I’m thinking about sustainable hardware again today.
My iPad is effectively my primary computer.
Despite the excellent keyboard shortcuts setup, I don’t want my only pointer to be my finger on the touch screen.
In other words, I want an external pointing device. It needs to fulfil three conditions:
One, it shouldn’t be built into a case. I already have the Smart Keyboard Folio I bought along with the iPad. It’s relatively light, the keyboard is good, and detaching the iPad is trivial.
Two, it needs to support multitouch. I have the first-generation Magic Trackpad, but it doesn’t support multitouch. That’s quite unfortunate, because it really is a beautiful piece of hardware that’s lasted me nearly seven years and it still going strong.
Three, it needs to be long-lasting. Specifically, I’m not a fan of accessories that
- need proprietary software to work, because their lifespan depends not on their own hardware but on that software continuing to be maintained
- need to connect to the internet to work, for much the same reasons above. We’ve discussed the perils of smart devices often on this site
- have built-in batteries in them. The lifespan of the hardware is now linked to that of this battery. Few manufacturers make it easy to replace built in batteries (typically Li-ion ones). And even if they could, there are no standard batteries that one could buy from third parties. On the other hand, accessories that use external batteries like AA or AAA cells are far more reliable – those are standard batteries and (while they’re not great for the environment) will likely be produced much longer than I expect the hardware to last.