10 iPad 2 Tips and Tricks

Monday, May 9, 2011

Are you looking for some great new tips and tricks to use with your iPad or iPad 2? Previously we did a article on 50 tips and tricks you can use with your iPad but it�s time for a new and fresh set of tips. We offer a major hat tip to TheAppleBlog for this great information. Now, let�s get to the tips and tricks.

Tip #1 Enable Multitasking Gestures
Apple recently introduced Xcode 4 to the Mac App Store and along with that release, came a little trick you can do to get multitouch Gestures right on your iPad or iPad 2. Once you enable Gestures on your iPad there are some really great and convenient things you can do such as:

Use 5 fingers to swipe up/down to reveal the multitask bar
Use 5 fingers to swipe left/right to navigate through open Apps
Perform a 5 finger pinch to close the App you are using and return to the Home Screen

Here is how you can enable multitouch Gestures on the iPad. You can get Xcode for $4.99 in the Mac App Store , then launch it once it is installed and select the Organizer tool from the Window menu. Connect your iPad to your computer via the USB cable and then click the �Use For Development� button. Log on to the Apple Developer Connection, click through the error messages and then on the iPad tap on Settings > General > and now you will see a new option called �Multitasking Gestures� that you can turn on.

Tip #2 Watch Movies From An SD Card On Your iPad

Did you know that you could watch movies on your iPad or iPad 2 directly from an SD card? You can. But to do so you will need a few things (besides the iPad itself):

Using these two accessories you can actually transfer movies right onto your iPad or iPad 2 and then watch a move from the default Photo app. Make sure that you have two nested folders on your SD card labeled /DCIM/100VIDEO and then place all of the videos in the 100VIDEO folder. Also make sure that themovie format is compatible with the iPad. I use Handbrake to get my movies ripped from DVD as it has always worked the best and it�s also free. You can learn more about Handbrake here.

Tip #3 Viewing PDF�s Without An App

There are some great iPad apps you can get for PDF�s but if all you want to do is read one then your iPad has a great (free) way to do so. Just use iBooks. There are several ways you can get PDF�s into iBooks including:

Connecting your iPad to your computer and drag and dropping a PDF right onto the little iPad icon in iTunes
Choosing to open a PDF from an Email attachment in �iBooks�
Accessing your PDF via iDisk, GoogleDocs, or Dropbox and then storing it in iBooks

iBooks offers up a great way to read PDF�s but if you want to do more than just read them, then here�s an article to check out:

Mark up PDF�s

Tip #4 Play Podcasts At Double Speed

Did you know that you can listen to Podcasts at double speed? Perhaps you want to know why? Well maybe you listed to a few favorite ones but you want to fast forward to just a specific section or two. No problem, here is how you can fast forward your Podcasts and you may not have even known this existed. When you are listening to Podcasts within the iPod app just tap the 1X and 2X button right on the far right of the timing bar. This will speed up the podcast and slow it back down to normal once you get to the desired spot.

Tip #5 Secret Keyboard Keys

This is one of those tips that a lot of people know about if they have an iPhone but it�s a very useful if you do not know about it yet. The iPad virtual keyboard has some hidden features that can be a major help as shortcuts to your typing. Here are just a few of the shortcuts you can do:

When entering an URL or Email address, press and hold the .com key and you can then choose to append .net, .org, .us, and .edu to the address
Press and hold any letter or symbol on the virtual keyboard and you will be presented with several new and helpful options

Tip #6 Join Wi-Fi Networks Without Asking

The default on the iPad is to have it ask you to join Wi-Fi networks by popping up a little dialog box which can get annoying. Additionally, it would be nice to just have your iPad automatically join those Wi-Fi networks that you have joined previously. To do this, tap on Settings > Wi-Fi > Turn OFF Ask to Join Networks. Your iPad or iPad 2 will now behave differently by joining any wireless network you have joined before but you can still manually add any new wireless network as well.

Tip #7 Find Text Anywhere On A Web Page

Here is a really cool iPad and iPad 2 tip that will make searching for a word or phrase on a web page very easy. Did you ever noticed that when you type a search term in Safari, there is a little section at the bottom of the results box that says, �On This Page�? Clicking on this will actually not search out on the Internet but it will search the page for that specific word or phrase.

Tip #8 Scroll To The Top Of A Web Page Quickly

Ever read a long article on a website and find that you want to get back to the top of the web page quickly? All you have to do (and I use this a lot) is tap one on the top of the screen near the status bar and the page will automatically scroll back to the top. This works in more apps than just the Safari app so give it a try in your favorite Twitter apps or news reader (RSS) apps.

Tip #9 Capture Screenshots To Your Photo Library

This is another fairly well-known tip that you can use for a ton of useful purposes. I use this all of the time to capture screen shots for blog posts. To take the perfect screen shot, simply hold down both the Home and Sleep button at the same time. The screen will appear as if it flashes and there will be an audible shutter noise. Now open up your Photo app and it will be there for you to edit or send via email, etc.

Tip #10 Access Your iTunes Library Remotely

As it turns out, with the latest updates to iOS (4.2 and 4.2.1) there are now multiple ways to access your massive media collections from your iPad. The reason this is a great thing is because your iPad can only have up to 64GB of storage and if you have a ton of music, videos, and movies then you might want to store those elsewhere and just use the iPad or iPad 2 as your digital hub. If you enable Home Sharing from within iTunes on your Mac, then you can also access your entire iTunes library (on your Mac) from your iPad or iPad 2 as long as you are connected to the same Wireless network. In order to do this you need to click on the Library tab in the iPod app. Then you select the iTunes Library you want to access. If you do not see any Libraries to choose from, make sure that you have enabled Home Sharing in iTunes on your Mac or other computers). One thing to note about Home Sharing. You cannot browse the remote iTunes library as well as the local one at the same time.

http://gigaom.com/apple/10-things-you-never-knew-you-could-do-on-your-ipad/

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