FWIW since iOS 13 usb drives work fine on iPad. I use mine for work, but most of what I do can be covered with a browser and video editor.

For what it's worth, you might be able to copy over comics using a USB drive now. You can definitely copy comics over a network share as an alternative, as the Files app supports mounting samba shares.

EDIT: of course that doesn't help with the loading of open source software on the device.

You can even use your USB floppy drive in iOS's Files app now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UH8EJutmmT4

You can also compile your own open source software from outside the Apple App Store, there are some limitations to long-term use that might require a $99/year developer account, but it’s still possible. And the $99/year is not per user but per company, so if you know somebody with a dev account, you can split it with them by starting a company instead.

Not to say that the iPad Pro is a Windows tablet replacement, to me they’re still very much distinct products right now. iPad OS isn’t (yet?) a macOS replacement for developers and power users.

I haven't tried using USB drives with the iPad, but they have been building out the Files app and there are more ways to work with external storage than before.

Loading software from outside the App Store is not going to happen, but they are, slowly but surely, expanding to support other tasks.

You can do both. For OSS software though, it would need to be iPadOS apps built with Xcode or some cross-platform framework like Xamarin, but some time ago, Apple enabled anyone to install apps without a developer account.

> load open source software from outside the Apple store - yes. Since that will never happen in our lifetime, probably not.

If that was non-negotiable why did you even consider an iPad Pro in the first place?