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Comment by namelost | Hacker News Reader

In essence the iPad is made for people who never learned how to use normal computers.

If you are a person who would mash the delete key once per character to delete a line of text (e.g. my parents) then perhaps the excruciating text selection is not really a negative, as text editing on computers was "always" excruciating. The simplified user experience, is however a positive.

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If one really took the time to "learn to use normal computers", then they would be perfectly capable to use a table+keyboard-only interface (and keyboard shortcuts) to do all kinds of editing tasks without even taking their hands from the home row. No need to "mash the delete key once per character to delete a line of text", at all.

So your argument is more true for middling users than for expert users of something like vim or emacs that can do every text edit function quickly with an external keyboard in iOS.

> expert users of something like vim or emacs that can do every text edit function quickly with an external keyboard in iOS

Show me where iOS implements incremental search and a persistent mark, then. For that matter, show me where any OS implements them.

You can run vim itself on iOS. As well as any number of other editors, and tons of standard and custom shortcuts are available -- to the point that not having access to a mouse for text selection is not any big deal for writing.

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