Can you not just use a Surface Pro? I've never used one but I thought it had a full-fledged OS so you could use it as a development machine, albeit with smaller HD and RAM than a typical notebook.
iPad Pro as Development Machine
11–20 of 151 posts
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#12I've been using my Openmoko Neo Freerunner as a real development machine back in 2008, with no remote desktop tricks - although the screen could have been a bit bigger, it wasn't that bad. Come back when you reach that :P
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#13I get excited every time I see an article about using the iPad Pro for development. But then it always turns out that people just use blink to ssh/mosh into another machine. I really wish I could have native Emacs on the iPad. It is one of the fastest and lightest machines around, phenomenally lightweight and with a great battery life. It has a pretty good keyboard attachment. And Emacs even without a native shell wo…
i tried a cloud-based editor & dev environment when the ipad pro first came out, and the biggest problem was missing/hard-to-emulate keyboard shortcuts (even with the keyboard cover). after that, the awkwardness of having to use touch in place of a mouse was also difficult to adjust to.
i've mainly used the ipad pro as my companion notebook replacement, using the notes app with a pencil. i had hoped by now that all handwritten text would be OCR'ed and searchable, but alas that's been limited to one mode of the notes app so far.
such a promising machine crippled by the indecision of not knowing what it wants to be when it grows up!
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#14And all you really need for development is relatively cheap ThinkPad laptop.
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#15Can you not just use a Surface Pro? I've never used one but I thought it had a full-fledged OS so you could use it as a development machine, albeit with smaller HD and RAM than a typical notebook.
Windows 10... a full-fledged OS? Mind you, there are tablets/convertibles that can support a full-fledged OS with relative ease. I just don't think the Surface is one of them, unless you're willing to wait until the hacks that are involved in making it work under Linux are included in the kernel mainline, and thus in distros. The SP 3 is there now, possibly the 4 as well. But what's the point when you can just pick something else and it'll probably work out of the box?
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#16Can you not just use a Surface Pro? I've never used one but I thought it had a full-fledged OS so you could use it as a development machine, albeit with smaller HD and RAM than a typical notebook.
Windows 10... a full-fledged OS? Mind you, there are tablets/convertibles that can support a full-fledged OS with relative ease. I just don't think the Surface is one of them, unless you're willing to wait until the hacks that are involved in making it work under Linux are included in the kernel mainline, and thus in distros. The SP 3 is there now, possibly the 4 as well. But what's the point when you can just pick s…
The Surface Pros are full fledged machines and quite powerful if bought with the right spec (not cheap though). Just get the keyboard cover. No idea how they work with Linux though.
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#17Too much configuration to even get started!! and the fact that you can't work offline makes this setup so much worse than a regular laptop for my regular use :( I wish there was a better dev environment on the ipad already
Why do you wish that? It sounds horrible. Why not just use a laptop (the right tool for the job).
Agreed. I don't know why anyone would want that. It's almost the equivalent of getting DOOM running on random devices.
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#18This falls under fetish category. Steve Jobs' Post PC world analogy was off in that PCs are the cars, trucks, convertibles etc. and tablets are the scooter. Yes you can do all your grocery shopping on the scooter given the groceries fit, the shop isn't too far away, it's not raining, the mileage will be good etc - you making that one successful grocery trip doesn't mean scooter is a car replacement.
That analogy works pretty good: For many people a scooter is all they need for day-to-day life, and when they need car they borrow/rent one.
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#19No mouse support though.
Re: iPad Pro as Development Machine
#20Can you not just use a Surface Pro? I've never used one but I thought it had a full-fledged OS so you could use it as a development machine, albeit with smaller HD and RAM than a typical notebook.
Windows 10... a full-fledged OS? Mind you, there are tablets/convertibles that can support a full-fledged OS with relative ease. I just don't think the Surface is one of them, unless you're willing to wait until the hacks that are involved in making it work under Linux are included in the kernel mainline, and thus in distros. The SP 3 is there now, possibly the 4 as well. But what's the point when you can just pick s…
The Surface line is actually, out of the box, a very good Linux development machine, if one is ok with not having camera and sleep.
The surface line was not Linux-friendly at the beginning, then around Ubuntu 17.04, the mainline kernel and the firmware started to give the required support for working daily.
The linux-surface kernel (https://github.com/jakeday/linux-surface) gives extra functionality - mainly the touchpad.