5 ms·

The problem with tablets is they're incredibly limited. The hardware seems to improve with every generation, but specifically in the instance of iOS: the softwa

The problem with tablets is they're incredibly limited. The hardware seems to improve with every generation, but specifically in the instance of iOS: the software seems to be stagnate. What's the point in having super fast storage, quad core processors and fast memory if the software is so limiting and horrible it doesn't let you take advantage of it? As a developer, I find iOS to be a horrible operating system and very limited. If you want to surf the web or play games then the iPad is great for that. The same thing applies for Android tablets, however I find Android tablets to be slightly more developer friendly because you can hack them and access powerful applications. Bottom line is tablets can never replace computers or laptops.

danieldk 10y ago
The same thing applies for Android tablets, however I find Android tablets to be slightly more developer friendly But Android tablets are also awful. Although I am primarily an Apple user and my wife uses an iPad, we bought an higher-end ASUS tablet based on Atom for me and our daughter (to watch cartoons on long car trips). The tablet came bloated with all kinds of nonsense apps, of which more than half cannot be removed or disabled. Android updates stopped after a year or so. It had an SD card slot, but it could only be used for a small subset of applications. The Nexus 7 2013 that we owned was better in the lack of crapware department. But the last Android update was in 2015 (6.0.1). After some iPads and the Nexus 7/ASUS adventures, I decided to stop using tablets completely. Laptops have become so light and compact that it's easy to take them to meetings (especially the MacBook 12" is great in this regard). As a bonus, I can just store my notes, etc. in plain text (org mode) in git, rather than being locked in some cloud silo.
- bostand 10y ago
  Nexus 7 was updated in 2016. Asus is king of crapware, never buy Asus.
- icebraining 10y ago
  As a bonus, I can just store my notes, etc. in plain text (org mode) in git, rather than being locked in some cloud silo. Not a bonus: on Android, you can use MobileOrg+SyncOrg (which syncs to any git remote). Or you can use Emacs on the terminal and sync using a generic generic git client like SGit.
  - danieldk 10y ago
    Or you can use Emacs on the terminal and sync using a generic generic git client like SGit. Not practical for my use case: the screen is too small, does not render LaTeX equations inline, etc.
- kitsunesoba 10y ago
  My experience with Android tablets has also been dismal. I've had two: a first (maybe second?) gen Kindle Fire rooted Cyanogenmod and more recently a Pixel C purchased with the dev discount. The first was kinda slow and heavy, and its display was too low DPI to use it for extended reading. All that was somewhat forgivable given that it wasn't supposed to run anything but Amazon's flavor of android, and, well, it's old. Running phone apps on it wasn't too bad since it's a 7" tablet. The Pixel though... its hardware was nice. It looked nice, felt nice, and for the most part, handled nicely (though its bezels had be accidentally tapping things on the screen frequently). The problem is that its WiFi drivers were horrible and as it turns out, the cracks in the android experience are much more visible when running on modern, powerful hardware. Lots of bits just felt janky, disjointed, or sluggish. None of the browsers I tried were as nice as mobile Safari, though Firefox came closest, which is weird to me — why isn't Google's browser the best on Google's OS and Google's hardware? Beyond that, the C's full size form factor made the lack of quality tablet apps on Android blindingly apparent. More often than not I had to settle for stretched out phone apps, which look and feel like crap on such a large screen. To be fair, the tiny handful of good tablet apps I found were very well-made, but they were far too rare. I'd also say Android's dev/hacker-friendliness is arguable. Yes, one can side load unsigned apps, which is cool. To me, though, this point is nearly moot due to the quality disparity between the Android SDK and dev ecosystem vs the same of iOS. Perhaps I'm biased, but barring projects where iOS doesn't provide the necessary hardware access or something, I'd almost always do my prototypes and v1s on iOS and port to Android later when demand drums up than vice versa, simply due to time and frustration saved.
bostand 10y ago
What do you think of the recent windows 10 tablets?
- digi_owl 10y ago
  Ugh. While i have not tried MS own Surface line, i have a 8" Windows tablet here, and it is basically a mess. MS has basically taken their Phone patform and bolted it onto desktop Windows. Thus you either have painfully limited phone apps (that you need a MS account just to download even when free) or you have the Win32 UI stuff that is a mess on touch screens (small widgets, easy to accidentally drag-n-drop, ever-present close button near the screen edge, etc etc etc). The Surface line may work a bit better because they have a pen to use, but at that point you are basically emulating a mouse via different means to get around the worst of the Win32 UI issues.
aaronbrethorst 10y ago
> What's the point in having super fast storage, quad core processors and fast memory if the software is so limiting and horrible it doesn't let you take advantage of it? That's kind of a funny thing to say given that one of the hallmark features of Android 'O' is them locking down what developers can do with the operating system: https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2017/03/first-preview-of-android-o.html https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2017/03/first-prev... Check out the very first feature mentioned, Background Limits.
mrweasel 10y ago
>If you want to surf the web or play games then the iPad is great for that I don't even think they're particularly good at surfing the web. The interface on the iPad (and perhaps tablets in general) is simply too limited to be useful for much other than basic surfing. It's annoying really, because many sites try to be tablet friendly and ruin their desktop experience to fit the tablet needs, but the tablet still isn't really as good as the desktop ever was. You may be correct in that it's the software, personally I think it's the touch screen that's the limiting factor.
baldfat 10y ago
You sound like the person who would really like a Pro Surface. I am a Linux head but the build is quality and the ease of tablet like duty is amazing. I used my friends with a frown and then I became really envious of the form factor and quality. I think this is the future of non-Apple laptops.
- Veratyr 10y ago
  Minor thing but I think perhaps you meant Surface Pro? https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/devices/surface-pro-4/overview https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/devices/surface-pro-...
Arizhel 10y ago
They're not good for surfing the web either, they're just better than phones, purely because of the larger screen. They still have all the same limitations, especially with the lack of a keyboard. I could browse Reddit or HN on a tablet, but there's no way to write my own comments longer than maybe one sentence because there's no keyboard. So it's fine for reading news stories, but that's about it; anything that involves interaction is just too cumbersome to bother. And if you suggest hauling around a separate keyboard, now you've made it so I might as well just bring my laptop.
digi_owl 10y ago
Sad part is that Android could have been there, except that Google got into a civil war between Android and ChromeOS, with the latter winning. Thus Android as anything more than a glorified media player OS sat stagnant for 5 years.

danieldk 10y ago

The same thing applies for Android tablets, however I find Android tablets to be slightly more developer friendly But Android tablets are also awful. Although I am primarily an Apple user and my wife uses an iPad, we bought an higher-end ASUS tablet based on Atom for me and our daughter (to watch cartoons on long car trips). The tablet came bloated with all kinds of nonsense apps, of which more than half cannot be removed or disabled. Android updates stopped after a year or so. It had an SD card slot, but it could only be used for a small subset of applications. The Nexus 7 2013 that we owned was better in the lack of crapware department. But the last Android update was in 2015 (6.0.1). After some iPads and the Nexus 7/ASUS adventures, I decided to stop using tablets completely. Laptops have become so light and compact that it's easy to take them to meetings (especially the MacBook 12" is great in this regard). As a bonus, I can just store my notes, etc. in plain text (org mode) in git, rather than being locked in some cloud silo.

bostand 10y ago
Nexus 7 was updated in 2016. Asus is king of crapware, never buy Asus.
icebraining 10y ago
As a bonus, I can just store my notes, etc. in plain text (org mode) in git, rather than being locked in some cloud silo. Not a bonus: on Android, you can use MobileOrg+SyncOrg (which syncs to any git remote). Or you can use Emacs on the terminal and sync using a generic generic git client like SGit.
- danieldk 10y ago
  Or you can use Emacs on the terminal and sync using a generic generic git client like SGit. Not practical for my use case: the screen is too small, does not render LaTeX equations inline, etc.
kitsunesoba 10y ago
My experience with Android tablets has also been dismal. I've had two: a first (maybe second?) gen Kindle Fire rooted Cyanogenmod and more recently a Pixel C purchased with the dev discount. The first was kinda slow and heavy, and its display was too low DPI to use it for extended reading. All that was somewhat forgivable given that it wasn't supposed to run anything but Amazon's flavor of android, and, well, it's old. Running phone apps on it wasn't too bad since it's a 7" tablet. The Pixel though... its hardware was nice. It looked nice, felt nice, and for the most part, handled nicely (though its bezels had be accidentally tapping things on the screen frequently). The problem is that its WiFi drivers were horrible and as it turns out, the cracks in the android experience are much more visible when running on modern, powerful hardware. Lots of bits just felt janky, disjointed, or sluggish. None of the browsers I tried were as nice as mobile Safari, though Firefox came closest, which is weird to me — why isn't Google's browser the best on Google's OS and Google's hardware? Beyond that, the C's full size form factor made the lack of quality tablet apps on Android blindingly apparent. More often than not I had to settle for stretched out phone apps, which look and feel like crap on such a large screen. To be fair, the tiny handful of good tablet apps I found were very well-made, but they were far too rare. I'd also say Android's dev/hacker-friendliness is arguable. Yes, one can side load unsigned apps, which is cool. To me, though, this point is nearly moot due to the quality disparity between the Android SDK and dev ecosystem vs the same of iOS. Perhaps I'm biased, but barring projects where iOS doesn't provide the necessary hardware access or something, I'd almost always do my prototypes and v1s on iOS and port to Android later when demand drums up than vice versa, simply due to time and frustration saved.

bostand 10y ago

What do you think of the recent windows 10 tablets?

digi_owl 10y ago
Ugh. While i have not tried MS own Surface line, i have a 8" Windows tablet here, and it is basically a mess. MS has basically taken their Phone patform and bolted it onto desktop Windows. Thus you either have painfully limited phone apps (that you need a MS account just to download even when free) or you have the Win32 UI stuff that is a mess on touch screens (small widgets, easy to accidentally drag-n-drop, ever-present close button near the screen edge, etc etc etc). The Surface line may work a bit better because they have a pen to use, but at that point you are basically emulating a mouse via different means to get around the worst of the Win32 UI issues.

aaronbrethorst 10y ago

> What's the point in having super fast storage, quad core processors and fast memory if the software is so limiting and horrible it doesn't let you take advantage of it? That's kind of a funny thing to say given that one of the hallmark features of Android 'O' is them locking down what developers can do with the operating system: https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2017/03/first-preview-of-android-o.html https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2017/03/first-prev... Check out the very first feature mentioned, Background Limits.

mrweasel 10y ago

>If you want to surf the web or play games then the iPad is great for that I don't even think they're particularly good at surfing the web. The interface on the iPad (and perhaps tablets in general) is simply too limited to be useful for much other than basic surfing. It's annoying really, because many sites try to be tablet friendly and ruin their desktop experience to fit the tablet needs, but the tablet still isn't really as good as the desktop ever was. You may be correct in that it's the software, personally I think it's the touch screen that's the limiting factor.

baldfat 10y ago

You sound like the person who would really like a Pro Surface. I am a Linux head but the build is quality and the ease of tablet like duty is amazing. I used my friends with a frown and then I became really envious of the form factor and quality. I think this is the future of non-Apple laptops.

Veratyr 10y ago
Minor thing but I think perhaps you meant Surface Pro? https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/devices/surface-pro-4/overview https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/devices/surface-pro-...

Arizhel 10y ago

They're not good for surfing the web either, they're just better than phones, purely because of the larger screen. They still have all the same limitations, especially with the lack of a keyboard. I could browse Reddit or HN on a tablet, but there's no way to write my own comments longer than maybe one sentence because there's no keyboard. So it's fine for reading news stories, but that's about it; anything that involves interaction is just too cumbersome to bother. And if you suggest hauling around a separate keyboard, now you've made it so I might as well just bring my laptop.

digi_owl 10y ago

Sad part is that Android could have been there, except that Google got into a civil war between Android and ChromeOS, with the latter winning. Thus Android as anything more than a glorified media player OS sat stagnant for 5 years.