Don't laugh.

[Tannin]

I bought a tablet today. Don't laugh! Spent the afternoon figuring out how to drive it. (Never used Android in my life before. Or an i-thing for that matter.) I've had to figure out things like swiping and pinching from scratch. Can't say I'd be super sorry if I never used one again either, real computers are much nicer. Still, it will do enough of what I need to be a useful thing once in a while.

I just bought it retail. Looked at the i-things because they have a vastly more practical screen shape, but damned if I'm paying $700-odd for a base model. Not a chance!

The funny thing is that my only real use case for it is the one thing it can't do! I wanted a tablet or phone to test web pages with, but bloody Android, despite all its huge security flaws, locks the hosts file away so you can't use the useless thing to join your local intranet. How daft is that? (Yes, there are workarounds. I'll get Tea to figure out which one is best when she has time. Probably she'll install a local DNS server on one of the Windows machines, that should work. Better than rooting the tablet, I imagine. Anyway, that's not urgent.)

BTW, WTF does Google not have an ENTER key on their stupid pop-up keyboard? How dumb is that? Really annoying.

 

[ddrueding]

There are better keyboards out there. It also depends on whether the company that makes your product decided to replace the stock keyboard (which normally has an enter key on it) with one of their own.

 

[Tannin]

Cheers Dave. I think Merc's Emoji thread holds the answer.

It's a Lenovo, BTW. $249 for a Yoga II 10 inch. The Yoga 2 was another $100, couldn't see the point in paying extra for functionality I'm unlikely to use..

I dunno anything about phones or tablets but it seems pretty clean, dodn't have a lot of rubbish apps all over it.

I must say, it's a bit of a pain having to get programs from Google and have a Google account to do so. I'm perfectly happy making my own judgments about software and the source of it, and I know damn well that the Google App Store has plenty of nasties in it, so it's actually less safe than doing the same thing on a PC. (Yes, I know you can change the settings. Just sayin' I don't like the model.)

 

[Mercutio]

With regard to screen shape, I vastly prefer a 16x9 screen held in portrait orientation. That gives the sensation that I'm actually reading a book. Most tablet manufacturers subtly hint that you should hold their devices in landscape mode, but why would we care about what they think?

Other Android app stores:
Amazon.com
Fdroid
Humble Bundle

For most purposes Google is the best choice, but I'm looking forward to your rants when you find out just how limiting Android is. Especially since it's a hippie love fest compared to iOS.

 

[Tannin]

Just so Merc. Much more to lean ... if I can be bothered. Pretty stupid not being able to use an intranet, pretty stupid not even being able to disable the bloody cameras without an app (who knows if the bloody app writer is honest) or a roll of electrical tape.

 

[Tea]

Hacker's keyboard seems vastly better than the standard one. Any opinions?

 

[ddrueding]

Haven't used it. Swype and Swiftkey are the two I use on my things.