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I have an iPad Pro 13" and I do love it for some tasks, most of all, as a portable photo album, as photography is a big hobby of mine. From the hardware perspec

by _ph_ 7y ago

I have an iPad Pro 13" and I do love it for some tasks, most of all, as a portable photo album, as photography is a big hobby of mine. From the hardware perspective, it could be the portable dream laptop replacement. Perfect screen, great battery life, small device. Where it is completely held back is the software: - a lot of small things. Picture in picture is a great feature, but it works inconsitently between apps, with some not at all, and why can't I arbitrarily size the video and put it into the corners? While per default watching a video/tv program rather small, I would like to have the ability to enlarge the picture, if something interesting comes up. - multitasking: haven't really been able to use that. 50:50 works sometimes, 75:25 usually is too small for the 25 part, should allow at least 66:33, if not completely flexible. Same for the hover over app, should allow for larger sizes. - file management: this is really painful, so many limitations in that area. No ability to copy files from an attached USB stick or SD card into iCloud. No general ability to move files between apps, even if those in principle support the file type. No ability to add a video to the TV app from iCloud, none to add songs to the music app. - applications: if your productive use of the iPad fits to one app from the app store: congratulations, if not, you are basically out of luck. There does not seem to be even a MUD client available for iPads. "Blink" is a pretty great SSH client, the best I found so far, but based on html rendering... Why isn't there a version of Termux for the iPad? It allows so many quick usages, it really adds a lot of productivity. If Apple doesn't trust app programmers with such a thing, why don't they offer a port themselves in a proper sandbox? I don't need to access the system files, a small chroot jail would be fine (perhaps with iCloud drive mounted?). Of course, given the power of the iPad, why not a small "Linux" app with a Wayland desktop? Apple, if you think that would be a big replacement for paid apps, that says a lot about the app universe :p And of course: a development environment. If general software development is too "dangerous" for an iPad, why is there no App creation environment? A self hosted environment would rock. Anyone remembers what Visual Basic 1-6 did for Windows? Why isn't there an equivalent on the iPad? Anyone at Apple ever saw a SmallTalk system? Just give Alan Kay a call, if you can't google it :p And of course: I like the smart keyboards, but how comes that at Apple no one understands the need for the ESC key and to a lesser extend the function keys, if you are advertising a "professional" device?

walterbell 7y ago
> Picture in picture is a great feature, but it works inconsitently between apps, with some not at all, and why can't I arbitrarily size the video and put it into the corners? PiP video can be resized, up to a limit of about 1/4 of the screen. > While per default watching a video/tv program rather small, I would like to have the ability to enlarge the picture, if something interesting comes up. There's an icon (diagonal arrow) to exit PiP mode and return to full-screen in the original app. > file management: this is really painful, so many limitations in that area. No ability to copy files from an attached USB stick iXpand USB drives are supported by some apps (e.g. nPlayer, LumaFusion). There's a rumor that external storage support will arrive in iOS13, hopefully without too many restrictions.
- _ph_ 7y ago
  PiP video can be resized, up to a limit of about 1/4 of the screen. Right, thats the problem. It is nice for keeping track of what happens, but e.g. when watching a football game, you want the ability to magnify, as I wrote, to an arbitrary video size. Also, why can't I put the video into the corner, why does it keep a significant distance to the screen edges, so covering more of my app than necessary for the video size. There's an icon (diagonal arrow) to exit PiP mode and return to full-screen in the original app. Which can be slow, and not work at all. Also, it might be impossible to get back to the PIP (depending on the app) and also affects the app you were using with the PIP. Why can't I just enlarge the PIP to cover most of my screen, at least up to 75%?
  - walterbell 7y ago
    Windowing will change in iOS13. Hopefully demos will appear at WWDC in a few weeks.
    - _ph_ 7y ago
      I sincerely hope so, assuming it changes into a really useful UI. The PIP is a prominent example of some iOS restrictions which don't seem to have any technical justifications. Someone seems to have decided it looks cute as it is, without any usability in mind. The macOS version of PIP has the same restrictions - a big reason why I haven't used this feature in years. At least you are allowed to freely position the PIP when pressing the CMD key.

by _ph_ 7y ago

walterbell 7y ago

> Picture in picture is a great feature, but it works inconsitently between apps, with some not at all, and why can't I arbitrarily size the video and put it into the corners? PiP video can be resized, up to a limit of about 1/4 of the screen. > While per default watching a video/tv program rather small, I would like to have the ability to enlarge the picture, if something interesting comes up. There's an icon (diagonal arrow) to exit PiP mode and return to full-screen in the original app. > file management: this is really painful, so many limitations in that area. No ability to copy files from an attached USB stick iXpand USB drives are supported by some apps (e.g. nPlayer, LumaFusion). There's a rumor that external storage support will arrive in iOS13, hopefully without too many restrictions.

_ph_ 7y ago
PiP video can be resized, up to a limit of about 1/4 of the screen. Right, thats the problem. It is nice for keeping track of what happens, but e.g. when watching a football game, you want the ability to magnify, as I wrote, to an arbitrary video size. Also, why can't I put the video into the corner, why does it keep a significant distance to the screen edges, so covering more of my app than necessary for the video size. There's an icon (diagonal arrow) to exit PiP mode and return to full-screen in the original app. Which can be slow, and not work at all. Also, it might be impossible to get back to the PIP (depending on the app) and also affects the app you were using with the PIP. Why can't I just enlarge the PIP to cover most of my screen, at least up to 75%?
- walterbell 7y ago
  Windowing will change in iOS13. Hopefully demos will appear at WWDC in a few weeks.
  - _ph_ 7y ago
    I sincerely hope so, assuming it changes into a really useful UI. The PIP is a prominent example of some iOS restrictions which don't seem to have any technical justifications. Someone seems to have decided it looks cute as it is, without any usability in mind. The macOS version of PIP has the same restrictions - a big reason why I haven't used this feature in years. At least you are allowed to freely position the PIP when pressing the CMD key.