I can now add text, edit or otherwise update the file and my changes are automatically saved to Dropbox.
With my large font settings and wide margins, here is an example of what my Elements screen looks like on the iPad:Ĭlicking the Information icon on the top-right of the screen will give me a word-count for the document, which is a useful feature. It is especially useful to have an external keyboard so that the digital keyboard doesn’t clutter your screen. Once you are in edit mode, you get a nice clean screen to work with. I organize my projects by folder on Dropbox, so I select the folder that I want to work with, drill down into the Drafts folder of that project, and select the file I want to edit. Then when you open it, you are presented with a list of the folders and text files in your Dropbox.
When you first install it, you configure it to work with your Dropbox account. Opening the project in ElementsĮlements is a Dropbox based tool. Once they are done, you can access the project in Elements on the iPad. Those steps need to be done once per project.
But I am also more comfortable if the iPad isn’t sitting right in my face. This is so that the feel of writing is the same, even if the screens are different.
When I write on the iPad, I use an external BlueTooth keyboard–the very same keyboard I use when writing on my MacBook. Elements has the font sizes I want, the clean screen look to it, and it synchronizes with Dropbox–which means I can make it sync seamlessly with Scrivener. So I went about looking for a really good text editor for the iPad and what I came up with after a fairly exhaustive search was Elements by Second Gear. Maybe it’s just me, but I felt there could be improvements in the process.