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UI experiments like this show that what a lot of pro users want for iOS on the iPad is for it to become a Mac. Maybe a Mac with a touch UI mode and a more mode

UI experiments like this show that what a lot of pro users want for iOS on the iPad is for it to become a Mac. Maybe a Mac with a touch UI mode and a more modern architecture, that is cleaner and has a more restrictive security model - but still a Mac. They'll say they don't for purity reasons, but their desires show otherwise: - Add ways to show multiple apps on screen at once (e.g. windows – but because they don't overlap, oh except for slide-over items, then it's new and therefore they don't have to admit they are asking for windows) - Add a hardware keyboard - Make the hardware case with keyboard into a laptop form factor - Add a touchpad - Add a way to drag and drop items between on screen apps - Add keyboard shortcuts - Add the Finder, oh sorry, I mean Files.app - Add a menu bar for Pro apps - Next they'll ask for a menu item to appear onscreen when an item is force touched; e.g. right click contextual menus Congratulations, you've invented a MacBook. At least you'll feel good about yourself as you can now think you're using "the future of computing" instead of simply an evolved version of what everyone was using a decade ago. This is a pessimistic but IMO true evaluation of how techies who are proud of themselves for using an iPad for 'real computing' self evaluate the decision.

bunnycorn 8y ago
There's no touchpad, and the iPad is still very different from the Mac in ways that are more significant than your list of details. For example, yes, there's a finder, but the places where you put files are 100% abstract, can be a hard drive, can be a SFTP, can be a cloud service that when offline, saves to the local storage and then uploads, can be a lazy extracting zip file, etc. The most significant way that iOS differs from macOS (or Windows 10 or whatever) is that in iOS every action is accounted for and proper permission is enforced.
- happybuy 8y ago
  > There's no touchpad Yet... with many of the Apple technorati asking for one and saying it's a necessary next step. > in iOS every action is accounted for and proper permission is enforced Yes, so this is the Mac with a more restrictive security model as referenced in the first comment. Apple is moving the macOS towards this with the Sandbox and how app extensions are structured.
  - oneeyedpigeon 8y ago
    > Yes, so this is the Mac with a more restrictive security model Maybe this is exactly why people want the changes to the iPad. They want a more powerful iPad rather than a less powerful Mac.
  - coldtea 8y ago
    >Yet... with many of the Apple technorati asking for one and saying it's a necessary next step. Never read any "Apple technorati", much alone "many", asking for one.
    - exergy 8y ago
      All the iPad reviews on youtube, Marques, Dave2D, the Verge...they were all crying out for a chance to fully exploit the blindingly fast A12 chip with software to match. Specifically multiple displays and mouse support.
      - coldtea 8y ago
        So, no touchpad mentioned.
        exergy 8y ago
        Ah, sorry, did you mean a Macbook with touch capabilities? In which case Linus has shouted himself hoarse begging for MacOS to adopt touchscreens. And I agree with him. I own a Surface. Having a touchscreen is one of those things that, for some at least, becomes a must have. For me it helps it walk the line between productivity machine and Youtube-while-cooking-dinner tablet.
        coldtea 8y ago
        Linus (for other readers: not Torvalds) is a random YouTuber, not an "Apple technoratti", which was the original claim -- that would be someone like Gruber, Jason Snell, the guys at The Loop, 9to5 Mac, Apple Insider, and so on). Original claim: "There's no touchpad Yet... with many of the Apple technorati asking for one and saying it's a necessary next step" Have actual "apple technoratti" asked for a touchpad? I never read one do so. Have they asked for touchscreens? Some did, some are against. In any case, I don't exactly see the reasoning. iPad is criticized because it doesn't have mouse support, and the Mac is criticized because it doesn't have touch support. As if a hybrid model wont have all the problems the Surface has -- (touch not that useful when using a keyboard, and mouse-based apps not that useful with touch) --and presumably the kind of lackluster sales the Surface has compared to the iPad.
- ubercow13 8y ago
  >can be a hard drive, can be a SFTP, can be a cloud service that when offline, saves to the local storage and then uploads, can be a lazy extracting zip file, etc. Just like you might have using various fuse filesystems on a laptop
  - lloeki 8y ago
    Or, possibly more accurately, GVFS/KIO
  - bunnycorn 8y ago
    FUSE is not standard in desktops. And you can't get custom UI.
- steve_taylor 8y ago
  > There's no touchpad 3D touch (or two-finger touch on non-3D touch devices) on the keyboard turns it into a trackpad of sorts, allowing you to move the cursor freely around the focused input.
  - bunnycorn 8y ago
    Is it a touchpad? No.
fredsted 8y ago
I feel that what Apple is doing with the iPad is trying to create a whole new separate paradigm of computing with glass slabs, without re-using the good ideas from the Mac. Whether it's pride or something else, they simply can't make themselves do a dual-use operating system (e.g. support for overlapping windows, mouse, file management - while still having good support for touch), so they are forced to come up with totally new ways of interacting with devices. While that's pretty interesting and totally fine, there is also a reason why modern MacBooks (and computers in general) are the way they are, so all the solutions are second-rate, and it's why professional users will always feel limited when using the iPad for things that are not just watching YouTube videos.
- katbyte 8y ago
  I would love a MacBook with touch, and even better a MacBook that transforms into an iPad.
  - bodi 8y ago
    A Surface that runs macOS.
    - jen729w 8y ago
      Not really. Have you seen a Surface? They’re fucking enormous. Say what you like about the new iPad, it’s amazingly thin.
      - zozbot123 8y ago
        The Surface Go is not "f'in enormous". It's as small as a vintage netbook, or an iPad (not "Pro") with an added keyboard.
      - shaklee3 8y ago
        The surface book 2 is one of the lightest laptops available.
      - ianai 8y ago
zozbot123 8y ago
> Add ways to show multiple apps on screen at once (e.g. windows – but because they don't overlap, oh except for slide-over items So, like i3wm. Makes sense on a small screen, I guess (the iPad mini is 8 in., even the iPad "Pro" is no larger than 13 in.)
miguelrochefort 8y ago
I'm still waiting for the OS that will have the courage to truly innovate. I had high hopes for webOS and Windows Phone, but they're both dead. I'm now waiting for Fuchsia. I expect to be disappointed. Maybe I'll need to show them?
- josteink 8y ago
  > I had high hopes for webOS and Windows Phone, but they're both dead. I'm now waiting for Fuchsia. But Fuschia is a kernel and as far as I can tell, Google’s in-place Linux-replacement for Android so that they can finally “escape” the GPL and do a full lockdown. Fuschia won’t bring you any interesting new, user-facing features.
  - miguelrochefort 8y ago
    There was a UI for Fuchsia called Armadillo, but they got rid of it. It looks like they're working on 3 new UIs: https://9to5google.com/2018/12/26/fuchsia-armadillo-ui-gone/ https://9to5google.com/2018/12/26/fuchsia-armadillo-ui-gone/
threeseed 8y ago
1) You can have multiple apps at once. 2) You can have a hardware keyboard which makes it into a laptop form factor. 3) You can drag/drop between screen apps. 4) You have keyboard shortcuts. So many of those wishlist items already exist.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
mch82 8y ago
It seems like this blog post introduces a new menu feature in a pending release of Codea, an iOS app for programming that has been used to create other apps that sold millions of copies. It’s exciting to see Codea trying to figure out how to bring app creation to iOS because Xcode is the last Mac-only app preventing me from an iPad only life. I agree that it’s a mistake to create iPad apps bound by the constraints of legacy technology (terminal windows, keyboards, typed code). However, the Codea editor has rethought many aspects of a PC editor for a touch interface. Some of them instantly make sense (like contextual color pickers or sliders for values), and some of them can still be improved.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  > Some of them instantly make sense (like contextual color pickers or sliders for values), and some of them can still be improved. Swift Playgrounds has something similar.
  - mch82 8y ago
    Codea has been available on iOS for 6 years & I recall they introduced the feature first, so I’m wondering if Swift Playgrounds got the idea from Codea
    - Pulcinella 8y ago
      I think a lot of the Swift Playgrounds ideas are “officially” acknowledged to have been inspired by that Bret victor “Inventing on Principle” talk.
pickpuck 8y ago
Then to accommodate all users, the perfect lineup sounds like: * iPhone - iOS (touch only) * iPad - iOS (touch only) * iPad Pro - iOS "Plus" (iPad + attachable keyboard/trackpad) * MacBook - iOS "Plus" (iPad + built-in keyboard/trackpad) * MacBook Pro - macOS * iMac - macOS * Mac Pro - macOS
- xattt 8y ago
  I can see the iOS iteration of the MacBook be called the iBook.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
coldtea 8y ago
>Congratulations, you've invented a MacBook. At least you'll feel good about yourself as you can now think you're using "the future of computing" instead of simply an evolved version of what everyone was using a decade ago. You miss the big picture. Creating "an evolved version of what everyone was using a decade ago" is the very idea, and that's precisely why they are entitled to feel good about themselves. They could make the iPad run full OS X with Finder and overlapping windows and everything and call it a day, all in a month or so (most of the time taken for things like driver support). But they don't want to "invent a MacBook". They want to get the iPad to be personal-computer-like powerful, without the negatives of the full PC experience. (Negatives for the masses, not for people who use Vim and Emacs and take pride in menial tasks like "organizing their file hierarchy"). For which, this iterative approach and enforced boundaries is exactly what's needed. E.g. they want to add a hardware keyboard, but make it entirely optional. So things should be touch-first-class (and not "also touch" like with Surface and co). They want multiple apps on screen but not the tedium of window management. For which the split screen (or eventually a tiled wm) makes more sense. And so on.
- exergy 8y ago
  I cannot conceive of any future where the eventual upshot of all of this isn't...a Surface Pro. The thing is, there is nowhere left for Apple to go. What else can they do with iOS? They will be forced to make iOS more powerful and that MUST include things like proper file management, multiple windows, displays, mouse support etc...aka a Surface Pro. Perhaps a more pleasing-to-look-at iteration than Windows 10, and better quality native apps, but a Surface Pro nevertheless.
  - coldtea 8y ago
    >I cannot conceive of any future where the eventual upshot of all of this isn't...a Surface Pro. Well, Ford's customers couldn't conceive of a future where the eventual upshot wouldn't be ...faster horses either. >The thing is, there is nowhere left for Apple to go Because we have exhausted UI paradigms and interaction design? >and that MUST include things like proper file management, multiple windows, displays, mouse support etc...aka a Surface Pro. The "aka a Surface Pro" is where you're wrong though. All of what you ask for can be answered by "just buy a Mac laptop" today. There's absolutely no reason for anyone to want an iPad that does all that -- except to get a laptop with touchscreen hybrid. But those are not exactly some wide success in the PC world either. The iPad serves a need without desktop-features. And it sells 10s of millions of units (10x or more than the Surface) every year without these features. The ability to get a desktop OS-X experience is not why iPads are bought. Here's how it can play out: E.g.: - "Proper file management" can be abstracted totally from storage as far as the apps are concerned, like iOS already does, and have powerful metadata properties and searchability (the way Microsoft tried and failed with their WinFS project). So not like Surface of today, or regular Finder-like file management. - Multiple windows can be non-overlapping, and develop into a tiling/snapping mechanism. OSes have already disfavored the once dominant MDI windows (and even third party apps have, e.g. Photoshop of yore with Photoshop of today). This can be a next step. - displays, the iPad Pro already supports external displays. - mouse support, this can or cannot be added, but if the table factor has to have any meaning it has to be secondary to the touch experience (so apps should be prepared to work in 100% touch mode). More importantly, the main premise of the iPad is the hassle free device management. Apps are all sandboxed, the OS is dead simple to configure, zero viruses, everything backed to the cloud, etc. Those are the avenues that will be enhanced and expanded, not how to run IDEs. It's not 'full customizability and power to run any niche pro app', it's 'it just works'. Pro apps will came (and in several sectors have come), but only by respecting the "it just works" part.
criddell 8y ago
> UI experiments like this show that what a lot of pro users want for iOS on the iPad is for it to become a Mac. I have a hard time understanding this. Why make the iPad into a Mac? If that's what you want, then get a Mac. My gripe with the iPad is that on larger screens, the somewhat sparse grid of app icons seems a little silly. They could at least increase the density. I hope they don't change the character of the iPad because right now it's my favorite computer to use.
interpol_p 8y ago
I think you could come up with a list of features and line them up and say that the iPad is basically reinventing the Mac. And it is, to some extent. I don't think that's a bad thing to happen right now. All I can say with absolute certainty is that it feels different to work and code on my iPad and iPhone than it does on my Mac. You outline very specific features that have since come (or will come) to iPad. But there are many less tangible "features" that really influence how it feels to use these computing devices. For example, I edit all my photos on my phone. I never thought I'd do that a decade ago, but I do. The screen is better there. The photos are already there. The editing tools are great. The phone is faster. They get shared easier from there. There's now an entirely different emotional context around editing photos. Another example is that it's far easier to turn on my phone or iPad. Opening my laptop is a heavy operation, often I'm sitting at my desk. It's work time. But just two days ago I was at the playground with my kids, I had some time to myself so I edited the very blog post we're commenting on, on my phone. I even edited some of the videos there. That's another one that I just keep doing on the phone. Editing videos. I keep using Apple's Clips app instead of Final Cut Pro because it's just so instant, and fun, and light-weight. And no one notices or cares about what the resulting video was made in if it's good. So by using git, and Codea, and building shaders on these devices we start to find out how we can differently fit more creative tasks into our lives. The Mac may never be replaced. But I might find that prototyping a game idea happens more often on my iPad or iPhone, simply because it's there when my laptop is not there. If that means we end up reinventing some of the Mac UI paradigms for iOS, so what? The physical devices themselves are so much more pervasive and instant that they are creating new use cases just because of how we hold them and feel about holding them.
blueboo 8y ago
> UI experiments like this show that what a lot of pro users want for iOS on the iPad is for it to become a Mac. So wrong! Down is up! Freedom is slavery! UI experiments like this show that -developers who make UI experiments like this- want it to become a Mac. And for God's sake let's not look to engineers' desires for UX cues. Engineers are so hellaciously picky about their setups -- imagine bridging the gap between Swift Playgrounds and customizing zsh -- that asking for nothing less than a full laptop is foregone conclusion. If we look at other "pro" users, however -- particularly in music and graphic design, you find -users- (here, we're not confusing users with developers making experiments) using these mobile devices for their virtues and not despite them. They're mobile slate notepads, ultra-reliable performance surfaces, or rich instant cameras. Plenty of shops have tried to create super-pro apps in this space. They've got rich and powerful interfaces that push well beyond typical UIKit. They're beautiful, expensive and unpopular (Audulus 3, Moog Model 15, Korg Gadget) The OP shop is going down this road, sadly. Try their shader editor -- it's beautifully done. And assuming the bugs get ironed out it will be celebrated as a beautiful and capable shader node editor for your phone...and then laid aside.
- mbrock 8y ago
  I think there's a certain economistic mindset that has a hard time dealing with how a more restricted interface can actually be more inspiring and productive. If all the measurable quantities are smaller, how could it possibly be better?
graeme 8y ago
Almost all of those already exist on an ipad, but it's not a macbook. I can't tell if you're saying an ipad is a macbook or if you genuinely don't know that all but 1 or 2 of those features exist.
jhack 8y ago
Hm, it's almost like the iPad and iOS aren't suitable environments to get real work done unless you're an artist.
hrktb 8y ago
I reread a few times but can’t get the gist of what you want to express. What does “become a mac” mean ? At this point the most defining trait of a mac is to have no touch input, so the iPad becoming a mac makes no sense to me. Otherwise what you are describing is growing a platform and adding features. Cherry picking stuff that were on the mac before doesn’t really mean much when there’s many other features that have no relation to the mac (face id, ARKit, pencil support, shortcuts, MLKit etc.) while the mac also gets iOS features. It seems you are mostly saying that the iPad has matured ?
tolmasky 8y ago
This is what happens when you abdicate leadership in your own platform. The only reason it seems like people want to replicate their mac is because they’re actually excited about the potential of the iPad and would like to move to the iPad fully as there’s nothing necessarily preventing that short of the workflows existing. But if in the 8 years since the release of the iPad you do almost nothing to accommodate these users (and you need look no further than the absurd behavior of receiving a phone call taking over your ENTIRE screen even if you are mid-drawing in the best made for iPad art tool), then people will start coming up with their own solutions, which often just look like mimicking the past. If Apple were to focus on the iPad instead of the watch and car and what-have-you, they could have had the bandwidth to show us alternative solutions.
envelopes 8y ago
I mean, you’re not wrong. But phone-sized, pocket-sized touch screen devices are a unique user interface to have to deal with. Sub 6 inch 16:9 aspect ratio, hand held, high resolution viewports have specific requirements, and they are intrinsic to the form factor. They can’t be modified away by additions to the chasis, or tweaks to the GUI. What really happens is a slow creep of size right on back up to the laptop form factor, and all the gaps in between. It started with phablets and plus-sized iPhones. But the Tablet itself was a laughable “innovation”. The iPad was just the iPhone, but bigger. And for what? Mostly just to watch movies in bed. Not much else going on there. Meanwhile pocket-sized items remain an established niche. Standing around, out and about, everyone is staring at their phones. No one is carrying a keyboard. No one seriously snaps it into a clamshell frame with a keyboard. A pocket sized item is a slab of glass and nothing else. All the rest has to be handled in the UI.

bunnycorn 8y ago

There's no touchpad, and the iPad is still very different from the Mac in ways that are more significant than your list of details. For example, yes, there's a finder, but the places where you put files are 100% abstract, can be a hard drive, can be a SFTP, can be a cloud service that when offline, saves to the local storage and then uploads, can be a lazy extracting zip file, etc. The most significant way that iOS differs from macOS (or Windows 10 or whatever) is that in iOS every action is accounted for and proper permission is enforced.

happybuy 8y ago
> There's no touchpad Yet... with many of the Apple technorati asking for one and saying it's a necessary next step. > in iOS every action is accounted for and proper permission is enforced Yes, so this is the Mac with a more restrictive security model as referenced in the first comment. Apple is moving the macOS towards this with the Sandbox and how app extensions are structured.
- oneeyedpigeon 8y ago
  > Yes, so this is the Mac with a more restrictive security model Maybe this is exactly why people want the changes to the iPad. They want a more powerful iPad rather than a less powerful Mac.
- coldtea 8y ago
  >Yet... with many of the Apple technorati asking for one and saying it's a necessary next step. Never read any "Apple technorati", much alone "many", asking for one.
  - exergy 8y ago
    All the iPad reviews on youtube, Marques, Dave2D, the Verge...they were all crying out for a chance to fully exploit the blindingly fast A12 chip with software to match. Specifically multiple displays and mouse support.
    - coldtea 8y ago
      So, no touchpad mentioned.
      - exergy 8y ago
        Ah, sorry, did you mean a Macbook with touch capabilities? In which case Linus has shouted himself hoarse begging for MacOS to adopt touchscreens. And I agree with him. I own a Surface. Having a touchscreen is one of those things that, for some at least, becomes a must have. For me it helps it walk the line between productivity machine and Youtube-while-cooking-dinner tablet.
        coldtea 8y ago
        Linus (for other readers: not Torvalds) is a random YouTuber, not an "Apple technoratti", which was the original claim -- that would be someone like Gruber, Jason Snell, the guys at The Loop, 9to5 Mac, Apple Insider, and so on). Original claim: "There's no touchpad Yet... with many of the Apple technorati asking for one and saying it's a necessary next step" Have actual "apple technoratti" asked for a touchpad? I never read one do so. Have they asked for touchscreens? Some did, some are against. In any case, I don't exactly see the reasoning. iPad is criticized because it doesn't have mouse support, and the Mac is criticized because it doesn't have touch support. As if a hybrid model wont have all the problems the Surface has -- (touch not that useful when using a keyboard, and mouse-based apps not that useful with touch) --and presumably the kind of lackluster sales the Surface has compared to the iPad.
ubercow13 8y ago
>can be a hard drive, can be a SFTP, can be a cloud service that when offline, saves to the local storage and then uploads, can be a lazy extracting zip file, etc. Just like you might have using various fuse filesystems on a laptop
- lloeki 8y ago
  Or, possibly more accurately, GVFS/KIO
- bunnycorn 8y ago
  FUSE is not standard in desktops. And you can't get custom UI.
steve_taylor 8y ago
> There's no touchpad 3D touch (or two-finger touch on non-3D touch devices) on the keyboard turns it into a trackpad of sorts, allowing you to move the cursor freely around the focused input.
- bunnycorn 8y ago
  Is it a touchpad? No.

fredsted 8y ago

I feel that what Apple is doing with the iPad is trying to create a whole new separate paradigm of computing with glass slabs, without re-using the good ideas from the Mac. Whether it's pride or something else, they simply can't make themselves do a dual-use operating system (e.g. support for overlapping windows, mouse, file management - while still having good support for touch), so they are forced to come up with totally new ways of interacting with devices. While that's pretty interesting and totally fine, there is also a reason why modern MacBooks (and computers in general) are the way they are, so all the solutions are second-rate, and it's why professional users will always feel limited when using the iPad for things that are not just watching YouTube videos.

katbyte 8y ago
I would love a MacBook with touch, and even better a MacBook that transforms into an iPad.
- bodi 8y ago
  A Surface that runs macOS.
  - jen729w 8y ago
    Not really. Have you seen a Surface? They’re fucking enormous. Say what you like about the new iPad, it’s amazingly thin.
    - zozbot123 8y ago
      The Surface Go is not "f'in enormous". It's as small as a vintage netbook, or an iPad (not "Pro") with an added keyboard.
    - shaklee3 8y ago
      The surface book 2 is one of the lightest laptops available.
    - ianai 8y ago

zozbot123 8y ago

> Add ways to show multiple apps on screen at once (e.g. windows – but because they don't overlap, oh except for slide-over items So, like i3wm. Makes sense on a small screen, I guess (the iPad mini is 8 in., even the iPad "Pro" is no larger than 13 in.)

miguelrochefort 8y ago

I'm still waiting for the OS that will have the courage to truly innovate. I had high hopes for webOS and Windows Phone, but they're both dead. I'm now waiting for Fuchsia. I expect to be disappointed. Maybe I'll need to show them?

josteink 8y ago
> I had high hopes for webOS and Windows Phone, but they're both dead. I'm now waiting for Fuchsia. But Fuschia is a kernel and as far as I can tell, Google’s in-place Linux-replacement for Android so that they can finally “escape” the GPL and do a full lockdown. Fuschia won’t bring you any interesting new, user-facing features.
- miguelrochefort 8y ago
  There was a UI for Fuchsia called Armadillo, but they got rid of it. It looks like they're working on 3 new UIs: https://9to5google.com/2018/12/26/fuchsia-armadillo-ui-gone/ https://9to5google.com/2018/12/26/fuchsia-armadillo-ui-gone/

threeseed 8y ago

1) You can have multiple apps at once. 2) You can have a hardware keyboard which makes it into a laptop form factor. 3) You can drag/drop between screen apps. 4) You have keyboard shortcuts. So many of those wishlist items already exist.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

mch82 8y ago

It seems like this blog post introduces a new menu feature in a pending release of Codea, an iOS app for programming that has been used to create other apps that sold millions of copies. It’s exciting to see Codea trying to figure out how to bring app creation to iOS because Xcode is the last Mac-only app preventing me from an iPad only life. I agree that it’s a mistake to create iPad apps bound by the constraints of legacy technology (terminal windows, keyboards, typed code). However, the Codea editor has rethought many aspects of a PC editor for a touch interface. Some of them instantly make sense (like contextual color pickers or sliders for values), and some of them can still be improved.

saagarjha 8y ago
> Some of them instantly make sense (like contextual color pickers or sliders for values), and some of them can still be improved. Swift Playgrounds has something similar.
- mch82 8y ago
  Codea has been available on iOS for 6 years & I recall they introduced the feature first, so I’m wondering if Swift Playgrounds got the idea from Codea
  - Pulcinella 8y ago
    I think a lot of the Swift Playgrounds ideas are “officially” acknowledged to have been inspired by that Bret victor “Inventing on Principle” talk.

pickpuck 8y ago

Then to accommodate all users, the perfect lineup sounds like: * iPhone - iOS (touch only) * iPad - iOS (touch only) * iPad Pro - iOS "Plus" (iPad + attachable keyboard/trackpad) * MacBook - iOS "Plus" (iPad + built-in keyboard/trackpad) * MacBook Pro - macOS * iMac - macOS * Mac Pro - macOS

xattt 8y ago
I can see the iOS iteration of the MacBook be called the iBook.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]

coldtea 8y ago

>Congratulations, you've invented a MacBook. At least you'll feel good about yourself as you can now think you're using "the future of computing" instead of simply an evolved version of what everyone was using a decade ago. You miss the big picture. Creating "an evolved version of what everyone was using a decade ago" is the very idea, and that's precisely why they are entitled to feel good about themselves. They could make the iPad run full OS X with Finder and overlapping windows and everything and call it a day, all in a month or so (most of the time taken for things like driver support). But they don't want to "invent a MacBook". They want to get the iPad to be personal-computer-like powerful, without the negatives of the full PC experience. (Negatives for the masses, not for people who use Vim and Emacs and take pride in menial tasks like "organizing their file hierarchy"). For which, this iterative approach and enforced boundaries is exactly what's needed. E.g. they want to add a hardware keyboard, but make it entirely optional. So things should be touch-first-class (and not "also touch" like with Surface and co). They want multiple apps on screen but not the tedium of window management. For which the split screen (or eventually a tiled wm) makes more sense. And so on.

exergy 8y ago
I cannot conceive of any future where the eventual upshot of all of this isn't...a Surface Pro. The thing is, there is nowhere left for Apple to go. What else can they do with iOS? They will be forced to make iOS more powerful and that MUST include things like proper file management, multiple windows, displays, mouse support etc...aka a Surface Pro. Perhaps a more pleasing-to-look-at iteration than Windows 10, and better quality native apps, but a Surface Pro nevertheless.
- coldtea 8y ago
  >I cannot conceive of any future where the eventual upshot of all of this isn't...a Surface Pro. Well, Ford's customers couldn't conceive of a future where the eventual upshot wouldn't be ...faster horses either. >The thing is, there is nowhere left for Apple to go Because we have exhausted UI paradigms and interaction design? >and that MUST include things like proper file management, multiple windows, displays, mouse support etc...aka a Surface Pro. The "aka a Surface Pro" is where you're wrong though. All of what you ask for can be answered by "just buy a Mac laptop" today. There's absolutely no reason for anyone to want an iPad that does all that -- except to get a laptop with touchscreen hybrid. But those are not exactly some wide success in the PC world either. The iPad serves a need without desktop-features. And it sells 10s of millions of units (10x or more than the Surface) every year without these features. The ability to get a desktop OS-X experience is not why iPads are bought. Here's how it can play out: E.g.: - "Proper file management" can be abstracted totally from storage as far as the apps are concerned, like iOS already does, and have powerful metadata properties and searchability (the way Microsoft tried and failed with their WinFS project). So not like Surface of today, or regular Finder-like file management. - Multiple windows can be non-overlapping, and develop into a tiling/snapping mechanism. OSes have already disfavored the once dominant MDI windows (and even third party apps have, e.g. Photoshop of yore with Photoshop of today). This can be a next step. - displays, the iPad Pro already supports external displays. - mouse support, this can or cannot be added, but if the table factor has to have any meaning it has to be secondary to the touch experience (so apps should be prepared to work in 100% touch mode). More importantly, the main premise of the iPad is the hassle free device management. Apps are all sandboxed, the OS is dead simple to configure, zero viruses, everything backed to the cloud, etc. Those are the avenues that will be enhanced and expanded, not how to run IDEs. It's not 'full customizability and power to run any niche pro app', it's 'it just works'. Pro apps will came (and in several sectors have come), but only by respecting the "it just works" part.

criddell 8y ago

> UI experiments like this show that what a lot of pro users want for iOS on the iPad is for it to become a Mac. I have a hard time understanding this. Why make the iPad into a Mac? If that's what you want, then get a Mac. My gripe with the iPad is that on larger screens, the somewhat sparse grid of app icons seems a little silly. They could at least increase the density. I hope they don't change the character of the iPad because right now it's my favorite computer to use.

interpol_p 8y ago

I think you could come up with a list of features and line them up and say that the iPad is basically reinventing the Mac. And it is, to some extent. I don't think that's a bad thing to happen right now. All I can say with absolute certainty is that it feels different to work and code on my iPad and iPhone than it does on my Mac. You outline very specific features that have since come (or will come) to iPad. But there are many less tangible "features" that really influence how it feels to use these computing devices. For example, I edit all my photos on my phone. I never thought I'd do that a decade ago, but I do. The screen is better there. The photos are already there. The editing tools are great. The phone is faster. They get shared easier from there. There's now an entirely different emotional context around editing photos. Another example is that it's far easier to turn on my phone or iPad. Opening my laptop is a heavy operation, often I'm sitting at my desk. It's work time. But just two days ago I was at the playground with my kids, I had some time to myself so I edited the very blog post we're commenting on, on my phone. I even edited some of the videos there. That's another one that I just keep doing on the phone. Editing videos. I keep using Apple's Clips app instead of Final Cut Pro because it's just so instant, and fun, and light-weight. And no one notices or cares about what the resulting video was made in if it's good. So by using git, and Codea, and building shaders on these devices we start to find out how we can differently fit more creative tasks into our lives. The Mac may never be replaced. But I might find that prototyping a game idea happens more often on my iPad or iPhone, simply because it's there when my laptop is not there. If that means we end up reinventing some of the Mac UI paradigms for iOS, so what? The physical devices themselves are so much more pervasive and instant that they are creating new use cases just because of how we hold them and feel about holding them.

blueboo 8y ago

> UI experiments like this show that what a lot of pro users want for iOS on the iPad is for it to become a Mac. So wrong! Down is up! Freedom is slavery! UI experiments like this show that -developers who make UI experiments like this- want it to become a Mac. And for God's sake let's not look to engineers' desires for UX cues. Engineers are so hellaciously picky about their setups -- imagine bridging the gap between Swift Playgrounds and customizing zsh -- that asking for nothing less than a full laptop is foregone conclusion. If we look at other "pro" users, however -- particularly in music and graphic design, you find -users- (here, we're not confusing users with developers making experiments) using these mobile devices for their virtues and not despite them. They're mobile slate notepads, ultra-reliable performance surfaces, or rich instant cameras. Plenty of shops have tried to create super-pro apps in this space. They've got rich and powerful interfaces that push well beyond typical UIKit. They're beautiful, expensive and unpopular (Audulus 3, Moog Model 15, Korg Gadget) The OP shop is going down this road, sadly. Try their shader editor -- it's beautifully done. And assuming the bugs get ironed out it will be celebrated as a beautiful and capable shader node editor for your phone...and then laid aside.

mbrock 8y ago
I think there's a certain economistic mindset that has a hard time dealing with how a more restricted interface can actually be more inspiring and productive. If all the measurable quantities are smaller, how could it possibly be better?

graeme 8y ago

Almost all of those already exist on an ipad, but it's not a macbook. I can't tell if you're saying an ipad is a macbook or if you genuinely don't know that all but 1 or 2 of those features exist.

jhack 8y ago

Hm, it's almost like the iPad and iOS aren't suitable environments to get real work done unless you're an artist.

hrktb 8y ago

I reread a few times but can’t get the gist of what you want to express. What does “become a mac” mean ? At this point the most defining trait of a mac is to have no touch input, so the iPad becoming a mac makes no sense to me. Otherwise what you are describing is growing a platform and adding features. Cherry picking stuff that were on the mac before doesn’t really mean much when there’s many other features that have no relation to the mac (face id, ARKit, pencil support, shortcuts, MLKit etc.) while the mac also gets iOS features. It seems you are mostly saying that the iPad has matured ?

tolmasky 8y ago

This is what happens when you abdicate leadership in your own platform. The only reason it seems like people want to replicate their mac is because they’re actually excited about the potential of the iPad and would like to move to the iPad fully as there’s nothing necessarily preventing that short of the workflows existing. But if in the 8 years since the release of the iPad you do almost nothing to accommodate these users (and you need look no further than the absurd behavior of receiving a phone call taking over your ENTIRE screen even if you are mid-drawing in the best made for iPad art tool), then people will start coming up with their own solutions, which often just look like mimicking the past. If Apple were to focus on the iPad instead of the watch and car and what-have-you, they could have had the bandwidth to show us alternative solutions.

envelopes 8y ago

I mean, you’re not wrong. But phone-sized, pocket-sized touch screen devices are a unique user interface to have to deal with. Sub 6 inch 16:9 aspect ratio, hand held, high resolution viewports have specific requirements, and they are intrinsic to the form factor. They can’t be modified away by additions to the chasis, or tweaks to the GUI. What really happens is a slow creep of size right on back up to the laptop form factor, and all the gaps in between. It started with phablets and plus-sized iPhones. But the Tablet itself was a laughable “innovation”. The iPad was just the iPhone, but bigger. And for what? Mostly just to watch movies in bed. Not much else going on there. Meanwhile pocket-sized items remain an established niche. Standing around, out and about, everyone is staring at their phones. No one is carrying a keyboard. No one seriously snaps it into a clamshell frame with a keyboard. A pocket sized item is a slab of glass and nothing else. All the rest has to be handled in the UI.