"[A]n iPhone is just a refrigerator, it’s not the addiction"
June 2, 2018 10:38 AM Subscribe
Apple’s biggest event of the year is looking unusually quiet: Instead of announcing new features at WWDC 2018, Apple may double down on being the privacy-first, user-focused alternative to its competition.
“But what will be more interesting is watching how Apple positions itself in relation to its competition right now. With all the news around GDPR–and Google and Facebook’s own alleged failures at meeting its standards on day one–it’s easy to imagine Cook doubling down on Apple products as privacy products that put the user first. Munster believes Apple could lean into this narrative even more by introducing more digital wellness tools akin to what we saw from Google at I/O. Bloomberg suggests that this initiative will be called Digital Health.”Apple Is Set to Unveil AR Upgrade, Software to Manage iPhone Use
Apple engineers have been working on an initiative dubbed Digital Health, a series of tools to help users monitor how much time they spend on their devices and inside of certain applications. [...]Related: Tim Cook’s Duke speech is a sign of WWDC 2018’s focus
“We need to have tools and data to allow us to understand how we consume digital media,” Tony Fadell, a former senior Apple executive who worked on the original iPhone and iPod, said in a recent interview. “We need to get finer-grain language and start to understand that an iPhone is just a refrigerator, it’s not the addiction.”
Apple routinely alternates between feature-driven and hardening-driven version releases. What they usually do, though, is alternate this by platform: MacOS gets a feature-driven release, then the next year iOS gets a feature-driven release, and so on. So if neither platform is getting a lot of features, that is unusual but might not mean a whole lot, particularly since both are pretty mature OSes at this point.
The WWDC keynote is usually Apple's song-and-dance to both the tech industry and the business sector; it's not particularly consumer-focused except inasmuch as pretty nearly everything they do is ultimately consumer-driven.
The productions usually open with a feel-good presentation about good things Apple has done or stands for (in the past, this included things like pushing full user accessibility, or environmental-oriented initiatives like ewaste recovery and solar power proliferation). These are followed by business-oriented slides about Apple's successes and expansions. The feature demos, product demos, and pitches about the pending OS are aimed primarily at the developer community.
Ultimately though there's a lot of overlap in audience targeting. Apple's aware of that and tends to keep the keynotes at a relatively accessible, high concept level. If you're a corporate investor, Apple's engagement with their third party developers will underline your decisions about Apple's continued corporate health. If you own a software company, being told that there are tens of millions of new iPhones being made will make you feel better about your decision to develop software for the iPhone. If you're a developer, the heads up now about details in the new OS and APIs shipping in three months is what you need to update your products without being late to market. If you're none of the above, it's just an interesting (or boring) TV show.
The Steve Jobs days of "One more thing" are pretty nearly dead. There was a long drought between the new hardware announcements that used to be made at the end of the WWDC keynotes, and the one last summer presenting the iMac Pro. Only Apple knows what the hell Apple is doing so I would take any rumors that new products are/aren't being announced with equal quantities of salt, but I'm inclined to say that trends are against this happening again.
posted by ardgedee at 11:38 AM on June 2, 2018 [2 favorites]
The WWDC keynote is usually Apple's song-and-dance to both the tech industry and the business sector; it's not particularly consumer-focused except inasmuch as pretty nearly everything they do is ultimately consumer-driven.
The productions usually open with a feel-good presentation about good things Apple has done or stands for (in the past, this included things like pushing full user accessibility, or environmental-oriented initiatives like ewaste recovery and solar power proliferation). These are followed by business-oriented slides about Apple's successes and expansions. The feature demos, product demos, and pitches about the pending OS are aimed primarily at the developer community.
Ultimately though there's a lot of overlap in audience targeting. Apple's aware of that and tends to keep the keynotes at a relatively accessible, high concept level. If you're a corporate investor, Apple's engagement with their third party developers will underline your decisions about Apple's continued corporate health. If you own a software company, being told that there are tens of millions of new iPhones being made will make you feel better about your decision to develop software for the iPhone. If you're a developer, the heads up now about details in the new OS and APIs shipping in three months is what you need to update your products without being late to market. If you're none of the above, it's just an interesting (or boring) TV show.
The Steve Jobs days of "One more thing" are pretty nearly dead. There was a long drought between the new hardware announcements that used to be made at the end of the WWDC keynotes, and the one last summer presenting the iMac Pro. Only Apple knows what the hell Apple is doing so I would take any rumors that new products are/aren't being announced with equal quantities of salt, but I'm inclined to say that trends are against this happening again.
posted by ardgedee at 11:38 AM on June 2, 2018 [2 favorites]
Where I live in central North Carolina, there are pretty substantial rumors that Apple is set to announce a new large corporate campus being built in the Raleigh-Durham area. There was regular dealmaking being reported in the news up until two weeks ago when everybody -- including the local politicians -- went silent. So we have a vested interest in seeing if that gets announced Monday.
*(Since the same area is also still in contention for Amazon's second major corporate campus, we might be facing in a couple years the mixed blessing of mumblety-dozen thousand new jobs being added, but all in effectively the same neighborhood along highways that are already choked solid during rush hours.)
posted by ardgedee at 11:42 AM on June 2, 2018 [4 favorites]
*(Since the same area is also still in contention for Amazon's second major corporate campus, we might be facing in a couple years the mixed blessing of mumblety-dozen thousand new jobs being added, but all in effectively the same neighborhood along highways that are already choked solid during rush hours.)
posted by ardgedee at 11:42 AM on June 2, 2018 [4 favorites]
I predict the big things will be:
1) a unified framework for Mac and iOS apps (leaked as Marzipan a while ago)
2) ARM Macs
3) Apple VR glasses
posted by w0mbat at 12:49 PM on June 2, 2018
1) a unified framework for Mac and iOS apps (leaked as Marzipan a while ago)
2) ARM Macs
3) Apple VR glasses
posted by w0mbat at 12:49 PM on June 2, 2018
I predict not one of those three shows up for at least another year, and VR glasses from Apple are 5-7 years out, minimum
posted by wotsac at 1:04 PM on June 2, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by wotsac at 1:04 PM on June 2, 2018 [4 favorites]
"Apple is looking to expand its ad sales business, The Wall Street Journal reports today, which would represent a significant change in the company’s business strategy" https://www.theverge.com/2018/6/1/17418664/apple-ad-sales-app-target-smartphone
posted by the antecedent of that pronoun at 1:08 PM on June 2, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by the antecedent of that pronoun at 1:08 PM on June 2, 2018 [3 favorites]
I predict the next iPhone will also make desserts.
posted by eustacescrubb at 1:47 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by eustacescrubb at 1:47 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
Instead of announcing new features at WWDC 2018, Apple may double down on being the privacy-first, user-focused alternative to its competition.
So yesterday, June 1, the top Apple related headlines were:
Apple is reportedly eyeing the ad business, despite past stance that targeted ads are 'creepy'
Apple Looks to Expand Advertising Business With New Network for Apps
Apple to Expand Digital Advertising Network to Third-Party Apps
posted by JackFlash at 2:00 PM on June 2, 2018 [3 favorites]
So yesterday, June 1, the top Apple related headlines were:
Apple is reportedly eyeing the ad business, despite past stance that targeted ads are 'creepy'
Apple Looks to Expand Advertising Business With New Network for Apps
Apple to Expand Digital Advertising Network to Third-Party Apps
posted by JackFlash at 2:00 PM on June 2, 2018 [3 favorites]
It would be weird for them to do advertising again, since they shut down their previous iAd program two years ago.
posted by jenkinsEar at 2:32 PM on June 2, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by jenkinsEar at 2:32 PM on June 2, 2018 [3 favorites]
My prediction: Apple will (eventually) release Macs with their own CPUs, but they will NOT be ARM.
My reasoning: when Apple introduced 64-bit iPhones, they moved quickly, within a few years, to phase out support for 32-bit apps. Why? Because Apple makes their own ARM chips, and chip real estate is at a premium in a phone CPU package. It is in Apple’s best interest to jettison 32-bit instruction decoding as quickly as possible.
On the desktop, however, it’s a different story. Chip space is less important, and it’s not Apple’s decision to support ia32 instructions, and Intel is probably never going to drop 32-bit support.
Apple has supported 64-bit on the desktop for over a decade now, and only in the past year they’ve suddenly moved aggressively to drop 32-bit support. If Intel isn’t stopping 32-bit, why should Apple? For most apps, it doesn’t make a whole bit of difference. And if Apple is phasing out Intel, why phase out 32-bit and 64-bit at different times? Why not just wait and phase them out at the same time?
My guess: Apple is making their own chip that will support x86-64 instructions. They will run existing apps without recompilation. Note that Intel did not invent x86-64, they have to license it from AMD, just like Apple will have to.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 3:31 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
My reasoning: when Apple introduced 64-bit iPhones, they moved quickly, within a few years, to phase out support for 32-bit apps. Why? Because Apple makes their own ARM chips, and chip real estate is at a premium in a phone CPU package. It is in Apple’s best interest to jettison 32-bit instruction decoding as quickly as possible.
On the desktop, however, it’s a different story. Chip space is less important, and it’s not Apple’s decision to support ia32 instructions, and Intel is probably never going to drop 32-bit support.
Apple has supported 64-bit on the desktop for over a decade now, and only in the past year they’ve suddenly moved aggressively to drop 32-bit support. If Intel isn’t stopping 32-bit, why should Apple? For most apps, it doesn’t make a whole bit of difference. And if Apple is phasing out Intel, why phase out 32-bit and 64-bit at different times? Why not just wait and phase them out at the same time?
My guess: Apple is making their own chip that will support x86-64 instructions. They will run existing apps without recompilation. Note that Intel did not invent x86-64, they have to license it from AMD, just like Apple will have to.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 3:31 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
At least half of all tech industry “prediction” thinkpieces about Apple are pulled straight out of the author’s ass. Hell, the main article in this post claims that the iPhone X is a flop (it’s sold really well) and is a technological failure (user satisfaction is through the roof) and uses links to two clickbait hot takes on its own site as proof.
posted by middleclasstool at 3:33 PM on June 2, 2018 [10 favorites]
posted by middleclasstool at 3:33 PM on June 2, 2018 [10 favorites]
(That was in response to the ad thing, not the chip architecture thing. I think Apple’s dumping Intel too.)
posted by middleclasstool at 3:35 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by middleclasstool at 3:35 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
The Apple-focused folks who aren’t just “say any old crazy thing and hope you hit the lottery” pundits that I follow have been talking about how exciting this year is, because there have been effectively no reliable leaks, two days out.
Me, I’m hoping for more iPad love. Last year was a really big deal. Also, hopefully we’ll see why Apple bought Workflow.
posted by DoctorFedora at 3:36 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
Me, I’m hoping for more iPad love. Last year was a really big deal. Also, hopefully we’ll see why Apple bought Workflow.
posted by DoctorFedora at 3:36 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
How how an iCloud Music Library that doesn't silently delete random folders of music? Because that is still a thing.
posted by lagomorphius at 4:16 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by lagomorphius at 4:16 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
Apple is ceding a lot of ground to Microsoft's Surface line with their crummy Mac lineup. I know of two large network management companies that went from being nearly all-Mac to all-Surface, Macs now needing a VP to sign off on the req, in the past three years. I understand the phones make massive money, but the Mac was not an insignificant business line that was managing to grow as the industry segment contracted. The phones will keep Apple afloat forever, but it's shocking that a multi-billion dollar business line turning the best profit margins in the industry is so neglected, or worse, so ineptly managed, it's literally withering before our eyes.
The Mac Mini and Mac Pro haven't been updated in years and years, and after a huge rush of initial sales, it turns out the utterly awful "butterfly key" keyboard is what's really turning everyone off the MacBook Pro, not the USB-C thing.
Also, Siri is an unusable mess these days. Google's voice recognition features in their apps work better on my iPhone than Siri does. I'll probably buy an iPhone X to replace my old Six Plus, as the Android market is entirely made up of slower phones with identical form-factors to the X, and I like handoff.
I'm not certain about my next Mac, tho. I really don't like the MacBook Pro. It may be time to explore Ubuntu on a suitable PC rig, best keyboard wins.
(I have a new gig, and they don't do Mac, so I am using Windows 10 on a recent Lenovo as my daily corporate-access rig. It's... bad. It's very, very, very bad. Microsoft took the Mac utility "Quicksilver" and copied it, made it stupid, and then made it so that's the only way you can find anything without a lot of poking and prodding and messing with those damn little squares. Click the start button and start typing and hope it can find what you mean... And their idea of spaces - I just gave up. Not useful, unless you've never seen how Unix going back to the '90s and the Mac do it, in which case I can see how someone would think this is amazing. Also, Lenovos are Thinkpads, right? What the hell happened to the keyboard? It's mush. I don't even have admin rights to install any of the linux subsystems. Ugh. I spend most of my time on the Red Hat jumphost to get work done. Which is to say, Apple's software has a LOT to offer in the personal computer and workstation space, if they'd get off their ass and MAKE GOOD HARDWARE.)
posted by Slap*Happy at 4:31 PM on June 2, 2018 [9 favorites]
The Mac Mini and Mac Pro haven't been updated in years and years, and after a huge rush of initial sales, it turns out the utterly awful "butterfly key" keyboard is what's really turning everyone off the MacBook Pro, not the USB-C thing.
Also, Siri is an unusable mess these days. Google's voice recognition features in their apps work better on my iPhone than Siri does. I'll probably buy an iPhone X to replace my old Six Plus, as the Android market is entirely made up of slower phones with identical form-factors to the X, and I like handoff.
I'm not certain about my next Mac, tho. I really don't like the MacBook Pro. It may be time to explore Ubuntu on a suitable PC rig, best keyboard wins.
(I have a new gig, and they don't do Mac, so I am using Windows 10 on a recent Lenovo as my daily corporate-access rig. It's... bad. It's very, very, very bad. Microsoft took the Mac utility "Quicksilver" and copied it, made it stupid, and then made it so that's the only way you can find anything without a lot of poking and prodding and messing with those damn little squares. Click the start button and start typing and hope it can find what you mean... And their idea of spaces - I just gave up. Not useful, unless you've never seen how Unix going back to the '90s and the Mac do it, in which case I can see how someone would think this is amazing. Also, Lenovos are Thinkpads, right? What the hell happened to the keyboard? It's mush. I don't even have admin rights to install any of the linux subsystems. Ugh. I spend most of my time on the Red Hat jumphost to get work done. Which is to say, Apple's software has a LOT to offer in the personal computer and workstation space, if they'd get off their ass and MAKE GOOD HARDWARE.)
posted by Slap*Happy at 4:31 PM on June 2, 2018 [9 favorites]
Yeah, my desktop OS experience has been a lot like that. Any time I find myself frustrated with macOS, I spend a day in Windows 10 and it’s followed with a Webcomic Name-style “oh no”
posted by DoctorFedora at 5:39 PM on June 2, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by DoctorFedora at 5:39 PM on June 2, 2018 [5 favorites]
The platform consolidation I can see them announcing a test drive version of, for polishing through the year and release next year. They’ve been doing lots of it in the APIs but there are some serious incompatibilities last I checked.
I don’t thing we get an arm Mac announcement this year but they absolutely are working on it. Maybe next year. It’s the only way they’ll get the battery life they want with a keyboard that doesn’t suck without bloating the cases again.
I do want to see a return to glory of the Mac Pro though I can see them dragging their heels on hardware because of the arm project. If we have to wait another year but then get a Mac Pro with like up to 48 arm cores I think people might be okay with that.
My 2012 rMBP is still okay, though is is bogging down occasionally. I dread it’s failure before an arm replacement.
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:26 PM on June 2, 2018 [2 favorites]
I don’t thing we get an arm Mac announcement this year but they absolutely are working on it. Maybe next year. It’s the only way they’ll get the battery life they want with a keyboard that doesn’t suck without bloating the cases again.
I do want to see a return to glory of the Mac Pro though I can see them dragging their heels on hardware because of the arm project. If we have to wait another year but then get a Mac Pro with like up to 48 arm cores I think people might be okay with that.
My 2012 rMBP is still okay, though is is bogging down occasionally. I dread it’s failure before an arm replacement.
posted by seanmpuckett at 6:26 PM on June 2, 2018 [2 favorites]
Hellfire, my last gig had me on 2010 era MBP hardware, and refused to upgrade me until I bailed just this year. I'd take that Mac back in a heartbeat. This 2017 Windows laptop from a major vendor is so pokey... and the trackpad is BushII-era ASUS Linux Netbook bad. It's flat out terrible. I had to un-retire my Logitech mouse with the weighted scroll-wheel to get stuff done. Bluetooth is worthless on the PC side of the house, apparently, so I have the USB logitech dongle permanently in place. Lenovo! You used to be cool, what happened?!?
posted by Slap*Happy at 6:44 PM on June 2, 2018
posted by Slap*Happy at 6:44 PM on June 2, 2018
I love the idea that the upcoming Mac Pro might be the first ARM Macintosh. I also love the idea that it might be the last X86 Macintosh.
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:46 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by DoctorFedora at 6:46 PM on June 2, 2018 [1 favorite]
My guess is that they'll do a "Rosetta stone year" with an 6-12 Core A12 ARM coupled with a low-power dual-core 1.4ghz x86 licensed from Via.
The keyboard will still be hot garbage, but it'll get 24 hours of battery life.
posted by wcfields at 9:26 PM on June 2, 2018
The keyboard will still be hot garbage, but it'll get 24 hours of battery life.
posted by wcfields at 9:26 PM on June 2, 2018
[comes into to snark about the user privacy aspects of the recent GDPR related reveal of all the data they collect on Safari's sync feature, then to snark on them blocking Telegram updates, then shakes his head and says "Not this time, not this time..." and walks away]
posted by Samizdata at 9:58 PM on June 2, 2018
posted by Samizdata at 9:58 PM on June 2, 2018
Still using my late '09 27" iMac. Had a drive failure about 18 months ago requiring a trip to the shop but with a new FireCuda still working perfectly well. Now downloading the 10.13.5 update.
posted by epo at 12:49 AM on June 3, 2018
posted by epo at 12:49 AM on June 3, 2018
All I want from WWDC this year is an updated iMac so I can get one. The last release was using outdated cpu arch at the time of release.
posted by flippant at 3:07 AM on June 3, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by flippant at 3:07 AM on June 3, 2018 [2 favorites]
Still have a 2015 Mac at work and I'm not upgrading until it dies and then I'll have to decide if I even want a Mac. There's a lot I like about Windows more than OSX but I'm not that big a fan of most Windows laptops although at least they have CNTL keys on both sides of the keyboard.
posted by octothorpe at 4:21 AM on June 3, 2018
posted by octothorpe at 4:21 AM on June 3, 2018
No love for the Mac Mini?
Seems to me that if Apple intend to experiment with an ARM-based machine then a Mac Mini would be the ideal form factor. It needs to be fanless due to case size, and it's less of an ask for customers (including developers) to drop £400-500 on a headless box than £1000-2000 on a laptop.
I suspect the iOS/macOS converged user interface is a non-starter unless they work out how to build a decent touchscreen laptop (goodbye touchbar, we hardly knew ye), and finish moving all their developers to targeting a common bytecode object format, at which point binaries will run seamlessly whether on intel or ARM (unlike the Fat binary migration mess that came about during the PowerPC/intel migration circa 2004-07).
As for when ARM will be powerful enough ... I have a shiny Gemini PDA and yesterday I found myself compiling linux userland apps on it (in Termux, rather than the developer preview of Linux). It was adequate already, and it's one of the x25 machines; the x27 ones now shipping are about 25% faster. Felt a bit like working on a circa-2010 Macbook Air, if the Air was shrunk down to the dimensions of an iPhone 8+ in a thick case. As ARM just announced the Cortex A76 for 2019 with Intel Core i3 performance levels, and Intel are promising to ship Optane solid state storage in the near future (FLASH-like non-volatile memory with DDR access speed and latency, i.e. RAM-like mass storage), the hardware landscape could look very different no later than 2020.
posted by cstross at 4:35 AM on June 3, 2018 [1 favorite]
Seems to me that if Apple intend to experiment with an ARM-based machine then a Mac Mini would be the ideal form factor. It needs to be fanless due to case size, and it's less of an ask for customers (including developers) to drop £400-500 on a headless box than £1000-2000 on a laptop.
I suspect the iOS/macOS converged user interface is a non-starter unless they work out how to build a decent touchscreen laptop (goodbye touchbar, we hardly knew ye), and finish moving all their developers to targeting a common bytecode object format, at which point binaries will run seamlessly whether on intel or ARM (unlike the Fat binary migration mess that came about during the PowerPC/intel migration circa 2004-07).
As for when ARM will be powerful enough ... I have a shiny Gemini PDA and yesterday I found myself compiling linux userland apps on it (in Termux, rather than the developer preview of Linux). It was adequate already, and it's one of the x25 machines; the x27 ones now shipping are about 25% faster. Felt a bit like working on a circa-2010 Macbook Air, if the Air was shrunk down to the dimensions of an iPhone 8+ in a thick case. As ARM just announced the Cortex A76 for 2019 with Intel Core i3 performance levels, and Intel are promising to ship Optane solid state storage in the near future (FLASH-like non-volatile memory with DDR access speed and latency, i.e. RAM-like mass storage), the hardware landscape could look very different no later than 2020.
posted by cstross at 4:35 AM on June 3, 2018 [1 favorite]
Any time I find myself frustrated with macOS, I spend a day in Windows 10 and it’s followed with a Webcomic Name-style “oh no”Windows has had some nasty regressions, too: the Windows 8 search UI was useful – not as good as Launchbar but starting to get into the same hotkey + typing to load things class of productivity. Windows 10 introduced Cortana and now it’s like hotkey, wait while it does something which takes 20 seconds on a quad core with SSD and gigabit Internet, be told no results, ooops, you meant this program you load multiple times a day? And their updates have increasingly removed your ability to disable it.
I’ve given up on the MBP bring fixed before Ives retires but I’m waiting for either an iMac with decent components this year or going back to Linux for the first time since the 90s.
posted by adamsc at 6:14 AM on June 3, 2018
tim cook is literally the worst apple ceo since gil amelio
posted by entropicamericana at 7:21 AM on June 3, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by entropicamericana at 7:21 AM on June 3, 2018 [3 favorites]
I'm surprised they haven't tried to patent and sell the iAbacus as a brand new idea!!!!
posted by Burn_IT at 9:42 AM on June 3, 2018
posted by Burn_IT at 9:42 AM on June 3, 2018
No love for the Mac Mini?
From Apple? Signs point to "no".
posted by thelonius at 9:51 AM on June 3, 2018 [1 favorite]
From Apple? Signs point to "no".
posted by thelonius at 9:51 AM on June 3, 2018 [1 favorite]
Apple may double down on being the privacy-first, user-focused alternative to its competition.
I'll believe it when I see it, but if I see it then I'll buy another iPhone instead of switching back to Android as currently planned.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 4:07 PM on June 3, 2018
I'll believe it when I see it, but if I see it then I'll buy another iPhone instead of switching back to Android as currently planned.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 4:07 PM on June 3, 2018
Hey hey, don't be so harsh on the Mac Mini. They've made it clear that "the Mac Mini remains a product in [their] lineup." Can't argue with that. 🤔
(It would be Very Cool Indeed if they released an ARM Mac Mini with the footprint of the new Apple TV. Or maybe even X86! A better NUC or something! But I wouldn't hold my breath on that one, to be honest. When the Mac Mini was last updated, it was during a time when "you can count how long it'll be before the next update in Star Wars movies" was even more of a dismal threat than it actually is anyway.)
posted by DoctorFedora at 5:23 PM on June 3, 2018
(It would be Very Cool Indeed if they released an ARM Mac Mini with the footprint of the new Apple TV. Or maybe even X86! A better NUC or something! But I wouldn't hold my breath on that one, to be honest. When the Mac Mini was last updated, it was during a time when "you can count how long it'll be before the next update in Star Wars movies" was even more of a dismal threat than it actually is anyway.)
posted by DoctorFedora at 5:23 PM on June 3, 2018
I'll believe it when I see it, but if I see it then I'll buy another iPhone instead of switching back to Android as currently planned.
The entirety of the Android market seems so skeevy, tho. Why the hell are they all notching out? Are they trying to trick us into thinking they're selling an iPhone X? Why? Why not do something fun and useful and cool like Gemini? If Gemini had an OELD screen on the outside of the top lid, I would pay iPhone X money for that, plus some. I'm already expected to carry two phones for my job, why not? I can use it with it with one of these bad boys to own the rack-and-stack experience.
We're not allowed to bring in chairs, rolling carts or even loose stacks of paper into the racks. Fine. I'll sit on the floor and 0\/\/|\|z0rz the first-light with this bitty rig.
If it can take calls and emails without flipping it open, OMG. Nerdvanna.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:50 PM on June 3, 2018
The entirety of the Android market seems so skeevy, tho. Why the hell are they all notching out? Are they trying to trick us into thinking they're selling an iPhone X? Why? Why not do something fun and useful and cool like Gemini? If Gemini had an OELD screen on the outside of the top lid, I would pay iPhone X money for that, plus some. I'm already expected to carry two phones for my job, why not? I can use it with it with one of these bad boys to own the rack-and-stack experience.
We're not allowed to bring in chairs, rolling carts or even loose stacks of paper into the racks. Fine. I'll sit on the floor and 0\/\/|\|z0rz the first-light with this bitty rig.
If it can take calls and emails without flipping it open, OMG. Nerdvanna.
posted by Slap*Happy at 7:50 PM on June 3, 2018
I'm holding out hope for updated MacBooks. I don't really care one way or another about the touchbar but I truly dislike the keyboard on the new ones. Even if they didn't break all the time they're absurdly loud and the key travel is awful. Also, external display support is terrible, something I thought they'd have fixed with an update by now, but nobody at Apple seems to give a shit.
I really do like my iPhone X and I've never used an Android phone I actually liked (I keep my work phone separate from my personal phone and I've gotten a few of the high end Android phones but have settled on a second iPhone for work, Android is just that awful to me).
I hope they'll actually start to care about the laptops again and make some that are a pleasure to use, not just the least bad option. Even the higher and Dell and Lenovos I've used recently still feel like hot garbage in comparison to the newer, worse, MacBooks.
Really though, I'd just like the whole industry to start caring about the way things actually feel rather than the illusion of how they feel. People are willing to pay for quality, it's just not available. These are things I spend 8-10 hours a day using. I'd prefer it if I enjoyed them.
posted by mikesch at 9:24 AM on June 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
I really do like my iPhone X and I've never used an Android phone I actually liked (I keep my work phone separate from my personal phone and I've gotten a few of the high end Android phones but have settled on a second iPhone for work, Android is just that awful to me).
I hope they'll actually start to care about the laptops again and make some that are a pleasure to use, not just the least bad option. Even the higher and Dell and Lenovos I've used recently still feel like hot garbage in comparison to the newer, worse, MacBooks.
Really though, I'd just like the whole industry to start caring about the way things actually feel rather than the illusion of how they feel. People are willing to pay for quality, it's just not available. These are things I spend 8-10 hours a day using. I'd prefer it if I enjoyed them.
posted by mikesch at 9:24 AM on June 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
From the keynote: “Are you merging MacOS and iOS? No.”
Well then.
posted by ardgedee at 12:07 PM on June 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
Well then.
posted by ardgedee at 12:07 PM on June 4, 2018 [1 favorite]
Of course there’s a lot of room around that “no”, and Federighi is currently explaining how they’re furnishing that room: Basically a means for porting iOS apps to MacOS, but not the other direction.
posted by ardgedee at 12:09 PM on June 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by ardgedee at 12:09 PM on June 4, 2018 [2 favorites]
The other essential new feature that’s going to get the lion’s share of media coverage tonight: Animoji bleps.
posted by ardgedee at 12:10 PM on June 4, 2018
posted by ardgedee at 12:10 PM on June 4, 2018
ME: Absolutely do not even consider installing the first beta of a new iOS on your main phone
ALSO ME: It is vitally important that I be able to send a cartoon picture of myself with my tongue sticking out to every person I know, today
posted by DoctorFedora at 5:21 PM on June 4, 2018 [3 favorites]
ALSO ME: It is vitally important that I be able to send a cartoon picture of myself with my tongue sticking out to every person I know, today
posted by DoctorFedora at 5:21 PM on June 4, 2018 [3 favorites]
I'm thrilled about Stacks, but what if I want stacks by topic/project, without having to specify tags? If I put files near each other, then they should just become a stack of files. That's how stacks work in real life.
Also, Dark Mode is basically the Copland hi-tech theme finally shipping, sweet.
posted by polymodus at 2:35 AM on June 5, 2018
Also, Dark Mode is basically the Copland hi-tech theme finally shipping, sweet.
posted by polymodus at 2:35 AM on June 5, 2018
I can't say that I'm excited about the improvements to Finder that were announced but I'm glad to see that it's getting some attention.
posted by octothorpe at 4:05 AM on June 5, 2018
posted by octothorpe at 4:05 AM on June 5, 2018
A version of Stacks has been available in the Dock for years, and I've always found it annoying there. I don't like stuff on the desktop so this whole feature is dead to me.
On the other hand, the Quicklook enhancements remind me of the days when Apple had a public Quicklook API and there were all kinds of cool third party widgets you could incorporate into the Finder. Some of my favorites provided views of code files with syntax coloring, structured XML and JSON views (that also worked on .plist files), and the ability to select and copy from within the contents of the Quicklook pane.
Limited photo editing is nice, but not nearly as useful to me as being able to riffle through a couple dozen data files that the Finder is formatting on the fly.
posted by ardgedee at 5:09 AM on June 5, 2018
On the other hand, the Quicklook enhancements remind me of the days when Apple had a public Quicklook API and there were all kinds of cool third party widgets you could incorporate into the Finder. Some of my favorites provided views of code files with syntax coloring, structured XML and JSON views (that also worked on .plist files), and the ability to select and copy from within the contents of the Quicklook pane.
Limited photo editing is nice, but not nearly as useful to me as being able to riffle through a couple dozen data files that the Finder is formatting on the fly.
posted by ardgedee at 5:09 AM on June 5, 2018
If I care about a file, I'm not going to leave it on the desktop so I'm not sure what utility the stacks thing would have for me.
posted by octothorpe at 5:14 AM on June 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by octothorpe at 5:14 AM on June 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
I don't buy for one second that data on Apple devices cannot be accessed by governments.
posted by GoblinHoney at 10:43 AM on June 5, 2018
posted by GoblinHoney at 10:43 AM on June 5, 2018
"If I care about a file" is context dependent; lots of people put files they care about on the Desktop which is the UI problem what Apple is recognizing descriptively, not prescriptivistically getting people to manually file stuff away. Phil Schiller actually made a subtle comment when Dock Stacks were originally demoed, he said a few things that downplayed the use of feeling on folder hierarchies, promoting Dock Stacks and Spotlight. Also recall the Put Back feature that was around in System 7 and OS 9, pressing Apple Y was a great shortcut you could use on stuff that you moved to the Desktop.
posted by polymodus at 11:07 AM on June 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by polymodus at 11:07 AM on June 5, 2018 [1 favorite]
I put files on my Desktop if I’m going to be working on them a lot. The folders and subfolders inside of my hard drive are more like filing cabinets for files that I just want to file away. Once they go in the “filing cabinet” they are out of sight, out of mind (but findable if needed).
I tend to think of my Desktop like my actual desktop, with the things I want/need to work on spread out there.
Also, I have a couple of folder aliases to quickly jump to Downloads, Screenshots, et cetera.
posted by blueberry at 1:55 PM on June 5, 2018
I tend to think of my Desktop like my actual desktop, with the things I want/need to work on spread out there.
Also, I have a couple of folder aliases to quickly jump to Downloads, Screenshots, et cetera.
posted by blueberry at 1:55 PM on June 5, 2018
I have no idea what Dock Stacks or Spotlight* is so I'm probably not much of a power OSX user. I just use the Launch Pad and Finder and not much else from the OS. I'm probably missing out but it works for me.
* Well I did just google them, so I know now but I doubt that I'll use them.
posted by octothorpe at 1:56 PM on June 5, 2018
* Well I did just google them, so I know now but I doubt that I'll use them.
posted by octothorpe at 1:56 PM on June 5, 2018
This may require its own FPP - but the '90s are cool again! Here's a RISC/Unix workstation with dual 22-core IBM POWER 9 CPUs. Comes with an older AMD 7100, but 22 cores worth of Big Blue go-juice with 2TB of RAM can make up for a multitude of sins. Yes, they sell the boards without the case, GFX, drives or memory sticks, so you can roll your own GNU-APL monster. Or run AIX and get the real thing, after paying Capital I more than the hardware was worth in licensing (hint, GNU-APL's documentation is IBM's APL 2 free-to-download manuals.) Be sure to hand-solder your own Space Cadet keyboard for maximum efficiency!
posted by Slap*Happy at 5:15 PM on June 7, 2018
posted by Slap*Happy at 5:15 PM on June 7, 2018
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posted by egypturnash at 11:00 AM on June 2, 2018 [5 favorites]