iPad-only is the new desktop Linux

This seems to be making the point that using an iPad is a 'badge of pride' because it's 'challenging'; trying to make the point that Linux is also difficult to use. Except, it's not the same type of challenge at all.

Linux usability can actually be pretty good, but it's dependent on familiarity, the desktop environment, the distro, the choice of installed applications; everything is customizable, and making most of that customization requires a willingness to research, understand, tinker.

An iPad is locked down to the point of hurting usability, the 'share' system is vastly inferior to Android's 'intents', split-screen mode just recently arrived, mouse support is intentionally missing. Trying to use it as a desktop replacement is borderline masochism. Frankly, it's nothing like desktop Linux, even if you're in an unfamiliar desktop environment.

iOS and Android works fairly well if all you are doing is working on one App at a time. Considering something simple as copying a password from a password manager to paste on target app is already very awkward process on Android...

Something I can do in less than 5 seconds on desktop takes 30 seconds in those, so I'm not sure how they can be compared to Linux desktop.

Its fun just to try and list the cultural clashes in the article, like the linked author tried to include as many as possible.

My school age kids use ipads as their primary computer at school and that carries over into home use. No matter what the linked article's author experienced as a professional journalist as "normal", to today's kids the ipad will be the new "normal". Maybe they'll be a human interest article in a decade about trying to use old fashioned desktops and laptops to do real work, instead of professional tablets that everyone uses.

Much like linux is useless on the desktop because no matter how many desktops its deployed and used upon, if it can't run Excel2013 then the small segment of the population that uses that software will never shut up about it being useless to everyone because its useless to them until their itch is scratched. Just like a skyscraper without parking for every employee is obviously useless because over 90% of the countries population drives cars to work. You just can't argue with special snowflakes who refuse to acknowledge they're special snowflakes.

There is a side dish that when I got started with computers in 1981 the UI was not user friendly and almost everyone was a noob, and now we have no noobs left but the UIs are all weird and exclusively noob focused. Its a stereotype that any discussion of "ease of use" WRT computers isn't a discussion about actual use, its a discussion about fads and styles in UI design and 99% of everything has been tried, heavily promoted, and discarded in the past. Therefore its unsurprising that today's standard sucks because UIs have always sucked and always will. That makes all this "easier" "harder" stuff just nonsense. Merely different ways to do things. In the linked article he doesn't like which directory in dropbox Byword links to, blah blah who cares. For all past and present and eternity it'll always be possible to complain about UIs and its completely content free.

someone took 20years to understand what a walled garden design means. I am trying really hard to not be offensive in this comment...

I think it would be interesting to see the amount of productivity people lose using their iPads.

In my experience my iPad means I am using my laptop a lot less, but it's taking me more time to do the same things I did on the laptop on my iPad.