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Looks like it's aimed squarely at students. Apple used to own the space. I don't think they do, anymore. They also had a lot of school IT stuff, like charging

Looks like it's aimed squarely at students. Apple used to own the space. I don't think they do, anymore. They also had a lot of school IT stuff, like charging carts.

robinhood 8mo ago
Have you seen classes in universities? In schools? My daughter is in secondary school - they all have mandatory iPads.
- organsnyder 8mo ago
  My kids' district gives them iPads in middle school (5th through 8th) and MacBook Airs in high school.
- snowwrestler 8mo ago
  My local school district is 100% Chromebooks, first issued in 4th grade and through high school.
- ChrisMarshallNY 8mo ago
  Not in some time (retired). I have seen lots of iPads in medical facilities. In fact, just this morning, I was looking at one, with a badly-designed app for checking in patients. Many of the patients are older folks. They tend to press long and hard on the big buttons. A sensible app developer traps tap and long-touch, and sends them both to the same handler. This developer only catches the tap event, and ignores long-touch. The attendant was getting grumpy, because she had to keep telling patients "tap 'gently'." It's just me, I know, but I get salty, when I see this kind of careless UI design (it was the app's fault -not the iPad's). I know that the medical group paid big bucks for the app.
- DaSHacka 8mo ago
  My old Highschool, as well as many other schools I've seen since, mandate Chromebooks. I think it tends to be the more well-off schools with the iPads, the chromebooks are definitely a lot cheaper over the long run for the district.
  - bigC5560 8mo ago
    This. I went to a broke, small school and we were assigned Chromebooks. When I was younger some teachers had a few iPads, but they were old and mostly used for games when we got our assignments done. We didn't do work on them the way we did the Chromebooks in middle/high school.
  - happyopossum 8mo ago
    > the chromebooks are definitely a lot cheaper over the long run for the district. I'd need to seem some evidence for that - cheap chromebooks break very easily. Talk to any school IT person who handles device repair/replacement and you will hear nightmares of 50+% loss rates...
    - DaSHacka 8mo ago
      This is true, but I was on the School's IT in HS and they were much easier to repair. Things like the keyboard caps were a constant pain point, but they were durable little devices and 30 minutes as all it took to fix the worst of issues. We would just hang on to the Chromebooks whenever they had a fault that made them inoperable, and when a new one came in with a problem, like missing keyboard caps or a broken webcam, we'd just part out one of the Chromebooks from the graveyard. I imagine that would be significantly more difficult with an iPad, even just opening them up is much harder, and there's not a whole lot you can do to fix them.
- jimmydddd 8mo ago
  Our middle schools started out with iPads. But they switched to Chromebooks because they were a lot more useful. Also, apparently, middle school boys aren't that good at caring for iPads. :-)
  - bilbo0s 8mo ago
    apparently, middle school boys aren't that good at caring for iPads. :-) Your district is liable to be unpleasantly surprised. Like ours, they will likely find middle school-ers are worse at caring for Chromebooks. The rate of broken Chromebooks for us was staggeringly high.
jimmydddd 8mo ago
My son went to college with his Mac. But a bunch of the courses required running Windows software. So we had to get him a PC as well.
- JKCalhoun 8mo ago
  Everything, as I understand it, is moving to the Web. Google Docs, Canvas…
  - bilbo0s 8mo ago
    Yeah. I'd be curious to know what school HN User jimmydddd's son goes to that it uses windows only software instead of the web? It just seems like something out of time. Like an engineering school that only teaches those building techniques that are predicated on load bearing masonry. Oh and by the way, here are the 5 drafting classes you need to take.
    - Apocryphon 8mo ago
      Looks like Quartus still doesn't support macOS.
- danaris 8mo ago
  What software being taught in colleges today (outside of highly specialised niches) requires Windows? Stats software is cross-platform or open-source. Art programs are cross-platform or open-source. Office suites are cross-platform or browser-based. Unless you're specifically trying to learn Windows development, dev tools are cross-platform and open source. 15 years ago, what you describe was probably quite common. Today, it's almost completely disappeared.
  - daemonologist 8mo ago
    When I was in college the exam nanny software required Windows, and not in a VM. (I had a Windows desktop at home, so I just remoted into that to take exams.) This was a few years ago but much less than 15. Also most "professional" CAD software is Windows-only, which is going to affect a big chunk of engineering majors.
DauntingPear7 8mo ago
Student at a US Uni here. They still do very much own the space for both tablets and laptops, especially in CS
- suobset 8mo ago
  CompSci grad in the US as well, it is genuinely a sea of either Macs or ThinkPads with $INSERT_FAV_LINUX_DISTRO here, and even then 66% of that are Macs.

Looks like it's aimed squarely at students. Apple used to own the space. I don't think they do, anymore. They also had a lot of school IT stuff, like charging carts.

robinhood 8mo ago

Have you seen classes in universities? In schools? My daughter is in secondary school - they all have mandatory iPads.

organsnyder 8mo ago
My kids' district gives them iPads in middle school (5th through 8th) and MacBook Airs in high school.
snowwrestler 8mo ago
My local school district is 100% Chromebooks, first issued in 4th grade and through high school.
ChrisMarshallNY 8mo ago
Not in some time (retired). I have seen lots of iPads in medical facilities. In fact, just this morning, I was looking at one, with a badly-designed app for checking in patients. Many of the patients are older folks. They tend to press long and hard on the big buttons. A sensible app developer traps tap and long-touch, and sends them both to the same handler. This developer only catches the tap event, and ignores long-touch. The attendant was getting grumpy, because she had to keep telling patients "tap 'gently'." It's just me, I know, but I get salty, when I see this kind of careless UI design (it was the app's fault -not the iPad's). I know that the medical group paid big bucks for the app.
DaSHacka 8mo ago
My old Highschool, as well as many other schools I've seen since, mandate Chromebooks. I think it tends to be the more well-off schools with the iPads, the chromebooks are definitely a lot cheaper over the long run for the district.
- bigC5560 8mo ago
  This. I went to a broke, small school and we were assigned Chromebooks. When I was younger some teachers had a few iPads, but they were old and mostly used for games when we got our assignments done. We didn't do work on them the way we did the Chromebooks in middle/high school.
- happyopossum 8mo ago
  > the chromebooks are definitely a lot cheaper over the long run for the district. I'd need to seem some evidence for that - cheap chromebooks break very easily. Talk to any school IT person who handles device repair/replacement and you will hear nightmares of 50+% loss rates...
  - DaSHacka 8mo ago
    This is true, but I was on the School's IT in HS and they were much easier to repair. Things like the keyboard caps were a constant pain point, but they were durable little devices and 30 minutes as all it took to fix the worst of issues. We would just hang on to the Chromebooks whenever they had a fault that made them inoperable, and when a new one came in with a problem, like missing keyboard caps or a broken webcam, we'd just part out one of the Chromebooks from the graveyard. I imagine that would be significantly more difficult with an iPad, even just opening them up is much harder, and there's not a whole lot you can do to fix them.
jimmydddd 8mo ago
Our middle schools started out with iPads. But they switched to Chromebooks because they were a lot more useful. Also, apparently, middle school boys aren't that good at caring for iPads. :-)
- bilbo0s 8mo ago
  apparently, middle school boys aren't that good at caring for iPads. :-) Your district is liable to be unpleasantly surprised. Like ours, they will likely find middle school-ers are worse at caring for Chromebooks. The rate of broken Chromebooks for us was staggeringly high.

jimmydddd 8mo ago

My son went to college with his Mac. But a bunch of the courses required running Windows software. So we had to get him a PC as well.

JKCalhoun 8mo ago
Everything, as I understand it, is moving to the Web. Google Docs, Canvas…
- bilbo0s 8mo ago
  Yeah. I'd be curious to know what school HN User jimmydddd's son goes to that it uses windows only software instead of the web? It just seems like something out of time. Like an engineering school that only teaches those building techniques that are predicated on load bearing masonry. Oh and by the way, here are the 5 drafting classes you need to take.
  - Apocryphon 8mo ago
    Looks like Quartus still doesn't support macOS.
danaris 8mo ago
What software being taught in colleges today (outside of highly specialised niches) requires Windows? Stats software is cross-platform or open-source. Art programs are cross-platform or open-source. Office suites are cross-platform or browser-based. Unless you're specifically trying to learn Windows development, dev tools are cross-platform and open source. 15 years ago, what you describe was probably quite common. Today, it's almost completely disappeared.
- daemonologist 8mo ago
  When I was in college the exam nanny software required Windows, and not in a VM. (I had a Windows desktop at home, so I just remoted into that to take exams.) This was a few years ago but much less than 15. Also most "professional" CAD software is Windows-only, which is going to affect a big chunk of engineering majors.

DauntingPear7 8mo ago

Student at a US Uni here. They still do very much own the space for both tablets and laptops, especially in CS

suobset 8mo ago
CompSci grad in the US as well, it is genuinely a sea of either Macs or ThinkPads with $INSERT_FAV_LINUX_DISTRO here, and even then 66% of that are Macs.