Workflow with a phone: Staying productive

[jago25_98]

What to get?

There are so many devices out there now. It's great. The question I want to know is how to make sure you're using these devices to actually do useful stuff instead of jerking off playing around.

My Nook Simple Touch (NST) has died. Through a bit of hacking it could do tons of stuff but at the end of the day I only really enjoyed using it on a long flight to properly read a book in a proper eBook format: actually reading rather than getting distracted on my phone.

There's lots more stuff out there now but what fosters a get-stuff-done situation?

I was thinking that maybe even a tiny screen device with no wifi and just an sdcard with books on might make more sense than something WhatsApp capable. Then again, being able to read pdfs properly on a massive 13" screen and take notes sounds handy. But then, 7FPS capable devices now are coming out and that refresh rate sounds handy.

Question: Are eBook readers replacing anything you'd normally use your phone for? How do they integrate with your phone? Can they change your workflow to something more productive?

[mobama]

Originally Posted by jago25_98

Question: Are eBook readers replacing anything you'd normally use your phone for?

Such as making phone calls? No.

Ereaders are quite monofunctional compared to smartphones and computers. Ereaders are primarily for displaying text, secondarily for turning pages in an ebook file. Some eink devices can take notes with a stylus (often sacrificing the ebook function for that). Some can serve as computer monitors, but then you need a computer.

For sufficient operability (a la workstation) you need a big device with tons of options for peripherals, i.e. a complete computer. But this sacrifices portability (carrying the thing around and doing some stuff on the go), which is why you need other devices in addition to the main workstation. Still nothing has been invented that would replace a workstation.

[lumpynose]

Originally Posted by jago25_98

make sure you're using these devices to actually do useful stuff instead of jerking off playing around.

You say that like "jerking off playing around" is a bad thing.

[lumpynose]

Originally Posted by jago25_98

Question: Are eBook readers replacing anything you'd normally use your phone for? How do they integrate with your phone? Can they change your workflow to something more productive?

I was playing around with an Onyx e-reader that exposes Android and as far as I'm concerned it's a disaster. The Android apps don't know that they're on a gray scale screen and use colors that don't map to gray scale; you can end up with text on a background where the 2 grays are too close in darkness/brightness. So unless the e-reader companies design their own apps I can't see it happening. Plus they seem to use the slowest processor that they can get away with.