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(Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

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Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#71

Post by mcintyre1994 »

nirvana wrote: post #67

Ideology has trumped engineering, and as hackers, you shouldn't tolerate it. Frankly, all of this has been obvious all along to any competent engineer, since the moment Apple introduced lightening. They described it as a serial bus and talked about how it gave more flexibility. If you think about it for 2 seconds its obviously better to run protocols over a serial bus than to run 30 lines of individual signals, with…

I agree with what you're saying, but I'm interested about Apple's open source operating system. Assuming OS X, I'm having trouble finding its entirety in open source, obviously it's built on open source but I don't think the entire OS is open sourced. I'm also having trouble believing it wouldn't have been used for a Linux desktop by now.

Sorry for replying to a small part of your comment, but I really do agree with the rest.

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#72

Post by objclxt »

nirvana wrote: post #67

Ideology has trumped engineering, and as hackers, you shouldn't tolerate it. Frankly, all of this has been obvious all along to any competent engineer, since the moment Apple introduced lightening. They described it as a serial bus and talked about how it gave more flexibility. If you think about it for 2 seconds its obviously better to run protocols over a serial bus than to run 30 lines of individual signals, with…

> defined as Apple, you know the company with the most popular open source operating system in the world?

I'm not sure which OS you're talking about...perhaps you could point me to the source code of either OS X or iOS? Certain core components of OS X are open source, but Darwin isn't OS X.

As someone who makes his living from writing Objective-C code, I don't have any ideological objection to Apple. But I think you shouldn't accuse people of spreading "lies and engineering ignorance" when you seem to be claiming something that's patently untrue.

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#73

Post by hosay123 »

objclxt wrote: post #72
nirvana wrote: post #67

Ideology has trumped engineering, and as hackers, you shouldn't tolerate it. Frankly, all of this has been obvious all along to any competent engineer, since the moment Apple introduced lightening. They described it as a serial bus and talked about how it gave more flexibility. If you think about it for 2 seconds its obviously better to run protocols over a serial bus than to run 30 lines of individual signals, with…

> defined as Apple, you know the company with the most popular open source operating system in the world? I'm not sure which OS you're talking about...perhaps you could point me to the source code of either OS X or iOS? Certain core components of OS X are open source, but Darwin isn't OS X. As someone who makes his living from writing Objective-C code, I don't have any ideological objection to Apple. But I think you…

Perhaps you didn't experience the PR storm around the time OS X was initially released: it was heavily geared towards nerds and the literal phrase "open source" was extensively employed in their marketing material.

This aside, you're basically trying to write off nirvana's (IMHO excellent) rant using a minor technicality, one of the common features of the discussions here that tends to make my skin crawl.

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#74

Post by StringyBob »

dmishe wrote: post #2

I think the main takeaway is that yes, lightning is future proof and can adapt to any output you want it to. I do wonder what's the reason for encode/decode cycle was in the first place though.

The interesting point to me is that a device can be future proof through iOS updates - i.e. for as long as apple is prepared to create software drivers/updates to support the peripheral. Obsolescence is now almost entirely a software rather than hardware problem. Features can be added or removed via updates.

Firmware loaded at runtime is not new (see many of the wifi/bluetooth dongles that don't work in linux). However, would apple let 3rd party peripherals download driver code? I wouldn't have thought they want to keep baking it into iOS itself as the number of peripherals increase. Perhaps drivers embedded in a controller app via the app store?

I like the idea that with a thunderboltlightning adapter (and a huge amount of hacking) iOS peripherals are a blank canvas and could be used with other non apple devices or for purposes never originally intended (that VGA card as a software radio transmitter springs to mind...)

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#75

Post by coldtea »

buro9 wrote: post #58
coldtea wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a strange day when we move from cables that work perfectly well to cables that need to be software upgradeable to work as well. Yes, it's a strange day when we move from "cables that work perfectly well BUT the device with the ports they connect to has to be replaced whenever a new technology cames along" to "cables that need to be software upgradable but are far more future proof and capable all the while fre…

That is a problem entirely of our own making. The stereo beside me has components that span 30 years and uses the same cabling for all components. I realise someone will come back with "Oh, but DRM, encryption, needing more information about the source and destination"... but I'd counter by pointing out that telecoms cabling works perfectly well for transporting all kinds of things across it. You can put into protoco…

>That is a problem entirely of our own making.

Aren't all problems in computing this way?

>The stereo beside me has components that span 30 years and uses the same cabling for all components.

Yes. And it does just one thing. Output analog electrically encoded sound signals.

Now, call me again when that stereo cabling has to also support: audio out, digital audio out, video out, different resolutions, MIDI out, connecting to medical and scientific devices for control, charging, data backup and sync, ethernet, etc etc...

>I realise someone will come back with "Oh, but DRM, encryption, needing more information about the source and destination"... but I'd counter by pointing out that telecoms cabling works perfectly well for transporting all kinds of things across it.

Only because there is a computer in the other (either an actual PC or a TV, etc) that knows what to expect and how to decode it and show it.

In this case, the computer is inside the cable, so the connected devices don't have to know everything.

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#76

Post by nier »

hosay123 wrote: post #73
objclxt wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> defined as Apple, you know the company with the most popular open source operating system in the world? I'm not sure which OS you're talking about...perhaps you could point me to the source code of either OS X or iOS? Certain core components of OS X are open source, but Darwin isn't OS X. As someone who makes his living from writing Objective-C code, I don't have any ideological objection to Apple. But I think you…

Perhaps you didn't experience the PR storm around the time OS X was initially released: it was heavily geared towards nerds and the literal phrase "open source" was extensively employed in their marketing material. This aside, you're basically trying to write off nirvana's (IMHO excellent) rant using a minor technicality, one of the common features of the discussions here that tends to make my skin crawl.

The technicality being that Darwin seizes to be an open source operating system once it is shipped with closed source components. Why would this be true?

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#77

Post by StringyBob »

seabee wrote: post #70
dmishe wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. This is _the_ question here, what prevented them from pushing framebuffer data to the adapter, which then puts it into HDMI compatible form

You'd need 3Gbps to push uncompressed 1080p data. If you look at USB 3.0 and make a not-unreasonable bet that Lightning is slower, then you simply don't have the bandwidth to do so.

As well as bandwidth, power consumption. Chucking 3Gbps down a long wire is going to reduce battery life for a mobile product. Perhaps the controller can support it, but heat dissipation in the phone is significant?

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#78

Post by MBCook »

dmishe wrote: post #39
taligent wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't they use H.264 and their existing hardware ? Do you really think it makes more sense to decode H.264 on the device then re-encode it in another format and then decode that on the adapter ? Sounds slow, illogical and bound to introduce more artifacts.

Nope. This is _the_ question here, what prevented them from pushing framebuffer data to the adapter, which then puts it into HDMI compatible form

Retina iPads already need to re-scale the image since they're higher resolution than an HDTV. Why force the little adapter to do (some pretty massive) scaling and encoding when the iPad has a very nice GPU?

It seems to me they had a system for outputting video via h.264, and they decided to use it again here. Seems like a reasonable decision at that point.

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#79

Post by hosay123 »

nier wrote: post #76
hosay123 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps you didn't experience the PR storm around the time OS X was initially released: it was heavily geared towards nerds and the literal phrase "open source" was extensively employed in their marketing material. This aside, you're basically trying to write off nirvana's (IMHO excellent) rant using a minor technicality, one of the common features of the discussions here that tends to make my skin crawl.

The technicality being that Darwin seizes to be an open source operating system once it is shipped with closed source components. Why would this be true?

OK here we go, and why not, after all it's Sunday and I've got nothing better to do.. right?

The central tenet was that discourse here is regularly devoid of sound engineering because it tends to be blinded by mindless cultural perceptions of the companies involved in whatever happens to be under discussion. In the case of Apple the expectation is their products are flawless and if not then all hell will be paid on blogs and comment sections everywhere.

Whether or not Darwin is or isn't open source doesn't freaking matter, it was heavily marketed as such back in the sands of time and even if this wasn't the case it doesn't invalidate the central point made in the rant - that just because this device has an Apple logo every popular discussion surrounding it turns to mindless diatribe as a result of non-engineering centric expectations people place on their products, and every engineering-centric party (i.e. hackers) must deal with the whining polluting engineering-centric forums for days every time it happens.

In effect, the complaint is that commenting resembles the squabble of a throng of uninformed consumers rather than the judicious discourse of a forum of engineers.

Re: (Presumably) Apple engineer comment on Lightning AV adapter design

#80

Post by senthilnayagam »

rdl wrote: post #69
buro9 wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is a problem entirely of our own making. The stereo beside me has components that span 30 years and uses the same cabling for all components. I realise someone will come back with "Oh, but DRM, encryption, needing more information about the source and destination"... but I'd counter by pointing out that telecoms cabling works perfectly well for transporting all kinds of things across it. You can put into protoco…

The amount of engineering that goes into making devices work over the huge installed base of cat5/cat5e/cat6 twisted pair is pretty amazing; I was amazed Gig-E worked, let alone 10GE. If there weren't the huge installed base of wires in the walls of buildings, we probably would have different standards for patch cables instead of fairly obscenely complex network interfaces.

all use Ethernet and standards are set for them, all peripherals need to talk to it in same protocol and newer devices should be back compatible .

But with lightning you can design cables which need not use device computing power for all transformations, it is pretty smart, they built this cable for the next decade we will see interesting applications from apple and its partners in coming years

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