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Become a Six Colors member to read exclusive posts, get our weekly podcast, join our community, and more!By Jason Snell for TechRepublic
Yes, iPad Pro is ready to be your work machine
With the iPad Pro, Apple is unabashedly making the case that the iPad is a platform that can be used for serious work. While the iPad isn’t going to work for every person’s specific needs, its successes in the enterprise and among grassroots iPad-only professionals suggests that the iPad is already being used to do a whole lot of serious work. The new iPad Pro models and this fall’s release of iOS 11 (now in public beta) are great news for anyone who wants to use an iPad to get work done.
In June, Apple updated both of its iPad Pro models. The larger one, with a 12.9-inch screen, has always been great at text input because of its expanded dimensions: Apple’s Smart Keyboard accessory offers full-sized keys, and even the on-screen keyboard is big enough to be considered full-sized. But the smaller iPad Pro model, which gained a 10.5-inch screen (up from 9.7 inches) and a few millimeters of extra width in landscape mode, is a much better device for typing than its predecessor, with the Smart Keyboard gaining full-size QWERTY keys and its software keyboard stretching to take advantage of the wider screen. With iOS 11, the typing story gets even better: Apple’s new software keyboard features a second set of symbols that can be triggers with a flicking gesture while typing; once you get used to it, text entry on the iPad speeds up a lot because toggling to the secondary keyboard for numbers and symbols becomes a rarity.