iPad Pro • Hacker News Board

Re: iPad Pro

#131

Post by reacharavindh » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:04 PM UTC

brandall10 wrote: post #90

reacharavindh wrote: post #32

I wish they made an iPhone SE as a miniature form of this iPad. square-ish edges (easier to hold), better & larger LCD displays within the same body size, and powerful internals. The new iphones are just too big for one-handed use. you want to type the name of the website on top bar of mobile Safari - bring the next hand out or drop your phone....

Agreed. I'm hoping as some of this newer tech is commoditized that economy of scale allows an updated smaller entry to return. I wouldn't mind paying X prices for such a beast, but I'm aware the market wouldn't support $500+.

Yeah, I'm actually not that picky about the tech inside. Give me last gen internals - A11 processor, prev. gen camera, no True tone/glued up display whatever to reduce cost. But, give me a phone that is the size of iPhone SE but with a bigger display, and decent enough camera - I'd line up in the store for that.

Re: iPad Pro

#132

Post by cm2187 » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:04 PM UTC

jaegerpicker wrote: post #125

bendavis381 wrote: post #78

Can someone more educated on the subject please explain to me what would be required to turn this into a proper development machine? I'm asking about what iOS changes would be needed, rather than opinions about the physical aspects of it like form factor.

Depends on what you want to output. Webapps? Nothing, it already has all you need, especially if you are willing to use a remote server that you are ssh'ed into but you don't NEED that. For native compiled code and apps? Apple needs to release a Xcode compiler and a developer mode that lets you run self-signed binaries on the hardware.

If you develop anything for the web, don't you need to check how it renders on other browsers?

Re: iPad Pro

#133

Post by davemp » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:04 PM UTC

It's such a shame that there's no thunderbolt 3 in the iPad Pro. I would love to ditch my MBP to just plug an iPad into a TB3 monitor and get a mouse, keyboard, drawing tablet, and charging with 1 wire. I can get close to that with a MBP. The only downsides are a MBP is heavier for mobile use and I'd have to buy an expensive tablet.

Re: iPad Pro

#134

Post by Pulcinella » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:05 PM UTC

twodayslate wrote: post #76

Still waiting on Xcode for the iPad "Pro"

Same. I was hoping we would see that.

The Swift Playgrounds app really hasn’t gotten any love[1] since it was first introduced. You can actually import UIKit and the other frameworks and compile them on the iPad but this is pretty much undocumentated. The preview views are tremendously buggy (really the whole app is) and there is all sorts of hidden debug stuff running in the background[2] that slows down performance. Everything has to be in a single file so doing anything moderately complicated is a pain, the editor is buggy and will sometimes highlight just the last three letters of a word, and there is no Interface Builder[3]. I would love a real XCode.

[1]There have been new playgrounds added (e.g. “Learn to Code with Swift”) but the app itself really hasn’t been changed at all. The same bugs have been present for years. And they aren’t obscur either. You will run into editor bugs within the first 5 minutes.

[2] The debug stuff is to help facilitate the different playgrounds, but doesn’t really provide any benefit to someone coding in a blank file outside of a playground. You can’t turn it off within the app.

[3] I know a lot of people don’t like IB, but it’s great for throwing together simple apps quickly. It’s odd that it is absent from the official apple App but Pythonista, an app made by one person, has an visual interface editor.

Re: iPad Pro

#135

Post by Mahn » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:05 PM UTC

bendavis381 wrote: post #78

Can someone more educated on the subject please explain to me what would be required to turn this into a proper development machine? I'm asking about what iOS changes would be needed, rather than opinions about the physical aspects of it like form factor.

Tangential, but it's worth noting that if what you are looking for is a portable development machine with tablet-like capatibilities, the Microsoft Surface series is arguably a better choice.

Re: iPad Pro

#136

Post by softinio » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:05 PM UTC

sorahn wrote: post #85

softinio wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this mouse already works with the ipad: https://www.swiftpoint.com/store/swiftpoint-gt-mouse-2/ I haven't tried it just came across it the other day

That only works with their vnc software. So, mouse on windows, through remote desktop running on the ipad. The iPad itself still has no concept of a cursor.

Oh I didn't realize that. Thanks for clarifying.

Funny good old HN I lost a point for not knowing that though I mentioned I came across and never used this product lol.

Re: iPad Pro

#137

Post by gambiting » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:05 PM UTC

Bahamut wrote: post #61

ascagnel_ wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It lacks a controller, though. And the "best" controller is missing three inputs you'd expect (L3/R3 "stick click" buttons and a select button).

I don't think gamers necessarily expect an L3/R3 button. The Switch does not have anything like that, and Nintendo has always been top tier for gaming controllers.

Switch has L3/R3 buttons(you can click the analog sticks) and games do use them(sprint in Fortnite for example is L3).

Even the WiiU Pro controller had clickable sticks.

Re: iPad Pro

#138

Post by OskarS » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:06 PM UTC

r0fl wrote: post #107

OskarS wrote: post #43

There's a point in the press conference where the presenter went "And you can scroll the UI as fast as you want, and it doesn't lag! We have 8 cores in our CPU!" (or something: not literal transcription) and the entire audience clapped. That's about as serious an indictment of the competence of the software development industry as I can imagine. Edit: to clarify: the line is "It's a real PSD... it's over 3 gigs, it's…

It was a 3gig PSD file. That is pretty impressive.

No! It's not! Not in 2018! You only think it's impressive because you're used to UI's being total fucking shit! That's why it's an indictment of the software industry!

I'm not saying it's not hard: it is hard. Programming is hard. Making sure you're not occupying the UI thread for more than 16 milliseconds per frame is sometimes a challenge. You have to use all sorts of scary stuff like "concurrency" and "threads" and "GPUs". But it's 2018: non-laggy UI's should be the baseline everywhere, for everything.

Re: iPad Pro

#139

Post by reacharavindh » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:06 PM UTC

Do you all use iPad for serious work? Curious what apps you use?

Other than Apple Notes(with Apple Pencil), and watching NetFlix, I dont make good use of it. I'd love to get some recommendation for useful apps to try...

Re: iPad Pro

#140

Post by cm2187 » Tue, Oct 30, 2018, 4:06 PM UTC

saagarjha wrote: post #99

bendavis381 wrote: post #78

Can someone more educated on the subject please explain to me what would be required to turn this into a proper development machine? I'm asking about what iOS changes would be needed, rather than opinions about the physical aspects of it like form factor.

You can program on an iPad already using interpreted languages such as Python and Lua. And you can SSH into other machines, run Git, and have a text editor already. The main issue with developing on an iPad is that it’s not easy to load unsigned, compiled code on it, and even if you do, there’s not much that the code can do because of the system sandbox.

I would have thought the main issue would be screen size. Don't developers like large screen real estate, being able to see documents side by side, or the code of your app, a browser rendering it and the debug tools inside the browser, and stackoverflow on the side?