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I won't be able to move from Intel to ARM for the foreseeable future because I rely on Bootcamp / Parallels for Windows development, but it will still be intere

I won't be able to move from Intel to ARM for the foreseeable future because I rely on Bootcamp / Parallels for Windows development, but it will still be interesting to see the new hardware. Big Sur's UI is obviously designed for touch, so I will be shocked if they don't release a touch screen Mac or a tablet that runs macOS. Now that they've worked out how to ship touchscreen Macs, hopefully that means they'll finally offer MacBook Pros without touchbars.

glhaynes 6y ago
We'll see of course, but I don't personally find it obvious at all that Big Sur is designed for touch. Or, if so, it's only an incidental byproduct of them applying a consistent style between iOS-iPadOS-macOS as they make it easier to make apps that run across all those platforms. I'll be surprised if macOS hardware gets touch versus iPadOS just growing into more and more of macOS's current roles.
- mrweasel 6y ago
  That raises an interesting point: Is it the existence of the iPad Pro that prevents Apple from moving forward on touch screen laptops. Introducing a touch screen MacBook could completely kill the iPad Pro and I'm not sure that Apple want to lose that market. Still it could be that they still firmly believe that touch screen on laptops are unnecessary and provides a poor user experience, something that I happen to believe that they would be right in.
mrweasel 6y ago
The library of available software will certainly be interesting. I can easily move to ARM, assuming Python, Bash and SSH works, but it would be easier, if I can expect AMD64 emulation/virtualisation in conjuction with Docker. Being able to run ARM based Docker images currently isn’t that useful. While I would love to see the touchbar go away, I don’t see any use case from a touch screen on laptops, in my line of work. It’s just as much a gimmick as the touchbar, in my case. If they do introduce it, I would hope it’s optional, like the touchbar should be.
- socialdemocrat 6y ago
  With Amazon offering cheap high performance ARM hardware in the cloud ARM based docker containers will be very useful in the future.
socialdemocrat 6y ago
No there will be no touch screen Mac. People have kept saying this for years, yet it never happens. Why? Because it is a terrible idea, and we don’t want it. If you want a touch based OS from Apple, then that already exists. It is called iOS. Why would you want a touch interface on an interface optimized for mouse and keyboard? You cannot have both. What works well for touch will be terrible with a keyboard/mouse interface. Microsoft was morons trying to merge the two paradigms. Win 10 is one of the worst OS’s I have used.
- arm 6y ago
  Apple has already announced ARM-based Macs will support running iOS apps. While they’d technically be usable without a touchscreen, I’d expect the user experience to be quite bad; especially for iOS games.
  - snazz 6y ago
    Lots of iOS games already support gamepads and iOS has supported keyboards and mice for a while now. I'm guessing that developers will be able to support keyboard/mouse once and get it on the iPad and Apple Silicon Macs.

glhaynes 6y ago

We'll see of course, but I don't personally find it obvious at all that Big Sur is designed for touch. Or, if so, it's only an incidental byproduct of them applying a consistent style between iOS-iPadOS-macOS as they make it easier to make apps that run across all those platforms. I'll be surprised if macOS hardware gets touch versus iPadOS just growing into more and more of macOS's current roles.

mrweasel 6y ago
That raises an interesting point: Is it the existence of the iPad Pro that prevents Apple from moving forward on touch screen laptops. Introducing a touch screen MacBook could completely kill the iPad Pro and I'm not sure that Apple want to lose that market. Still it could be that they still firmly believe that touch screen on laptops are unnecessary and provides a poor user experience, something that I happen to believe that they would be right in.

mrweasel 6y ago

The library of available software will certainly be interesting. I can easily move to ARM, assuming Python, Bash and SSH works, but it would be easier, if I can expect AMD64 emulation/virtualisation in conjuction with Docker. Being able to run ARM based Docker images currently isn’t that useful. While I would love to see the touchbar go away, I don’t see any use case from a touch screen on laptops, in my line of work. It’s just as much a gimmick as the touchbar, in my case. If they do introduce it, I would hope it’s optional, like the touchbar should be.

socialdemocrat 6y ago
With Amazon offering cheap high performance ARM hardware in the cloud ARM based docker containers will be very useful in the future.

socialdemocrat 6y ago

No there will be no touch screen Mac. People have kept saying this for years, yet it never happens. Why? Because it is a terrible idea, and we don’t want it. If you want a touch based OS from Apple, then that already exists. It is called iOS. Why would you want a touch interface on an interface optimized for mouse and keyboard? You cannot have both. What works well for touch will be terrible with a keyboard/mouse interface. Microsoft was morons trying to merge the two paradigms. Win 10 is one of the worst OS’s I have used.

arm 6y ago
Apple has already announced ARM-based Macs will support running iOS apps. While they’d technically be usable without a touchscreen, I’d expect the user experience to be quite bad; especially for iOS games.
- snazz 6y ago
  Lots of iOS games already support gamepads and iOS has supported keyboards and mice for a while now. I'm guessing that developers will be able to support keyboard/mouse once and get it on the iPad and Apple Silicon Macs.