in preference to a converted JPG file; the next 25MB+ email crashes the Photo app before they’re sent through if I needed to send them to another individual.

In fairness, I am running iOS 4.3 Beta 3, that can account for the bug in Photos. multiple the pictures have converted as expected, which makes my thwarted success all that more tantalizing.

Dropbox doesn’t work for some reason. It can be the Chinese firewall, although I’ve had issues with the information-side of different apps with websites that aren’t restricted. Hard to claim.

Worst of all, I will’t attempt to use any other apps to get the photos online because the App Store refuses to simply accept any of my account verification, despite entering in every credit card I’ve got. I will understand not letting me download apps which might be restricted in China-I’m on Chinese internet, in spite of everything-but for some reason the App Store won’t let me download anything at all, not even free apps.

Right now the best choice I will be able to see is to view each photo within the Photo app, then take a screenshot of it, then crop and rotate each, then upload those. It’s going to probably work, although the pictures would only be as high-resolution as the iPad’s screen. Failing all else, that’s what I’ll do, but I’m probably not longing for it.

Maybe each of the errors-even the App Store failure- may be attributed to the beta version of iOS I’m running. I assume some other foreigner in China can test it next month when the overall version of 4.2 is out.

But it’s a gorgeous frustrating feeling to grasp that your data is within the device you’re using but caused by its closed system troubleshooting options are limited. It’s a bit like being sick at Disneyland and getting stuck at the pinnacle of Space Mountain. Suddenly the veneer of blinking lights stops looking like the longer term and starts feeling like being trapped in a tiny car at the hours of darkness inside a warehouse.

I still really like the iPad for travel. I think in spite of the fact that I buy an Air-even the tiny version-I’ll still bring the iPad along for books, video, etc. I mean, hell, I already own it. Might in addition.

But the gild is ever so slightly off the lily. And in preference to being impressed with how capable the iPad would be compared to a standard computer, today I’m missing traveling with a machine that provides me more flexibility when my expected path dead ends.

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This post is tagged: american airports, content management system, hotel restaurant, information side, unexpected problems