Tag: coffee

Road Warrior kit v.2018

I’m trying out a new road warrior setup: I’ve got a little Samsung Tab E tablet, with a 4G cell modem, which I paired up with my Logitech K480 Bluetooth keyboard.

The keyboard has a handly little knob that I can use to quickly select up to three different Bluetooth devices. Right now, I’m just using slots 1 and 2 for my iPhone 6S Plus and my Tab E.

I’m using the Tab E instead of my refurbished Lenovo X201, which runs the latest version of Ubuntu. That computer is a favorite, because it’s small and easy to upgrade, compared to (say) a MacBook Pro. But, it doesn’t have a cellular modem built in.

I’m going to see how much productive work I can get done with this setup. Since my main productive activity is writing, and I’m doing that right now on this Logitech ‘board, I’m happy with that.

To publish or edit posts on my WordPress blogs, I can use the WordPress.com app, which is OK. I prefer the desktop browser interface.

I suppose I could use the desktop version of the WordPress admin screens on the tablet, but I don’t have very much screen real estate, even compared to the relatively tiny screen on the Lenovo.

Here are the biggest advantages to this setup:

  • Because both the tablet and the iPhone are connected to my cell network, I don’t need WiFi (but I can use it if I want).
  • I can power both my devices with my huge external USB battery pack if my device batteries run low, so I don’t need a wall socket if the batteries run down.
  • If I do have access to a wall socket, I can charge the battery pack and then use the battery pack to charge my tablet and phone.
  • The tablet and the keyboard are lighter than a notebook computer.

Here’s what I can’t do:

  • Any kind of WordPress development, including basic CSS work, is really out of the question.
  • Photo editing: I can use online tools, Instagram or Skitch to edit photos, but that means simple stuff, like cropping and applying filters, nothing fancy.
  • I can’t really do any media editing, like editing video or audio. I’d want to do that stuff with macOS or Ubuntu, with a dual-screen setup back at the office.

But, I can write and listen to music and update my blogs. I can answer emails and check Google Analytics. I can do what I need to do.

I’ll see how it goes. In the meantime, I’ve been publishing every day. Monday, I posted Publish every day to send a flood of traffic to your site on my company blog. Plus I posted How to write 3,000 words every day here on the Stratopress. And then, yesterday, I posted Bone broth bounty to my new health blog, Bye Bye Blubber. As you can tell, I have a weakness for alliteration. Whatever gets me to 3,000 words!