Bundle Discount!
Save 30% when you build your own bundle of three or more books, including Take Control of...
(30% discount overrides other coupons and is calculated on the first screen of our cart.)
Take Control of iPad Basics
Learn key iPad concepts and skills with this free ebook!
Whether you've already used an iPad or you're starting from a blank slate, Take Control editor-in-chief Tonya Engst helps you patch the blank spots in your basic iPad know-how. She walks those who haven't yet made the leap through deciding which iPad and accessories to buy, after which she helps you understand the iPad's buttons and ports, learn multi-touch gestures, download apps, sync data and media, find your stuff, and avoid newbie mistakes. The ebook wraps up with a discussion of how to impress your friends with a great iPad demo!
Why is this ebook free? Two reasons. The iPad is easy to use, but it's also completely unfamiliar for many people, and we wanted to help new users become comfortable more quickly. Also, we have a number of other Take Control ebooks about the iPad, and by collecting all the iPad basics in this ebook, those books can instead focus on the more-subtle details and expert advice that sets Take Control titles apart.
Four more Take Control ebooks pick up where this one leaves off, helping you read books and listen to audio, get productive work done, manage your email, and go under the hood with networking and security details. You can buy them individually, or:
Save 30% on a bundle discount: Select checkboxes for the Bundle Discount at left. Be sure to scroll down and click the Buy Selected Ebooks button.
Save 33% on the iPad IQ bundle: Buy all four together with the Improve Your iPad IQ bundle.
Shopping on your iPad? Read the FAQ tab below to find out about options for reading your ebook on the iPad.
More Info
Contents & Intro
FAQ
Blog
Book Info
113 pages
Version 1.1
Updated 17-Jun-10
2.0 MB download
ISBN: 1615420517
Read onscreen with Table of Contents, Intro, Quick Start, and section starts.
About the Author
Tonya Engst co-founded the TidBITS online publication in 1990 with her husband Adam Engst. Tonya is Editor in Chief of the Take Control series, which is published by TidBITS Publishing Inc. She has edited over half of the Take Control titles.
Move Files and Data between the iPad and Your Computer
Find Your Stuff
Secure Your iPad
Demo Your iPad
About This Book
Read Me First
This ebook guides you through the basics of using an iPad, helping you gain confidence and master important fundamental features. This ebook also serves as a general introduction for other iPad-related ebooks in the Take Control series. It was written by Tonya Engst, edited by Adam Engst, and published by TidBITS Publishing Inc.
Introduction
This ebook is for you if you’re on the cusp of buying an iPad, if you’ve just bought an iPad and aren’t sure what to do with it, or if you’ve had an iPad for a while, but feel that you’re missing out on certain basic functions.
My mission is to provide helpful guidance regarding the most essential things to know about the iPad. When you finish reading, you will be more confident in your use of the iPad and you’ll be ready for the more advanced content in other Take Control ebooks about the iPad, which assume you know this basic information. By collecting the basics here in one ebook, my goal is to make learning about the iPad easy and avoid repeating information in those other ebooks.
I’m excited about the iPad. The new touchscreen is big fun, and the operating system behind the iPad—the iPhone OS—is fairly new, so Apple has been able to rethink many last-century decisions about how a computer should work.
All this new technology, however, can cause to bumps in the road for people who want to use the iPad comfortably without spending hours researching arcane details. For example, although this may seem reasonable for those who have been using iPods for years, a rational newcomer might find it odd to use iTunes—software that was originally designed for listening to music—to move photos from a computer to an iPad (but not vice-versa).
In this ebook I hope to share my enthusiasm for the iPad, and to help you navigate any basic rough spots that interfere with your enjoyment of your iPad.
Let’s begin!
iPad Basics Quick Start
This ebook first looks at how to buy an iPad and related accessories. After that, I've organized it so if you read from start to finish with a new iPad in hand, by the end of the ebook, your iPad will be set up, you'll be comfortable with its basic features, and you'll be ready to give a whiz-bang demo of it to anyone who asks. However, you should feel free to jump in and start reading anywhere.
If you'd prefer to start with a visual introduction to the buttons and ports on your iPad, see Find Buttons and Ports.
Decide what to buy:
Whether you've not yet bought an iPad or you're thinking of buying one for someone else, see Which iPad Is Right for You?
Learn about AppleCare and Accessories for your iPad.
Come to grips with a few essentials:
If you're not sure what all those buttons and ports around the edge of your iPad are for, read Find Buttons and Ports.
Visit the mother ship! Connect Your iPad to a Computer in order to set it up, make backups, and move data to it.
Read important advice on how to Handle the Battery properly, plus learn how to Turn Your iPad Off and On.
Make sure your iPad has the latest version of its operating system and core apps in Update Your iPad's Software.
Understand the basic finger gestures necessary to interact with the iPad's onscreen interface by reading Learn the Interface.
If you're using a Bluetooth device, such as a wireless keyboard or headset, learn how to connect it to your iPad in Connect with Bluetooth.
Get online:
Depending on your iPad model, you can Get Online with a Wi-Fi connection or a cellular connection.
Manage your apps:
Learn how to Find Great Apps and Shop for Apps.
Find out how to Start Using a New App, and learn how to Update Apps, Share Apps, and Delete an App .
Keep track of your stuff:
Learn where the iPad puts your stuff in Find Your Stuff, and Devise a Strategy for how you'll transfer files and data between your iPad and other devices.
What would happen if your iPad were damaged, lost, or stolen? Make sure you Know Backup Basics and how to Secure Your iPad.
Show off your iPad:
Having a new iPad is a lot like having a new puppy. It's cute, and you're likely to want to show it off to friends and relatives. Read Demo Your iPad for advice on how to give a good demo.
Can I read this ebook on an iPad, iPhone, or iPod touch?
There are lots of great ways to read PDFs on these devices. For more details, please read our latest Device Advice.
Ask a Question
Feel free to ask us if you have a question about this book!
Send Us Your Comments!
How could we not publish such kind words? If you'd like to send us your comments (good or bad, though we hope they're all good), just click the Feedback link on the cover of your copy of the ebook. Be sure to let us know if we can publish your comment. Thanks!
Update Plans
June 18, 2010—Now that version 1.1 of this ebook is available, I have no immediate plans to do another update. It's likely that I'll update the ebook for iOS 4.
In the free ebook that I wrote, Take Control of iPad Basics, I told readers to periodically check for a new version of the iPad's operating system, and to update to any new version that might be available.
Recently, Apple has updated the iPad's operating system twice—first to version 3.2.1 and then to version 3.2.2.
According to Apple, version 3.2.1 enhanced Wi-Fi connectivity. Apple did not provide details, but it appears that some or all of the problems mentioned on page 46 of "iPad Basics" were addressed. Apple's article about the topic was last updated on July 15, the day that 3.2.1 came out, and a label on the article says that the article is no longer being updated. If you are having a connection problem, it suggests that you try updating your router firmware, adjusting the screen brightness of the iPad (I don't know why this would matter), and renewing your IP address. Read the article for details.
Other improvements include fixing a bug with video playback freezing and better video-out reliability over VGA. The update also adds Bing (Microsoft's Web search engine) as an option for the Safari app's Search field. To switch the Search field to Bing, go to Settings > Safari > Search Engine.
Version 3.2.2 fixes some security problems, such as a problem that could happen if you view a PDF with "maliciously crafted embedded fonts," according to Apple's article About the security content of the iOS 3.3.3 Update for iPad. The chances of you experiencing such problems are small, but it's still a good idea to install the update.
If iTunes doesn't actively ask if you want the update and walk you through the update process, you can initiate the update by selecting your iPad in the iTunes sidebar, viewing the default Summary pane, and clicking the Update button.
YouTube has introduced a mobile version of its site at m.youtube.com. According to YouTube, the mobile version's features are more in alignment with the full Web site's features and the mobile site does not use Flash, so all the videos should play on the iPad. If you decide to try the site, note that once a video is playing, you can access the playback controls by tapping the playing video. Once you've done this, the video plays in an iPad-like interface, complete with playback controls. Rotate the iPad to the landscape (horizontal) position to view the largest image.
The mobile version may have more to do clashing titans of the tech industry (YouTube's parent company is Google) than with user's needs, but it certainly offers iPad users another option for viewing YouTube videos.
If you like the mobile site and want to view it quickly from your Home screen, you can make a "Web clip" of the site: Go to the site in Safari, tap the plus (+) button on the toolbar, and then Tap Add to Home Screen. Then, name the clip and tap the Add button. The iPad will respond by switching to the Home screen and showing an icon for the clip you created. Tap the icon to quickly return to the mobile YouTube site.
If you'd like to read more about the mobile YouTube site, here are two good resources:
Apple released a Find My iPhone app today, which, despite its name, works with any iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch. The app comprises all the features found on Apple's MobileMe site, as described in Take Control of iPad: Networking & Security, but in a well-presented compact form, with the ability to refresh the current location of any registered device with a tap.
The MobileMe Web site, me.com, was also refreshed with a new Web app version of Find My iPhone, which looks and works nearly identically with the iOS app.
I've written up a full description of how the new app works both on the iPhone and iPad—the display is slightly different—and information about the updated Web app at me.com for TidBITS. Please see Apple Adds Find My iPhone App and Updates Web App.
During his keynote speech at yesterday's Apple Worldwide Developer conference, Steve Jobs discussed the upcoming version of iBooks, Apple's ebook-reading app. When the new version of iBooks ships later this month, we'll be able to enjoy these new features:
PDF support: Steve showed PDFs being loaded into iBooks through iTunes (as in pages 71–72 in this ebook), and he noted that an option in the Mail app will let you save attached PDFs into iBooks. However, he did not clarify whether (or when) PDFs will be in the iBookstore. He did say that better PDF-reading options was "one of the biggest requests we've gotten for the iPad." PDFs wil show on a separate "shelf" in iBooks, accessed through a button at the top of the iBooks screen.
Many publishers, including TidBITS, are excited about this change, because the PDF format allows us to retain "page fidelity." Page fidelity means that we can retain the layout we created in the ebook. Page fidelity works well for anything that has a lot of graphics or tables—cookbooks, technical books, children's books, text books, and so forth. EPUB is best for books that have a simple layout with only a few graphics or with graphics that can sit nicely on a line by themselves.
Notes: You'll be able to afix virtual notes to pages in your ebooks, much like attaching a sticky note to a real-life sheet of paper.
Fast bookmarking: You'll be able to just tap in the upper right of the iBooks screen to bookmark a page.
Multi-device support: The new version of iBooks will run not only on the iPad, but also on any iOS 4 device. (I'm not certain if it will run on an iPhone or iPod touch under iPhone OS 3.)
Sync: If you have iBooks running on multiple devices set to use the same account, you can wirelessly sync ebooks, bookmarks, notes, and current reading position across all devices. There is no charge for iBooks syncing. (This is similar to the Amazon Kindle's Whispersync service, which works among Kindles and various Apple devices.)
by Tonya Engst
Tonya Engst co-founded the TidBITS online publication in 1990 with her husband Adam Engst. Tonya is Editor in Chief of the Take Control series, which is published by TidBITS Publishing Inc. She has edited over half of the Take Control titles.
