Generally the reason people acknowledge the dealer is because they're inexperienced in live play and don't want to give anything away by how they count their chips. The biggest problem most people that I know who made that transition is table etiquette, they don't know how to act in a casino and how to tip dealers. My best example is when a friend of mine won a tournament and I almost had to kick his ass to get him to go tip the dealer the standard 10%. Table talk sometimes becomes an issue, cursing and whatnot.
Keeping notes, some casinos allow it others don't. Ask either the floor manager or the dealer before you take a book out.
Personally I started by playing home games, then went to casinos, then into online.
edit: fixed a couple of typos
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