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Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

sixcolors.com

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Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#111

Post by Gigachad »

wlesieutre wrote: post #79
giobox wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And in the case of the iPad, try to sell you them individually for each family member... It's 2023, and you still can't have multiple user accounts on any model of iPad, "Pro" or otherwise. This is a feature you can just take for-granted on virtually any other "computer" too.

You can if you're a school! https://support.apple.com/en-hk/guide/deployment-education/e... The feature has existed for years , Apple just won't let you use it because they'd rather sell separate devices to every family member. For all the talk about environmentalism and their elaborate phone recycling robots, they're not too concerned about the "reduce" part of "reduce, reuse, recycle." Never mind that it's the most…

I've heard that the multi user feature for schools is pretty skin deep and that it basically just acts as an auth for apps which store all data remotely. Not at all something you could just drop on regular consumers.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#112

Post by zakki »

hotnfresh wrote: post #93
gtvwill wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol no they wouldn't or they'd have done it ten years ago. Apple is after your dollars they care nothing for what's better for you for productivity or any ethics outside of profit really. Their actions over the last 20 years set that in stone.

> Apple is after your dollars they care nothing for what's better for you for productivity or any ethics outside of profit really. A damning indictment of the personal computing industry is that Apple nonetheless deliver the best of anyone this front, by a mile, for most users. The whole product category of personal computing devices and operating systems is a real shit-show.

The problem is most other devices are cheaper so no complaint for the shit-show. With Apple’s prices, I want more.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#113

Post by Gigachad »

perardi wrote: post #6

When the iPad first came out, people knocked it as "a big iPod touch". But…maybe that wasn't a bad thing? I feel like the iPad, despite alllll the efforts to seemingly make it a pro device, is an iPhone, but bigger. It's great for messages, browsing Facebook, and watching video, and that's just fine. Because that serves a lot of people's needs, and trying to add in a bunch more stuff just overloads the touch interfac…

The ipad is the perfect device for old people. You can't mess it up, it's extremely simple to use, has a long life span, etc. The users do not care that they can not host a webserver on it because it prevents their bank account being drained after they click the wrong advert.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#114

Post by gizajob »

iainmerrick wrote: post #98
mrcwinn wrote: post #89

Here’s the real problem. Apple will never intentionally prolong upgrade cycles for expensive laptops by offering you a cheaper device that can “do everything.” The iPad was conceived as a media consumption device, sitting between a phone and a laptop. Steve Jobs said this at the beginning. You want to browse the web, you want send some emails, you want to watch movies. That’s it. Nothing more. Save yourself some trav…

Apple will never intentionally prolong upgrade cycles for expensive laptops by offering you a cheaper device that can “do everything.” If that were the case, they’d be making much more money from laptops than from iPads, right? If they were making just as much money from iPads, though, it would make sense to make the iPad as good as possible. Cannibalizing Mac sales wouldn’t be a big deal. Per the Six Colors breakdow…

I was thinking recently that there was something weirdly cryptic and prophetic at the end of that Walter Isaacson biography of Steve Jobs - I haven't looked it up again, but there's some tale along the lines of Steve on his deathbed playing with an interface, like he's seen a vision of the future and having an epiphany. The book tells it as if like he's playing with an Apple TV and a remote control which doesn't make much sense as a deathbed experience...but now I realise he had an Apple Vision prototype and that's what he was looking at/through. I think they must be that many years ahead in their labs, like decadal R&D.

RIP Steve.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#115

Post by Gigachad »

thih9 wrote: post #41
timestretch wrote: post #5

I'd buy an iPad immediately if I could run MacOS on it.

I don't get why this is still impossible in 2023, with M1 in both macbooks and ipads. I'm sure at some point someone at apple has built a prototype and did extensive testing, I'd love to know why was that shut down. And whether it was a business related issue, or a tech/UX related issue.

My guess is that Apple wants companies to reinvent their programs to work well on a touchscreen, which has largely been happening. If you could just drop macos on the ipad, we wouldn't have things like Procreate. You'd just get told to install desktop photoshop and connect a mouse and keyboard.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#116

Post by zakki »

gizajob wrote: post #96
madeofpalk wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like all things Apple, iPad is great if you only use it for the exact, limited use cases it was designed for. The moment you start to be beyond that slightly it completely falls apart. Contrast it to a more general computer running macOS or Windows, which does a poorer job at what iPad does best, but it has a much longer tail where the complexity ramps up linearly, compared to the hockey stick of iOS.

At the same time though, limited tools can lead to creativity. I know we're in the company of coders with complex workflows, but using and understanding a limited tool well to the point where you can max it out can be better than living with a "long tail" of untapped power and productivity. Strange though, how the iPad is ostensibly a much better device given the touchscreen and keyboard (and now pencil) and yet rema…

Creativity also happened in unlimited environments. That’s why there are many more use cases for computer/laptop.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#117

Post by theCodeStig »

jeromeparadis wrote: post #53
Joe_Boogz wrote: post #32

I’ve been using Remote Desktop to a windows environment in the cloud for a while. It’s been pretty great actually. As long as you have a Bluetooth mouse an IPad makes a great thin client in a pinch. I know people want MacOs, but it’s a workaround that works.

As a developer/CTO who's use-case when travelling is just being able to take care of emergencies if something present itself I wanted to do away from bringing a laptop in vacation. Since I develop using Docker, my solution is basically an EC2 machine I can fire if needed that has VSCode installed as a server running in a browser with Docker installed in the same machine. Basically a cloud dev environment available in…

I trialed a similar set up with code-server for a few weeks, and was shocked at how well it works, provided stable and fast internet access.

Although VSCode is impressive, at the end of the day, I'm an emacser. I went back to: emacs in a terminal over mosh, accessed with Blink Shell on the iPad; or access the same instance over Microsoft Remote Desktop for a desktop experience.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#118

Post by drewg123 »

ab_testing wrote: post #52
drewg123 wrote: post #36

I really, really wish that Apple had not let developers opt-out their apps from running on M1/M2 Macbooks. My use case is a long flight where I want to watch a movie on a screen bigger than my phone. For a while, some of the streaming service iOS apps ran on my MBP. In fact, I subscribed to HBO Max partially because their app worked on my MBP. But since their rebrand to Max, it no longer works.

What is the problem with using the browser on the MacBook to access content ?

Many flights do not have reliable internet access that is fast enough to stream video. And I want to watch what I want to watch, not the random selection of stuff I might find on the inflight entertainment. Not to mention that I want to zone out, and not hear a captive airline credit card sales pitch from the flight attendants at 90db in my headphones while they pause the video I'm watching.

So, for all those reasons, I'd prefer to download content prior to the flight and watch it in-flight.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#119

Post by satvikpendem »

gizajob wrote: post #90
oflannabhra wrote: post #18

I know Apple has a strong resistance to the two-in-one form factor, but an M-series MacBook Air with detachable screen that seamlessly transitions between macOS and iPadOS is basically my dream device.

I'm amazed the two haven't converged yet. I've no doubt apple have lurking in their labs a "double iPad" with a "screen" and a second screen where the keyboard now lives, running a version of iOS-like MacOS. Would love that device and think it'll emerge eventually.

I don't think they'll converge, I see Apple eventually using its Vision product line to supplant traditional rectangular slab based devices.

Re: Giving up the iPad-only travel dream

#120

Post by raincole »

Gigachad wrote: post #113
perardi wrote: post #6

When the iPad first came out, people knocked it as "a big iPod touch". But…maybe that wasn't a bad thing? I feel like the iPad, despite alllll the efforts to seemingly make it a pro device, is an iPhone, but bigger. It's great for messages, browsing Facebook, and watching video, and that's just fine. Because that serves a lot of people's needs, and trying to add in a bunch more stuff just overloads the touch interfac…

The ipad is the perfect device for old people. You can't mess it up, it's extremely simple to use, has a long life span, etc. The users do not care that they can not host a webserver on it because it prevents their bank account being drained after they click the wrong advert.

My father doesn't own a PC. He never used one in his whole life. To him, using his iPad is "using a computer".

iPad solves exactly ONE single problem for him: no enough screen space on his phone.

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