5. Notes and Reminders

My iPad goes everywhere I do—I call it my personal assistant for a reason! It provides me with a lot of tools, including email, web browser, instant messaging, maps, and much more. I showed you in Chapter 4, “Contacts,” how to use your iPad to keep all of your contacts in one place, and in the next chapter I’m going to show you how to use the Calendar app for keeping your appointments and important dates always at hand.

But between accessing my contacts and my calendar, there are two reasons I use my iPad often and cannot live without it. The first is the ability to take quick notes. Regardless of whether I’m on a phone call, in a face-to-face meeting, or stuck in traffic, I open the Notes app when I need to jot down some basic text so I won’t forget.

And speaking of not forgetting, that’s the other benefit I get from keeping my iPad handy—reminders. The Reminders app keeps me organized, reminding me of conference calls with my editor, chapters due, doctor and dentist appointments for my kids, and much more.

The best thing about the Notes and Reminders apps is that they’re just so simple to use. Let me show you.

Tap the icon to open the Notes app and you’ll be greeted by a blank note page, as shown in Figure 5.2.

Returning to the Notes app in Landscape view, let me explain the different sections and icons.

When you start using the onscreen keyboard to type up a note, the title of the note changes to whatever is entered on the first line. As you can see in Figure 5.4, the first line of the current note I’m viewing is “Jim’s To Do List.” I can edit that title by tapping at the end of that line with my finger and then using the keyboard’s Backspace key to modify it.

If you’d rather not delete an entire line of text but maybe insert a bit of text at the beginning, you don’t have to use the Backspace key to completely erase the existing line. Instead, press and hold your finger anywhere on the line, and a small magnifying lens will appear, as shown in Figure 5.5.

While the magnifying lens is visible, move your finger left or right and place the cursor where you wish to begin editing. You can then use the Backspace key to delete some text or just type to add new text. Figure 5.6 shows that I’ve added my first name to the To Do List line, and this is also reflected in the title of the note.

To add a new note, tap the plus sign (+) in the upper-right corner; a new, clean note page will appear, allowing you to type up a new page of notes.

Once you have a note typed, you have some tools available that aren’t readily visible.

Now try this: Tap and hold on an existing word in a note until the magnifying lens appears and then remove your finger. A small pop-up toolbar will appear, as shown in Figure 5.7.

The pop-up toolbar offers three choices: Select, Select All, and Paste. If you tap Select, the word you tapped and held will briefly be selected, as shown in Figure 5.8.

The word will be highlighted and a new toolbar will appear that offers five options: Cut, Copy, Paste, Suggest, and Define.

Before I explain these options, notice that the highlighted word has two small dots surrounding it. If you drag the dot in the upper-left corner of the word to the left, the selection can be expanded to include any words that occur before the single selected word. Likewise, dragging the dot in the lower-right corner to the right will allow you to highlight additional words to the right of the single selected word. As you can see in Figure 5.9, I’ve used these dots to select two words.

Once I’ve selected the words to edit, I can use Cut, Copy, or Paste. In this case, I’ll choose Copy. When I do, the small toolbar disappears.

Next, I’ll tap on an empty line in the note (use the Return key to add additional blank lines if you need them) and a familiar toolbar appears, offering the options Select, Select All, and Paste. When I select Paste, the copied text is added.

Now let’s revisit the Select All option. I’ll tap and hold my finger and then release it so the toolbar shown in Figure 5.7 appears. This time, however, I’ll tap Select All, which selects the entire word.

After making the text selection, you choose whether you want to Cut, Copy, or Paste. Cut removes the text completely, Copy stores a copy of the selected text on the clipboard, and Paste replaces any text currently selected (in this case, all of it) with whatever is currently stored on the clipboard (in this case, “Buy new”). You can also expand the current text selection using the dots as described previously.

Back in Figure 5.8, you saw that two other options are available when you select a word: Suggest and Define.

If you tap Suggest, you will be given a short list of replacement words—these aren’t always synonyms, so be careful. Instead, Notes typically offers a pluralized form of the selected word or a different spelling option. Honestly, I’ve never found the Suggest feature to be of much use. If the iOS thinks a word is misspelled, the word will be underlined, as shown in Figure 5.10.

Tap the misspelled word and a suggested correction will appear above it, as shown in Figure 5.11. If you prefer the suggestion, tap it and the original (misspelled) word will be replaced.

At the bottom of each note you’ll see the four icons shown in Figure 5.12. If you cannot see the four icons, you may need to hide the keyboard by tapping the Hide Keyboard button in the lower-right corner of the on-screen keyboard. (It looks like a keyboard with a small arrow beneath it.)

The Previous Note and Next Note buttons are self explanatory: Tap the Next Note button and the note below the current one in the Notes List will appear. If you’re viewing the last note in the list, the Next Note button will be disabled. Tap the Previous Note button to view the note above the current one in the Notes List; the Previous Note button will be disabled when viewing the note at the top of the Notes List.

The Delete Note button looks like a trashcan; tap it and a Delete Note button will appear.

Tap the Delete Note button to delete the note, or tap elsewhere to keep the note. Deleting a note is permanent, so only tap the Delete Note button if you’re 100% certain you won’t need it again.

The Share button offers four options—Mail, Message, Print, and Copy—as shown in Figure 5.13.

I cover the Mail app in Chapter 7, “The Mail App,” and the Message app in Chapter 10, “Apps for Instant Communication,” but just know that if you select either of these options, the matching app will open, allowing you either to email the contents of the note to a recipient (with the Mail app) or to instant message them to a contact (via the Message app).

The Print option will only work if you have a printer that has the AirPrint service built in. If you’d like a list of printers that offer this option, visit http://support.apple.com/kb/HT4356 and read the list of vendors that sell compatible printers as well as instructions for enabling the AirPrint feature on your iPad.

The Copy option allows you to place a copy of the note’s contents on the clipboard so you can paste the text elsewhere in other apps (or simply in a new note). Not all apps have access to the clipboard, but if you find the Paste option in another app (such as Calendar), it’s a good bet you’ll be able to copy content from a note and paste it in the other app.

Before leaving the Notes app, I want to show you two more features the Notes app offers.

Over time, you’re likely to build up quite a collection of notes in the Notes app. The title of a note doesn’t always give you the best idea of what’s inside, so type a word in the Search box and any notes that contain that word will be filtered and listed below the Search box, as shown in Figure 5.15. Notes that do not contain that word are not visible.

The second feature is more of a shortcut for the Delete Note button. If you tap and drag your finger left on the title of a note in the Notes List, a small red Delete button will appear, as shown in Figure 5.16. Tap the Delete button to permanently remove the note.

And that’s the Notes app. Pretty simple, isn’t it? But it’s one of my go-to apps that I constantly use. I don’t need fancy fonts and formatting most of the time, so the Notes app is fast and easy to use when I just need to type up some thoughts or ideas without risk of losing them.

Go ahead and press the Home button to close down the Notes app. Don’t worry—any note you are currently working on will be saved instantly!

The Reminders app looks the same in either Landscape or Portrait view, but in Portrait view the list of reminders displayed will be thinner so that longer descriptions will wrap to another line.

I’ll start with the simplest task first: creating a reminder. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Tap the plus button (+) in the upper-right corner of the screen (or simply tap on the first line in the Reminders List) and the onscreen keyboard appears along with an empty check box on the selected line.

2. Type in a description of the reminder—keep in mind that you don’t have to enter a time or date at this point. I’ll show you how to set that information shortly.

3. Tap the Done button to add the reminder to the Reminders List.

4. Continue to add additional reminders either by tapping the plus sign or just tapping the Return button on the keyboard to move to the next line. Figure 5.18 shows that I’ve created three new reminders.

5. Tap and hold any Reminder item and drag it up or down to shift its location in the list.

For instance, let’s say I really need to remember to confirm the babysitter for Saturday evening, but rather than check with her on Saturday afternoon, I’d rather check on Friday. Here are the steps I would follow:

1. I start by tapping the reminder in the Reminders List. The Details window appears, as shown in Figure 5.19.

2. The first line is obvious: It matches the text of the reminder I created. I can tap in that text field, however, to edit the title if necessary.

3. As you can see, the Remind Me On a Day feature is turned Off, but I can simply tap the Off button to turn it to the On position, as shown in Figure 5.20. Turning on this option reveals more information that can be tweaked.

4. As you can see, the reminder date is set for today (Thursday, November 1, 2012 at 12 p.m.). The default reminder time will always be 30 minutes after you turn on the reminder, but this is easily changed. Just tap the date and time displayed, and four spinning columns will appear, as shown in Figure 5.21.

5. I can now use my finger to adjust the date and time as necessary.

6. When I’m happy with the selected day and time, I tap my finger on the title of the reminder to close the day/time selection tool.

7. I can also click the Done button if all I want is a single, one-time reminder.

1. As you saw in Figure 5.20, the Reminder Details window shows the Repeat option. By default, it’s set to Never. However, if you tap that line, you get the list of options shown in Figure 5.22.

2. Several options are available: Every Week, Every 2 Weeks, Every Month, Every Year, and even Every Day (for those of you who need a constant daily reminder of something). In this example, we have chosen Every Week.

3. Once you’ve finished selecting a Repeat pattern, click the Done button, which takes you back to the previous screen.

4. If you want to set a specific end date, choose the End Repeat option, which allows you to select a day/time using the familiar columns that spin up and down.

5. Tap the Show More option, and you’ll be given the ability to set the reminder’s priority, select a list that holds the reminder, and add notes if you like. Figure 5.23 shows these three options.

• Priority—Tap the Priority option and you can set a reminder to None, Low, Medium, or High priority. Depending on your selection, the reminder will have one, two, or three exclamation points added its left, as shown in Figure 5.24.

• List—Choosing the List option allows you to assign a reminder to the default Reminders List unless you tap the Create New List button shown just above the calendar. You can create new lists to organize reminders; you might create a work list and a home list to keep different reminders. Tap a list to only view reminders stored inside.

• Notes—Use the Notes field to type in information such as an address or gate code or other piece of information that will be relevant when the reminder opens. (I’ll show you what a reminder on the iPad looks like when it pops up, in just a moment.)

6. When you’ve completed a task, especially one you haven’t configured to trigger at a certain day and time, simply tap the check box to the left of the item.

Tap the Close button to remove the alert or tap the View button to open the Reminders app so you can place a check in the box.