4 ms·

Keep in mind Apple is a hardware company. The software is their moat (not core competency).

jfrunyon 5y ago
Apple is a (system) software company. While that includes procuring and integrating individual hardware components, they're not a hardware company. They've recently been branching out into designing their own hardware (or claiming to, it's not clear to me how much they've done in-house vs contracted out or off the shelf, but I digress) but they've been making software to put on other people's slightly-customized hardware for a much longer time.
comeonseriously 5y ago
No. One could probably get away with saying that a decade ago, but not today. They're every bit a software company as they are a hardware company.
- mcculley 5y ago
  Apple is a systems company. I would not bother with macOS for use on other hardware. I would not buy Apple laptops if not for macOS. For a given feature, the user might not know how much of the implementation was done in software versus hardware. Apple excels at integrating their software with their hardware. I was using Linux on laptops until 2004. When I bought a 12" PowerBook G4 and experienced WiFi, sound, and printing working reliably, I realized I could no longer bother with Linux on laptops. This reliability has suffered lately and I hope they can get it back.
  - jfrunyon 5y ago
    Perhaps it's time to give Linux on laptops another try? ;)
    - mcculley 5y ago
      Okay, I'll bite. Which distribution works on modern hardware and supports suspend/resume, WiFi, sound, external monitors, and printing without me digging into a config file at every different place I visit? Just to be clear, I have been using Linux since 1992. I am completely comfortable with Linux on the desktop and the server. What I found is that Linux does not deal well with configuration, and configuration on laptops changes daily (or more).
      - shaicoleman 5y ago
        The hardware support is pretty good nowadays, and almost everything works out of the box. There's a few caveats: * Sound works fine in general, but might be a bit buggy with Bluetooth. If you encounter any issues, installing Pipewire reportedly solves most of them. * External monitors works fine, as long as you don't mix HiDPI and LoDPI at the same time. In the future, Wayland should fix this. * HiDPI mostly works, but still requires some config tweaks for a handful of apps. * Suspend/resume still sucks, mainly due to buggy nVidia/AMD graphics drivers. Only the Intel GPU drivers suspend reliably in my experience. * WiFi works flawlessly, especially if you're using the Intel WiFi hardware, which is very common on laptops. * Printing works fine except with Windows-only printers, but they are pretty rare. * Distros don't really matter that much, but you'd might need to update your kernel if you use an LTS distro with newish hardware. The Ubuntu based distros, e.g. Mint/Ubuntu/Pop!_OS are good options and have the largest user base, so it's easiest to find solutions if you encounter any issue. * If you just want to test hardware compatibility, I recommend trying Ubuntu 21.10 on a USB stick. * You'd might want to look at /r/linuxhardware [1] for specific hardware recommendations for your needs. You can also look at the Ubuntu Certified Hardware [2] 1. https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxhardware/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxhardware/ 2. https://ubuntu.com/certified https://ubuntu.com/certified
        mcculley 5y ago
        This sounds like 2004.
        shaicoleman 5y ago
derekjdanserl 5y ago
This is a ridiculous thing to say considering all of their hardware is useless without their proprietary software. If running the Linux kernel on Apple hardware did not require a massive reverse engineering effort (see https://asahilinux.org https://asahilinux.org) then maybe you would have a point.
amelius 5y ago
Apple is an IT company.
oneplane 5y ago
No. It's the software, stupid. (this is pretty much the tagline for 15+ years now with those exact literal words) And even then, people buy complete products from the company so in a way it's not really an 'either' company, they are far too vertically integrated. There is supply chain, semiconductor manufacturing and design, software engineering, hardware engineering, consumer products, consumer services, there is stuff like AppleCare, ABM, ASM, Developer interaction, events... the list goes on. The hardware is only there to enable the software in this concept, not the other way around. This is also why if the UX conditions are met, more powerful/newer/shinier hardware was often not used since it doesn't improve any of the software enablement. You can't sell a good UX with bad software on good hardware. You can sell a good UX with good software on anything. https://allthingsd.com/20111005/iphone-4s-its-the-software-stupid/ https://allthingsd.com/20111005/iphone-4s-its-the-software-s... https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476239/apple-and-wearable-computing--it-s-the-software--stupid.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476239/apple-and-wear... https://www.computerworld.com/article/3353038/apple-in-2019-its-all-about-the-software-stupid.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/3353038/apple-in-2019-... https://techcrunch.com/2008/10/15/what-android-can-learn-from-the-iphone-its-the-software-stupid/ https://techcrunch.com/2008/10/15/what-android-can-learn-fro...

Apple is a (system) software company. While that includes procuring and integrating individual hardware components, they're not a hardware company. They've recently been branching out into designing their own hardware (or claiming to, it's not clear to me how much they've done in-house vs contracted out or off the shelf, but I digress) but they've been making software to put on other people's slightly-customized hardware for a much longer time.

comeonseriously 5y ago

No. One could probably get away with saying that a decade ago, but not today. They're every bit a software company as they are a hardware company.

mcculley 5y ago
Apple is a systems company. I would not bother with macOS for use on other hardware. I would not buy Apple laptops if not for macOS. For a given feature, the user might not know how much of the implementation was done in software versus hardware. Apple excels at integrating their software with their hardware. I was using Linux on laptops until 2004. When I bought a 12" PowerBook G4 and experienced WiFi, sound, and printing working reliably, I realized I could no longer bother with Linux on laptops. This reliability has suffered lately and I hope they can get it back.
- jfrunyon 5y ago
  Perhaps it's time to give Linux on laptops another try? ;)
  - mcculley 5y ago
    Okay, I'll bite. Which distribution works on modern hardware and supports suspend/resume, WiFi, sound, external monitors, and printing without me digging into a config file at every different place I visit? Just to be clear, I have been using Linux since 1992. I am completely comfortable with Linux on the desktop and the server. What I found is that Linux does not deal well with configuration, and configuration on laptops changes daily (or more).
    - shaicoleman 5y ago
      The hardware support is pretty good nowadays, and almost everything works out of the box. There's a few caveats: * Sound works fine in general, but might be a bit buggy with Bluetooth. If you encounter any issues, installing Pipewire reportedly solves most of them. * External monitors works fine, as long as you don't mix HiDPI and LoDPI at the same time. In the future, Wayland should fix this. * HiDPI mostly works, but still requires some config tweaks for a handful of apps. * Suspend/resume still sucks, mainly due to buggy nVidia/AMD graphics drivers. Only the Intel GPU drivers suspend reliably in my experience. * WiFi works flawlessly, especially if you're using the Intel WiFi hardware, which is very common on laptops. * Printing works fine except with Windows-only printers, but they are pretty rare. * Distros don't really matter that much, but you'd might need to update your kernel if you use an LTS distro with newish hardware. The Ubuntu based distros, e.g. Mint/Ubuntu/Pop!_OS are good options and have the largest user base, so it's easiest to find solutions if you encounter any issue. * If you just want to test hardware compatibility, I recommend trying Ubuntu 21.10 on a USB stick. * You'd might want to look at /r/linuxhardware [1] for specific hardware recommendations for your needs. You can also look at the Ubuntu Certified Hardware [2] 1. https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxhardware/ https://www.reddit.com/r/linuxhardware/ 2. https://ubuntu.com/certified https://ubuntu.com/certified
      - mcculley 5y ago
        This sounds like 2004.
        shaicoleman 5y ago

derekjdanserl 5y ago

This is a ridiculous thing to say considering all of their hardware is useless without their proprietary software. If running the Linux kernel on Apple hardware did not require a massive reverse engineering effort (see https://asahilinux.org https://asahilinux.org) then maybe you would have a point.

amelius 5y ago

Apple is an IT company.

oneplane 5y ago

No. It's the software, stupid. (this is pretty much the tagline for 15+ years now with those exact literal words) And even then, people buy complete products from the company so in a way it's not really an 'either' company, they are far too vertically integrated. There is supply chain, semiconductor manufacturing and design, software engineering, hardware engineering, consumer products, consumer services, there is stuff like AppleCare, ABM, ASM, Developer interaction, events... the list goes on. The hardware is only there to enable the software in this concept, not the other way around. This is also why if the UX conditions are met, more powerful/newer/shinier hardware was often not used since it doesn't improve any of the software enablement. You can't sell a good UX with bad software on good hardware. You can sell a good UX with good software on anything. https://allthingsd.com/20111005/iphone-4s-its-the-software-stupid/ https://allthingsd.com/20111005/iphone-4s-its-the-software-s... https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476239/apple-and-wearable-computing--it-s-the-software--stupid.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476239/apple-and-wear... https://www.computerworld.com/article/3353038/apple-in-2019-its-all-about-the-software-stupid.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/3353038/apple-in-2019-... https://techcrunch.com/2008/10/15/what-android-can-learn-from-the-iphone-its-the-software-stupid/ https://techcrunch.com/2008/10/15/what-android-can-learn-fro...