[mathewsanders]

What is the UX for switching between apps or moving the screen like?

Can you do this with keyboard shortcuts or do you find yourself switching between keyboard and touch screen for some interactions?

I find this idea of using a keyboard super appealing but don’t like the idea of switching between keyboard and screen all the time. At least a virtual keyboard is on the screen!

[aikinai]

I often use an external keyboard with my iPad (but not really on the go). Both multi-tasking and keyboard shortcut support have gotten a lot better recently (with an especially big push in iPadOS 15), but I find the biggest blocker that iPadOS still hasn’t been decided with a keyboard in mind.

For example, tons of apps—including Apple apps—don’t highlight text fields by default as they would on a computer, so you have to tap (or click) the field before you can type. You can very rarely tab to switch focus between different buttons and menus. You can’t type to jump to an item in a list, etc.

MacOS has so many little productivity enhancers, especially in regards to keyboard shortcuts and keyboard control, and the people designing iOS/iPadOS have just never made it a priority so even with an external keyboard, I find myself having to use touch or the mouse so much more often.

[joeman1000]

You can CMD-TAB to other apps as on macOS. There are many of the same keyboard shortcuts translated to iPadOS, even some emacs movement keys in all text boxes!

There isn’t enough room to have more than one thing open usually, so lots of CMD-TAB action.

Normally I’m doing one or the other - typing or annotating/drawing with the pencil. If I need touch-interaction when typing I can use the trackpad.

I can’t say it’s a perfect experience, or even a practical one, but I still enjoy it. Maybe it’s just the novelty of the setup. It weighs more (with the keyboard-case) than my MacBook Air, but it does have a nicer screen and it is waterproof. It lends itself more to portability for sure. I tend to just chuck it in my bag more often than I did with my laptop.

[throwaway413]

Alt+tab works fine on iOS, and I’m pretty sure you can trigger the app switcher view with a shortcut, can’t remember.