iPad Pro for Beginners: The Unofficial Guide to Using the iPad Pro (7 page)

I mentioned there being lots of photo editing apps. So how do you buy, download and finally remove apps? I’ll look at that in this section.

To purchase apps (and buy purchase, remember you can buy a free app, so you aren’t actually buying anything).

The first thing you see when you open the app store are the feature apps—which is to say games…lots and lots of games! Games are the top telling category in the app store, but don’t worry—there is more there than games. Later in this handbook, I will tell you some of the essential apps you should get, but for now, let’s see how the app store works, so you can discover some of them yourself.

Most of the categories on top have subcategories to help you break down each section and discover more apps.

If you hear about a new app and want to check it out, use the Search option.

When you find an app you want to buy, simply tap the price button and type in your App store password. Remember: just because an app is free to download doesn’t mean you won’t have to pay something to use it. Many apps use “in-app purchases” which means you have to buy something within the app. You will be notified before you purchase anything.

Apps are constantly coming out with new updates with new, better features; updates are almost always free, unless noted, and are easy to install. Just click on the last tab: updates. If you have any apps that need to be updated, you will see it here; you will also see what’s new in the app. If you see one, tap update to begin the update.

If you bought an app, but accidently deleted it—or changed your mind about deleting it, don’t worry! You can download the app again in the same place that you see the updates. Just tap on Purchased.

When you tap the Purchased button, you will see two options; one to see all the apps you have purchased and one to just see the apps not on your tablet; tap the one that says Not on This iPad. To re-download anything, at no cost, just tap the Cloud button to the right of the screen. You can even download it again if you bought it on another iPad (as long as it’s under the same account.

Deleting apps is easy. On your home screen, tap and hold the icon of the app you want to remove; next tap the “x” on top the app. That’s it..

By now, you probably know all about Siri (if not, press and hold the bottom, square, button on the iPad to activate) and how it can remind you of things.

So what exactly do you do with it? The first thing you should do is introduce Siri to your family. Siri is pretty smart, and she wants to meet your family. To introduce her to your family, activate Siri Press and hold the Home button and say, “Brian is my brother” or “Susan is my boss.” Once you confirm the relationship you can now say things like, “Call my brother” or “email my boss.”

Siri is also location-based. What does that mean? It means instead of saying “Remind me to call wife at 8am” you can say “Remind me when I leave work to call wife” and as soon as you step out of the office  you will receive a reminder. Siri can be a bit frustrating at first, but it’s one of the tablets most powerful apps, so give it a chance!

Everyone hates dealing with waits. There’s nothing worse than being hungry and having to wait an hour for a table. Siri does her best to make your life easier by making reservations for you. For this to work, you’ll need a free app called ‘OpenTable’ (you’ll also need a free account), which is in the Apple App store. This app makes its money by restaurants paying it, so don’t worry about having to pay to use it. Once it’s installed, you will simply activate Siri (press the Home button until it turns on) and say “Siri, make me a reservation at the Olive Garden” (or wherever you want to eat). Note, not all reservations participate in OpenTable, but hundreds (if not thousands) do, and it’s growing monthly, so if it’s not there, it probably will be soon.

Siri is ever evolving and with the latest update, Apple has taught her everything she needs to know about sports. Go ahead, try it! Press and hold the Home button to activate Siri, and then say something like “What’s the score in the Kings game” or “Who leads the league in homeruns?”

Siri has also got a little wiser in movies. You can say “Movies directed by Peter Jackson” and it will give you a list and let you see a synopsis, the review rating from Rotten Tomatoes, and in some cases even a trailer or an option to buy the movie. You can also say “Movie show times” and a little of nearby movies playing will appear. At this time, you cannot buy tickets to the movie, though one can imagine that option will be coming very soon.

Finally, Siri, can open apps for you. If you want to open an app, simply say “Open and the apps name.”

The iPad Pro promises better battery life. But let’s face it, no matter how great the battery is, you probably would love to have just a little bit more life in your charge.

Disable Notifications

My mom told me her battery didn’t seem to be lasting very long. I looked at her iPad and could not believe how many notifications were activated. She knows absolutely nothing about stock, nor does she have any desire to learn, and yet she had stock tickers going. You might want notifications on something like Facebook, but there are probably dozens of notifications running in the background that you don’t even know about, nor do you even need to. Getting rid of them is easy; Go to ‘Settings’, then to ‘Notifications’. Anything that shows up as ‘In Notification Center’ is currently active on your tablet. To disable them, tap on the app and then switch it to off. They aren’t gone for good. Anytime you want to turn them back on, just go to the very bottom where it says ‘Not In Notification Center’ and switch them back on.

Brightness

Turning down the brightness just a shade can do wonders for your tablet and might even give your eyes some needed relief. It’s easy to do. Go to ‘Settings’, then to ‘brightness’. Just move the slider to a ‘setting’ that you feel comfortable with.

Email

I prefer to know when I get email as soon as it comes. By doing this, my tablet is constantly refreshing email to see if anything has come in; this drains the battery, but not too terribly. If you are the kind of person who doesn’t really care when they get email, then it might be good to just switch it from automatic to manual. That way it only checks email when you tap the mail button. To switch manual on, go to ‘Settings’, then to ’Mail, Contacts, Calendars’ and finally go to ‘Fetch New Data’. Now go to the bottom and tap ‘Manually’ (you can always switch it back later).

Location, Location, Lo…Battery Hog

Have you heard of location-based apps? These apps use your location to determine where exactly you are. It’s actually a great feature if you are using a map of some sort. So let’s say you are looking for somewhere to eat and you have an app that recommends restaurants, it uses your GPS to determine your location so it can tell what’s nearby. That is great for some apps, but it is not so for others. Anytime you use GPS, it’s going to drain your battery, so it’s a good idea to see what apps are using it and question if you really want them to. Additionally, you can turn it off completely and switch it on only when needed. To do either, go to ‘Settings’, then to ‘Location Services’, switch any app you don’t want to use this service to off (you can always switch it back on later).

Accessorize

90% of you will probably be completely content with these fixes and happy with their battery life; but if you still want more, consider buying a batter pack. You can get an external battery charger to slip in your purse or briefcase, these packs let you charge any USB device (including iPads and iPads). External battery chargers cost about the same, the one advantage of a charger versus’ a pack is it will charge any device that has a USB, not just the iPad Pro.