Integrating Mac and iPad

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In February of this year I wrote a column about transitioning from one Mac to multiple Macs (desktop and laptop) and also touched on using an iPad and cloud-based storage. I briefly discussed the complexity of finding files when you have such a environment and concluded with the question: "How do you integrate files on your Mac and iPad so you only have to do one search to find a file or the latest version of a file?"

Unfortunately, I never received an answer.

Please send me some of your thoughts. Most of us have, or will have, this issue. We need to start a discussion about it.

Almost all of us grew up with one computer and a hierarchical structure for storing files. We basically took a paper-based file cabinet storage system and dumped it onto our computer system. There was nothing wrong with that. Given the state of computer hardware and software at that time, there wasn't an alternative.

Some of us have hundreds of thousands of files in incredibly complex structures. In essence, we have been dragging our thoughts and environment from the past into the present and the future.

Consider that the cost of hard drives is orders of magnitude less than they were 5 or 10 years ago. Moreover, the cost of a hard drive is a fraction of the 5-year cost of storing the same amount of data on a provider's cloud-based hard drives. In addition, the cost of flash-based storage continues to drop and is expected to come down to hard drive cost within a few years.

Thus, we need to revise our thinking about data storage. Practices based on outdated pricing may no longer be applicable.

Our computing habits, needs and wants are changing. At least some of us want access to our files wherever we are although at times we are not sure what files we need.

That says that the ideal is we should store all our files in the cloud. That's currently much too expensive, even with free 2 to 5 GB available from several cloud-based storage providers.

Let's also assume that for the next 5 years we can't be sure of having Internet access wherever we go. That means we need to store all our files on all our devices - in addition to storing the files in the cloud. That's obviously not doable and, even if it were, it would be much too expensive. After all, it probably will be more than a few years before our iPhones and iPads have 500 GB or 1 TB of storage and 5 GHz of processing power. So figure that we can live with storing locally on mobile devices at least those files for which we need access all the time and everywhere, but not all our files.

That's probably the best probable configuration. But before we look at some practical considerations, I have to address a key issue which involves breaking thought patterns of many years. As you heard or read many times, I have about 1.6 million files which I've accumulated over years and, since some might be helpful years later, never deleted. This system is more than a little out of date now that mobile computing with less technology maximum storage is an implicit assumption for a growing number of us.

When I'm in my office at home, I tend to use my iMac. But elsewhere in the house or when I'm away from home, the iPad is my computer. After a fair amount of thought and experimenting, I'm putting most new files relating to computer usage in Evernote. I'm a Premium user ($45 a year). This means that all these files and other Evernote stored files are stored in the cloud and are also available locally on my iMac and my iPad. On my iPhone, however, I only keep those Evernote files which relate to computing because storing all my Evernote files on the iPhone would take up too much room and I already have them available on the iPad.

Evernote is a great solution for files which I may need at anytime and which I'd like to revise anywhere. If I have to deal with a problem with my iMac, I can still see all the notes stored in Evernote even though I may not be able to access them on my iMac. In addition, even if I can access them, I now have a second screen to use when I'm solving a problem on the iMac. But think about it. I had to break a years-long habit of putting those files on a Mac.

However, I'm not going to move all computer-related files. For example, I'll produce the newsletter on the iMac and almost all files relating to the production of the newsletter will remain on my Mac. Only the final version of the newsletter will end up in Evernote.

With all new computer-related files being stored in Evernote, I'm now starting to move hundreds of such files from the iMac into Evernote. A bit time-consuming, but there's a gigantic benefit. Evernote uses tags and Evernote can also efficiently search on content. Thus, by using tags I am starting to move away from folders. This means I can reduce the number of folders from more than 100 to less than 50. Since the names of folders gradually expand over time, I've enjoyed being able to be able to start with a clean slate having have the benefit of my years of experience.

My next task will be dealing with the files relating to politics and a discussion group in which I participate. All such new files, primarily newspaper columns, go into Evernote. Once I have moved all the computer-related files over to Evernote, I'll start on my political files.

Hold it! I've talked about retrieving files from anywhere. Perhaps more important is saving files from anywhere. With Evernote and some other apps, I can save files from my iDevices. Thus, I can surf the Web or read email on an iDevice and save the material in Evernote.

But there is yet another issue. You can't do an iPad-wide search on the iPad. Or, at least, I don't yet know how to do it. I have files with the GoodReader app. I have to search for them in GoodReader. I have to do a separate search for files in Evernote, as I have to do for Pages, Numbers and Mail files. Those files are stored with the app used to create them.

My solution is to move as many files as possible to Evernote so I can limit the times I have to search on both the iMac and the iPad.

What you think of these approaches? Do you have any suggestions for alternative approaches or improvements? Please reply. We are all entering a new world and the more thoughts we can share, the better off we all will be.

— Mark S. Bazrod, Editor

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©2012 by Mark Bazrod & MLMUG
Posted 09/03/12
Updated xx/xx/12