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Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

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241–250 of 373 posts

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#241
post #198
post #67

The iPad App Store is perhaps an even more dysfunctional place than the iPhone in how much it holds hardware and use cases hostage to the manufacturer's vision. Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it in the moments you want to do anything remotely tinkery on an iPad. Apple's hardware since the 2021 iPad Pro (with M1) has had the ability to do this. The iPads h…

I don’t think versatile devices are possible. I love iPad Pro for what it is. I tried Surface Pro and it was a much inferior tablet experience, even though the device is more “versatile”. I just doing think that you can get an excellent tablet by trying to be a laptop at the same time.

I have a Surface Pro and really like it. But for sure it is 100% a compromise experience, especially on the tablet side.

But part of it was reconditioning myself; the “proper tablet experience” largely comes from limitations of what they let you do with it. And with more features comes some complexity. For me it’s worth the tradeoff.

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There have been various efforts to estimate the effect piracy has on revenue like https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15319476 or http://blog.wolfire.com/2010/05/Another-view-of-game-piracy So depending on product category it might be a large drop (EU study finds -38% displacement rate for books) but it might also be a boost (EU study finds +24% for video games), and it is hard to say in general, since even a 90% pi…

Well, the point I was trying to make, said in another way is that the initial success of App Store (iOS, in particular) was driven that the fact that , suddenly, users thought that was OK to pay for the software. I think that the (relative) lack of piracy and difficulty for ordinary users to install pirated software has been a key factor in the success of it: "there's an app for that, and I can't easily find it for f…

> suddenly, users thought that was OK to pay for the software

I would argue almost the opposite way. Users are now conditioned to expect the software to be free with ads of 99 cents. Both greatly lowering the cap on what people can charge for software due to expectations. Instead we've seen the rise of subscription services apps that have no business needing one.

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#243

I am happy to see Apple's arm twisted, but disappointed the demand is to allow alternative app stores and not user-facing side-loading. In my view, having only the official Apple App Store is just fine as long as Apple also adds the ability to install an app off an unsigned IPA file for free. With that, users would be free to install apps that Apple don't deem fit for the app store, giving them the freedom to use the…

> ability to install an app off an unsigned IPA file for free I feel like the thinking is that there must be an entity — somebody running an app store — who could be held legally responsible for any damage caused by malware distributed via their channels. Regular non-tech-savvy users cannot be trusted with such delicate software as apps running on their personal phones.

The thing is though, as you said, it's my personal iPhone. If I want to be able to install an unsigned app I should be able to. There should be ways to dissuade the non-technical people but my feeling is it is my iPhone so I should be able to do as I wish.

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#244
post #67

The iPad App Store is perhaps an even more dysfunctional place than the iPhone in how much it holds hardware and use cases hostage to the manufacturer's vision. Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it in the moments you want to do anything remotely tinkery on an iPad. Apple's hardware since the 2021 iPad Pro (with M1) has had the ability to do this. The iPads h…

Another thing is the issue of e-waste. At some point i had multiple older iPads with perfectly great screens, and i wanted to use them as "hubs" for a home setup to control various things, another option was using them as secondary screens, or maybe just give them to a kid. You couldn't, they were simply to old for the new IOS update, and almost all apps including browsers requires the newer IOS and update automatica…

A story going in completely different direction --

I have a Sony Xperia phone from 2017. It has stopped receiving OS updates after Android 8, and I don't use it any more other than occasionally as a backup phone. A while ago, I discovered that people on xda are putting LineageOS (a custom ROM based on AOSP) with Android 14 on it, tried that myself, and it works! As slow as the phone is, it can run apps without any problem. This is truly amazing.

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

totally agree - the iPad Pro could be a great second coding/programming tool - I'd love to justify buying myself one, but.. I just don't see a use-case if I can't work on it. I don't design stuff, don't really feel like I need a separate browsing device either

Yep, I've got one and don't use too much. Too big for scrolling, too limited (software) for work. But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose

> But Apple knows iPad might cannibalize mac and limit it's uses on purpose

Felt the goal was to overtake Mac during the 2015-2019 era, all the real engineering focus was on iPad, the Macs were underpowered and not really fit for purpose.

Why would Apple choose a platform where they don't get 30% of every Creative Cloud sub when they could have had that.

Only reason they backtracked was because Mac sales didn't fall off and the iPad just isn't that good to do real work on.

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#246

The biggest problem rn is Apple's blocking of JIT for everything but browsers. This means neither UTM nor the more modern emulators can run at close to full speed. I'd like to see this changed. This seems like the real "Gatekeeper".

Could you explain what JIT would allow? Would sideloading allow this to "work" or would it need OS support?

JIT (Just-In-Time) compilation is a technique that allows certain programs to run significantly faster by compiling code at runtime, rather than ahead of time.

Apple enabled this for iOS 14+, but killed it again with iOS 17. It's basically the reason why we currently don't have full speed VM's on iOS / iPadOS devices.

While Sideloading / Altstore / Sidestore allows you to install any IPA, this still doesn't enable JIT for these apps. There are currently some workarounds that involve running certain software on your local network (search SideJITServer on Github).

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#248
post #67

The iPad App Store is perhaps an even more dysfunctional place than the iPhone in how much it holds hardware and use cases hostage to the manufacturer's vision. Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it in the moments you want to do anything remotely tinkery on an iPad. Apple's hardware since the 2021 iPad Pro (with M1) has had the ability to do this. The iPads h…

VMs on iOS:

https://getutm.app/

Coding work on iOS:

blink shell

https://blink.sh/

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep. Repeating a collage from 2020 ( https://imgur.com/a/CQwApt8 ) and comment ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31644188 ) on the strange workarounds done to use Linux (or possibly even windows) on an ipad.

Isn't iSH is a toy shell? The last time I looked at it, it didn't provide any access to the actual iPad OS or file system details.

Well it will probably never, since all apps are always within the sandbox. The idea is to ssh out to some other system. Besides the actual iOS shell is not so interesting or useful anyway. (Jailbroken devices have had them for a while, you won't be running your nvim and git stuff locally anytime soon.)

Re: Apple must open iPadOS to sideloading within 6 months, EU says

#250
post #67

The iPad App Store is perhaps an even more dysfunctional place than the iPhone in how much it holds hardware and use cases hostage to the manufacturer's vision. Just imagine how much more versatile the iPad Pro would be if only you could run Linux VMs on it in the moments you want to do anything remotely tinkery on an iPad. Apple's hardware since the 2021 iPad Pro (with M1) has had the ability to do this. The iPads h…

totally agree - the iPad Pro could be a great second coding/programming tool - I'd love to justify buying myself one, but.. I just don't see a use-case if I can't work on it. I don't design stuff, don't really feel like I need a separate browsing device either

you can work on it

https://blink.sh/

see also https://docs.blink.sh/advanced/code

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