The iPad is my favorite computer peripheral :) v6.baty.net/2021/ipad…
@jack I think you nailed the core issue with using an iPad exclusively for some kind of work; and my sense is that there is nothing inherent to the iPad platform that makes emacs and org mode impossible: ie., the iPad is powerful enough that it shouldn't have a problem working with those files and doing that kind of work. But the walled garden approach to iOS devices precludes any serious port of emacs to the iPad, at least for now.
I've seen some setups for other use cases like compiling code, where folks use a Mac Mini as a server with no monitor and then remote access it. While I don't think that makes a lot of sense for using Emacs, or, in my case, coding and running R for stats, it is an interesting approach that might now or in the future become a viable option for making the iPad the primary device. Just not today.
@lukemperez I've tried some of the workarounds, but none were worth the effort. But you're right, one day maybe!
@jack I use my iPad a lot for primary work (reading academic articles, email, first drafts of notes). But for the heavy computational stuff, it’s the Mac or bust. Tbh, if I could run Linux on an M1 iPad for R, LaTeX, and a few other things, even if it were to boot from an external drive—that would be killer and my iPad would handle 95-99 percent of what I do.
In fact, now that I think about it, it already does cover most of that, but the flaw in the percentage metaphor is that the remaining percentage which we cannot do is vital and strong enough to warrant keeping a Mac around.