As a reasonably "younger folk", on-screen keyboards are still dreadful. You could attach a bluetooth keyboard or use an OTG cable (or use a USB-C keyboard if you can manage to find any :P), but at that point you're just back to having a really awful laptop.

The Transformers were an interesting concept that could have made it viable, it's too bad that they switched to Windows...

Bluetooth keyboards are pretty popular nowadays. Leave them in the bag when you're just reading or emailing (which is most of the time), take them out only when you need to write a lot.

I still miss the old Stowaway keyboard: http://danbricklin.com/log/stowaway.htm

It would be awesome to have the same keyboard, but updated for modern devices. There's lots of cheap Bluetooth keyboards out there these days, but I've never seen one as mechanically elegant and nice to type on as the Stowaway was.

I still cling to mine, though the keys are a bit sticky these days. Haven't used it in a few years because it's not suited to (as you say) modern devices. But there doesn't seem to be any substitute, and I'm stumped as to why. If I can keyboard cases for an iPad for $25, I imagine the hard Bluetooth problems aren't so hard anymore, so it's a matter of making the hardware. But if someone thought there was money in it...

This is the key for me. I have a first generation iPad and a bluetooth keyboard. The only apps that I really use are Prompt (an SSH app from Panic), Pocket, and iBooks. It is an old iPad, but perfectly usable as a terminal, and I can spend all day in emacs with battery power left over to read articles on the way home.

Which Bluetooth keyboard do you use?

I use the Apple mini one. Good battery life and I'm happy enough with the feel.

You're right the experience isn't great, that doesn't stop people trying though. There are many mobile IDEs too that try all sorts of different layouts, but they are all an exercise in frustration at the end of the day. I think really it can never work, but it's interesting to see things like this, if only to verify the problem.

Attaching a keyboard and then SSHing to a computer having full developer environment works OK.

Yet why would you want to do that instead of working on a laptop?

Because an iPad mini fits in my purse and can be pulled out on the subway to fool around with F#.

Funnily, I assumed the ipad Pro was the target for such tools.

Yeah, that's what his blog post said, so for him and other .Net on iOS devs (Xamarin), makes total sense there.

For the rest of us, casual .Net coding on the go :)

Because an ipad mini is much lighter and works 4 weeks in standby, connected to wifi, and probably a good 10-15 hours of actual use? It's my device of choice when going on business trips now, despite the fact that I have a macbook air.

I don't have a laptop.

I'm a fast typist on both physical and virtual keyboards, and I would never code or do any other kind of serious typing on a tablet, my wrists would go AWOL in minutes.

I do some hobbyist Prolog programming in Textastic on an iPad mini. I can do it in my lazy boy and ftp the file to my desktop for testing when I get to that point. It's perfect for doing little puzzler programs where you spend much much more time thinking before you ever try to run the program. Helps that Prolog has a really minimal syntax, though I wouldn't try to do so something serious in it.

I have been testing out the iPad for development work and it's working out ok so far. I do have a separate keyboard and an ipad support and I mostly work on remote machines using server auditor ssh app. One advantage is the separation of screen from the keyboard so I can have the screen at eye level and the keyboard at elbow level. Less strain on the neck. A mini desktop like environment. Oh and I am 39 :)

I use my iPad Pro with keyboard to SSH into a Mac and use vim or Coda to develop.

Better battery life than most laptops and built-in SIM card means I can work almost anywhere. Plus I also get to draw sketches whenever I want (both UI designs and for fun). And I really like iPads.