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The erosion of the Mac experience

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Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#21
I've of two minds on this topic.

The first is that the vast majority of concerns are coming from the Independent developer iOS/Mac scene. Some of these concernes are legit. There is unquestionably problems with Apple's quality with some software. The new SwiftUI based Settings app in Ventura is not yet stable, and when Apple's entire raison d'etre has been it just works, it's understandable that people get upset when things just don't work. If I were a independent mac developer, with my only source of revenue depending on Apple's goodwill and development APIs, I can see being upset.

On the other hand, it seems to me that the Apple community, especially the independent mac community has become increasingly a toxic monoculture. Just like polarization affecting other parts of the world - the community has become vitriolic, isolated and extremist at times. Anything not done in line with the one true Steve Jobs and in a way the community wanted - the apple way - has been labeled a disaster and "problematic".

In particular I think of the crusade/jihad against 1Password 8 when 1Password went Electron (in part to address many of the same problems). It got to the point that people were posting "evidence" of how bad 1Password 8 (electron based) was by posting screenshots of a misidentified previous version (which was worse). The twitter abuse heaped on developers just working to make a great product was a bad look.

The Apple podcasting community talks about Apple the way Trump fans talk about Democrats or Democrats talk about Republicans. It often bleeds into non-apple content as well. I've consistently found that the angriest people on twitter are apple partisans.

I finally unsubscribed to Accidental Tech Podcast after listening since almost the first episode just because of how negative everything is. It's not universal - I found another apple centric podcast to replace it - but it is pervasive.

To be fair - a lot of that is that this is what the modern media does. For example Linus Tech Tips's Tech Linked channel has the following headlines for their videos over the last 90 days:

1) Apple Betrayed Us All

2) Apple has no Shame

3) Apple got SERVED

4) Apple calls this PRO?

5) It's over Apple, the EU won!

6) Something is wrong with the M2 Apple Air

7) Apple will never escape this.

so I am inclined to treat a lot of this as just what people do to get listens and clicks.

I think the right perspective is somewhere between the two extremes. I wrote an app recently in Swift and SwiftUI that was amazing in how little effort it took to get a good (but not great) app and interface. Much faster than Flutter and far more visually fluid (animations, look and feel, etc). I can see its limitations though, and if all I knew was Objective C and AppKit, I could completely see where a developer would be skeptical of the approach. But the promise is most definitely there for a brighter future. In the mean time, my personal PoV is that things like Slack (which is electron based), 1Password 8 and Adobe Creative Suite shows that you can be both pluralist and great. Attacking them for not being pure isn't helping anything.

Long term, I have hope. Most of the criticisms of Apple's software were echos of similar complaints of the horribleness of Apple's laptops a few years ago. They turned that around - and I think Apple is honestly working to fix their software in the same matter. Apple needed to get off of Objective-C (who knows C anymore, to say nothing of objective-c?) and AppKit (30 year old technology at this point). Like the Intel to Arm transition, a lot of work is going on behind the scenes to make the transition work.

Apple really wants to be the BMW of the compute world - and Tim Cook's entire strategy seems to be the BMW every nickle and dime strategy. If Apple really wants to do that, they need things to just work.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#22
I just started developing in Swift/SwiftUI with a few app ideas in mind as a 37 year old with quite a bit of XP developing web services and *nix based utilities.

I _really_ like the overall experience of Swift and the mac ecosystem a lot. Maybe there is a lot of truth in the headline, but other than XCode not being as excellent as PyCharm or VSCode, I'm having a lot of fun and getting some users along the way.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#23
post #6

I believe that Apple is strategically choosing to coast on their desktop software while they work to harmonize their mobile, desktop, and entertainment software stacks. Why? Because based on rumors, patents, and the decisions they've made and the actions they've taken (or not taken), it appears as though that Apple believes that in the not so distant future the concept of having a separate mobile device and a computi…

> Consumers will have a single device, and that device will be capable of some form of altered reality interaction, or at least some impressive context switching behaviour.

... plus for real work they will have Microsoft Windows 14, so they will be covered.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#24
post #6

I believe that Apple is strategically choosing to coast on their desktop software while they work to harmonize their mobile, desktop, and entertainment software stacks. Why? Because based on rumors, patents, and the decisions they've made and the actions they've taken (or not taken), it appears as though that Apple believes that in the not so distant future the concept of having a separate mobile device and a computi…

That seems exactly the opposite direction they’ve always gone though. Microsoft tried to have a completely unified PC/tablet experience, where their desktop OS basically became completely tabled focused in Windows 8. Whereas Apple has always made a strong distinction between e.g. the iPad and the Mac, refusing to build a convertible Mac or any Mac with a touch screen…

I think Microsoft failed in it’s aim to steal market share just as Apple isn’t willing to cannibalize itself, yet.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#25
post #15
post #6

I believe that Apple is strategically choosing to coast on their desktop software while they work to harmonize their mobile, desktop, and entertainment software stacks. Why? Because based on rumors, patents, and the decisions they've made and the actions they've taken (or not taken), it appears as though that Apple believes that in the not so distant future the concept of having a separate mobile device and a computi…

> the concept of having a separate mobile device and a computing device will be irrelevant. Well ... yeah. People have been predicting and experimenting with this for more than a decade. But when you do this some parts of each platform has to suffer. It's a compromise. User interfaces have to change, designs have to consolidate, performance or features take a hit. So the challenge becomes how do you sell this? Seamle…

Let me use a single device but via different hardware depending on context.

Give me a phone I can plug into 2 monitors and a keyboard and interact with as a desktop, or slot into the back of a laptop case for portable computing, or put into my pocket.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#26
post #22

I just started developing in Swift/SwiftUI with a few app ideas in mind as a 37 year old with quite a bit of XP developing web services and *nix based utilities. I _really_ like the overall experience of Swift and the mac ecosystem a lot. Maybe there is a lot of truth in the headline, but other than XCode not being as excellent as PyCharm or VSCode, I'm having a lot of fun and getting some users along the way.

[deleted]

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#27

They really have to stop this release cadence. It’s not working and hasn’t been working for so long.

That’s my biggest gripe with MacOS: the yearly release schedule. Give us two or three years on each major release - at least.

Take the labour saved and do something about bugs that affect system stability (the well-documented finder memory leak, for example), particularly problematic apps (looking at you, Music.app) and the woeful developer documentation.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#28
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the concept of having a separate mobile device and a computing device will be irrelevant. Well ... yeah. People have been predicting and experimenting with this for more than a decade. But when you do this some parts of each platform has to suffer. It's a compromise. User interfaces have to change, designs have to consolidate, performance or features take a hit. So the challenge becomes how do you sell this? Seamle…

Let me use a single device but via different hardware depending on context. Give me a phone I can plug into 2 monitors and a keyboard and interact with as a desktop, or slot into the back of a laptop case for portable computing, or put into my pocket.

I remember when Bill Gates pitched this concept years before the first iPhone. It has been possible for a while with the right Android phones.

Still waiting on someone to make it useable.

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#29
post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the concept of having a separate mobile device and a computing device will be irrelevant. Well ... yeah. People have been predicting and experimenting with this for more than a decade. But when you do this some parts of each platform has to suffer. It's a compromise. User interfaces have to change, designs have to consolidate, performance or features take a hit. So the challenge becomes how do you sell this? Seamle…

Let me use a single device but via different hardware depending on context. Give me a phone I can plug into 2 monitors and a keyboard and interact with as a desktop, or slot into the back of a laptop case for portable computing, or put into my pocket.

Isn't that what Samsung Dex is?

Re: The erosion of the Mac experience

#30

I have been hearing this for almost 2 decades now, as long as I’ve been following the ‘community’. Meanwhile, in my real life, my parents, wife, kids, and friends, are all happier than they ever ever been with their latest MacBooks and macOS. Things like iCloud photo syncing, universal control, and airdrop feel boring to us, but they make the computing experience feel pretty much like living in the future for them.

Nothing against you and your family, but I am disappointed when for example, the Netflix app shows 2 rows of 6 titles when probably 100 could fit on the 3024-by-1964 native resolution display. Heck even the top 10 list scrolls to the right and only shows 1 through 4.
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