I agree. I don't get these guys that rant about Apple being ahead due to no "real" competition. How many YEARS had the other players had but squandered their opportunity?
There is no "real" competition yet because the other makers (as usual) are playing catch-up. They waited to see what Apple came up with first before they dip their feet in the water. Now, they have the pressure of trying to come up with something with the polish of the iPad, and especially at a price-point that is competitive with the iPad as well and that is probably where they will have the most difficult time competing against.
Oh.. but wait until Android comes out... then <insert blah, blah Android comment here>
Its not a rant you pretty much said what I did. That no one has bothered to release anything when this was suppose to be the year of the Tablet. So yeah they are playing catch up. And Android is the only one that can really mount any real competition at this point and they are coming late to the game.
A simple example to illustrate this is the mail app on the iPad -- it has a 2-column display, e.g. mail headers and selected mail detail (one column and popup in portrait mode).
Android * doesn't have this! WebOS doesn't have this! I am not sure about PlayBook OS, but I doubt it!
* The Galaxy Tab has implemented this by skinning Android with system-supplied apps that imitate the apps on the iPad. There is no API or Framework in Android to do this.
This isn't an OS feature but the app. This is why the Samsung folks could easily replicate this.
Quote:
Apple has a single core OS that runs on all its hardware!
So does google. It's called linux. Linux sucks in comparison but there it is. Of course Google doesn't have a desktop Android yet.
WP7 is based on the WinCE kernel which is it's own kernel but the API level (WPF, XNA, .NET, etc) is common to the desktop. As common as iOS is with desktop OSX anyway.
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That means that any features on the Mac that would be desirable on a tablet -- are there for the taking (porting).
That's true for Android and WP7 as well given that folks have ported Java apps to Android and Windows apps to WinCE and presumably will again for WP7.
Quote:
Again, here's a simple example to illustrate what I mean:
Open iTunes and display the contents of your song library or a playlist in list view. The display will show several columns that all scroll together, vertically. When you tap the header of any column, the table is sorted by that column (alternately, ascending and descending). Also, you can resize and rearrange (drag and drop) columns
No big deal, right! On an iPhone, a multi-column table doesn't make much sense -- it would be too small to read and manipulate.
Actually there are many examples of multi-column tables on phone apps. I use them in mine. Apple, IMHO, has some advantages over Android here but not much over WP7. Frankly, developing UIs on Android isn't much better than developing on Java was. Possible to make very elegant UIs but a manual and annoying process.
Quote:
What about a tablet? Could someone taking inventory in a store, or drilling-down any data use a multi-column table?
I think so!
Already done.
Quote:
As of today, iOS does not support multi-column tables (nor do any of the other mobile OSes).
False. TableLayout in Android is one of the basic layouts. It supports rows and columns of arbitrary child views. Sorting by column you have to do yourself. After you do that once you can refactor that for any other app. There's probably one you can already refactor on CodeGuru or one of the other various coding how-to sites.
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When Apple implemented the single-column table on the iPhone, it did not implement it from scratch -- rather, it subsetted and ported the NSTableView from Mac OS X to become UITableView.
If Apple decides (or developers insist) that a more robust multi-column table view makes sense in iOS -- it already has working code that it can port at any time.
Apple improving UITableView would be a nice to have but given that TableLayout already exists on Android this isn't exactly moving the state of the art forward.
Quote:
There are several ways Apple could do this. I suspect they will re-implement NSTableView to run on iOS, then migrate it back to the Mac OS X Mothership.
Apple (and NeXT, before it) has been working for many, many years to implement features like this in Mac OS X.
Given that iTunes has these (via a prettified NSTableView) and MacWidgets replicated that in Java I'd say this is very much a solved problem and it was fairly trivial to do anyway. Not a many, many year effort.
False. Android's is probably behind iOS in terms of ease of development but I expect WP7 to be equal or better to iOS in terms of ease of development. From my experience I was mucking around with making the layout and UI not suck in Android while my iOS teammates were tracking down some memory leaks like 1999. WP7 has about 80-90% of the ease of use in terms of UI laydown using WPF as iOS and C# has garbage collection like Java on Android.
WPF and XNA are fully baked APIs with thousands and thousands of coders familiar with them.
Quote:
No other Desktop OS has a Mobile OS version to which it can port,
No one but Apple has a single SDK for both desktop and mobile.
A simple example to illustrate this is the mail app on the iPad -- it has a 2-column display, e.g. mail headers and selected mail detail (one column and popup in portrait mode).
Android * doesn't have this! WebOS doesn't have this! I am not sure about PlayBook OS, but I doubt it!
* The Galaxy Tab has implemented this by skinning Android with system-supplied apps that imitate the apps on the iPad. There is no API or Framework in Android to do this.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
This isn't an OS feature but the app. This is why the Samsung folks could easily replicate this.
You make my point! UISplitViewController is most-definetly an iOS API\t\t:
Any iPad iOS developer can easily add this capability -- Any Android developer must RYO or DIY. There is little probability that Android apps [using this capability] will have a consistent look and feel across various implementations.
The forked iOS for the iPad (iOS 3.2) is full of things that were added or reimplemented for the larger screen and targeted uses of a tablet as compared to a smart phone. Likely, Apple worked on this for a year, or so, before the iPad announcement.
I suspect it is things like this that cause Google to say that Android is not tablet ready -- and won't be until 2 releases from now/
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
Apple has a single core OS that runs on all its hardware!
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
So does google. It's called linux. Linux sucks in comparison but there it is. Of course Google doesn't have a desktop Android yet.
WP7 is based on the WinCE kernel which is it's own kernel but the API level (WPF, XNA, .NET, etc) is
I guess I should have been more specific (though I think you know what I meant).
I meant a core OS and its UI.
Do you think Google is going to offer and support a full-blown desktop OS? What UI? To what end?
Sure Linux qualifies for the OS part. But, who would want a Linux UI (which one) on a phone or tablet. Certainly not Google. Android provides the UI through s Java derivative. Java tends to supply a consistent, but meets-minimum. UI/UX.
WP7 is an unknown. It, likely, will have some success in the smart phone marketplace. It is unclear what MS is going to do in the Tablet space -- Windows 7 or WP 7 or Both.
AFAIK, these 2 OS variants do not share common code to the extent that iOS OS X and Mac OS X do. Apple has been working on re-implementing and consolidating the 2 OSes since before the iPhone was announced. For example, the Midi API, has been recently ported to iOS. The Mac OS X file system has always existed on iOS -- it's just hidden and sandboxed.
I feel fairly confident that Apple is working on an Universal OS. uOS, to run seemlessly on all Apple hardware. I am less sanguine that MS is doing the same.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
That means that any features on the Mac that would be desirable on a tablet -- are there for the taking (porting).
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
That's true for Android and WP7 as well given that folks have ported Java apps to Android and Windows apps to WinCE and presumably will again for WP7.
Here, I was referring to Apple having a robust set of APIs and Frameworks including many UI constructs.
Because the underlying OS is the same, Apple can more easily migrate APIs/Frameworks in either direction.
This would relieve the app developer from doing the heavy lifting. and tends to provide a pleasant and consistent UI/UX.
In my experience neither Linux or Java provide anything but an "acceptable" UI and certainly not a pleasant UX for the average consumer.
Win 7 does provide a better UI/UX, but, as of today, this is not acceptable (in demand) on a smart phone or tablet. I don't know that MS plans to migrate APIs/Frameworks among W7 and WP7 (or if they even can).
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
Again, here's a simple example to illustrate what I mean:
Open iTunes and display the contents of your song library or a playlist in list view. The display will show several columns that all scroll together, vertically. When you tap the header of any column, the table is sorted by that column (alternately, ascending and descending). Also, you can resize and rearrange (drag and drop) columns
No big deal, right! On an iPhone, a multi-column table doesn't make much sense -- it would be too small to read and manipulate.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
Actually there are many examples of multi-column tables on phone apps. I use them in mine. Apple, IMHO, has some advantages over Android here but not much over WP7. Frankly, developing UIs on Android isn't much better than developing on Java was. Possible to make very elegant UIs but a manual and annoying process.
Sure there are -- I've written a couple myself. But they are very specialized and somewhat difficult to use on a phone-size device.
To be clear, I am talking about a single view displaying multiple, manipulatable, table columns -- as opposed to a view with a single table column, drilling-down to another column on a separate view.
I certainly have not seen nor written multi-column table apps that exploit all the NSTableView capabilities -- resizable columns, drag and drop column repositioning, intermingled fat rows, etc.
In most cases, multi-column tables are limited by the small screen size. On the larger screens, it makes more sense and is more useful.
But my point here, as above, is that Apple has an existing Mac OS X API/Framework that it can readily port to iOS.
So the developer can take advantage of the construct without having to do the heavy liftiing.
I've written most of the NSTableView capabilities in JavaScript -- It was a bitch!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
What about a tablet? Could someone taking inventory in a store, or drilling-down any data use a multi-column table?
I think so!
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
Already done.
Sure. it's already done -- the hard way.
My points are:
1) with the proper API/Framework it is easy to implement, consistently -- without, it is difficult
2) Since Apple already has the construct running in a [largely] compatible OS it is relatively easy for Apple to migrate this to iOs.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
As of today, iOS does not support multi-column tables (nor do any of the other mobile OSes).
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
False. TableLayout in Android is one of the basic layouts. It supports rows and columns of arbitrary child views. Sorting by column you have to do yourself. After you do that once you can refactor that for any other app. There's probably one you can already refactor on CodeGuru or one of the other various coding how-to sites.
My example specifically refers to a table of multiple columns [simultaneously displayed] that can be easily manipulated as individual columns or as the table as a whole..
Even the beginning developer can write an app that displays a simple table (including using HTML in a WebView}
When you start to add the manipulation of the table columns. things start to get more complex: sorting; resizing columns; repositioning columns (drag and drop); horizontal scrolling of columns; fat rows....
As mentioned above, Apple has the capability to port NSTableView to iOS. NSTableview makes these capabilities easy to implement. Android has nowhere to get this construct other than to roll its own or copy Apple's implementation.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
When Apple implemented the single-column table on the iPhone, it did not implement it from scratch -- rather, it subsetted and ported the NSTableView from Mac OS X to become UITableView.
If Apple decides (or developers insist) that a more robust multi-column table view makes sense in iOS -- it already has working code that it can port at any time.
Apple improving UITableView would be a nice to have but given that TableLayout already exists on Android this isn't exactly moving the state of the art forward.
Two different things -- displaying a table and manipulating individual columns in a table.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
There are several ways Apple could do this. I suspect they will re-implement NSTableView to run on iOS, then migrate it back to the Mac OS X Mothership.
Apple (and NeXT, before it) has been working for many, many years to implement features like this in Mac OS X.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
Given that iTunes has these (via a prettified NSTableView) and MacWidgets replicated that in Java I'd say this is very much a solved problem and it was fairly trivial to do anyway. Not a many, many year effort.
Are you deliberately being obtuse. This thread is talking about tablets in general and the iPad in particular,
My post discusses the potential advantage that Apple has to port constructs to its mobile OS, iOS.
Yes this problem has been solved on the desktop -- it has not been solved on a mobile OS, particularly on a tablet.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
No other Mobile OS has this repository!
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
False. Android's is probably behind iOS in terms of ease of development but I expect WP7 to be equal or better to iOS in terms of ease of development. From my experience I was mucking around with making the layout and UI not suck in Android while my iOS teammates were tracking down some memory leaks like 1999. WP7 has about 80-90% of the ease of use in terms of UI laydown using WPF as iOS and C# has garbage collection like Java on Android.
WPF and XNA are fully baked APIs with thousands and thousands of coders familiar with them.
I was referring to desktop APIs/Frameworks (including UI) that could be easily migrated to mobile OS.
Sure, it's easier to write garbage-collected code -- it it better?
As to WP7 -- it is unclear whether MS plans to use it on tablets.
I do not know enough about WP7 to know if Win 7 APIs/Frameworks can be easily migrated to WPY. I suspect not.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
No other Desktop OS has a Mobile OS version to which it can port,
No one but Apple has a single SDK for both desktop and mobile.
Quote:
Originally Posted by nht
Both false statements
I'll give you that...
I should have linked the 2 statements together:
Android has a mobile OS but no desktop OS containing a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- to port to the mobile OS.
MS has a Desktop OS with a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- but it is unclear whether MS will port these to WP7 for use on tablets.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dick Applebaum
By the time the competition has this capability, Apple will have a uOS (Universal OS in Sol's words) that runs seamlessly on all its real devices and cloud devices.
BTW, a multi-colmun table might be useful navigating, say, an AppleTV. How about someone browsing for files on a tablet file system?
It's in the UI toolkit yes. Java has a split panes as well and so does MS has gridsplitter. Do they behave exactly like UISplitViewController? No but the core functionality is there and available for porting (if it hasn't already for gridsplitter) to the mobile platform.
Android UI paradigms don't lend themselves all that much to splitpanes at the moment.
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Any iPad iOS developer can easily add this capability -- Any Android developer must RYO or DIY. There is little probability that Android apps [using this capability] will have a consistent look and feel across various implementations.
Yes, I pointed that UI development in Android is clunky too. It's one of the tradeoffs of the platform but one that Google could address without all THAT much effort.
That doesn't mean that Google is bereft of a UI API and it certainly doesn't mean that MS doesn't have one. While they say Silverlight it's still based on WPF and XAML. And XNA vs OpenGL. The WP7 Silverlight is the same as the desktop RIA/version 3.
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I guess I should have been more specific (though I think you know what I meant).
I meant a core OS and its UI.
Do you think Google is going to offer and support a full-blown desktop OS? What UI? To what end?
I know what you meant. You meant that Apple has some kind of unique advantage because it controls both OS and APIs and a desktop one to draw from. This is true but not unique. Google picked Java and control both OS and APIs. While Java isn't a desktop OS it has many of the desired frameworks. Microsoft is even better positioned with a fully baked UI framework in WPF/XAML (aka Silverlight) and XNA and also controls their OS.
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Sure Linux qualifies for the OS part. But, who would want a Linux UI (which one) on a phone or tablet. Certainly not Google. Android provides the UI through s Java derivative. Java tends to supply a consistent, but meets-minimum. UI/UX.
There are Android netbooks. You can run Android-x86 on your desktop even if nobody does currently. Java doesn't need to be ugly and there are many beautiful java apps. Here's one example: http://www.vimeo.com/3373420
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WP7 is an unknown. It, likely, will have some success in the smart phone marketplace. It is unclear what MS is going to do in the Tablet space -- Windows 7 or WP 7 or Both.
Doesn't matter if you know C#, XAML and WPF.
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I feel fairly confident that Apple is working on an Universal OS. uOS, to run seemlessly on all Apple hardware. I am less sanguine that MS is doing the same.
It's called OSX.
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Here, I was referring to Apple having a robust set of APIs and Frameworks including many UI constructs.
Because the underlying OS is the same, Apple can more easily migrate APIs/Frameworks in either direction.
The underlying OS isn't as relevant as the interface paradigm required. As in touch vs WIMP. Both Google and MS have robust APIs and Frameworks including many UI constructs.
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This would relieve the app developer from doing the heavy lifting. and tends to provide a pleasant and consistent UI/UX.
Which MS has and Google doesn't care quite as much about.
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In my experience neither Linux or Java provide anything but an "acceptable" UI and certainly not a pleasant UX for the average consumer.
Linux is just a kernel as some folks like to point out. Android is kinda a weird looking distro but no more so than any other linux significantly altered for a specific domain (like real time or CE devices).
And as stated (and shown) above you can make elegant and usable Java apps.
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Win 7 does provide a better UI/UX, but, as of today, this is not acceptable (in demand) on a smart phone or tablet. I don't know that MS plans to migrate APIs/Frameworks among W7 and WP7 (or if they even can).
C#, WPF/Silverlight (WPF/E), XNA are the core dev APIs and language across the board. These will let you develop on pretty much any MS platform from desktop to XBox 360 to phone to whatever Win tablets will exist.
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As mentioned above, Apple has the capability to port NSTableView to iOS. NSTableview makes these capabilities easy to implement. Android has nowhere to get this construct other than to roll its own or copy Apple's implementation.
There are open source java table implementations they can use. This is not a difficult task.
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Two different things -- displaying a table and manipulating individual columns in a table.
I can manipulate the columns if I wish to grab relevant touch events.
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Are you deliberately being obtuse. This thread is talking about tablets in general and the iPad in particular,
My post discusses the potential advantage that Apple has to port constructs to its mobile OS, iOS.
Yes this problem has been solved on the desktop -- it has not been solved on a mobile OS, particularly on a tablet.
I'm not being obtuse, I'm showing you that it's not difficult either on a tablet or desktop. This was written by one guy as a hobby project to replicate OSX UI elements in Java. IT IS NOT HARD.
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I was referring to desktop APIs/Frameworks (including UI) that could be easily migrated to mobile OS.
And both MS and google have them. MS more, Google less.
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Sure, it's easier to write garbage-collected code -- it it better?
Yes.
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As to WP7 -- it is unclear whether MS plans to use it on tablets.
I do not know enough about WP7 to know if Win 7 APIs/Frameworks can be easily migrated to WPY. I suspect not.
And you would be clearly wrong if you bothered to look.
Quote:
I'll give you that...
I should have linked the 2 statements together:
Android has a mobile OS but no desktop OS containing a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- to port to the mobile OS.
MS has a Desktop OS with a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- but it is unclear whether MS will port these to WP7 for use on tablets.
Google has less depth than Apple but they aren't starting from zero or Oracle wouldn't be suing them. There are a gazillion java frameworks adaptable to Android.
MS has ALREADY ported their desktop APIs and Frameworks to WP7. It is the basis of WP7 development. Do I need to say C#/WPF/Silverlight/XAML and XNA one more time?
I hope you'll forgive me for not being terribly impressed by a 26% increase to something virtually nonexistent. Good for the iPad, but a drop in the computer industry's bucket.
Comments
I agree. I don't get these guys that rant about Apple being ahead due to no "real" competition. How many YEARS had the other players had but squandered their opportunity?
There is no "real" competition yet because the other makers (as usual) are playing catch-up. They waited to see what Apple came up with first before they dip their feet in the water. Now, they have the pressure of trying to come up with something with the polish of the iPad, and especially at a price-point that is competitive with the iPad as well and that is probably where they will have the most difficult time competing against.
Oh.. but wait until Android comes out... then <insert blah, blah Android comment here>
Its not a rant you pretty much said what I did. That no one has bothered to release anything when this was suppose to be the year of the Tablet. So yeah they are playing catch up. And Android is the only one that can really mount any real competition at this point and they are coming late to the game.
A simple example to illustrate this is the mail app on the iPad -- it has a 2-column display, e.g. mail headers and selected mail detail (one column and popup in portrait mode).
Android * doesn't have this! WebOS doesn't have this! I am not sure about PlayBook OS, but I doubt it!
* The Galaxy Tab has implemented this by skinning Android with system-supplied apps that imitate the apps on the iPad. There is no API or Framework in Android to do this.
This isn't an OS feature but the app. This is why the Samsung folks could easily replicate this.
Apple has a single core OS that runs on all its hardware!
So does google. It's called linux. Linux sucks in comparison but there it is. Of course Google doesn't have a desktop Android yet.
WP7 is based on the WinCE kernel which is it's own kernel but the API level (WPF, XNA, .NET, etc) is common to the desktop. As common as iOS is with desktop OSX anyway.
That means that any features on the Mac that would be desirable on a tablet -- are there for the taking (porting).
That's true for Android and WP7 as well given that folks have ported Java apps to Android and Windows apps to WinCE and presumably will again for WP7.
Again, here's a simple example to illustrate what I mean:
Open iTunes and display the contents of your song library or a playlist in list view. The display will show several columns that all scroll together, vertically. When you tap the header of any column, the table is sorted by that column (alternately, ascending and descending). Also, you can resize and rearrange (drag and drop) columns
No big deal, right! On an iPhone, a multi-column table doesn't make much sense -- it would be too small to read and manipulate.
Actually there are many examples of multi-column tables on phone apps. I use them in mine. Apple, IMHO, has some advantages over Android here but not much over WP7. Frankly, developing UIs on Android isn't much better than developing on Java was. Possible to make very elegant UIs but a manual and annoying process.
What about a tablet? Could someone taking inventory in a store, or drilling-down any data use a multi-column table?
I think so!
Already done.
As of today, iOS does not support multi-column tables (nor do any of the other mobile OSes).
False. TableLayout in Android is one of the basic layouts. It supports rows and columns of arbitrary child views. Sorting by column you have to do yourself. After you do that once you can refactor that for any other app. There's probably one you can already refactor on CodeGuru or one of the other various coding how-to sites.
When Apple implemented the single-column table on the iPhone, it did not implement it from scratch -- rather, it subsetted and ported the NSTableView from Mac OS X to become UITableView.
If Apple decides (or developers insist) that a more robust multi-column table view makes sense in iOS -- it already has working code that it can port at any time.
Or you can just code your own:
http://www.iphonedevx.com/?p=153
Apple improving UITableView would be a nice to have but given that TableLayout already exists on Android this isn't exactly moving the state of the art forward.
There are several ways Apple could do this. I suspect they will re-implement NSTableView to run on iOS, then migrate it back to the Mac OS X Mothership.
Apple (and NeXT, before it) has been working for many, many years to implement features like this in Mac OS X.
Given that iTunes has these (via a prettified NSTableView) and MacWidgets replicated that in Java I'd say this is very much a solved problem and it was fairly trivial to do anyway. Not a many, many year effort.
http://code.google.com/p/macwidgets/
No other Mobile OS has this repository!
False. Android's is probably behind iOS in terms of ease of development but I expect WP7 to be equal or better to iOS in terms of ease of development. From my experience I was mucking around with making the layout and UI not suck in Android while my iOS teammates were tracking down some memory leaks like 1999. WP7 has about 80-90% of the ease of use in terms of UI laydown using WPF as iOS and C# has garbage collection like Java on Android.
WPF and XNA are fully baked APIs with thousands and thousands of coders familiar with them.
No other Desktop OS has a Mobile OS version to which it can port,
No one but Apple has a single SDK for both desktop and mobile.
Both false statements.
A simple example to illustrate this is the mail app on the iPad -- it has a 2-column display, e.g. mail headers and selected mail detail (one column and popup in portrait mode).
Android * doesn't have this! WebOS doesn't have this! I am not sure about PlayBook OS, but I doubt it!
* The Galaxy Tab has implemented this by skinning Android with system-supplied apps that imitate the apps on the iPad. There is no API or Framework in Android to do this.
This isn't an OS feature but the app. This is why the Samsung folks could easily replicate this.
You make my point! UISplitViewController is most-definetly an iOS API\t\t:
http://developer.apple.com/library/i...009370-CH3-SW1
Any iPad iOS developer can easily add this capability -- Any Android developer must RYO or DIY. There is little probability that Android apps [using this capability] will have a consistent look and feel across various implementations.
The forked iOS for the iPad (iOS 3.2) is full of things that were added or reimplemented for the larger screen and targeted uses of a tablet as compared to a smart phone. Likely, Apple worked on this for a year, or so, before the iPad announcement.
I suspect it is things like this that cause Google to say that Android is not tablet ready -- and won't be until 2 releases from now/
Apple has a single core OS that runs on all its hardware!
So does google. It's called linux. Linux sucks in comparison but there it is. Of course Google doesn't have a desktop Android yet.
WP7 is based on the WinCE kernel which is it's own kernel but the API level (WPF, XNA, .NET, etc) is
I guess I should have been more specific (though I think you know what I meant).
I meant a core OS and its UI.
Do you think Google is going to offer and support a full-blown desktop OS? What UI? To what end?
Sure Linux qualifies for the OS part. But, who would want a Linux UI (which one) on a phone or tablet. Certainly not Google. Android provides the UI through s Java derivative. Java tends to supply a consistent, but meets-minimum. UI/UX.
WP7 is an unknown. It, likely, will have some success in the smart phone marketplace. It is unclear what MS is going to do in the Tablet space -- Windows 7 or WP 7 or Both.
AFAIK, these 2 OS variants do not share common code to the extent that iOS OS X and Mac OS X do. Apple has been working on re-implementing and consolidating the 2 OSes since before the iPhone was announced. For example, the Midi API, has been recently ported to iOS. The Mac OS X file system has always existed on iOS -- it's just hidden and sandboxed.
I feel fairly confident that Apple is working on an Universal OS. uOS, to run seemlessly on all Apple hardware. I am less sanguine that MS is doing the same.
That means that any features on the Mac that would be desirable on a tablet -- are there for the taking (porting).
That's true for Android and WP7 as well given that folks have ported Java apps to Android and Windows apps to WinCE and presumably will again for WP7.
Here, I was referring to Apple having a robust set of APIs and Frameworks including many UI constructs.
Because the underlying OS is the same, Apple can more easily migrate APIs/Frameworks in either direction.
This would relieve the app developer from doing the heavy lifting. and tends to provide a pleasant and consistent UI/UX.
In my experience neither Linux or Java provide anything but an "acceptable" UI and certainly not a pleasant UX for the average consumer.
Win 7 does provide a better UI/UX, but, as of today, this is not acceptable (in demand) on a smart phone or tablet. I don't know that MS plans to migrate APIs/Frameworks among W7 and WP7 (or if they even can).
Again, here's a simple example to illustrate what I mean:
Open iTunes and display the contents of your song library or a playlist in list view. The display will show several columns that all scroll together, vertically. When you tap the header of any column, the table is sorted by that column (alternately, ascending and descending). Also, you can resize and rearrange (drag and drop) columns
No big deal, right! On an iPhone, a multi-column table doesn't make much sense -- it would be too small to read and manipulate.
Actually there are many examples of multi-column tables on phone apps. I use them in mine. Apple, IMHO, has some advantages over Android here but not much over WP7. Frankly, developing UIs on Android isn't much better than developing on Java was. Possible to make very elegant UIs but a manual and annoying process.
Sure there are -- I've written a couple myself. But they are very specialized and somewhat difficult to use on a phone-size device.
To be clear, I am talking about a single view displaying multiple, manipulatable, table columns -- as opposed to a view with a single table column, drilling-down to another column on a separate view.
I certainly have not seen nor written multi-column table apps that exploit all the NSTableView capabilities -- resizable columns, drag and drop column repositioning, intermingled fat rows, etc.
In most cases, multi-column tables are limited by the small screen size. On the larger screens, it makes more sense and is more useful.
But my point here, as above, is that Apple has an existing Mac OS X API/Framework that it can readily port to iOS.
So the developer can take advantage of the construct without having to do the heavy liftiing.
I've written most of the NSTableView capabilities in JavaScript -- It was a bitch!
What about a tablet? Could someone taking inventory in a store, or drilling-down any data use a multi-column table?
I think so!
Already done.
Sure. it's already done -- the hard way.
My points are:
1) with the proper API/Framework it is easy to implement, consistently -- without, it is difficult
2) Since Apple already has the construct running in a [largely] compatible OS it is relatively easy for Apple to migrate this to iOs.
As of today, iOS does not support multi-column tables (nor do any of the other mobile OSes).
False. TableLayout in Android is one of the basic layouts. It supports rows and columns of arbitrary child views. Sorting by column you have to do yourself. After you do that once you can refactor that for any other app. There's probably one you can already refactor on CodeGuru or one of the other various coding how-to sites.
My example specifically refers to a table of multiple columns [simultaneously displayed] that can be easily manipulated as individual columns or as the table as a whole..
Even the beginning developer can write an app that displays a simple table (including using HTML in a WebView}
When you start to add the manipulation of the table columns. things start to get more complex: sorting; resizing columns; repositioning columns (drag and drop); horizontal scrolling of columns; fat rows....
As mentioned above, Apple has the capability to port NSTableView to iOS. NSTableview makes these capabilities easy to implement. Android has nowhere to get this construct other than to roll its own or copy Apple's implementation.
When Apple implemented the single-column table on the iPhone, it did not implement it from scratch -- rather, it subsetted and ported the NSTableView from Mac OS X to become UITableView.
If Apple decides (or developers insist) that a more robust multi-column table view makes sense in iOS -- it already has working code that it can port at any time.
Or you can just code your own:
http://www.iphonedevx.com/?p=153
Apple improving UITableView would be a nice to have but given that TableLayout already exists on Android this isn't exactly moving the state of the art forward.
Two different things -- displaying a table and manipulating individual columns in a table.
There are several ways Apple could do this. I suspect they will re-implement NSTableView to run on iOS, then migrate it back to the Mac OS X Mothership.
Apple (and NeXT, before it) has been working for many, many years to implement features like this in Mac OS X.
Given that iTunes has these (via a prettified NSTableView) and MacWidgets replicated that in Java I'd say this is very much a solved problem and it was fairly trivial to do anyway. Not a many, many year effort.
http://code.google.com/p/macwidgets/
Are you deliberately being obtuse. This thread is talking about tablets in general and the iPad in particular,
My post discusses the potential advantage that Apple has to port constructs to its mobile OS, iOS.
Yes this problem has been solved on the desktop -- it has not been solved on a mobile OS, particularly on a tablet.
No other Mobile OS has this repository!
False. Android's is probably behind iOS in terms of ease of development but I expect WP7 to be equal or better to iOS in terms of ease of development. From my experience I was mucking around with making the layout and UI not suck in Android while my iOS teammates were tracking down some memory leaks like 1999. WP7 has about 80-90% of the ease of use in terms of UI laydown using WPF as iOS and C# has garbage collection like Java on Android.
WPF and XNA are fully baked APIs with thousands and thousands of coders familiar with them.
I was referring to desktop APIs/Frameworks (including UI) that could be easily migrated to mobile OS.
Sure, it's easier to write garbage-collected code -- it it better?
As to WP7 -- it is unclear whether MS plans to use it on tablets.
I do not know enough about WP7 to know if Win 7 APIs/Frameworks can be easily migrated to WPY. I suspect not.
No other Desktop OS has a Mobile OS version to which it can port,
No one but Apple has a single SDK for both desktop and mobile.
Both false statements
I'll give you that...
I should have linked the 2 statements together:
Android has a mobile OS but no desktop OS containing a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- to port to the mobile OS.
MS has a Desktop OS with a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- but it is unclear whether MS will port these to WP7 for use on tablets.
By the time the competition has this capability, Apple will have a uOS (Universal OS in Sol's words) that runs seamlessly on all its real devices and cloud devices.
BTW, a multi-colmun table might be useful navigating, say, an AppleTV. How about someone browsing for files on a tablet file system?
.
You make my point! UISplitViewController is most-definetly an iOS API\t\t:
http://developer.apple.com/library/i...009370-CH3-SW1
It's in the UI toolkit yes. Java has a split panes as well and so does MS has gridsplitter. Do they behave exactly like UISplitViewController? No but the core functionality is there and available for porting (if it hasn't already for gridsplitter) to the mobile platform.
Android UI paradigms don't lend themselves all that much to splitpanes at the moment.
Any iPad iOS developer can easily add this capability -- Any Android developer must RYO or DIY. There is little probability that Android apps [using this capability] will have a consistent look and feel across various implementations.
Yes, I pointed that UI development in Android is clunky too. It's one of the tradeoffs of the platform but one that Google could address without all THAT much effort.
That doesn't mean that Google is bereft of a UI API and it certainly doesn't mean that MS doesn't have one. While they say Silverlight it's still based on WPF and XAML. And XNA vs OpenGL. The WP7 Silverlight is the same as the desktop RIA/version 3.
I guess I should have been more specific (though I think you know what I meant).
I meant a core OS and its UI.
Do you think Google is going to offer and support a full-blown desktop OS? What UI? To what end?
I know what you meant. You meant that Apple has some kind of unique advantage because it controls both OS and APIs and a desktop one to draw from. This is true but not unique. Google picked Java and control both OS and APIs. While Java isn't a desktop OS it has many of the desired frameworks. Microsoft is even better positioned with a fully baked UI framework in WPF/XAML (aka Silverlight) and XNA and also controls their OS.
Sure Linux qualifies for the OS part. But, who would want a Linux UI (which one) on a phone or tablet. Certainly not Google. Android provides the UI through s Java derivative. Java tends to supply a consistent, but meets-minimum. UI/UX.
There are Android netbooks. You can run Android-x86 on your desktop even if nobody does currently. Java doesn't need to be ugly and there are many beautiful java apps. Here's one example: http://www.vimeo.com/3373420
WP7 is an unknown. It, likely, will have some success in the smart phone marketplace. It is unclear what MS is going to do in the Tablet space -- Windows 7 or WP 7 or Both.
Doesn't matter if you know C#, XAML and WPF.
I feel fairly confident that Apple is working on an Universal OS. uOS, to run seemlessly on all Apple hardware. I am less sanguine that MS is doing the same.
It's called OSX.
Here, I was referring to Apple having a robust set of APIs and Frameworks including many UI constructs.
Because the underlying OS is the same, Apple can more easily migrate APIs/Frameworks in either direction.
The underlying OS isn't as relevant as the interface paradigm required. As in touch vs WIMP. Both Google and MS have robust APIs and Frameworks including many UI constructs.
This would relieve the app developer from doing the heavy lifting. and tends to provide a pleasant and consistent UI/UX.
Which MS has and Google doesn't care quite as much about.
In my experience neither Linux or Java provide anything but an "acceptable" UI and certainly not a pleasant UX for the average consumer.
Linux is just a kernel as some folks like to point out. Android is kinda a weird looking distro but no more so than any other linux significantly altered for a specific domain (like real time or CE devices).
And as stated (and shown) above you can make elegant and usable Java apps.
Win 7 does provide a better UI/UX, but, as of today, this is not acceptable (in demand) on a smart phone or tablet. I don't know that MS plans to migrate APIs/Frameworks among W7 and WP7 (or if they even can).
C#, WPF/Silverlight (WPF/E), XNA are the core dev APIs and language across the board. These will let you develop on pretty much any MS platform from desktop to XBox 360 to phone to whatever Win tablets will exist.
As mentioned above, Apple has the capability to port NSTableView to iOS. NSTableview makes these capabilities easy to implement. Android has nowhere to get this construct other than to roll its own or copy Apple's implementation.
There are open source java table implementations they can use. This is not a difficult task.
Two different things -- displaying a table and manipulating individual columns in a table.
I can manipulate the columns if I wish to grab relevant touch events.
Are you deliberately being obtuse. This thread is talking about tablets in general and the iPad in particular,
My post discusses the potential advantage that Apple has to port constructs to its mobile OS, iOS.
Yes this problem has been solved on the desktop -- it has not been solved on a mobile OS, particularly on a tablet.
I'm not being obtuse, I'm showing you that it's not difficult either on a tablet or desktop. This was written by one guy as a hobby project to replicate OSX UI elements in Java. IT IS NOT HARD.
I was referring to desktop APIs/Frameworks (including UI) that could be easily migrated to mobile OS.
And both MS and google have them. MS more, Google less.
Sure, it's easier to write garbage-collected code -- it it better?
Yes.
As to WP7 -- it is unclear whether MS plans to use it on tablets.
I do not know enough about WP7 to know if Win 7 APIs/Frameworks can be easily migrated to WPY. I suspect not.
And you would be clearly wrong if you bothered to look.
I'll give you that...
I should have linked the 2 statements together:
Android has a mobile OS but no desktop OS containing a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- to port to the mobile OS.
MS has a Desktop OS with a repository of APIs/Frameworks -- but it is unclear whether MS will port these to WP7 for use on tablets.
Google has less depth than Apple but they aren't starting from zero or Oracle wouldn't be suing them. There are a gazillion java frameworks adaptable to Android.
MS has ALREADY ported their desktop APIs and Frameworks to WP7. It is the basis of WP7 development. Do I need to say C#/WPF/Silverlight/XAML and XNA one more time?