Tuesday, May 21, 2019

Writing Hardware: Filling Pens, Configuring iPads

     Refilling my daily-carry fountain opens this morning.  I carry three, which is self-indulgent but gives me a seriously permanent black for writing checks, a dark brown for documents that need to be obviously signed and not photocopied with a signature and a bold pen for headings and anything that needs to be readable from a distance.  It's a comforting ritual and not without a little risk.

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     Last night, I finally learned how to turn off "smart quotes" and other auto-corrected mother-henning on the iPad!  In hindsight, it should have been obvious.  Apple prides themselves on providing a seamless, well-integrated user experience.  Apps have only the bare minimum of settings internal to themselves -- because most of the settings are global, or at least accessed through the "Settings" menu.

     In this case, Settings > General > Keyboard > "Smart Punctuation" OFF.  Done!

     There are a lot of other elbow-jogglings that can be toggled on that menu as well.  This change makes the iPads a lot more useful to me, since I greatly prefer Standard Manuscript Format and it calls for straight quotes.
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2 comments:

  1. Glenn KelleyMay 25, 2019 at 8:11 AM

    Do you use the same pen with three different nibs or a variety .
    I picture you with three Parker 51s .

    Glenn

    ReplyDelete
  2. Roberta XMay 29, 2019 at 7:16 AM

    Interesting question! I use a variety. My really permanent ink pen is a Lamy "Safari" with a clear body; the brown-ink one is a nice Pilot "Metropolitan" and a big, bold-nib no-mane pen with blue-black ink finished of the front rank. I carry a pair of Kaweco "Sport" pens as backups, with brown and blue ink. They're really good pens. None of my daily carry pens are exotic, rare or expensive. You only have to have your favorite antique ring-top necklace-worn Duofold get caught on a piece of conduit and plummet to the floor twelve feet below once to decide to carry inexpensive pens at work.

    The Lamy, Pilot and Kaweco pens are smooth, dependable fountain pens and I would be comfortable recommending them to anyone. You can get nicer and far more expensive pens (Pelikan is probably the next level up), but the improvements in dependability and ease of use are only incremental.

    At my desk at home, I use a variety but favor new Conklins and classic Parker Duofolds.

    ReplyDelete

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