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by drewying 4698 days ago
Isn't this the dream of the Microsoft Surface and similar tablets? Give them multitasking, a keyboard case, and boom instant productivity.

I personally just think it comes down to screen real estate. Small screens are hard to do anything productive. I still remember trying to type up a paper in college on an Acer netbook. Even with a full "laptop experience", it was a horrible and scarring experience.

2 comments

One of Microsoft's biggest failures is that the keyboard is useless unless you're sitting at a table. I wanted a surface pro, until the keyboard covers were revealed.

I suspect that most people who really wanted a hardware keyboard (lots of people don't even want them) for a mobile device will agree with me when I say that if your keyboard case requires a table in order to be used, then you may as well not even have bothered to try.

I purchased a Clamcase Pro for my Ipad, and it's absolutely amazing. I have fairly large hands, but I can still type on the device in a manner that's completely natural and comfortable, at about 90wpm. I've used several different netbooks, and they all felt cramped in comparison. So far, I've completed dozens of essays and reports on the device. I even use it for some light web development. The best part, however, is that the case can actually be used like a normal laptop.

If IOS had better productivity apps, a decent multitasking system, a file system, and sublime text, it would be the best computer I've ever owned.

So one of the things interviewees mentioned is that there was a difference between "micro moments" and "full blown work".

Writing a paper is full blown work that they know they cant do on a mobile device. But they expected a lot of the micro-moments to work.