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I'm not sure why you'd want to use it as a development device when there is a not much heavier MacBook Air available with the same brain in it. I actually ran f

by hughrr 5y ago

I'm not sure why you'd want to use it as a development device when there is a not much heavier MacBook Air available with the same brain in it. I actually ran from September 2021 to January 2022 with just my iPad Pro as a computer for all personal tasks, which include programming, and decided that I was artificially limiting what I was doing for the sake of a minimalist ideal. iOS is just not the right tool for the job. Each Apple device has a very nice overlapping niche and a lot of consistency between them but some devices are intentionally not designed to do some tasks. iOS is fine for non power user tasks and simple automation but nothing more. For 80% of what I do that is fine so I usually go to the iPad first always. But if I want to sit down and do full on keyboard based productivity it's the MBP every time. The iPad Pro has a very special place in my heart though. It's the most reliable and efficient machine and with the Apple Pencil it's a game changer. I love to take it with me when I go out for a weekend and will sit in a hotel, do spreadsheet, organise tasks, do some drawing, watch some streams, casual messaging and emails and even video and photo editing. But not programming!

pjmlp 5y ago
An idea that is very bad explored is using handwriting for programming. Naturally it is somehow still a PhD topic, but imagine using Swift playgrounds with the pencil as if it was paper notebook.
- hughrr 5y ago
  That would be horrible. My handwriting is terrible.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    Hence why it is still a PhD issue, however I think it would be quite cool instead of trying always to fit a keyboard into portable screens.
- emsy 5y ago
  5 people on earth would dominate humanity with handwritten APL.
- rodgerd 5y ago
  A mentor of mine got her start working with a Big Giant Brain as his assistant - he only programmed by reading fanfold paper output and writing his code down. She would type it up, run it, and then bring the output back for him to analyse. I can imagine such a person finding this idea gratifying, albeit perhaps too much of a REPL for his tastes.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    When I started at technical school writing pseudo code in paper before coding into a 512 KB PC with 8" floppies was common, like doing diagrams of data structures, so maybe I am biased.
emsy 5y ago
That’s a circular explanation. The iPad isn’t suitable for programming because it isn’t suitable for programming. The limitation is completely arbitrary because Apple thinks they can tell users what they should use their devices for. It’s “Your holding it wrong” applied to software.
- hughrr 5y ago
  Actually that’s not it. It’s not suitable because of the modality, window management and state and data management concepts which are all compromises required for high efficiency touch driven mobile devices.
  - emsy 5y ago
    Of course you're going to get a different experience than on a desktop OS, and you're not going to satisfy every programming environment. But between "virtually none" and "every" there is a huge space that iOS would be able to fill with its current OS design. I'd argue that a lot of developers could do their job on the iPad, if there was VS Code available for it. Right now this isn't even possible, because alternative browser engines aren't allowed on iOS. Why not allow the software on the device? There's no need to change the OS in the slightest. It's easy to dismiss the concept, when it hasn't even had the chance to prove itself.
    - hughrr 5y ago
      You can actually build code in swift playgrounds on iOS.
      - emsy 5y ago
        That's why I wrote "virtually". Others suggested virtualization, which I think would be a good tradeoff that doesn't require usability changes to the underlying OS (and would finally put the processor to good use). Other than that, the inability to code on iOS is due to artificial gatekeeping by Apple, not due to design decisions. There are many ways coding (and probably other types of apps!) on iOS would be possible, if it wasn't for Apple.
mhh__ 5y ago
Because I already own an iPad

by hughrr 5y ago

pjmlp 5y ago

An idea that is very bad explored is using handwriting for programming. Naturally it is somehow still a PhD topic, but imagine using Swift playgrounds with the pencil as if it was paper notebook.

hughrr 5y ago
That would be horrible. My handwriting is terrible.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Hence why it is still a PhD issue, however I think it would be quite cool instead of trying always to fit a keyboard into portable screens.
emsy 5y ago
5 people on earth would dominate humanity with handwritten APL.
rodgerd 5y ago
A mentor of mine got her start working with a Big Giant Brain as his assistant - he only programmed by reading fanfold paper output and writing his code down. She would type it up, run it, and then bring the output back for him to analyse. I can imagine such a person finding this idea gratifying, albeit perhaps too much of a REPL for his tastes.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  When I started at technical school writing pseudo code in paper before coding into a 512 KB PC with 8" floppies was common, like doing diagrams of data structures, so maybe I am biased.

emsy 5y ago

That’s a circular explanation. The iPad isn’t suitable for programming because it isn’t suitable for programming. The limitation is completely arbitrary because Apple thinks they can tell users what they should use their devices for. It’s “Your holding it wrong” applied to software.

hughrr 5y ago
Actually that’s not it. It’s not suitable because of the modality, window management and state and data management concepts which are all compromises required for high efficiency touch driven mobile devices.
- emsy 5y ago
  Of course you're going to get a different experience than on a desktop OS, and you're not going to satisfy every programming environment. But between "virtually none" and "every" there is a huge space that iOS would be able to fill with its current OS design. I'd argue that a lot of developers could do their job on the iPad, if there was VS Code available for it. Right now this isn't even possible, because alternative browser engines aren't allowed on iOS. Why not allow the software on the device? There's no need to change the OS in the slightest. It's easy to dismiss the concept, when it hasn't even had the chance to prove itself.
  - hughrr 5y ago
    You can actually build code in swift playgrounds on iOS.
    - emsy 5y ago
      That's why I wrote "virtually". Others suggested virtualization, which I think would be a good tradeoff that doesn't require usability changes to the underlying OS (and would finally put the processor to good use). Other than that, the inability to code on iOS is due to artificial gatekeeping by Apple, not due to design decisions. There are many ways coding (and probably other types of apps!) on iOS would be possible, if it wasn't for Apple.

mhh__ 5y ago

Because I already own an iPad