11 ms·

The iPad App Store is perhaps an even more dysfunctional place than the iPhone in how much it holds hardware and use cases hostage to the manufacturer's vision.

by DCKing 2y ago

The iPad App Store is perhaps an even more dysfunctional place than the iPhone in how much it holds hardware and use cases hostage to the manufacturer's vision. Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it in the moments you want to do anything remotely tinkery on an iPad. Apple's hardware since the 2021 iPad Pro (with M1) has had the ability to do this. The iPads have the RAM (16gb on higher storage models), appropriate keyboard and trackpads, the works. Great hardware being held back by Apple's vision people weren't allowed to deviate from. A straightforward reading of the DMA suggests that Apple is not allowed to restrict apps from using hardware features. Let's hope that means Parallels/VMware style VMs are possible without too much of a fight.

BillyTheKing 2y ago
totally agree - the iPad Pro could be a great second coding/programming tool - I'd love to justify buying myself one, but.. I just don't see a use-case if I can't work on it. I don't design stuff, don't really feel like I need a separate browsing device either
- dainiusse 2y ago
  Yep, I've got one and don't use too much. Too big for scrolling, too limited (software) for work. But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose
  - xoac 2y ago
    Not sure if this is true. I mean wasn’t the vision that you actually don’t need the mac for most things when the ipad came out?
    - ako 2y ago
      For certain groups of people (the majority?) that is reality, as long as you don’t need compilers, IDEs, or virtualization you can do pretty much anything on an iPad.
  - whywhywhywhy 2y ago
    > But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose Felt the goal was to overtake Mac during the 2015-2019 era, all the real engineering focus was on iPad, the Macs were underpowered and not really fit for purpose. Why would Apple choose a platform where they don't get 30% of every Creative Cloud sub when they could have had that. Only reason they backtracked was because Mac sales didn't fall off and the iPad just isn't that good to do real work on.
    - sakjur 2y ago
      Wasn’t that the period when Apple were positioning themselves to get the Macs away from Intel? I’m not sure the goal was to let the iPad overtake as much as it was to get its processors ready to take over from Intel.
    - rickdeckard 2y ago
      I believe it's simply more lucrative to keep selling both devices to the same target group, than try to solve the users' problem with a single device. Everything in Apple is designed to silo off the two product groups. An "iPad with MacOS" would just shift revenue from the MacOS division to the iPad division, losing a MacOS customer and probably NOT gaining a iPad customer (as he would have purchased an iPad anyway). Just as much as developing an MacBook convertible is not an issue of user experience but an issue of unnecessary cannibalization of iPad sales...
      - latexr 2y ago
        By that logic, the iPhone wouldn’t have been able to play music as soon as it launched. Yet that was part of the whole pitch: “an iPod, a phone, and an internet communicator”.
        richrichardsson 2y ago
        Not so sure. From mid-to-late 90s onwards a mobile phone was basically an essential item. I was never tempted to buy an iPod, but combine the phone and iPod and give me internet access to boot... sold.
  - latexr 2y ago
    > But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose Apple isn’t afraid to cannibalise its own products. They did exactly that with the iPhone in regard to the iPod. If someone is going to displace one of your most successful products, it better be yourself with something even more outstanding. It would have been in Apple’s best (financial) interest to have the iPad cannibalise the Mac because they’d have more control and earn more money from app sales.
    - tvshtr 2y ago
      This is nowhere close to being analogous. Apple could sacrifice iPod because they had much bigger fish to fry.
- d0mine 2y ago
  iPad (any model) with keyboard-cover can be used as a great portable ssh/mosh terminal (eg with Termius app). I work in Emacs--most functionality is available via terminal.
  - oefrha 2y ago
    The keyboard cover keyboard is shit though, I hate every second with it. Plus no escape etc.
    - accrual 2y ago
      I've never owned a keyboard cover, but one could bring a TKL or 60% mechanical keyboard for the full typing experience without a laptop - might be a good compromise for some.
- Terretta 2y ago
  you can work on it https://blink.sh/ https://blink.sh/ see also https://docs.blink.sh/advanced/code https://docs.blink.sh/advanced/code
- lutoma 2y ago
  I switched from an iPad to a Surface Go 3 running Fedora a while ago and it really transformed my tablet use. I mostly just watched Youtube videos and did some light browsing on my iPad, but never really any serious work. Occcasionally I would ssh into other machines using apps like Blink, but even with the external keyboard the UX just feels ... off. Same for other apps that have IDE-like environments. They work, but they're never really great to use. I was skeptical about getting a Linux tablet because of the worse battery life and less polished overall experience, but having a desktop Firefox with all add-ons, my text editor of choice, and the ability to open a terminal and run whatever I want really more than makes up for it (Plus GNOME is a pretty good tablet experience out of the box these days as long as you broadly stick to their 'official' apps).
- immibis 2y ago
  Why not buy one of the hundreds of non-Apple tablets which can do what you want?
  - chongli 2y ago
    Because they don’t run iPadOS? People love all the things the OS can do. They just wish it wouldn’t stop them from doing that one thing in particular that they it to do. Tantalizingly close to perfection with one glaring flaw is extremely frustrating!
    - immibis 2y ago
      What can it do that other ones can't? Integration with Apple's walled garden is the most common complaint.
      - chongli 2y ago
        It's the UI. It is designed from the ground up for touch. People who like iPadOS do not like Windows Surface tablets for that exact reason. A desktop UI that's been shoehorned into a tablet is not as good as a purpose-built touch UI.
        immibis 2y ago
        The two tablet genders: iPad, and Windows Surface. It's a shame no other giant tech company ever created one that has exactly the combination of attributes you asked for.
        chongli 2y ago
        If you’re referring to Android, the answer is no. Android is a mobile OS. It does not run Mac or Windows desktop apps.
        fennecbutt 2y ago
grishka 2y ago
Not just VMs, you could technically also run things like PC emulators, with real PC operating systems, especially older ones, with acceptable performance. Just imagine using Windows 98 on an iPad!
- accrual 2y ago
  Reminds me of running Windows 95 under Bochs on the Sony PSP. The the CPU turned up to max (333MHz) it was just barely fast enough to impress your friends. ;)
changoplatanero 2y ago
Is it right to say that currently the cost of the hardware is being partly subsidized by the profits Apple makes from the software? If some of the profit from the software gets taken away will we see the price of the hardware rise?
- spacebanana7 2y ago
  In an economic textbook sense, yes. In the current situation Apple has to consider that a marginal price rise in hardware will lose marginal revenue in software, thereby shifting the equilibrium price of hardware lower.
- varispeed 2y ago
  The cost of custom chips is massive, but then manufacturing is cheap - after selling N units to pay off the initial investment, it's almost free (unit cost) when done at scale.
  - lotsofpulp 2y ago
    I don’t think manufacturing would end up almost free for any of the newest chips since there are such tight tolerances and high failure rates. At least not for quite a few more years when (if?) there are competing fabs.
- Rinzler89 2y ago
  >Is it right to say that currently the cost of the hardware is being partly subsidized by the profits Apple makes from the software? No, it wouldn't be. You're probably thinking about gaming consoles who's HW is sold at a loss or at very thin profit margins and subsidized by the more expensive game purchases, but Apple hardware already has the highest profit margins of any HW manufacturer out there, and at their 200 USD per 8GB of commodity RAM and NAND chips, you better believe it. So no, they don't need the walled garden SW money to fund HW. Their HW alone brings in plenty of cash.
- fauigerzigerk 2y ago
  Probably not. If the current price is optimal then it will remain optimal even if costs rise.
TaylorAlexander 2y ago
Oh gosh if I could use a series of iPad apps to run a Linux system on an iPad I’d be so happy. I mean I could get an android tablet but I don’t really like android. I’m fine with iOS and I love Linux, so sticking those two together would be really nice. Actually I’d love to run a Linux VM on my iPhone too!
- op00to 2y ago
  What’s the benefit to you of a VM on your iPhone when you can simply ssh to a vm somewhere else? Not saying there isn’t a benefit, but curious about what you want to do. Other than people who are in the middle of nowhere, which at that point I’d recommend a raspberry pi and a battery bank or a laptop or something. I use the pi and battery for running various ham radio stuff while out in a park or whatever and connect from an iPad, and that works very well in my use case.
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    >iPhone when you can simply ssh to a vm somewhere else? Like not having reliable internet access everywhere. In a lot of areas mobile internet is spotty. Or you're in roaming so it's insanely expensive. Plus we already have these powerful devices in out pocket, more powerful than PC's were 10 years ago, sitting idly doing nothing most of the time, why not put them to use when in need instead of paying for some extra remote cloud compute on top of that. Also, VMs don't just mean Linux for web development, it could be a VM for retro gaming or running things in VM for security sandboxing etc. That would be really neat to always have with me instead of having to ssh all the time.
    - skydhash 2y ago
      While I agree with your use case, doing nothing most of the time is how those devices last day long on a battery and can run without a fan. My MBA get toasty when I OCR a pdf, I cannot imagine a phone on a sustained load.
      - Rinzler89 2y ago
seltzered_ 2y ago
Yep. Repeating a collage from 2020 ( https://imgur.com/a/CQwApt8 https://imgur.com/a/CQwApt8 ) and comment ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31644188 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31644188 ) on the strange workarounds done to use Linux (or possibly even windows) on an ipad.
- huhtenberg 2y ago
  Isn't iSH is a toy shell? The last time I looked at it, it didn't provide any access to the actual iPad OS or file system details.
  - EraYaN 2y ago
    Well it will probably never, since all apps are always within the sandbox. The idea is to ssh out to some other system. Besides the actual iOS shell is not so interesting or useful anyway. (Jailbroken devices have had them for a while, you won't be running your nvim and git stuff locally anytime soon.)
MyFirstSass 2y ago
Another thing is the issue of e-waste. At some point i had multiple older iPads with perfectly great screens, and i wanted to use them as "hubs" for a home setup to control various things, another option was using them as secondary screens, or maybe just give them to a kid. You couldn't, they were simply to old for the new IOS update, and almost all apps including browsers requires the newer IOS and update automatically without asking - essentially bricking them on purpose. Anyway i ended up giving them to a "safe e-waste center" but i'm sceptical they'll actually be recycled. I think locking down a device should be illegal especially e-waste considered, and if there's some reason not to, then it should at least be opened the day official support ends so the device can be used to watch videos/games for kids/whatever.
- manderley 2y ago
  Of course they were recycled, there are valuable minerals in these devices.
  - MyFirstSass 2y ago
    Well, in my country there's been multiple scandals about waste handling where it was found very little ended up being recycled, the sorting people did in some cases created more pollution because it had to be transported and huge amounts ended up in big dumps of toxic assorted garbage either here or in some third world country where kids then make a few cents a day scavenging in the toxic piles. So yeah, i'm sceptical. There's a reason it's called reduce, re-use, recycle as a very distant third as far as i've seen.
- pzo 2y ago
  Same, I wish once device stops being supported it should give easy option to be jailbroken and unlock bootloader. Such devices could be retrofitted for many other roles e.g robotics toy with arduino/raspberrypi, smart home, smart router etc.
- bojan 2y ago
  As a counterexample, the other day I found my old Nexus 5, from 2013, running Android 6. While it was not completely straightforward, I was able to reset the phone and link it to a new Google account, and after several cycles of updates the entire Google suite seems to work, including Maps, and not slowly at that. I was, and still am, genuinely impressed.
walterbell 2y ago
> Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it After installing https://ish.app https://ish.app for Alpine Linux emulation on iPad, one immediately comes up with use cases, even though it's excruciatingly slow. Hopefully Apple opens up the imminent M3 iPad Pros to allow macOS and Linux VMs, even if the feature is initially price segmented to devices with extra RAM. The iPad 4:3 high-resolution screen offers unmatched vertical real estate for text editing.
- rickdeckard 2y ago
  As long as the majority of the target group keeps buying MacBooks AND iPads, I doubt that Apple has an incentive to cannibalize its own product line. They are well-aware of this, visible from the fact that they never bothered to add a touch panel or Pen-support to any MacBook, or make the Watch a standalone device: Customers wanting this either buy the devices individually anyway, or wouldn't be willing to hand over the sum of all combined devices for a single "superset" device. Just imagine that Apple's view of the "iPad Pro with MacOS" demographic are customers who purchased a 1600 USD MacBook and a 1000 USD iPad. Is the "iPad with MacOS" able to replace either of those? Would they be able to charge 2600 USD for that device and sell comparable volumes?
  - xattt 2y ago
    I see the Watch the same as a late 90s Palm device. You can’t make it standalone, because it depends on a larger device for configuration. Unless, of course, you’re suggesting that it be made available for Android users as well.
    - HenryBemis 2y ago
      I bought some Apple Watches (because of reasons). I am wearing one right now. Model 3 (Nike edition or something). I've switched everything off (WiFi, Bluetooth, analytics, the whole thing). It only shows the date and time. The battery lasts 4-5 days. It's amazing when you shut down the telemetry-battery-draining functionality of devices. And to add some more insult, I am using an Android phone, which ofc don't even try to connect to my watch :) I believe -and Gemini just confirmed- that they don't work together. > it depends on a larger device for configuration yes, the architecture was purposfully made, so that the Watch only collects your bio-metrics, with limited own/independent functionality. They (Apple) does want everyone in the 'garden', so why open it up?
inopinatus 2y ago
the FreeBSD project has a unique opportunity
f6v 2y ago
I don’t think versatile devices are possible. I love iPad Pro for what it is. I tried Surface Pro and it was a much inferior tablet experience, even though the device is more “versatile”. I just doing think that you can get an excellent tablet by trying to be a laptop at the same time.
- cromka 2y ago
  It’s a screen. Add a regular Bluetooth keyboard mouse and you have a PC. There’s no compromise here from hardware perspective, it’s just software that’s in the way.
  - f6v 2y ago
    I mean, Samsung has DeX. It’s exactly what you describe. I don’t like it, I don’t need it. I’d rather have a focused device than one that tries to be two things at once.
  - TheFuzzball 2y ago
    The UI elements on iPadOS are necessarily larger to accommodate touch. It's just a lot less information dense than macOS, and making it the same scale will make using it as a touch device harder.
  - freeopinion 2y ago
    Remember the size of the original iPhone? I have long wondered why nobody makes a universal compute brick in such a form factor without a screen. Then sell 5" or 7" or 10" or 27" screens with and without touch that connect to the little brick. I can buy a 15" screen right now for under $75. It's the ultimate super-thin laptop if you remove the compute and keep the brick in your purse/backpack/holster. For extra points, connect two compute bricks for more muscle.
    - asadotzler 2y ago
      Thermals is why. Closest we get is Mac Mini and NUC.
- 2y ago
niutech 2y ago
You can run Linux on iPad today, see the options: https://ipadlinux.org https://ipadlinux.org
- pquki4 2y ago
  While this is doable, it is far from an enjoyable experience -- many packages are not available on iSH or have issues, for example. Most people are not going to replace their laptop with these two apps.
Terretta 2y ago
VMs on iOS: https://getutm.app/ https://getutm.app/ Coding work on iOS: blink shell https://blink.sh/ https://blink.sh/
- talldayo 2y ago
  Lmao at UTM still being harder to install than QEMU
  - ivanjermakov 2y ago
    In order to have JIT enabled you need to run another app from ANOTHER device. What a joke, Apple?
shepherdjerred 2y ago
I've been so confused about Apple advertising the capabilities of the M1 iPad -- it's got a _real_ processor, it's so fast! ...but nothing on the iPad can _really_ use it.
- trogdor 2y ago
  That’s simply not true. For example, Final Cut Pro, Davinci Resolve and Logic Pro all exist as iPad apps.
  - shepherdjerred 2y ago
    Eh, what I mean is it's a very constrained set. I would like to see emulators, _real_ games, VMs, dev environments, etc.
fagrobot 2y ago
ewe

by DCKing 2y ago

BillyTheKing 2y ago

totally agree - the iPad Pro could be a great second coding/programming tool - I'd love to justify buying myself one, but.. I just don't see a use-case if I can't work on it. I don't design stuff, don't really feel like I need a separate browsing device either

dainiusse 2y ago
Yep, I've got one and don't use too much. Too big for scrolling, too limited (software) for work. But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose
- xoac 2y ago
  Not sure if this is true. I mean wasn’t the vision that you actually don’t need the mac for most things when the ipad came out?
  - ako 2y ago
    For certain groups of people (the majority?) that is reality, as long as you don’t need compilers, IDEs, or virtualization you can do pretty much anything on an iPad.
- whywhywhywhy 2y ago
  > But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose Felt the goal was to overtake Mac during the 2015-2019 era, all the real engineering focus was on iPad, the Macs were underpowered and not really fit for purpose. Why would Apple choose a platform where they don't get 30% of every Creative Cloud sub when they could have had that. Only reason they backtracked was because Mac sales didn't fall off and the iPad just isn't that good to do real work on.
  - sakjur 2y ago
    Wasn’t that the period when Apple were positioning themselves to get the Macs away from Intel? I’m not sure the goal was to let the iPad overtake as much as it was to get its processors ready to take over from Intel.
  - rickdeckard 2y ago
    I believe it's simply more lucrative to keep selling both devices to the same target group, than try to solve the users' problem with a single device. Everything in Apple is designed to silo off the two product groups. An "iPad with MacOS" would just shift revenue from the MacOS division to the iPad division, losing a MacOS customer and probably NOT gaining a iPad customer (as he would have purchased an iPad anyway). Just as much as developing an MacBook convertible is not an issue of user experience but an issue of unnecessary cannibalization of iPad sales...
    - latexr 2y ago
      By that logic, the iPhone wouldn’t have been able to play music as soon as it launched. Yet that was part of the whole pitch: “an iPod, a phone, and an internet communicator”.
      - richrichardsson 2y ago
        Not so sure. From mid-to-late 90s onwards a mobile phone was basically an essential item. I was never tempted to buy an iPod, but combine the phone and iPod and give me internet access to boot... sold.
- latexr 2y ago
  > But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose Apple isn’t afraid to cannibalise its own products. They did exactly that with the iPhone in regard to the iPod. If someone is going to displace one of your most successful products, it better be yourself with something even more outstanding. It would have been in Apple’s best (financial) interest to have the iPad cannibalise the Mac because they’d have more control and earn more money from app sales.
  - tvshtr 2y ago
    This is nowhere close to being analogous. Apple could sacrifice iPod because they had much bigger fish to fry.
d0mine 2y ago
iPad (any model) with keyboard-cover can be used as a great portable ssh/mosh terminal (eg with Termius app). I work in Emacs--most functionality is available via terminal.
- oefrha 2y ago
  The keyboard cover keyboard is shit though, I hate every second with it. Plus no escape etc.
  - accrual 2y ago
    I've never owned a keyboard cover, but one could bring a TKL or 60% mechanical keyboard for the full typing experience without a laptop - might be a good compromise for some.
Terretta 2y ago
you can work on it https://blink.sh/ https://blink.sh/ see also https://docs.blink.sh/advanced/code https://docs.blink.sh/advanced/code
lutoma 2y ago
I switched from an iPad to a Surface Go 3 running Fedora a while ago and it really transformed my tablet use. I mostly just watched Youtube videos and did some light browsing on my iPad, but never really any serious work. Occcasionally I would ssh into other machines using apps like Blink, but even with the external keyboard the UX just feels ... off. Same for other apps that have IDE-like environments. They work, but they're never really great to use. I was skeptical about getting a Linux tablet because of the worse battery life and less polished overall experience, but having a desktop Firefox with all add-ons, my text editor of choice, and the ability to open a terminal and run whatever I want really more than makes up for it (Plus GNOME is a pretty good tablet experience out of the box these days as long as you broadly stick to their 'official' apps).
immibis 2y ago
Why not buy one of the hundreds of non-Apple tablets which can do what you want?
- chongli 2y ago
  Because they don’t run iPadOS? People love all the things the OS can do. They just wish it wouldn’t stop them from doing that one thing in particular that they it to do. Tantalizingly close to perfection with one glaring flaw is extremely frustrating!
  - immibis 2y ago
    What can it do that other ones can't? Integration with Apple's walled garden is the most common complaint.
    - chongli 2y ago
      It's the UI. It is designed from the ground up for touch. People who like iPadOS do not like Windows Surface tablets for that exact reason. A desktop UI that's been shoehorned into a tablet is not as good as a purpose-built touch UI.
      - immibis 2y ago
        The two tablet genders: iPad, and Windows Surface. It's a shame no other giant tech company ever created one that has exactly the combination of attributes you asked for.
        chongli 2y ago
        If you’re referring to Android, the answer is no. Android is a mobile OS. It does not run Mac or Windows desktop apps.
        fennecbutt 2y ago

grishka 2y ago

Not just VMs, you could technically also run things like PC emulators, with real PC operating systems, especially older ones, with acceptable performance. Just imagine using Windows 98 on an iPad!

accrual 2y ago
Reminds me of running Windows 95 under Bochs on the Sony PSP. The the CPU turned up to max (333MHz) it was just barely fast enough to impress your friends. ;)

changoplatanero 2y ago

Is it right to say that currently the cost of the hardware is being partly subsidized by the profits Apple makes from the software? If some of the profit from the software gets taken away will we see the price of the hardware rise?

spacebanana7 2y ago
In an economic textbook sense, yes. In the current situation Apple has to consider that a marginal price rise in hardware will lose marginal revenue in software, thereby shifting the equilibrium price of hardware lower.
varispeed 2y ago
The cost of custom chips is massive, but then manufacturing is cheap - after selling N units to pay off the initial investment, it's almost free (unit cost) when done at scale.
- lotsofpulp 2y ago
  I don’t think manufacturing would end up almost free for any of the newest chips since there are such tight tolerances and high failure rates. At least not for quite a few more years when (if?) there are competing fabs.
Rinzler89 2y ago
>Is it right to say that currently the cost of the hardware is being partly subsidized by the profits Apple makes from the software? No, it wouldn't be. You're probably thinking about gaming consoles who's HW is sold at a loss or at very thin profit margins and subsidized by the more expensive game purchases, but Apple hardware already has the highest profit margins of any HW manufacturer out there, and at their 200 USD per 8GB of commodity RAM and NAND chips, you better believe it. So no, they don't need the walled garden SW money to fund HW. Their HW alone brings in plenty of cash.
fauigerzigerk 2y ago
Probably not. If the current price is optimal then it will remain optimal even if costs rise.

TaylorAlexander 2y ago

Oh gosh if I could use a series of iPad apps to run a Linux system on an iPad I’d be so happy. I mean I could get an android tablet but I don’t really like android. I’m fine with iOS and I love Linux, so sticking those two together would be really nice. Actually I’d love to run a Linux VM on my iPhone too!

op00to 2y ago
What’s the benefit to you of a VM on your iPhone when you can simply ssh to a vm somewhere else? Not saying there isn’t a benefit, but curious about what you want to do. Other than people who are in the middle of nowhere, which at that point I’d recommend a raspberry pi and a battery bank or a laptop or something. I use the pi and battery for running various ham radio stuff while out in a park or whatever and connect from an iPad, and that works very well in my use case.
- Rinzler89 2y ago
  >iPhone when you can simply ssh to a vm somewhere else? Like not having reliable internet access everywhere. In a lot of areas mobile internet is spotty. Or you're in roaming so it's insanely expensive. Plus we already have these powerful devices in out pocket, more powerful than PC's were 10 years ago, sitting idly doing nothing most of the time, why not put them to use when in need instead of paying for some extra remote cloud compute on top of that. Also, VMs don't just mean Linux for web development, it could be a VM for retro gaming or running things in VM for security sandboxing etc. That would be really neat to always have with me instead of having to ssh all the time.
  - skydhash 2y ago
    While I agree with your use case, doing nothing most of the time is how those devices last day long on a battery and can run without a fan. My MBA get toasty when I OCR a pdf, I cannot imagine a phone on a sustained load.
    - Rinzler89 2y ago

seltzered_ 2y ago

Yep. Repeating a collage from 2020 ( https://imgur.com/a/CQwApt8 https://imgur.com/a/CQwApt8 ) and comment ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31644188 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31644188 ) on the strange workarounds done to use Linux (or possibly even windows) on an ipad.

huhtenberg 2y ago
Isn't iSH is a toy shell? The last time I looked at it, it didn't provide any access to the actual iPad OS or file system details.
- EraYaN 2y ago
  Well it will probably never, since all apps are always within the sandbox. The idea is to ssh out to some other system. Besides the actual iOS shell is not so interesting or useful anyway. (Jailbroken devices have had them for a while, you won't be running your nvim and git stuff locally anytime soon.)

MyFirstSass 2y ago

Another thing is the issue of e-waste. At some point i had multiple older iPads with perfectly great screens, and i wanted to use them as "hubs" for a home setup to control various things, another option was using them as secondary screens, or maybe just give them to a kid. You couldn't, they were simply to old for the new IOS update, and almost all apps including browsers requires the newer IOS and update automatically without asking - essentially bricking them on purpose. Anyway i ended up giving them to a "safe e-waste center" but i'm sceptical they'll actually be recycled. I think locking down a device should be illegal especially e-waste considered, and if there's some reason not to, then it should at least be opened the day official support ends so the device can be used to watch videos/games for kids/whatever.

manderley 2y ago
Of course they were recycled, there are valuable minerals in these devices.
- MyFirstSass 2y ago
  Well, in my country there's been multiple scandals about waste handling where it was found very little ended up being recycled, the sorting people did in some cases created more pollution because it had to be transported and huge amounts ended up in big dumps of toxic assorted garbage either here or in some third world country where kids then make a few cents a day scavenging in the toxic piles. So yeah, i'm sceptical. There's a reason it's called reduce, re-use, recycle as a very distant third as far as i've seen.
pzo 2y ago
Same, I wish once device stops being supported it should give easy option to be jailbroken and unlock bootloader. Such devices could be retrofitted for many other roles e.g robotics toy with arduino/raspberrypi, smart home, smart router etc.
bojan 2y ago
As a counterexample, the other day I found my old Nexus 5, from 2013, running Android 6. While it was not completely straightforward, I was able to reset the phone and link it to a new Google account, and after several cycles of updates the entire Google suite seems to work, including Maps, and not slowly at that. I was, and still am, genuinely impressed.

walterbell 2y ago

> Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it After installing https://ish.app https://ish.app for Alpine Linux emulation on iPad, one immediately comes up with use cases, even though it's excruciatingly slow. Hopefully Apple opens up the imminent M3 iPad Pros to allow macOS and Linux VMs, even if the feature is initially price segmented to devices with extra RAM. The iPad 4:3 high-resolution screen offers unmatched vertical real estate for text editing.

rickdeckard 2y ago
As long as the majority of the target group keeps buying MacBooks AND iPads, I doubt that Apple has an incentive to cannibalize its own product line. They are well-aware of this, visible from the fact that they never bothered to add a touch panel or Pen-support to any MacBook, or make the Watch a standalone device: Customers wanting this either buy the devices individually anyway, or wouldn't be willing to hand over the sum of all combined devices for a single "superset" device. Just imagine that Apple's view of the "iPad Pro with MacOS" demographic are customers who purchased a 1600 USD MacBook and a 1000 USD iPad. Is the "iPad with MacOS" able to replace either of those? Would they be able to charge 2600 USD for that device and sell comparable volumes?
- xattt 2y ago
  I see the Watch the same as a late 90s Palm device. You can’t make it standalone, because it depends on a larger device for configuration. Unless, of course, you’re suggesting that it be made available for Android users as well.
  - HenryBemis 2y ago
    I bought some Apple Watches (because of reasons). I am wearing one right now. Model 3 (Nike edition or something). I've switched everything off (WiFi, Bluetooth, analytics, the whole thing). It only shows the date and time. The battery lasts 4-5 days. It's amazing when you shut down the telemetry-battery-draining functionality of devices. And to add some more insult, I am using an Android phone, which ofc don't even try to connect to my watch :) I believe -and Gemini just confirmed- that they don't work together. > it depends on a larger device for configuration yes, the architecture was purposfully made, so that the Watch only collects your bio-metrics, with limited own/independent functionality. They (Apple) does want everyone in the 'garden', so why open it up?

inopinatus 2y ago

the FreeBSD project has a unique opportunity

f6v 2y ago

I don’t think versatile devices are possible. I love iPad Pro for what it is. I tried Surface Pro and it was a much inferior tablet experience, even though the device is more “versatile”. I just doing think that you can get an excellent tablet by trying to be a laptop at the same time.

cromka 2y ago
It’s a screen. Add a regular Bluetooth keyboard mouse and you have a PC. There’s no compromise here from hardware perspective, it’s just software that’s in the way.
- f6v 2y ago
  I mean, Samsung has DeX. It’s exactly what you describe. I don’t like it, I don’t need it. I’d rather have a focused device than one that tries to be two things at once.
- TheFuzzball 2y ago
  The UI elements on iPadOS are necessarily larger to accommodate touch. It's just a lot less information dense than macOS, and making it the same scale will make using it as a touch device harder.
- freeopinion 2y ago
  Remember the size of the original iPhone? I have long wondered why nobody makes a universal compute brick in such a form factor without a screen. Then sell 5" or 7" or 10" or 27" screens with and without touch that connect to the little brick. I can buy a 15" screen right now for under $75. It's the ultimate super-thin laptop if you remove the compute and keep the brick in your purse/backpack/holster. For extra points, connect two compute bricks for more muscle.
  - asadotzler 2y ago
    Thermals is why. Closest we get is Mac Mini and NUC.
2y ago

niutech 2y ago

You can run Linux on iPad today, see the options: https://ipadlinux.org https://ipadlinux.org

pquki4 2y ago
While this is doable, it is far from an enjoyable experience -- many packages are not available on iSH or have issues, for example. Most people are not going to replace their laptop with these two apps.

Terretta 2y ago

VMs on iOS: https://getutm.app/ https://getutm.app/ Coding work on iOS: blink shell https://blink.sh/ https://blink.sh/

talldayo 2y ago
Lmao at UTM still being harder to install than QEMU
- ivanjermakov 2y ago
  In order to have JIT enabled you need to run another app from ANOTHER device. What a joke, Apple?

shepherdjerred 2y ago

I've been so confused about Apple advertising the capabilities of the M1 iPad -- it's got a _real_ processor, it's so fast! ...but nothing on the iPad can _really_ use it.

trogdor 2y ago
That’s simply not true. For example, Final Cut Pro, Davinci Resolve and Logic Pro all exist as iPad apps.
- shepherdjerred 2y ago
  Eh, what I mean is it's a very constrained set. I would like to see emulators, _real_ games, VMs, dev environments, etc.

fagrobot 2y ago

ewe