If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter • Hacker News Board

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#481

Post by mattlondon » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 7:09 AM UTC

smallerfish wrote: post #366

mattlondon wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My work Linux laptop frequently (several times daily) breaks Bluetooth, breaks audio, does not wake from sleep, wakes from sleep but only shows the mouse pointer on a black screen, stops throttling the CPU down, resets the DHCP-specified DNS server to 0.0.0.0, sends stuff to printers that cause them to just spit out endless blank sheets of paper. The "solutions" to all of these are multi-step manual disasters... unin…

Sounds like a truly broken install. What's the maintenance history of the machine? Have you been patching it from third party repos? Why are you running Jack on a work computer anyway? Back up your documents and do a fresh install. It'll take you an hour and you'll regain stability.

Corporate centrally managed install. Dell hardware.

Jack is apparently needed to get Bluetooth to emit audio reliably... but I would not put much trust in that since it didn't fix Bluetooth not working.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#482

Post by least » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 7:14 AM UTC

gcanyon wrote: post #473

least wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this is a bit of an odd take, given that the alternative is that the computer just silently allows you to download content from anywhere. I don't think this makes someone any more susceptible to malware than they already were. Little Snitch is the sort of software that the average person wouldn't install, anyway. I understand the point, though. Going to just about any major website you will be pummeled with p…

> the computer just silently allows you to download content from anywhere How many times have you been asked to approve a download? How many of those times have you said "no"? If the answer is "hundreds" and "zero," what's the point? If the answer "hundreds" and "ten just in the past week," then that's exactly the point, and it serves a valuable purpose.

My response was mostly to your last sentence, "The more times they have to click 'yes' without thinking, the more susceptible to malware they become." There exists a dichotomy of you click on a link, it loads the page or begins the download or alternatively, you click the link, Little Snitch checks its filters and if it doesn't have a rule set, it'll prompt you to set one. In no case is the second one going to make someone more susceptible to malware, because the worst case scenario, where someone approves every single download, results in exactly identical outcomes as the person who does not have Little Snitch installed.

I agree broadly with your point that prompt fatigue or decision fatigue is problematic and should be avoided when possible. I think this is a problem in particular with Little Snitch even, which doesn't do enough to provide. However, the point of Little Snitch is to allow someone to monitor and control the traffic at a granular level and the consequence of providing that utility is the frequent prompts whenever you're visiting a new site. To Obdev's credit, silent mode exists and you can set it to deny or allow all traffic without a prompt (and evaluate the traffic at your leisure).

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#483

Post by afandian » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 7:34 AM UTC

lostgame wrote: post #332

afandian wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I never found a way of disabling the automatic starting of iTunes when you press the play/pause button on the keyboard. How do I choose my own music player app? And my new Mac has things like (can't remember exactly) 'musiccreationd'. These count as 'startup items' to me.

I believe it’s just in System Preferences -> Keyboard, but may be mistaken.

I had a another look in "Keyboard Shortcuts". Lots of shortcuts, including a category called 'App shortcuts'. No mention of iTunes / Apple Music. I think it's just hard-coded in the OS.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#484

Post by joconde » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 7:34 AM UTC

simonebrunozzi wrote: post #303

joconde wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Note that Windows now has an official package manager called WinGet ( https://github.com/microsoft/winget-cli ), which worked very well when I tried it a few months ago; Skype and OneDrive can now be uninstalled without an external tool; and disabling all telemetry also seems to weaken antivirus protection.

Is it named after apt-get ? (loved Debian and always will)

I guess? :) There’s also NuGet in Visual Studio.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#485

Post by tarsinge » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 7:46 AM UTC

2muchcoffeeman wrote: post #307

koyote wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there is also a huge problem with things being touched for no reason and making them worse. I have never been a big fan of Apple's software, but I must say that this is not just an Apple problem, it's a software industry problem. The amount of software I use daily that has actually improved in the last 5 years as opposed to getting worse is getting frustratingly low as the years go on. I have just upgraded to the l…

We have come to a point where we have large companies employing thousands of people who need a purpose. Fix your bugs. There are plenty. It’s not that they have no purpose. They want to add things to their resume so the next place will give them a pay bump or get that promotion. If your strategy was to hop around between jobs every 12+ months or climb the ladder, would you bother making things better? You’ll be gone…

It's a good point, management and execs always take the blame for that kind of behavior but engineers are guilty too.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#486

Post by InvaderFizz » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 7:59 AM UTC

dharmon wrote: post #143

superasn wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Yes first thing I run if I ever have to use a Windows PC is this little gem called Shutup 10 (1). 2. Then there is another software called 10AppsManager (2) to remove further bloatware like Onedrive, Skype, etc. 3. After that I visit ninite.com (3) to get the usual software without toolbars and spyware. 4. For other software like ffmpeg I use choco or chocolatey (4). I am now a full time linux user but this was th…

This is great! Thanks! I am forced to use a Windows machine sometimes for work, and to me the unpardonable sin is that Windows seems to randomly reboot _without asking me_! I come to my office and all my open sessions are gone. How do you turn this off?! I try turning off the setting but it randomly turns itself back on. Also, how do people set up a reasonable dev environment not built around Visual Studio? On my Mac…

I used the debugger method[0] to control Windows Update. It redirects the call to the reboot scheduler that is called by Windows Update.

This has worked flawlessly for almost two years and multiple Windows feature updates.

0: https://lazyadmin.nl/it/how-to-stop-automatic-restart-win-10...

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#487

Post by fyzix » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 8:13 AM UTC

mnadkvlb wrote: post #50

moralestapia wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah that sucks, but on OSX side I have to restart my computer every week or so because of forced updates. Restarting really is a big deal for me as my workspace consists of several dozen open windows, some of them I have to login, navigate to a particular place, etc... also you lose your train of thought. It has gotten that bad for me, that I have to take screenshots before restarting every time, so I don't lose tra…

Of course its better to have a system which will not install the updates automatically and will just be stuck at restart (windows 10 wink). If i disable apple updates on a macbook, it will show the notification but will never update without my permission, good luck doing that on windows.

You are not forced to update on windows pro, only in the home edition

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#488

Post by wernsey » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 8:20 AM UTC

yosito wrote: post #292

jjice wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is something so many big companies do, and I hate it. Every 6 months it seems Spotify has to change their UI and make it harder to find what I want. Just make a decent UI and stick to it. I don't understand why there are redesigns over and over and over. My assumption is that it keeps people employed, even if they aren't necessarily needed. It at least takes away from more important issues being taken care of.

> why there are redesigns over and over and over Because they aren't building UIs to be useful for pleasant for users anymore. Once these data-driven companies have enough users locked in, they begin optimizing the user interface to manipulate user behavior for profit. They shift from helping you do what you want to manipulating you into doing what they want you to do. It's actually gotten so bad that open source sof…

Reading your comment reminded me of the blog by Jeff Atwood https://blog.codinghorror.com/our-programs-are-fun-to-use/

Surely if some company focussed on making software that puts the user at the centre they'd be able to carve out a pretty decent niche for them.

Sadly if they we're a public company their investors would probably be unhappy because they'd be sacrificing the all important "growth", but a private company might be able to get away with it.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#489

Post by nickpp » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 9:38 AM UTC

smoldesu wrote: post #111

nickpp wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah maybe you as a developer want some fancy CSS and bleeding fresh Web API but I as a user don't. The web is too bloated as it is, I feel that Apple is on my side putting a damper on that. Safari is powerful enough as it is. You want voip, notifications, codecs and so on - do the work and learn to write a native app. I'd rather pay for that than paying with my attention to ads in your "free" web app.

Yeah, this is the kind of entitled mentality that is going to sink the MacOS ship. I'm not writing a native app just for basic web browser functionality. If the choice comes down to re-writing everything for MacOS or dropping support altogether, I have no qualms cutting out less than 20% of the desktop market share.

I sincerely hope you do. It would open the market for some dedicated, more talented macOS native companies.

Re: If Apple keeps letting its software slip, the next big thing won’t matter

#490

Post by mft_ » Tue, Nov 16, 2021, 9:45 AM UTC

josephg wrote: post #385

mft_ wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it’s worse than that. IIRC I had the second model of Android phone ever released in the UK, and even that phone’s notification system was superior to iOS of 2021. I’ve always assumed patents are to blame - I mean, surely no one at Apple uses their iOS notifications and thinks “yes, that system is perfect in every way”? There must be other factors at work?

Can you elaborate? I have an iPhone and notifications seem fine. But I’m probably missing something. I haven’t had an android phone in nearly a decade. What do android notifications do differently and better?

From memory (my last use of Android it was a long time ago!) it was a combination of two factors:

1) Android's system relied on icons appearing on the bar at the top of the screen (e.g. a mail icon for mail, or a message icon for a text, etc.) - which was both unintrusive, and very quick and practical to check. To check a message, you'd just pull down the menu from that bar, and you'd see your different notifications in more detail, most recent first, and a tap would take you to the app. It was a lovely holistic concept. In contrast, iOS has some aspects of this, but it's not holistic:

* Red dots on icons indicate waiting content, but don't reflect when the content is from (unless you're obsessed with clearing all of your red dots - which would be a problem in itself)

* The notification center offers a list of notifications, but it's not linked to a visual reminder - you have to remember to check it.

* The notification center is shown on the lock screen, but IME it's buggy, not always responsive, and sometimes disappears confusingly.

* There are also banners which pop up (and there used to be alerts?) but these aren't connected with the other approaches.

TL;DR: Android had a single holistic approach; iOS has a variety of apparently unrelated approaches.

2) When you're using your phone or computer (it happens on MacOS too) many of Apple's notifications distract you and demand your attention or action. This would include banners which hang around obstructing part of your screen and need a swipe to remove them, or alerts which must be interacted with before you can do anything else. I find this a fundamentally user-unfriendly paradigm.