My loving wife (36 years TODAY!) has asked me if I might like an ipad for Father’s Day! I’ve done some reading and have messed a bit with one owned by a friend and am at least interested in looking a little more into one.
Is anyone aware of any applicationss that might be useful in either model railroading OR train watching? I’ve scanned the apps store on the Apple web site but was disappointed that there was no way to search for keywords in the apps’ descriptions. So I thought I’d ask if anyone here a). uses an ipad and b). has a few apps that they have found helpful for our collective interest in trains.
Congrats on your anniversary! may you have many more healthy ones!
I don’t know.
BUT, I can’t imagine that a magazine series/forum series like MRR has here would want to be left behind in the techical dust.
Even all Social Security payments of all types by Mar 1, 2013 will ALL be electronic deposits or electronic debit cards, announced today.
I do believe the ipad and clones will be the wave of the future! So anyone not wanting to become a quick “dinosaur” will jump on board sooner than later.
The “experts” already advise to think seriously before you buy another another desktop or laptop as they are on their way out. Net books, ipads and the like will likely be the near future items to have.
They also advise as banking/bill paying goes paperless and online that one employ a single netbook SOLELYfor the purpose of banking and bill paying online and NOT GO ANYWHERE/DO ANY SEARCHES ONLINE with it to avoid it getting corrupted and hacked.
Man I still like to have paper in my hands, though. SOmething about teh feel of it…the smell of it…i don;t know…maybe I will be a dinosaur!
Well… if the iPhone has apps you can run the JMRI panel to run your trains, I don’t see why you couldn’t run that on the iPAD. Heck, you may even be able to install JMRI straight on that thing, they have a MAC version you know. JMRI for MACs here
Edit: I just found out the iPAD runs the iPhone OS, so you can try this app
Ipad will not be the wave of the future. Tablets might be, I’d even go so far as to say we’ll see the old Star Trek Padds, But not Ipad.
It’s too limited. Not only for the the standard Windows/Mac problems, but also for memory, the Ipad does not conform to standard movie formats, and oh by the way, it’s slowly killing AT&T’s network.
“They” are forgetting that you would need a whole separate network to avaoid getting hacked, and would still be wrong. Get a good anti-virus. Better yet, get 2. I also reccomend a program called Web of Trust, which is a user-rated filter, and has stopped a number of things by diverting me to it’s default page. Between that, Spy Bot, Ccleaner, and the Windows IE built-in, and some common snese, your fine.
One of the things I like about my trains is that they are not something I do at a computer keyboard with a screen in front of me. They are not virtual. They are not on-line.
In short, my trains are real. I like the feeling of creating something physical, with size and weight, as opposed to something which consists of bits and pixels.
I’m up on the latest technology, but I don’t need to surf the web from my cell phone, just make calls. Call me a dinosaur if you will. You should hear the music I listen to in the trainroom…
I guess I was thinking in terms of something like a conversion app that you could run at the worbench when you were cutting away at those strips of wood to get just the right length.
If that train monitoring software were available in an iPad version, I’ll bet the railfans would snap them up by the shipping container load. But I’m hearing that something like that isn’t in the future of ATCS.
Most of the content here on MR would be available except for the movies since I’m guessing that they are probably in Flash format. I was just wondering about other modeling or prototype uses that those of you who have them or have access to them might have come across.
Maybe, maybe not. The iPad is only the first, there will be copycats and competitors. Sometimes there is a danger in being an early adopter of a new technology. (HD DVD anyone? Or how about Laser-Disc?) Although iPad vs. Streak vs. whatever probably isn’t exactly the same sort of format war like Beta vs. VHS or HD-DVD vs. Blu-Ray. In cases like that it’s better to wait for the format war to be won and lost.
Um, no. iPads and the like are not a replacement for a full desktop or laptop computer. They simply do not have similar capabilities. iPads are memory limited devices and can only run one application at a time. They’re pretty slick but they do not have the capability to replace regular computers. Even netbooks are severely limited in comparison to a standard laptop.
The iPad is basically not much more than an iPhone with a bigger screen that you can’t make phone calls from.
I have been using my stepson’s iPad and it sure has potential. Leaves all other PC’s Operating Systems in the dust right now.
I will probably wait for a tablet as the first generation of a device will come down in cost and have more options in the next version which will not be far behind.
I found this out almost three years ago when I bought the first mini laptop.
No, I was thinking more in terms of conversions to HO scale, etc for scratchbuilding. I know that the calculator function will do a lot but oftentimes, specialized programs make those calculations much easier to enter & use.
Another application I’ve found on the web is one which is a hip roof calculator. That really helps ehen you are trying to cut roofing material for those pesky two-angled corners.
It might be fun for you to bookmark this thread and go back and read it in a couple of years. I’m not trying to start a flame war but I predict your assumptions are quite off base. Apple has led the way with new stuff for the past several years and I see no sign of that situation changing anytime soon. They now out rank Microsoft in size and they are selling iPads and the just introduced iPhones at a fever pitch. The Windows vs Mac “problem” is bascically a moot point nowdays. The whole point of the iPad isn’t to replace a PC, it is made to augment the internet experience and use when surfing, e-mail, download books, music and videos along with other apps. Macs are still not a big target for the virus creators so far due to several reasons. The world is always moving
No flames here. It is fun to see where technology goes to. One of the fun conversations I got to have with Dad. Sigh.
My problem with Windows/Mac is that programs and files are not cross-compatible. For example, there are 2 versions of JMRI as referenced above. Now, before you comment on that part, please allow me to also call out
One of which is a ver’y simplified, streamlined, and closely gaurded computer code. Which is the/a reaosn that there need to be different versions. This is kinda nice for anti-virus, but I don’t like the idea of having to buy something twice, as a home user, or potentially as a business, and switching becomes difficult. I’ve not heard if the Universities have hit the compatibilit issues or not, I know there were problems with Office03 and 07, I haven’t paid much attrention to Mac/Windows in college situations. My point on anti-virus was more directed at the dual networks/systems, not Mac, but it actually worked out nicely.
I’ll admit, when I took the “Mac 101” class at my High School, I got burned. the Macs we got came with very simplistic programs and were most likely not properly tied into the network. However, first encounters are the ones that stick. My overall impression was “Okay, so it’s another operating system like Linux is to Windows, with a brandname to pay for. Big Fat Hairy Deal.” (Brownie points if you can tell me where that’s from) Yes, these were the programs, but if I’m gonna pay another 1-200 bucksa for a brandname, I want a basic program setup that
Two versions of JMRI? No there aren’t. There might HAVE to be if the stop development of Java for MacOS like they’ve been threatening, and if JMRI wants to move forward then the Macs will be left behind - however since Bob Jacobsen is a Mac user I doubt that will happen.
What are the limitations of the WiThrottle? I find it works very well. They’ve even added turnout control but I don;t need that. I guess the only limitation vs a real throttle is that the F2 isn;t momentary - bet that could be fixed up REAL quick though if someoen asked for it. It’s also on ANdroid now too, not just iPhone.
I’d be curious to know how many responders to this post actually have an iPad, and how many responses are based on idle speculation.
I do have an iPad, and it’s a great device - arguably one of the best computing devices I’ve ever owned, based on it’s convenience and capabilities. 10 hours of battery life, while playing video. I have had mine since May, and I have not once seen the device crash or not work. Every sync connects. From a user standpoint, it has been flawless. I would replace mine in 10 seconds if it was lost, stolen, or broken.
As was mentioned, it’s not a replacement for a computer, although it is pretty darn close. When used in conjunction with a smart phone and laptop, it’s simply fantastic. I use mine currently at work to take notes in meetings, calendering, etc.
I use mine all the time for model railroading - as a throttle sometimes, but more as a very handy reference tool. With web access, it’s easy to call up pertinent forum posts or web sites or magazines when I’m working on an project - it’s light profile makes it perfect to take with me where I go to the benchwork, instead of taking the work back to the bench.
As a quick aside, the whole mac/pc is a tired argument. All software should be cross platform compatible in my mind, to limit your product to a single platform is normally not a technology based decision, but an economic and marketing one. In the higher education institutions I’ve been with over the past decade, Macs (since the Intel processor), despite a higher initial cost. provide a greater ROI due to their ability to multi-system boot, and that the support needed for that platform is much less than the Windows variants. Folks may not want to hear that, but that’s just the way it is.
Not yet. I just don’t know what I’d do with it. A coworker has one, I played around with it for a while, and it’s quite impressive. But I think I’d end up with a very expensive toy. My iPhone was a no-brainer. I need a phone anyway, and it gets my email, and I read books on it - and it’s super handy to carry around. The iPad isn;t powerful enough to replace my work laptop, and just can’t do some of the things I need a laptop for, so I’d have to carry around 2, well 3 devices. The whole reason I got and have been using smartphones since not long after they came out was to reduce how much junk I have to tote along when I go places. I had been carrying a PDA< phone, and laptop. Now I’m down to two. I’m waiting to see what the next gen iPad can do - I skipped the first two iPhones and started with a 3G, now I have a 4, skipping the 3GS. Perhaps I’ll experiment with one of those inexpensive ANdroid tablets coming out.