Having recently bought an iPad I am excited about the prospect of using it to give my talks. I haven’t used it yet and am anxious about how the whole thing works. Is it as good as using a laptop? My 17″ MacBook Pro is heavy, so being able to project my slides using a light device like the iPad has many attractions.
Gavin Meikle, The presentation Doctor, has used the iPad and has shared his experiences here. Sounds like it’s good but needs more functionality. In particular, we need to be able to show PowerPoint and not just Keynote (fabulous though Keynote is) because (a) PowerPoint is still what most of us use, especially in the Windows world, and (b) converting powerPoint to Keynote does screw up some of the formatting and other slide properties. But hopefully things will improve since these are early days of the iPad and Apple will want to encourage businesses to use iPad for presentations and they must realise that most corporations do not, and probably never will, use Keynote.
Mark // Nov 18, 2010 at 2:09 pm
I created an app to fill the gaps of wanting to see what is on my ipad screen while presenting, and also having a remote control.
Point App
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/point/id401175425?mt=8
Feature Highlights:
* Import photos from your iPad photo library, including slides in JPEG
* Rearrange the order of your slides on the fly
* Display your current slide on the iPad screen while it is connected to a projector or external monitor
* Remote control your slides with the Control Point app for the iPhone and iPod touch
* Remote control your iPad volume with the Control Point app for the iPhone and iPod touch
* 10-hour iPad battery life with WiFi & 3G switched off.
* 18-hour iPhone battery life with WiFi & 3G switched off.