UT Tablet on stand
==================

I have bought a new stand for  our tablets - a Fellowes I-Spire plastic
stand for iPad [1]. It is  now very cheap and available everywhere (the
[1] has it for  too big amount of money, just  search for other sellers
to see how cheap  it actually is). I think that iPad  users found it to
be too  ugly for their  devices so only a  few people actually  got it.
Yes, its white-gray plastics with  some transparent parts and its shape
makes it look as  a thing from dark past (aesthetically  it fits to mid
1990s I think).

Its usability is a different story: it is massive and thus very stable.
Even a much wider devices that the  original iPad are held well her. It
also elevates  the device to  the comfortable height. I  actually throw
away  (well, re-purposed  as picture  stands and  so) all  other tablet
stands which I have had at home.

So  now I  have a  relatively  useful and  reasonable modern  low-power
workstation - the BQ Aquaris M10 FHD tablet with a (cheap) HP Bluetooth
keyboard (the SK-9017  model) and the Lenovo Bluetooth  Laser Mouse. It
is not  the preferred solution (I  have a selection of  better machines
here)  but there  are cases  when it  is handy  (on the  home office  I
sometimes need  to work from a  different room then my  wife; our wired
Ethernet is in  one room only so  I have to move to  an unequipped room
and use this thing - or a some laptop- on WiFi).

The Ubuntu  Touch behaves more like  the Android than the  actual Linux
desktop. But things like an  e-mail, a www (including audio conferences
- I  have had no  luck with  the camera in  the Morph browser),  a text
editor, a  compiler, a GNU Octave  and other tools work  well here. Now
there is also a VNC client so I can control my main machine (the POWER9
box) from  here. In theory,  I can run  OpenOffice locally but  I don't
have good  experience with running  complex GUI programs on  the Ubuntu
Touch's XMir server (it's a X11 compatibility layer for the Mir display
server which it still uses).

The easiest way to write texts  (LaTeX sources, programs and so) is use
of the  Seabass2 text editor  (an Ubuntu  Touch native app  with syntax
highlighting and other functionalities) and the to compile/process them
in the  Linux container  (with less or  more complete  Debian install).
Simpler GUI  apps (which use Gtk+-2  and -3 and some  newer Qt) usually
also work very well (through the XMir, of course).

It is not ideal but it was much worse before some time...


References:

[1] https://www.amazon.com/Fellowes-I-Spire-Tablet-Stand-9311301/dp/B00BXF5GKK