6 ms·

Now we just have to wait for Apple to add the reverse - control your Mac from your iPad :) This could be pretty useful bc of the touch screen + pencil combo. B

Now we just have to wait for Apple to add the reverse - control your Mac from your iPad :) This could be pretty useful bc of the touch screen + pencil combo. Back in 2016 I spent a weekend mocking up an "iPad as a graphics tablet" app, and it was surprisingly easy and effective [0][1]. I'm sure Apple could do a lot better. [0]: https://github.com/Danappelxx/iPadMouse https://github.com/Danappelxx/iPadMouse [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTHTx4MMwg4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTHTx4MMwg4

kergonath 5y ago
There’s already Sidecar. It’s not quite what you want, but it’s a step in that direction.
- danappelxx 5y ago
  Wow… I just assumed Sidecar was a second monitor, totally underestimated it. Bummer it only works on newer MacBooks!
  - kergonath 5y ago
    Yes, I think it relies on some features of a recent-ish Bluetooth version. To be fair, I never use it for something requiring complex input, but it’s nice for something like a movie, a music app, or something that runs in the background but you might want to have a glance at every now and then.
  - tdonovic 5y ago
    By newer macbooks, its just macbooks newer than 2015. The 2015s and earlier didn't have h265 encoders in hardware, and thus don't work properly. There is a hack you can install to force sidecar to run on earlier macs, but the latency and quality is terrible, partially because h264 is harder to shove over the wire than more compressed h256
- dmart 5y ago
  Yeah, Sidecar is pretty cool. I was surprised to learn that even pressure-sensitivity from the Apple Pencil worked (at least in Blender where I tried it out.) It'd be nice if you could initiate it from the iPad side, though. There used to be a remote access feature built into iCloud called Back to my Mac, not sure why it was killed.
  - pram 5y ago
    Using it as a Wacom is the killer feature of Sidecar imo
- skohan 5y ago
  I recently got an iPad, and I've been a bit disappointed by sidecar. First of all, it doesn't support the portrait orientation, which doesn't seem like it should be complicated. Also it's a bit finicky. For instance if you are using sidecar and the system goes to sleep, waking the laptop will not wake the ipad, and if things are asleep to long you get an unclear error message and have to restart sidecar from a system menu a couple levels deep. It's an awesome feature, and using an iPad as a second monitor makes for a really awesome lightweight setup for mobile working, but I wish they would invest a bit more in the UX. It's already 80% there, and most of the fixes required don't seem super complicated.
  - makeitdouble 5y ago
    > It's already 80% there, and most of the fixes required don't seem super complicated. I hope they make it evolve further, but it’s the story of Apple features. For the remaining 20% there are less seamless but more evolved third party apps (I personally use Duet, which is not without faults but has portrait support and more)
    - skohan 5y ago
      Is it as smooth and low-latency as sidecar?
      - makeitdouble 5y ago
        I don’t use sidecar but I'd wager it's not as smooth nor optimized. I use it with an older iPad so newer version might be better at it, but I see some artifacts on scrolling sometime, and it's clearly using the iPad's resources at full. There are params like resolution and processing that can be adjusted to priotitize what you care about (e.g. I go with retina res and more latency/lower processing). I think sidecar will be better at the thing it does, I use duet mainly for the fexibility.
  - Jcowell 5y ago
    My iPad always wakes up if previously connected to sidecar, even wirelessly.

kergonath 5y ago

There’s already Sidecar. It’s not quite what you want, but it’s a step in that direction.

danappelxx 5y ago
Wow… I just assumed Sidecar was a second monitor, totally underestimated it. Bummer it only works on newer MacBooks!
- kergonath 5y ago
  Yes, I think it relies on some features of a recent-ish Bluetooth version. To be fair, I never use it for something requiring complex input, but it’s nice for something like a movie, a music app, or something that runs in the background but you might want to have a glance at every now and then.
- tdonovic 5y ago
  By newer macbooks, its just macbooks newer than 2015. The 2015s and earlier didn't have h265 encoders in hardware, and thus don't work properly. There is a hack you can install to force sidecar to run on earlier macs, but the latency and quality is terrible, partially because h264 is harder to shove over the wire than more compressed h256
dmart 5y ago
Yeah, Sidecar is pretty cool. I was surprised to learn that even pressure-sensitivity from the Apple Pencil worked (at least in Blender where I tried it out.) It'd be nice if you could initiate it from the iPad side, though. There used to be a remote access feature built into iCloud called Back to my Mac, not sure why it was killed.
- pram 5y ago
  Using it as a Wacom is the killer feature of Sidecar imo
skohan 5y ago
I recently got an iPad, and I've been a bit disappointed by sidecar. First of all, it doesn't support the portrait orientation, which doesn't seem like it should be complicated. Also it's a bit finicky. For instance if you are using sidecar and the system goes to sleep, waking the laptop will not wake the ipad, and if things are asleep to long you get an unclear error message and have to restart sidecar from a system menu a couple levels deep. It's an awesome feature, and using an iPad as a second monitor makes for a really awesome lightweight setup for mobile working, but I wish they would invest a bit more in the UX. It's already 80% there, and most of the fixes required don't seem super complicated.
- makeitdouble 5y ago
  > It's already 80% there, and most of the fixes required don't seem super complicated. I hope they make it evolve further, but it’s the story of Apple features. For the remaining 20% there are less seamless but more evolved third party apps (I personally use Duet, which is not without faults but has portrait support and more)
  - skohan 5y ago
    Is it as smooth and low-latency as sidecar?
    - makeitdouble 5y ago
      I don’t use sidecar but I'd wager it's not as smooth nor optimized. I use it with an older iPad so newer version might be better at it, but I see some artifacts on scrolling sometime, and it's clearly using the iPad's resources at full. There are params like resolution and processing that can be adjusted to priotitize what you care about (e.g. I go with retina res and more latency/lower processing). I think sidecar will be better at the thing it does, I use duet mainly for the fexibility.
- Jcowell 5y ago
  My iPad always wakes up if previously connected to sidecar, even wirelessly.