Keynote 4+

The app is solid. But, it could be so much better with very little imagination and effort (especially for the soon-to-be trillion-dollar company that makes the iPad Pro!).

For example, Keynote needs drag to select.

Long touch at a particular spot to activate selection mode and bring up crosshairs. Drag the finger, during which a dotted rectangle dynamically follows to show you what you are selecting. Lift finger, and all items touching the rectangle have been selected. Upon lifting finger, show popover action menu.

This is pretty straightforward, and countless other apps already do it.

The current approach of selecting one item at a time while keeping another finger on an "anchor" item is silly and slow for slides that have many graphical objects.

Keynote developers need to work with OmniGraffle for a day. I get it that Keynote probably doesn't want to be as intricate as OmniGraffle with multitouch, but still.... there are some basic things (like drag to select) that could be done so much more intuitively and creatively to truly capture the magic of touch interface.

I have observed that many folks view Keynote as simply an office tool. Indeed, I have made several conventional presentations as an Infection Control Specialist, both before retirement and for Home School children. But Keynote is so much more! Think of Keynote as a painters palette upon which you can gather together many creative elements into a work of art. What are these elements? They might include, photographs, video, music and sound effects, animation, graphic objects, and writing. Each element can interact with one another, for example merge a still photo with an animation. Or perhaps, a video can take center stage surrounded by animation and text. Perhaps, you have the video look like it is playing on a TV set to outdoor movie screen. Or perhaps combine an animation with a sound effect, or combine a musical background with original artwork. Move and time each element to demonstrate your creativity. When your living work of art is complete, you can convert it all to a video which you can share.

As others have stated, dragging to select would be so much more efficient. I can’t tell you the number of times I’ve had to select and reselect because of multiple layers of objects...and it just never seems to work properly. I instinctively keep trying to use my Apple Pencil to work with, only to scribble all over my work. Also, why is it that when I group objects together, I can’t link them? For example, I have font on top of a shape and want to link them both to another slide, so I grouped them. I have to link both the text and the shape in order for this to work? I’ve probably spent double the time on my project than necessary if the app just offered basic functions. It’s also incredibly frustrating that when I zoom, the toolbar blocks the top of my slide completely, so the only way I’m able to navigate small shapes at the top of my slide is to be zoomed out...but I can’t use my Apple Pencil to navigate the elements of my slide in place of my fingers!