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I dislike this post intensely. The opinion comes across as uncharitable, as the author probably has not used this Macbook Pro yet. How can you (alexeysemeney) b

I dislike this post intensely. The opinion comes across as uncharitable, as the author probably has not used this Macbook Pro yet. How can you (alexeysemeney) be so sure? I consider myself a developer, and I almost never use the Fn and ESC keys on my Mac. Everybody uses the computer differently, but I'm pretty sure this is not a deal-breaker for most. One could also argue that the touch bar might lead to innovative developer tools, such as timeline interfaces for Replay Debugging. There are already a lot of applications in the content creation (Photoshop, Illustrator, Maya) space, which developers frequently use to create assets.

ag_47 10y ago
hmm, looking at the comments -- am I the only who uses Fn + Arrow Keys for Page Up/Down and Home/End purposes? How can you not?
- jobigoud 10y ago
  I realize I don't know the first thing about MacBook keyboards. Are you saying they don't have Page up, Page down, Home and End? Maybe a Windows thing but I use Function keys everyday, F3 for incremental search, F5, F9, F10, F11 for debugging. Not having these keys would be handicapping.
  - gurkendoktor 10y ago
    Home/end are not really necessary on a Mac, where you can use cmd+arrow keys instead (left=start of line, right=end of line, up=start of document, down=end of document). The function keys are also not commonly used by apps because the system maps them to brightness control, volume, play/pause etc. by default and you need to use the Fn key to produce the actual function key keystrokes. The convention for incremental search is: cmd+F to open the find dialog, cmd+G for "Find Next" (which is great because it's right next to cmd+F), and cmd+E cmd+G for "search for selection". Every macOS app works that way and the F3 key will not be missed. It's really not that bad. The only key I miss on Mac keyboards is forward delete (Del).
    - dump121 10y ago
      You can change Fn keys behaviour from prefs and I believed all developers would have defaulted to Function keys but seems not so. Chrome, IntelliJ, VSC all use Fn keys for debugging, and also at least I have mapped most of function keys to some tasks, like F5 for open symbol etc. Touchbar is only good for some slider like things where continuous strip will help. It is also good for novice users like MSOffice ribbon, they can see a lot of things on screen now and they don't have to hunt in menu or remember shortcuts. But for a real pro user spending whole day in few softwares, it makes no sense. I have seen pro photoshop users using 3-4 keys long shortcut like second nature, they need access to tonnes of features and variants so more keys the merrier. Honestly, I haven't seen any real use cases of the touchbar, smileys and photo slider is cute but not something on top of my list to optimise.
    - scentoni 10y ago
      fn+Backspace = forward delete
  - mikejmoffitt 10y ago
    I also make good use of the F-keys, as well as the pgup/pgdn/home/end/del block. I use both Linux and Windows.
  - redler 10y ago
    With the touch bar, you could now have buttons (virtual, of course) with those labels and functions.
- ghostly_s 10y ago
  You're describing the 'Fn' mod-key. Everyone else here is describing the F-keys. The 'Fn' key is still there and does what it always did. In fact, it calls up the traditional 'Fn' keys on the touchbar, functionally just the same as the old MBPs, making all this whining look particularly stupid.
chairmanwow 10y ago
Many common applications that developers use have many keybindings that heavily rely upon the Escape key (Vim for sure).
- deleted 10y ago
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- yoz-y 10y ago
  The escape key can be right there on the capslock (option to be enabled in System Preferences -> Keyboard). Using Esc key heavily with its default location is not practical at all. As for the F-keys I think this is more of a problem.
  - echelon 10y ago
    I use it in its default location literally thousands of times a day and I don't mind. (I use a Mac at work.)
    - jlgaddis 10y ago
      Same here. I use the Escape key as Esc in vim and it would probably take me a long time to break that "muscle memory". As for some recommendations others have had... I have Caps Lock mapped to Ctrl and Ctrl-[ remapped for tmux so those are out. This is the same across several machines (MBP and multiples ThinkPads) so the more feasible solution for me is to simply stop using the Mac.
  - base698 10y ago
    I had to install a third party program to get that to work, do they let you do that now?
    - zwily 10y ago
      Yes, it's an option in the normal Keyboard Modifier Keys system pane now.
  - 10y ago
Swizec 10y ago
I smash the esc key violently every time I climb myself into a corner with Emacs shortcuts and don't know how to get out. But it's on a proper mechanical keyboard because prolonged use of builtin keyboards hurts my hands.
- to3m 10y ago
  C-] might be a better bet - it will cancel any active command, like C-g, and also back out of any recursive edits, while leaving your window layout intact.
- deleted 10y ago
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- ungzd 10y ago
  But it uses C-g as cancel, not Esc.
  - to3m 10y ago
    keyboard-escape-quit is bound to ESC ESC ESC.
echelon 10y ago
I'm a vim user. Why in the world did they remove ESC? That's one of my most frequently used keys. And no, I don't think remapping it is a great idea. If I had to use this for work I would protest.
- ixtli 10y ago
  I don't understand why people keep saying they've "removed" the escape key. The thing is programmable. http://live.arstechnica.com/hello-again-apples-october-2016-mac-event/images/Screen%20Shot%202016-10-27%20at%201.49.43%20PM.png http://live.arstechnica.com/hello-again-apples-october-2016-...
  - jasonlotito 10y ago
    If it's anything like their existing dynamic stuff, I worry it will be too slow. There are far too many cases where I search for something, see it pop up, go to hit enter, and as I'm hitting enter, Spotlight decides to shift focus to something else. So for their magic toolbar thing to work, they'd have to do something they haven't been able to do in my experience.
    - ixtli 10y ago
      That's fair. My experience has been, at least with the iPhone, that they've made an effort to make it more and more responsive as time has gone on. Tangentially, this is why I don't understand people who install these third party keyboards that make background network requests. It's like, the keyboard is slow enough as it is without having to go to the public internet on a cell connection :/
      - jasonlotito 10y ago
        Yeah, I haven't noticed that yet. Not to say it hasn't improved, but I just haven't noticed an improvement. My other concern is workflow. Right now, the magic toolbar is only on the laptop. This basically means the magic toolbar is only useful when using my laptop's keyboard. Otherwise, it's really an awkward tool to use.
Spooky23 10y ago
It's just the typical post Apple event trolling.
deleted 10y ago
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zzzcpan 10y ago
ESC key is required for productive use of Vim and even Photoshop! And since we are talking about graphics, Inkscape is heavy on Fn keys too.
djsumdog 10y ago
It's a terrible post, and a terrible site (did it break anyone else's back button?) I gave up on Mac as a development platform back in 2012 when they removed expose and replaced it with that terrible Mission Control garbage. Then I went back to Linux and discovered tiling window managers and haven't looked back. (and yes, I realize there are some good ones for mac now). But I will say on this post that the escape key is a good point. I use it all the time. Sure you can rebind it, but it's not a useless, SysReq/ScrollLock type key. Most developers will have to rebind it if it doesn't appear on that touch bar thingy.
quxbar 10y ago
I couldn't agree more, this kind of stance is embarrassing from a professional standpoint. It's ridiculous to act like this one special arrangement of plastic on a computer is so crucial to development. All 'real' developers remap their own modifier keys. All 'real' developers use full cherry-mx mechanical keyboards. All 'real' developers write assembly with pen and paper and then print their stack of punchcards once. etc, etc.
grey-area 10y ago
Also, Apple seems to think it has an escape key (see the header pic which clearly shows esc as an option): http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/ http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/ I don't think it would be very hard for terminal.app (or other apps targeted at developers) to show esc f1 etc along the top when it is open, and it can strictly have better function keys because instead of f4 etc they can be customised to say what they'd actually do. I agree the fuss over the touch bar is overplayed.
wlesieutre 10y ago
I do some programming (Xcode and VS Code), I do some 3D art (blender, substance), and I do some photography (Lightroom). Not all of those programs will support it at launch, but I expect they will sooner or later. And the new screen sounds fabulous (I have a wide gamut external screen already, though it's AdobeRGB instead of P3, the MacBook will do better in reds and not quite as well in greens). I wish it were cheaper, sure, but this looks like a fantastic computer to me. Yeah, you need some different cables. You might need to rebind some hotkeys. It might take a while for some pieces of software to support the touch bar properly. If you don't want to be an early adopter or you can't get over your Vim muscle memory, pick up a refurbished 2015 model and the rest of us can buy a few new USB cables and move on with our lives.
- deong 10y ago
  If I were still a Mac user (back to Linux a year or so ago), I think I'd be annoyed by the new laptops. Not enraged...just annoyed a bit. It's not the end of the world, but like a lot of Apple's recent moves, I'm left with a feeling of "OK, but why?" With both the headphone jack removal on the iPhone and the function keys here, Apple has used "but they're old" as part of the justification. Playing a slideshow showing me a keyboard from 1970 that had function keys is not itself any form of argument against function keys. Sure, the touch bar can serve the purpose of the escape key. Crucially however, so could the escape key. The demos look neat enough, but it's hard to envision a 0.5" strip of touch screen being all that broadly useful outside a few niche cases where a long linear control is just what you need (e.g., audio scrubbing). It's not that I think these laptops are bad necessarily. It's more that I think they're gimmicky. Apple seems to do an awful lot of things these days that remind me of Samsung circa 2012 or so -- "press this button to send your heartbeat to your spouse" kind of stuff. Meanwhile, Microsoft looks to be absolutely on fire.
  - major505 10y ago
    You, sir, are absolute rigth.
  - wlesieutre 10y ago
    The justification isn't just "they're old" though. It's "they're old and almost completely unused." I know in Windows there are actual actions on the f-keys (F1 for help, F2 for rename, F5 for reload, etc.), but the Mac has no such equivalents. They're used for hardware and music control, and have this whole secondary mode of fn+F_ chords that hardly anyone touches. The touch bar will be useful in nearly every app. I wasn't about to set up and memorize custom F-key bindings in every piece of software I use, so it's going to be more useful. And it allows for types of input that buttons couldn't offer to begin with. With the headphone jack, it was "it's old and we have something better," which I'm not thrilled by (but I wasn't planning on getting a new phone anyway). The USB-C and removal of F-keys I'm totally on board with.
bsbechtel 10y ago
You may never use the Fn and ESC keys (I hardly do either), but this does add to the list of events developers now need to handle in order to develop cross-platform compatible software.
- gurkendoktor 10y ago
  Using function keys as shortcuts is already a terrible idea on macOS because these are used to control the screen brightness, volume, play/pause etc. The TouchBar might actually make it easier for new users to realise what the Fn key does.
  - dump121 10y ago
    either you don't use macbook or not interested enough to look for how to change that behavior. It is a single flag in preferences that allow you to use the keys as function keys and screen brightness etc. with 'fn' key.
    - gurkendoktor 10y ago
      I know, but that doesn't make the F keys a good choice for cross-platform app developers. Nobody would release a web browser on macOS where F5 is the only way to reload the page - not before and not after the TouchBar.
Sephiroth87 10y ago
Yes, thank you, I was starting to think I'm not actually a real developer, since I can't even remember the last time I even used a function key...
rorykoehler 10y ago
I was configuring a server while walking through the airport the other day (long story and I won't bore you with details) on my ipad. There is no control key on the ipad keyboard meaning that I could not save any files from the ssh terminal. It was not the greatest experience and I can definitely see these kinds of things happening on laptop now due to apples "courage". They seem to be gung-ho on breaking things that work perfectly in the name of "progress".
- realworldview 10y ago
  Which ssh client doesn't give you a ctrl key?
- joemi 10y ago
  Unless Apple made an iPad SSH client I don't know about, this sounds like you were just using a bad app. The first two that popped up when I just googled for "ipad ssh client" clearly have control keys, as seen in their screenshots, and some other ones I've tried also have control keys.
- mst 10y ago
  When I concluded my Thinkpad Tablet 2 was a little bit too small to work as a primary machine (switched to a Helix 2 for that), I re-paired the bluetooth keyboard w/optical trackpoint with my tablet. The keyboard fits inside my jacket. I can't express quite how wonderful it is on the occasions I don't have a bag with me to still be able to have a proper keyboard+mouse setup when something goes sideways.
seanwilson 10y ago
> I consider myself a developer, and I almost never use the Fn and ESC keys on my Mac. ESC usage just off the top of my head: cancelling any dropdown (e.g. IDE autocomplete, browser autocomplete, Spotlight, quick file search in Atom/Sublime), cancelling any OK/cancel dialog (e.g. save as), the ESC + '.' sequence in Bash to get the last word of the last command. I could map ESC to the caps lock key I suppose.
- rch 10y ago
  I actually use the caps lock key sometimes, e.g. FORTRAN 77.
- mcphage 10y ago
  If you go to the current Apple homepage, the first image they present you with shows the Esc key right there. So all of those things you currently do with it? You'll still be able to do with it.
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mrmondo 10y ago
You are not the only one, took the words out of my mouth
jbmorgado 10y ago
Well, he goes trough more than the bar. I have a 2013 15" MacBook Pro, the diference with the top of the line that came out yesterday comes down a slight bump in the dedicated Graphics Card (which I don't appreciate since I use CUDA a lot and as such I actually prefer the GTX 750M to a only slightly better AMD card in the new model), and a 0.1 GHz bump in the processor (back from the 2.3 GHz i7 my MacBook Pro has). I do understand that taking out the Esc and F* keys and replace it for a smart bar can be seen as a valid design option, but I can't see how shipping a Laptop 3 years later with, lets face it, basically the same specs and ask for the same price can be something positive.
- trapperkeeper79 10y ago
  I'm surprised why more devs are not getting upset at the lack of an Nvidia GPU option.
  - jbmorgado 10y ago
    About devs I'm not sure, but I use it a lot at work for simulations (optimised for CUDA) and some Deep Learning and the Nvidia card is a must.
- copperx 10y ago
  > ask for the same price can be something positive. Didn't they bump up the base price?
  - jbmorgado 10y ago
    They did, but this is the top of the line option. The price for that one remained the same.
bisby 10y ago
As a vim user, esc is pretty important. I would say the author clearly knows very little computer specs: "The MacBook Pro had options with 2.4 gigahertz dual-core processors back in 2010. Anything new in 2016? Not really, well… nope." Because a 2010 2.4ghz dual core is identical to a 2016 2.4 ghz dual core.... I thought we got over comparing processors purely by their clock speed a long time ago. (I will agree that theyve been going with lower and lower power to allow for better battery life, this is a terrible way to make the comparison. Id much rather see a processor comparison graph here). Personally I think this is a terrible decision, but then again, I think using a laptop keyboard for programming is a terrible decision too. I need multiple monitors and an external keyboard to get anything done, so I typically use a desktop, and then use a lightweight laptop (basically a chromebook) to remote into the desktop if I absolutely need to be mobile. Also, "What other people are saying" and then listing 4 anecdotal quotes seems pretty uncompelling. I imagine this is not a great developer's laptop. But apple fanboys will keep buying it and either stop using vim just so they can keep using apple or buy an external keyboard. And Im really not sure what else you could really want out of a laptop then.
- trevor-e 10y ago
  I think rather than stop using vim people will remap the ESC key to something else, like caps lock, which many already do.
  - deleted 10y ago
    [deleted]
- boardwaalk 10y ago
  http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Avoid_the_escape_key http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Avoid_the_escape_key
  - blowski 10y ago
    My laptop should work the way I want it to, not the other way around.
Kurtz79 10y ago
I find really amusing that after the Macbook reveal last year half of the response comments (in sites like ArsTechnica) were of the gist "just give me an updated Macbook Air, with the same form factor and a better screen". Well, the base Macbook Pro model does exactly that. There is also an option (cheaper!) to keep the function keys. http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/10/no-new-macbook-airs-as-apple-instead-makes-lower-end-1500-macbook-pro/ http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/10/no-new-macbook-airs-as-... I might be getting old and grumpy, but more than anything else it boggles my mind when apparently everyone believes they should be the target user Apple (or Microsoft, or Google,or...) design their product for, and they consider a personal insult when that is not the case. I don't think there was ever a time where the laptop market had so many options, at all price levels, many of those of such a high quality. You don't like that a particular manufacturer is offering ? Vote with your wallet and choose another option, don't whine.
- ishbits 10y ago
  I think there are lot of us who may never have really like Mac hardware, but find the OS is the best option out there to get our work done. Its just a little sad it locks us to specific hardware platform as well.
fuj 10y ago
Here we go again... why are you people so blind in following a brand. Apple, Google, Tesla, etc. It's ridiculous. Whatever those companies do, it's always good. I use a mbp everyday, but I have no problems with saying how stupid this is and I don't even use vim. Are you seriously saying, that removing the ESC and Functions keys is not issue and does not affect you, as developer?! If you use your mbp for Facebook or if you program in Visual Basic, then I might understand.
usernam 10y ago
I've used the Lenovo's "adaptive keyboard". It's crap to use, especially for development. FN keys are especially easy to remap for macros or lesser used functions, and having no haptic feedback essentially kills their function for a touch typist. It's also no wonder that newer carbon models came back to regular fn keys. I actually bought/buy macbooks for their build quality, and generally only install linux on them. Looks like this particular model marks the end of this path.
TheOtherHobbes 10y ago
I think it's a completely fair post. Devs are a huge market for Apple, but Apple is ignoring them. This isn't about ESC, it's about whether Apple has any interest in acknowledging the dev market and keeping devs on board. The answer is "no." Apple is making no concessions to developers or professional power users who need performance. Instead, Apple is producing vanilla-grade laptops with a touch of gimmicky brand frosting to justify the high price. The real heuristic is skimping on performance and connectivity to maintain margins. The cost to users is significant lost productivity. This is the MacBook Pro Intern Edition. It could have been more, but that's where Apple is now.
- PopsiclePete 10y ago
  They're ignoring the giant behemoth that is ....Vim users..? What? Wait till the EMACS crowd gets a whiff of how Apple refuses to sell pedals for their keybindings, then Apple is truly in trouble. Look, I know VIM is popular, but so is XCode, so is Sublime, so is Atom, so is TextMate, so is a multitude of other text editors for God's sake, that to claim that Apple is somehow "abandoning the entire software development community", as if VIM users somehow speak for all of them, is pretty whiny and unrealistic. Do you think Apple really worries that a bunch of what, Open Source "hackers" producing yet another Ruby testing framework are now going to abandon their platform? Seriously? Get off your high horse, man. There's thousands of Visual Studio developers in the Windows world and thousands of XCode developers in the OS X world who don't give two shits about your 1970's vintage terminal mode text editor. Apple will be fine. Software developers (again, a much larger group than you obviously think) are also going to be fine. And aren't you guys always bragging what power users you are? So now that one (remappable!!!!) key is gone your entire world is crashing around you? If you're such a fossil that you can't adapt to the absence of this one key, that already is of extremely limited use for 99.9% of people, how did you cope with the disappearance of the floppy disk, the caps lock key, the parallel port, VGA, optical disc drives? How did you ever adjust from storing backups of your code on floppy disks once that went away? What happens when Windows laptops one day follow suit and remove the Escape key and the (just as useless) Caps Lock key? If VIM users can't adapt to a simple change such as this, maybe you deserve to fade to irrelevancy? Just keep buying 2008-era laptops off Ebay well into the 2030's, I guess? Truly pathetic rants, truly.
laichzeit0 10y ago
I put it to you that you've never used a debugger if you've never used Fn keys.
- nogbit 10y ago
  Visual Studio is the only place I've really used the function keys (F5, F10, F11), and I rarely use VS anymore. Outside of that I use F2 when in any kind of GUI that permits renaming of a file or folder. All of which can be rebound.
  - dump121 10y ago
    What about IntelliJ or Chrome or any IDE for that matter.
- pklausler 10y ago
  I use gdb and never use function keys.
- snowwrestler 10y ago
  To use the function keys on an old MacBook Pro, you have to chord with the "fn" key to override the brightness, volume, etc controls. To use the functions keys in the touch bar in the new MacBook Pro, you have to chord with the "fn" key as well. So where is the difference...
  - mikejmoffitt 10y ago
    It has always been possible to set those keys to default to F-key functions instead of media functions. The difference here is that the position may not be constant, and you can't feel with your fingers what you're over before you commit to activating the function, so you must look. In some contexts you can "get used to it", but this is a steeper uphill battle.
    - snowwrestler 10y ago
      I would not be surprised if one of the customizations of the touch bar is to set the function keys as the default.
EugeneOZ 10y ago
I'm a programmer and I'm pretty sure most of developers use F-keys and, especially, esc button. Let's believe together :)
legohead 10y ago
Do you use USB or HDMI? You don't use any of the function keys on a mac, like volume, brightness, play/pause? I use those constantly. And then the lackluster specs. That alone leaves me no real reason to upgrade.
antihero 10y ago
The claims about CPU MHz are hilarious, too. It's an entirely different CPU generation.
steele 10y ago
Apple didn't need to remove the Fn row to have their touch bar.
Erikun 10y ago
Surely the weird thing about removing the escape key is that it is used to bring up the force quit menu (cmd-option-esc). Pretty ingrained in my mind at least, but to be fair not needed that often.
cptskippy 10y ago
> I almost never use the Fn and ESC keys on my Mac. While my primary isn't a Mac, my default left hand resting position on my keyboard is index finger on ESC and thumb on ALT.
overgard 10y ago
Developer here. Dealbreaker for me. All my tools heavily use function keys and escape. If I had no other options I'd just deal with it, but Apple is competing with themselves: since they didn't bother to upgrade the actual performance, I have no incentive to move from my current macbook. And when I do, I'll probably just buy a different brand if they don't release a laptop that's actually useful for me.
- snowwrestler 10y ago
  Non-developer here. The new MacBook has both an escape key and function keys, as could clearly be seen in the demos and screenshots on Apple.com. So all your tools will still work. Saying the new MacBook doesn't have an escape key is like saying the iPhone doesn't have an "L" key. It does when you need it to.
PascLeRasc 10y ago
I use the F keys a lot in Matlab, but I'd guess that Matlab users are just as much a minority of developers that developers are of Mac users, so I can see why it's not a big deal to Apple. Maybe Mathworks will add some of the functionality to the touch bar anyway.
snowwolf 10y ago
The ESC key should hardly be a deal breaker for Vim devs - most remap it to caps lock on a Mac because it's easier to reach. The 13" model has a version that keeps that row anyway. And the Touch Bar does still have a function key row/view? with ESC. MacVim and iTerm could probably add the functionality that the whole row is an ESC key when they are the active apps. For me though, Apple got it wrong by releasing a gimmick (touch bar) which may be useful for some groups of Pro users (designers/film editors?) but I can't see adding much value to what I think is their largest group - software developers. For me my ideal developer laptop is small, light and powerful. So while it's great the Pro is now the same size and weight as the air (13" model), I think they could have gone even smaller - see the Dell XPS 13. A 13" full powered (i7, 16GB ram) in a 12" body (by having an edge to edge 'infinity' screen). Basically they should have released a MacBook that can run an i7 and 16GB ram.
syngrog66 10y ago
a huge number of technical types use vim and other CLI/Terminal type tools daily. There are many tools and apps that assume the Escape key exists.
thecodewarrior 10y ago
'almost never use the Fn or ESC keys' Then I'll wager your knowledge of the capabilities of the apps you use is limited and if you are developing UIs I'll bet that while you consider them slick and sophisticated, they are in reality limited and inefficient.

ag_47 10y ago

hmm, looking at the comments -- am I the only who uses Fn + Arrow Keys for Page Up/Down and Home/End purposes? How can you not?

jobigoud 10y ago
I realize I don't know the first thing about MacBook keyboards. Are you saying they don't have Page up, Page down, Home and End? Maybe a Windows thing but I use Function keys everyday, F3 for incremental search, F5, F9, F10, F11 for debugging. Not having these keys would be handicapping.
- gurkendoktor 10y ago
  Home/end are not really necessary on a Mac, where you can use cmd+arrow keys instead (left=start of line, right=end of line, up=start of document, down=end of document). The function keys are also not commonly used by apps because the system maps them to brightness control, volume, play/pause etc. by default and you need to use the Fn key to produce the actual function key keystrokes. The convention for incremental search is: cmd+F to open the find dialog, cmd+G for "Find Next" (which is great because it's right next to cmd+F), and cmd+E cmd+G for "search for selection". Every macOS app works that way and the F3 key will not be missed. It's really not that bad. The only key I miss on Mac keyboards is forward delete (Del).
  - dump121 10y ago
    You can change Fn keys behaviour from prefs and I believed all developers would have defaulted to Function keys but seems not so. Chrome, IntelliJ, VSC all use Fn keys for debugging, and also at least I have mapped most of function keys to some tasks, like F5 for open symbol etc. Touchbar is only good for some slider like things where continuous strip will help. It is also good for novice users like MSOffice ribbon, they can see a lot of things on screen now and they don't have to hunt in menu or remember shortcuts. But for a real pro user spending whole day in few softwares, it makes no sense. I have seen pro photoshop users using 3-4 keys long shortcut like second nature, they need access to tonnes of features and variants so more keys the merrier. Honestly, I haven't seen any real use cases of the touchbar, smileys and photo slider is cute but not something on top of my list to optimise.
  - scentoni 10y ago
    fn+Backspace = forward delete
- mikejmoffitt 10y ago
  I also make good use of the F-keys, as well as the pgup/pgdn/home/end/del block. I use both Linux and Windows.
- redler 10y ago
  With the touch bar, you could now have buttons (virtual, of course) with those labels and functions.
ghostly_s 10y ago
You're describing the 'Fn' mod-key. Everyone else here is describing the F-keys. The 'Fn' key is still there and does what it always did. In fact, it calls up the traditional 'Fn' keys on the touchbar, functionally just the same as the old MBPs, making all this whining look particularly stupid.

chairmanwow 10y ago

Many common applications that developers use have many keybindings that heavily rely upon the Escape key (Vim for sure).

deleted 10y ago
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yoz-y 10y ago
The escape key can be right there on the capslock (option to be enabled in System Preferences -> Keyboard). Using Esc key heavily with its default location is not practical at all. As for the F-keys I think this is more of a problem.
- echelon 10y ago
  I use it in its default location literally thousands of times a day and I don't mind. (I use a Mac at work.)
  - jlgaddis 10y ago
    Same here. I use the Escape key as Esc in vim and it would probably take me a long time to break that "muscle memory". As for some recommendations others have had... I have Caps Lock mapped to Ctrl and Ctrl-[ remapped for tmux so those are out. This is the same across several machines (MBP and multiples ThinkPads) so the more feasible solution for me is to simply stop using the Mac.
- base698 10y ago
  I had to install a third party program to get that to work, do they let you do that now?
  - zwily 10y ago
    Yes, it's an option in the normal Keyboard Modifier Keys system pane now.
- 10y ago

Swizec 10y ago

I smash the esc key violently every time I climb myself into a corner with Emacs shortcuts and don't know how to get out. But it's on a proper mechanical keyboard because prolonged use of builtin keyboards hurts my hands.

to3m 10y ago
C-] might be a better bet - it will cancel any active command, like C-g, and also back out of any recursive edits, while leaving your window layout intact.
deleted 10y ago
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ungzd 10y ago
But it uses C-g as cancel, not Esc.
- to3m 10y ago
  keyboard-escape-quit is bound to ESC ESC ESC.

echelon 10y ago

I'm a vim user. Why in the world did they remove ESC? That's one of my most frequently used keys. And no, I don't think remapping it is a great idea. If I had to use this for work I would protest.

ixtli 10y ago
I don't understand why people keep saying they've "removed" the escape key. The thing is programmable. http://live.arstechnica.com/hello-again-apples-october-2016-mac-event/images/Screen%20Shot%202016-10-27%20at%201.49.43%20PM.png http://live.arstechnica.com/hello-again-apples-october-2016-...
- jasonlotito 10y ago
  If it's anything like their existing dynamic stuff, I worry it will be too slow. There are far too many cases where I search for something, see it pop up, go to hit enter, and as I'm hitting enter, Spotlight decides to shift focus to something else. So for their magic toolbar thing to work, they'd have to do something they haven't been able to do in my experience.
  - ixtli 10y ago
    That's fair. My experience has been, at least with the iPhone, that they've made an effort to make it more and more responsive as time has gone on. Tangentially, this is why I don't understand people who install these third party keyboards that make background network requests. It's like, the keyboard is slow enough as it is without having to go to the public internet on a cell connection :/
    - jasonlotito 10y ago
      Yeah, I haven't noticed that yet. Not to say it hasn't improved, but I just haven't noticed an improvement. My other concern is workflow. Right now, the magic toolbar is only on the laptop. This basically means the magic toolbar is only useful when using my laptop's keyboard. Otherwise, it's really an awkward tool to use.

Spooky23 10y ago

It's just the typical post Apple event trolling.

deleted 10y ago

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zzzcpan 10y ago

ESC key is required for productive use of Vim and even Photoshop! And since we are talking about graphics, Inkscape is heavy on Fn keys too.

djsumdog 10y ago

It's a terrible post, and a terrible site (did it break anyone else's back button?) I gave up on Mac as a development platform back in 2012 when they removed expose and replaced it with that terrible Mission Control garbage. Then I went back to Linux and discovered tiling window managers and haven't looked back. (and yes, I realize there are some good ones for mac now). But I will say on this post that the escape key is a good point. I use it all the time. Sure you can rebind it, but it's not a useless, SysReq/ScrollLock type key. Most developers will have to rebind it if it doesn't appear on that touch bar thingy.

quxbar 10y ago

I couldn't agree more, this kind of stance is embarrassing from a professional standpoint. It's ridiculous to act like this one special arrangement of plastic on a computer is so crucial to development. All 'real' developers remap their own modifier keys. All 'real' developers use full cherry-mx mechanical keyboards. All 'real' developers write assembly with pen and paper and then print their stack of punchcards once. etc, etc.

grey-area 10y ago

Also, Apple seems to think it has an escape key (see the header pic which clearly shows esc as an option): http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/ http://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/ I don't think it would be very hard for terminal.app (or other apps targeted at developers) to show esc f1 etc along the top when it is open, and it can strictly have better function keys because instead of f4 etc they can be customised to say what they'd actually do. I agree the fuss over the touch bar is overplayed.

wlesieutre 10y ago

I do some programming (Xcode and VS Code), I do some 3D art (blender, substance), and I do some photography (Lightroom). Not all of those programs will support it at launch, but I expect they will sooner or later. And the new screen sounds fabulous (I have a wide gamut external screen already, though it's AdobeRGB instead of P3, the MacBook will do better in reds and not quite as well in greens). I wish it were cheaper, sure, but this looks like a fantastic computer to me. Yeah, you need some different cables. You might need to rebind some hotkeys. It might take a while for some pieces of software to support the touch bar properly. If you don't want to be an early adopter or you can't get over your Vim muscle memory, pick up a refurbished 2015 model and the rest of us can buy a few new USB cables and move on with our lives.

deong 10y ago
If I were still a Mac user (back to Linux a year or so ago), I think I'd be annoyed by the new laptops. Not enraged...just annoyed a bit. It's not the end of the world, but like a lot of Apple's recent moves, I'm left with a feeling of "OK, but why?" With both the headphone jack removal on the iPhone and the function keys here, Apple has used "but they're old" as part of the justification. Playing a slideshow showing me a keyboard from 1970 that had function keys is not itself any form of argument against function keys. Sure, the touch bar can serve the purpose of the escape key. Crucially however, so could the escape key. The demos look neat enough, but it's hard to envision a 0.5" strip of touch screen being all that broadly useful outside a few niche cases where a long linear control is just what you need (e.g., audio scrubbing). It's not that I think these laptops are bad necessarily. It's more that I think they're gimmicky. Apple seems to do an awful lot of things these days that remind me of Samsung circa 2012 or so -- "press this button to send your heartbeat to your spouse" kind of stuff. Meanwhile, Microsoft looks to be absolutely on fire.
- major505 10y ago
  You, sir, are absolute rigth.
- wlesieutre 10y ago
  The justification isn't just "they're old" though. It's "they're old and almost completely unused." I know in Windows there are actual actions on the f-keys (F1 for help, F2 for rename, F5 for reload, etc.), but the Mac has no such equivalents. They're used for hardware and music control, and have this whole secondary mode of fn+F_ chords that hardly anyone touches. The touch bar will be useful in nearly every app. I wasn't about to set up and memorize custom F-key bindings in every piece of software I use, so it's going to be more useful. And it allows for types of input that buttons couldn't offer to begin with. With the headphone jack, it was "it's old and we have something better," which I'm not thrilled by (but I wasn't planning on getting a new phone anyway). The USB-C and removal of F-keys I'm totally on board with.

bsbechtel 10y ago

You may never use the Fn and ESC keys (I hardly do either), but this does add to the list of events developers now need to handle in order to develop cross-platform compatible software.

gurkendoktor 10y ago
Using function keys as shortcuts is already a terrible idea on macOS because these are used to control the screen brightness, volume, play/pause etc. The TouchBar might actually make it easier for new users to realise what the Fn key does.
- dump121 10y ago
  either you don't use macbook or not interested enough to look for how to change that behavior. It is a single flag in preferences that allow you to use the keys as function keys and screen brightness etc. with 'fn' key.
  - gurkendoktor 10y ago
    I know, but that doesn't make the F keys a good choice for cross-platform app developers. Nobody would release a web browser on macOS where F5 is the only way to reload the page - not before and not after the TouchBar.

Sephiroth87 10y ago

Yes, thank you, I was starting to think I'm not actually a real developer, since I can't even remember the last time I even used a function key...

rorykoehler 10y ago

I was configuring a server while walking through the airport the other day (long story and I won't bore you with details) on my ipad. There is no control key on the ipad keyboard meaning that I could not save any files from the ssh terminal. It was not the greatest experience and I can definitely see these kinds of things happening on laptop now due to apples "courage". They seem to be gung-ho on breaking things that work perfectly in the name of "progress".

realworldview 10y ago
Which ssh client doesn't give you a ctrl key?
joemi 10y ago
Unless Apple made an iPad SSH client I don't know about, this sounds like you were just using a bad app. The first two that popped up when I just googled for "ipad ssh client" clearly have control keys, as seen in their screenshots, and some other ones I've tried also have control keys.
mst 10y ago
When I concluded my Thinkpad Tablet 2 was a little bit too small to work as a primary machine (switched to a Helix 2 for that), I re-paired the bluetooth keyboard w/optical trackpoint with my tablet. The keyboard fits inside my jacket. I can't express quite how wonderful it is on the occasions I don't have a bag with me to still be able to have a proper keyboard+mouse setup when something goes sideways.

seanwilson 10y ago

> I consider myself a developer, and I almost never use the Fn and ESC keys on my Mac. ESC usage just off the top of my head: cancelling any dropdown (e.g. IDE autocomplete, browser autocomplete, Spotlight, quick file search in Atom/Sublime), cancelling any OK/cancel dialog (e.g. save as), the ESC + '.' sequence in Bash to get the last word of the last command. I could map ESC to the caps lock key I suppose.

rch 10y ago
I actually use the caps lock key sometimes, e.g. FORTRAN 77.
mcphage 10y ago
If you go to the current Apple homepage, the first image they present you with shows the Esc key right there. So all of those things you currently do with it? You'll still be able to do with it.

deleted 10y ago

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mrmondo 10y ago

You are not the only one, took the words out of my mouth

jbmorgado 10y ago

Well, he goes trough more than the bar. I have a 2013 15" MacBook Pro, the diference with the top of the line that came out yesterday comes down a slight bump in the dedicated Graphics Card (which I don't appreciate since I use CUDA a lot and as such I actually prefer the GTX 750M to a only slightly better AMD card in the new model), and a 0.1 GHz bump in the processor (back from the 2.3 GHz i7 my MacBook Pro has). I do understand that taking out the Esc and F* keys and replace it for a smart bar can be seen as a valid design option, but I can't see how shipping a Laptop 3 years later with, lets face it, basically the same specs and ask for the same price can be something positive.

trapperkeeper79 10y ago
I'm surprised why more devs are not getting upset at the lack of an Nvidia GPU option.
- jbmorgado 10y ago
  About devs I'm not sure, but I use it a lot at work for simulations (optimised for CUDA) and some Deep Learning and the Nvidia card is a must.
copperx 10y ago
> ask for the same price can be something positive. Didn't they bump up the base price?
- jbmorgado 10y ago
  They did, but this is the top of the line option. The price for that one remained the same.

bisby 10y ago

As a vim user, esc is pretty important. I would say the author clearly knows very little computer specs: "The MacBook Pro had options with 2.4 gigahertz dual-core processors back in 2010. Anything new in 2016? Not really, well… nope." Because a 2010 2.4ghz dual core is identical to a 2016 2.4 ghz dual core.... I thought we got over comparing processors purely by their clock speed a long time ago. (I will agree that theyve been going with lower and lower power to allow for better battery life, this is a terrible way to make the comparison. Id much rather see a processor comparison graph here). Personally I think this is a terrible decision, but then again, I think using a laptop keyboard for programming is a terrible decision too. I need multiple monitors and an external keyboard to get anything done, so I typically use a desktop, and then use a lightweight laptop (basically a chromebook) to remote into the desktop if I absolutely need to be mobile. Also, "What other people are saying" and then listing 4 anecdotal quotes seems pretty uncompelling. I imagine this is not a great developer's laptop. But apple fanboys will keep buying it and either stop using vim just so they can keep using apple or buy an external keyboard. And Im really not sure what else you could really want out of a laptop then.

trevor-e 10y ago
I think rather than stop using vim people will remap the ESC key to something else, like caps lock, which many already do.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
boardwaalk 10y ago
http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Avoid_the_escape_key http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Avoid_the_escape_key
- blowski 10y ago
  My laptop should work the way I want it to, not the other way around.

Kurtz79 10y ago

I find really amusing that after the Macbook reveal last year half of the response comments (in sites like ArsTechnica) were of the gist "just give me an updated Macbook Air, with the same form factor and a better screen". Well, the base Macbook Pro model does exactly that. There is also an option (cheaper!) to keep the function keys. http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/10/no-new-macbook-airs-as-apple-instead-makes-lower-end-1500-macbook-pro/ http://arstechnica.com/apple/2016/10/no-new-macbook-airs-as-... I might be getting old and grumpy, but more than anything else it boggles my mind when apparently everyone believes they should be the target user Apple (or Microsoft, or Google,or...) design their product for, and they consider a personal insult when that is not the case. I don't think there was ever a time where the laptop market had so many options, at all price levels, many of those of such a high quality. You don't like that a particular manufacturer is offering ? Vote with your wallet and choose another option, don't whine.

ishbits 10y ago
I think there are lot of us who may never have really like Mac hardware, but find the OS is the best option out there to get our work done. Its just a little sad it locks us to specific hardware platform as well.

fuj 10y ago

Here we go again... why are you people so blind in following a brand. Apple, Google, Tesla, etc. It's ridiculous. Whatever those companies do, it's always good. I use a mbp everyday, but I have no problems with saying how stupid this is and I don't even use vim. Are you seriously saying, that removing the ESC and Functions keys is not issue and does not affect you, as developer?! If you use your mbp for Facebook or if you program in Visual Basic, then I might understand.

usernam 10y ago

I've used the Lenovo's "adaptive keyboard". It's crap to use, especially for development. FN keys are especially easy to remap for macros or lesser used functions, and having no haptic feedback essentially kills their function for a touch typist. It's also no wonder that newer carbon models came back to regular fn keys. I actually bought/buy macbooks for their build quality, and generally only install linux on them. Looks like this particular model marks the end of this path.

TheOtherHobbes 10y ago

I think it's a completely fair post. Devs are a huge market for Apple, but Apple is ignoring them. This isn't about ESC, it's about whether Apple has any interest in acknowledging the dev market and keeping devs on board. The answer is "no." Apple is making no concessions to developers or professional power users who need performance. Instead, Apple is producing vanilla-grade laptops with a touch of gimmicky brand frosting to justify the high price. The real heuristic is skimping on performance and connectivity to maintain margins. The cost to users is significant lost productivity. This is the MacBook Pro Intern Edition. It could have been more, but that's where Apple is now.

PopsiclePete 10y ago
They're ignoring the giant behemoth that is ....Vim users..? What? Wait till the EMACS crowd gets a whiff of how Apple refuses to sell pedals for their keybindings, then Apple is truly in trouble. Look, I know VIM is popular, but so is XCode, so is Sublime, so is Atom, so is TextMate, so is a multitude of other text editors for God's sake, that to claim that Apple is somehow "abandoning the entire software development community", as if VIM users somehow speak for all of them, is pretty whiny and unrealistic. Do you think Apple really worries that a bunch of what, Open Source "hackers" producing yet another Ruby testing framework are now going to abandon their platform? Seriously? Get off your high horse, man. There's thousands of Visual Studio developers in the Windows world and thousands of XCode developers in the OS X world who don't give two shits about your 1970's vintage terminal mode text editor. Apple will be fine. Software developers (again, a much larger group than you obviously think) are also going to be fine. And aren't you guys always bragging what power users you are? So now that one (remappable!!!!) key is gone your entire world is crashing around you? If you're such a fossil that you can't adapt to the absence of this one key, that already is of extremely limited use for 99.9% of people, how did you cope with the disappearance of the floppy disk, the caps lock key, the parallel port, VGA, optical disc drives? How did you ever adjust from storing backups of your code on floppy disks once that went away? What happens when Windows laptops one day follow suit and remove the Escape key and the (just as useless) Caps Lock key? If VIM users can't adapt to a simple change such as this, maybe you deserve to fade to irrelevancy? Just keep buying 2008-era laptops off Ebay well into the 2030's, I guess? Truly pathetic rants, truly.

laichzeit0 10y ago

I put it to you that you've never used a debugger if you've never used Fn keys.

nogbit 10y ago
Visual Studio is the only place I've really used the function keys (F5, F10, F11), and I rarely use VS anymore. Outside of that I use F2 when in any kind of GUI that permits renaming of a file or folder. All of which can be rebound.
- dump121 10y ago
  What about IntelliJ or Chrome or any IDE for that matter.
pklausler 10y ago
I use gdb and never use function keys.
snowwrestler 10y ago
To use the function keys on an old MacBook Pro, you have to chord with the "fn" key to override the brightness, volume, etc controls. To use the functions keys in the touch bar in the new MacBook Pro, you have to chord with the "fn" key as well. So where is the difference...
- mikejmoffitt 10y ago
  It has always been possible to set those keys to default to F-key functions instead of media functions. The difference here is that the position may not be constant, and you can't feel with your fingers what you're over before you commit to activating the function, so you must look. In some contexts you can "get used to it", but this is a steeper uphill battle.
  - snowwrestler 10y ago
    I would not be surprised if one of the customizations of the touch bar is to set the function keys as the default.

EugeneOZ 10y ago

I'm a programmer and I'm pretty sure most of developers use F-keys and, especially, esc button. Let's believe together :)

legohead 10y ago

Do you use USB or HDMI? You don't use any of the function keys on a mac, like volume, brightness, play/pause? I use those constantly. And then the lackluster specs. That alone leaves me no real reason to upgrade.

antihero 10y ago

The claims about CPU MHz are hilarious, too. It's an entirely different CPU generation.

steele 10y ago

Apple didn't need to remove the Fn row to have their touch bar.

Erikun 10y ago

Surely the weird thing about removing the escape key is that it is used to bring up the force quit menu (cmd-option-esc). Pretty ingrained in my mind at least, but to be fair not needed that often.

cptskippy 10y ago

> I almost never use the Fn and ESC keys on my Mac. While my primary isn't a Mac, my default left hand resting position on my keyboard is index finger on ESC and thumb on ALT.

overgard 10y ago

Developer here. Dealbreaker for me. All my tools heavily use function keys and escape. If I had no other options I'd just deal with it, but Apple is competing with themselves: since they didn't bother to upgrade the actual performance, I have no incentive to move from my current macbook. And when I do, I'll probably just buy a different brand if they don't release a laptop that's actually useful for me.

snowwrestler 10y ago
Non-developer here. The new MacBook has both an escape key and function keys, as could clearly be seen in the demos and screenshots on Apple.com. So all your tools will still work. Saying the new MacBook doesn't have an escape key is like saying the iPhone doesn't have an "L" key. It does when you need it to.

PascLeRasc 10y ago

I use the F keys a lot in Matlab, but I'd guess that Matlab users are just as much a minority of developers that developers are of Mac users, so I can see why it's not a big deal to Apple. Maybe Mathworks will add some of the functionality to the touch bar anyway.

snowwolf 10y ago

The ESC key should hardly be a deal breaker for Vim devs - most remap it to caps lock on a Mac because it's easier to reach. The 13" model has a version that keeps that row anyway. And the Touch Bar does still have a function key row/view? with ESC. MacVim and iTerm could probably add the functionality that the whole row is an ESC key when they are the active apps. For me though, Apple got it wrong by releasing a gimmick (touch bar) which may be useful for some groups of Pro users (designers/film editors?) but I can't see adding much value to what I think is their largest group - software developers. For me my ideal developer laptop is small, light and powerful. So while it's great the Pro is now the same size and weight as the air (13" model), I think they could have gone even smaller - see the Dell XPS 13. A 13" full powered (i7, 16GB ram) in a 12" body (by having an edge to edge 'infinity' screen). Basically they should have released a MacBook that can run an i7 and 16GB ram.

syngrog66 10y ago

a huge number of technical types use vim and other CLI/Terminal type tools daily. There are many tools and apps that assume the Escape key exists.

thecodewarrior 10y ago

'almost never use the Fn or ESC keys' Then I'll wager your knowledge of the capabilities of the apps you use is limited and if you are developing UIs I'll bet that while you consider them slick and sophisticated, they are in reality limited and inefficient.