We have just finished work on Texpad v1.1. The headline feature for this release is that you can typeset LaTeX locally on your iPad without needing an internet connection. Porting LaTeX to the iPad was a painful process, but it went surprisingly quickly and it’s great to see the almost instantaneous DVI preview.

Also on its way is, v1.0.1 with fixes for the first day release problems that slipped through the beta testing. They were principally small editor bugs and a dropbox issue that caused unnecessary conflicted copies to be created.

v1.0.1 was submitted to Apple just over a week ago, so it should make it to the App Store over the weekend, and we will submit 1.1 immediately after that, so you will be typesetting on your iPad within a fortnight.

It is worth mentioning that the TeXLive distribution on our cloud servers is 5GB compared to Texpad’s minimal 15MB collection, so the cloud option will remain for those who need more advanced packages. We will build and expand the iPad’s range of packages in future updates.

What comes next? Texpad v1.2 of course. In this update, we will work on supporting Bluetooth keyboards more fully, images will be shipped off to the cloud servers along with TeX files, and other typesetting chains (pLaTeX, XeLaTeX, LaTeX->dvips, …).

Meanwhile Texpad (desktop) v1.4.1 has been in review for two weeks now, so with luck that should be out soon. It has support for Retina MacBooks, fixes a transient bug in global search on Mountain Lion and improves BibTeX support once again.