How practical is an iPad for "reading" programming books?
Solution 1:
I use GoodReader for reading Apple manuals, synced via Dropbox. GR remembers positions in all PDFs I read. It also keeps all my annotations and highlights in sync with PDFs on my Mac. Overall, very convenient solution IMHO.
Solution 2:
I use iBooks on the iPad to read all my development books, and if your doing iOS development you'll even find the Apple development books in eBook format. It's the main purpose I bought my iPad, and it definitely works for that purpose. Since iBooks can import PDF's even my older books I have scanned works.