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The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

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Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#561

Post by telesilla »

TheKarateKid wrote: post #508
jarjoura wrote: post #480

As someone who worked on the iPad v1, I can tell you, it was a product built in search of a problem. It was going to compete against the, then, growing Netbook market. Steve Jobs thought Windows was going to win that market and hastily threw a team together to answer for it. However, during several all-hands, no one except SJ seemed even remotely excited about the product. "These things will probably sell in the educ…

> “Developers will always surprise us, they will come up with use cases for us." Well, they did. iPads are now replacing POS registers and kiosks. Although a part of me dies when I see iPad Pros being used for this, because it’s so powerful and capable yet being used as a big touch monitor.

Same for musicians: many of us have an iPad for displaying scores due the superiority of the screen legibility in varying environments, and app support. I use mine almost exclusively for piano scores - I couldn't live without it. Doubling as a Netflix host on flights is a bonus.

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#562

Post by chongli »

snapetom wrote: post #411
Fiahil wrote: post #269

I completely agree with this article. The iPad hardware is absolutely wonderful, it's light, gorgeous and powerful. I got the latest iPad pro to watch Netflix in bed and it fills that purpose completely. However, the OS running on the machine is bad. Very bad. The multitasking is horrifying. The Files app is unusable (especially if you want to access your files from an FTP server). You have to use your finger to sele…

I feel that Apple has lost its way with OS design in the past 5 years or so. Not at a macro level, but at a micro, "little things" level. Launch anything Apple-written these days and you'll get a wizard telling you how to use some new widget - just like any other software by anyone else. I don't think Apple has ever done that before because features were designed so well, you can easily figure it out. Then there are…

Past 5 years? Maybe closer to the past 25 years. Ever since Apple decided OS X would be the successor to classic Mac OS. This is when Apple finally left their incredibly rigorous user interface guidelines behind [1] and made technical considerations (preemptive multitasking, multithreading, and virtual memory) the priority, along with “lickability.” [2]

The classic Macs were the last truly easy to use desktop computers. My father and all of my older relatives of his generation had no problems using classic Macs. OS X however? Completely baffled. Might as well have sat them down in front of a terminal connected to an old Unix mainframe. Yeah, it has a lot of superficial similarities to classic Mac OS, but it violates the principle of least surprise far too often to be called easy to use.

iOS is easy to use though. Hand an iPad to any of those same relatives and they get along fine. It’s way less powerful though, despite running on a computer several orders of magnitude faster.

[1] https://archive.arstechnica.com/reviews/4q00/macosx-pb1/maco...

[2] https://www.zdnet.com/article/lickable-buttons/

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#563

Post by VvR-Ox »

jarjoura wrote: post #480

As someone who worked on the iPad v1, I can tell you, it was a product built in search of a problem. It was going to compete against the, then, growing Netbook market. Steve Jobs thought Windows was going to win that market and hastily threw a team together to answer for it. However, during several all-hands, no one except SJ seemed even remotely excited about the product. "These things will probably sell in the educ…

I just recently bought a used iPad that still got the iPadOS update and what I noticed is very ambivalent.

PRO: - The device is light, has a nice screen and good sound. I can use it to read documents that need color, watch videos and browse the web all in one device with acceptable performance - The battery has enough capacity for the pad to work for days without recharging - You can use pencil 1 as an input device (I would not have bought one without support for pencil)

CON: - While apps like browsers (Safari, Firefox) look like the desktop versions they are just poor copies without the full potential. Without Add-On's my browsing experience is very limited in comparison to the experience on my computer - No Adobe Suite like many people wanted it while you can run Apps like the real PS on a surface - No native terminal, seriously? I live in a terminal and e.g. consume news via newsbeuter - Support for USB thumbdrives and mouse have just been added recently while competitors allowed much easier access much earlier. This "walled garden" feeling diminishes the experience a lot for me. I hoped for the iPad to be more like "a real PC/Mac" and this is one of the major reasons I never bought an early model or a new one.

My dream iPad would be more like macOS because as someone coming from Linux it feels already "walled" enough for my taste.

I have another major concern but that is based on the evidence about consumption, climate change etc. and of course Apple itself can probably not do much about it (can they?): What happens to the device when it is obsolete (e.g. no major OS updates and security patches)? It would be really awesome if they would open up to after market solutions to reduce waste and keep their products running so one can install linux on it.

I know this is a wild dream in a world that is driven by maximizing profit. Let dreamers be dreamers ;)

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#564

Post by mechhacker »

koboll wrote: post #326

I do digital painting on the side, as a hobby. In that field, the iPad Pro, specifically the Procreate app, has been revolutionary -- every single famous digital illustrator, concept artist, and comics artist I follow on Instagram has one, and they post gorgeous work done on them regularly. It's the only tool that comes remotely close to challenging the gold standard workflow of Wacom tablet + Photoshop, and Wacom an…

As a drawing hobbyist, this is the main reason I got an iPad. It's incredible to draw on and experiment with.

Another killer app for me is Nebo. The text recognition and UI is very good. I use it for regular, cursive writing and conversion to text. It's the least in-my-way handwriting recognition that I've used. I've played around with it in French and Czech as well, and it recognized the language and accent differences even though my handwriting is quite poor.

It will also recognize and solve some handwritten math problems and simple diagrams. I originally tried this back when PDAs were a thing, but that form factor and capability a decade and a half ago was awful.

I just wish it had something like windows subsystem for Linux so that I could do some programming in my normal environment as well, then I would pick up a decent keyboard cover and leave my laptops at home.

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#565

Post by AgloeDreams »

e_proxus wrote: post #349
AgloeDreams wrote: post #235

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Two fingers on the keyboard, it turns into a cursor control. You're welcome :)

That does not work for me on iOS 13.3.

Even with a tap and hold? It should make the letters go away. Works juyst fine on 13.3 on my Pro 10.5

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#566

Post by phren0logy »

amiga_500 wrote: post #488
snapetom wrote: post #411

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel that Apple has lost its way with OS design in the past 5 years or so. Not at a macro level, but at a micro, "little things" level. Launch anything Apple-written these days and you'll get a wizard telling you how to use some new widget - just like any other software by anyone else. I don't think Apple has ever done that before because features were designed so well, you can easily figure it out. Then there are…

Itunes was utterly terrible. My iphone is terrible. Apple make very, very bad software. And their hardware is overpriced. And they deliberately make people pay more for accessories like their pointless new audio port. Android is superior in every way, except (I'm told) on privacy. I cannot comprehend why anyone buys apple. I have to have apple for my work phone, and I hate it. Just today I was wrestling with their dr…

To offer a counterpoint, I found Android on a tablet to be a UX disaster. To be fair, I last tried it a few years ago, but it REALLY put me off. The iPad has confusing and unnecessary limitations, but Android on a tablet was inscrutable and inconsistent. It gave me so many ways to shoot myself in the foot, and burn up a battery doing nothing at all.

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#567

Post by mbrameld »

jarjoura wrote: post #480

As someone who worked on the iPad v1, I can tell you, it was a product built in search of a problem. It was going to compete against the, then, growing Netbook market. Steve Jobs thought Windows was going to win that market and hastily threw a team together to answer for it. However, during several all-hands, no one except SJ seemed even remotely excited about the product. "These things will probably sell in the educ…

They're pretty ubiquitous in aviation! I started flying helicopters a couple years ago and almost every pilot I know has one loaded with ForeFlight that they use both for mission planning and then strap to their knee for the flight. The flight school I went to even includes a new Mini in their PPL course. They give a pilot a ton of functionality that would cost tens of thousands of dollars to replicate with certified avionics.

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#568

Post by neuronic »

VvR-Ox wrote: post #563
jarjoura wrote: post #480

As someone who worked on the iPad v1, I can tell you, it was a product built in search of a problem. It was going to compete against the, then, growing Netbook market. Steve Jobs thought Windows was going to win that market and hastily threw a team together to answer for it. However, during several all-hands, no one except SJ seemed even remotely excited about the product. "These things will probably sell in the educ…

I just recently bought a used iPad that still got the iPadOS update and what I noticed is very ambivalent. PRO: - The device is light, has a nice screen and good sound. I can use it to read documents that need color, watch videos and browse the web all in one device with acceptable performance - The battery has enough capacity for the pad to work for days without recharging - You can use pencil 1 as an input device (…

> as someone coming from Linux it feels already "walled" enough for my taste

Not criticizing at all, genuinely curious: what do you want to accomplish on an iPad that is prevented by the walled garden?

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#569

Post by [deleted] »

jarjoura wrote: post #480

As someone who worked on the iPad v1, I can tell you, it was a product built in search of a problem. It was going to compete against the, then, growing Netbook market. Steve Jobs thought Windows was going to win that market and hastily threw a team together to answer for it. However, during several all-hands, no one except SJ seemed even remotely excited about the product. "These things will probably sell in the educ…

[deleted]

Re: The iPad Awkwardly Turns 10

#570

Post by gowld »

snapetom wrote: post #411
Fiahil wrote: post #269

I completely agree with this article. The iPad hardware is absolutely wonderful, it's light, gorgeous and powerful. I got the latest iPad pro to watch Netflix in bed and it fills that purpose completely. However, the OS running on the machine is bad. Very bad. The multitasking is horrifying. The Files app is unusable (especially if you want to access your files from an FTP server). You have to use your finger to sele…

I feel that Apple has lost its way with OS design in the past 5 years or so. Not at a macro level, but at a micro, "little things" level. Launch anything Apple-written these days and you'll get a wizard telling you how to use some new widget - just like any other software by anyone else. I don't think Apple has ever done that before because features were designed so well, you can easily figure it out. Then there are…

As soon as they fixed text control, they broke URL handling. Long press on a link? Congrats, now you've got a weird floating popup Safari window with no Close button! Enjoy trying to use the finicky "drag between two invisible targets to open the app switcher" gesture to find and close the unwanted window.
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