In my experience software application development is usually done by a relatively small group of engineers who take ownership of a specific app. Working with a product manager they implement improvements in the code over time. Leaving aside the major platform code bases, Apple has a relatively small portfolio of end user apps. Given their financial resources that makes it even more puzzling that key apps seem to get ignored for extended periods of time. What are they doing differently that keeps them from updating important apps like Maps, iLife and iWorks with some regularity? Your points about the Maps app are especially relevant given the importance of maps in the mobile ecosystem. I have used Maps to get me to my driving destinations in several countries so I know that the basic functionality is there but, as you suggest, it could and should be so much better.
" In fact, there hasn't ever been more opportunity for Apple to pursue in the history of the company. " "This could greatly simplify the setup of HomeKit's locks ..."
Huh! they lost market share 5 years running, including going through the floor this year MS has some serious difficulty there that goes way beyond hardware before they can sell anything.
Their smartphone market share is now absurdly low.
....With the mess that MS is making of Windows 10 there is a golden opportunity to get an awful lot more users of their hardware. What is missing from their current HW lineup? Well, the MacMini has been crippled by the last so called update. A decent upgrade of this plus a price reduction would make moving from a windows desktop easier.
Then there is the MacPro. Well past its sell by date with the current hardware. Far too expensive as well. I built a hackintosh because Apple offered nothing for me in that area....
The neglect on the Mac hardware front is puzzling. As you day, with the teething problems of Win 10 Apple should have had their Mac hardware ready to shock and awe. Instead all they managed was the MacBook. Which to me seems overpriced and limited, even compared with the geriatric MacBook airs. Its pricing seems a poor fit for its power and other limitations. Which probably explains why I have never seen a MacBook outside a store display. And where is Skylake and usbC/TB3 in the MacBook range? Let alone retina and a reasonable amount of RAM in std MBAs? Imagine Mac sales would have been if Apple had released updated laptops before Christmas, like their competitors managed even earlier. What is going on?
Daniel makes many fine points here! But I haven't read so many "musts" and "immediately's" since the last time I saw an Enderly piece (that has been awhile).
I don't see either typo. If you point any out, I'm more than happy to fix them.
After re-reading and editing your own article dozens of times, the remaining typos don't jump out anymore.
hes not saying you misspelled those -- he's saying you're claiming apple "must" do so many things "immediately"...which raises the question -- or what?
Huh! they lost market share 5 years running, including going through the floor this year MS has some serious difficulty there that goes way beyond hardware before they can sell anything.
Their smartphone market share is now absurdly low.
'Solid breakthrough' is just brimming with enthusiasm, don't you think? It's like Engadget just had to think up something positive to say about the slow kid. Fact is the 950 is ordinary hardware, except perhaps the camera, and is in truth little more than a holding pattern until MS can come out with the fabled Intel based surface phone. But will it run Crysis?
To get back on topic, let's hope that macs through low prioritisation don't end up like Windows phones.
....With the mess that MS is making of Windows 10 there is a golden opportunity to get an awful lot more users of their hardware. What is missing from their current HW lineup? Well, the MacMini has been crippled by the last so called update. A decent upgrade of this plus a price reduction would make moving from a windows desktop easier.
Then there is the MacPro. Well past its sell by date with the current hardware. Far too expensive as well. I built a hackintosh because Apple offered nothing for me in that area....
The neglect on the Mac hardware front is puzzling. As you day, with the teething problems of Win 10 Apple should have had their Mac hardware ready to shock and awe. Instead all they managed was the MacBook. Which to me seems overpriced and limited, even compared with the geriatric MacBook airs. Its pricing seems a poor fit for its power and other limitations. Which probably explains why I have never seen a MacBook outside a store display. And where is Skylake and usbC/TB3 in the MacBook range? Let alone retina and a reasonable amount of RAM in std MBAs? Imagine Mac sales would have been if Apple had released updated laptops before Christmas, like their competitors managed even earlier. What is going on?
not sure what you're talking about. my rMBP from last year is the finest computer I've ever owned. it screams and is perfect for my work (software dev, running VMs, etc). i see no neglect.
The neglect on the Mac hardware front is puzzling. As you day, with the teething problems of Win 10 Apple should have had their Mac hardware ready to shock and awe. Instead all they managed was the MacBook. Which to me seems overpriced and limited, even compared with the geriatric MacBook airs. Its pricing seems a poor fit for its power and other limitations. Which probably explains why I have never seen a MacBook outside a store display. And where is Skylake and usbC/TB3 in the MacBook range? Let alone retina and a reasonable amount of RAM in std MBAs? Imagine Mac sales would have been if Apple had released updated laptops before Christmas, like their competitors managed even earlier. What is going on?
not sure what you're talking about. my rMBP from last year is the finest computer I've ever owned. it screams and is perfect for my work (software dev, running VMs, etc). i see no neglect.
I am sure it does. For an early 2015 machine it was good. Late 2015 machines by competitors have skylake, updated nVidia GPUs, usbC/TB3 etc. Why shouldn't people in the market for a laptop now want the same from a Mac laptop? It would scream even more.
edit: disclosure. In Australia the school year starts the end of January. I need to buy three laptops for my kids. I have have held off past Christmas waiting for MBA updates, but I doubt Oz's small market factors into Apple's release schedule. I cannot justify paying premium prices, particularly with the falling exchange rate, for outdated tech. I need future proofing as much as possible. I will have to buy within three weeks. It's looking like HP (spectre pro x360) or Dell (XPS or Inspiron 7000) will get my money, which will make me sad and give me the irrits with Cook and his priorities.
I don't see either typo. If you point any out, I'm more than happy to fix them.
After re-reading and editing your own article dozens of times, the remaining typos don't jump out anymore.
hes not saying you misspelled those -- he's saying you're claiming apple "must" do so many things "immediately"...which raises the question -- or what?
Okay, I get the Enderle shade now. Ouch!
Even if you think it's overstated, I think the premise is clear in the first and last paragraphs. Apple can't just be exacting in its hardware. The ecosystems that support premium hardware also need serious work.
I am sure it does. For an early 2015 machine it was good. Late 2015 machines by competitors have skylake, updated nVidia GPUs, usbC/TB3 etc. Why shouldn't people in the market for a laptop now want the same from a Mac laptop? It would scream even more.
edit: disclosure. In Australia the school year starts the end of January. I need to buy three laptops for my kids. I have have held off past Christmas waiting for MBA updates, but I doubt Oz's small market factors into Apple's release schedule. I cannot justify paying premium prices, particularly with the falling exchange rate, for outdated tech. I need future proofing as much as possible. I will have to buy within three weeks. It's looking like HP (spectre pro x360) or Dell (XPS or Inspiron 7000) will get my money, which will make me sad and give me the irrits with Cook and his priorities.
What makes you so sure there will ever be another MBA update?
As for other models, they come when all the parts are ready, and no sooner. I find it hard to believe a spec bump matters so much to kids' usage that you'd jump ship to Windows PCs so easily as opposed to buying the best Mac available now.
EMV cards are always left in the slot during the transaction. That's how they've always worked. And unfortunately, the US card issuers have decided on chip-and-signature instead of chip-and-PIN, over the objections of the major merchants. We all know how useless a signature is at checkout time.
Completely agree. Nice work, DED. If there is an AppleCar in the works, I assume Maps would have to improve beyond imagination! I really hope Apple keeps commercialisation as a consequence of making great products, not the cause. I continue to look forward to Apple's and DED's future excellent contributions!
I also completely agree. Well written and perfectly on point, DED. I've been leading software teams, albeit on a small scale within a non-tech company, for 35 years and I am repeatedly astonished at how little Apple accomplishes each year on the software and services front (outside of their core OS products; I don't feel qualified to assess Swift) given their immense resources and presumably world-class talent. 15-20 years ago, I assumed they purposely under-achieved in those areas to avoid the appearance or reality of competing with the software firms they desperately needed and wanted to develop for their platforms. Those days are long gone, however. They still need firms like Adobe and Microsoft to create their suites to run well on apple hardware, for sure. And, they've got them. But the real key to winning from a platform perspective is Maps, Siri, Photos, iCloud and Apple Music. In their current for, compared to offerings from Google, Dropbox and Microsoft, all of these suck. Siri - I personally have gotten a 5% success rate at best with what I would consider bread-and-butter inquiries in the past 3 years. Why would anyone even want Siri hands free in its current state? My daughter, who's a very successful Yelp employee, super digitally savvy and passionate about music - someone I'd consider a member of the prototypical Apple Music target market - told me this week that after buying Apple Music and using it side-by-side versus Spotify for a few months, that Apple Music is useless and she's cancelling her subscription. Photos and iCloud I barely dare to try to explain and defend to my wife who is a member of the Apple target market of "it just works" people. And Maps - well, I can't say it any better than DED. Of course, I'm sure we all realize that Cook and his team know we're all folks who are deeply committed to the Apple ecosystems and have been for years. I just hope that doesn't mean they take our comments for granted. I got into IT in the late 70's when IBM ruled the roost and I have always remembered overhearing the IBM rep for our account (a medium-sized insurance company is where I worked at the time) at Christmas-time 1979 yelling (yes yelling) at our infrastructure lead for not going thru with some hardware purchase he imagined we needed to do. That was for me the epitome of hubris and it left a bad taste in my mouth re IBM for 20 years. As soon as I had buying authority, I went with Dell and others. Apple - especially given they're only 10 years out of the wilderness of being a nearly-irrelevant tech firm - shouldn't be resting on any laurels and should be using a sizeable fraction of their cash flow to focus intensively on improving the service offerings this forum discussion has highlighted.
I am sure it does. For an early 2015 machine it was good. Late 2015 machines by competitors have skylake, updated nVidia GPUs, usbC/TB3 etc. Why shouldn't people in the market for a laptop now want the same from a Mac laptop? It would scream even more.
edit: disclosure. In Australia the school year starts the end of January. I need to buy three laptops for my kids. I have have held off past Christmas waiting for MBA updates, but I doubt Oz's small market factors into Apple's release schedule. I cannot justify paying premium prices, particularly with the falling exchange rate, for outdated tech. I need future proofing as much as possible. I will have to buy within three weeks. It's looking like HP (spectre pro x360) or Dell (XPS or Inspiron 7000) will get my money, which will make me sad and give me the irrits with Cook and his priorities.
What makes you so sure there will ever be another MBA update?
As for other models, they come when all the parts are ready, and no sooner. I find it hard to believe a spec bump matters so much to kids' usage that you'd jump ship to Windows PCs so easily as opposed to buying the best Mac available now.
The MBA should be the perfect school laptop, it just needs a spec upgrade before I would buy it. If I was choosing I would rather the MacBook be discontinued. A nice tech demo, but ultimately too compromised. I need something for my kids now, and it needs to be future proof, thus using the latest parts, which are readily available in wintel machines. Current win 10 offerings are big improvements over win 8 machines, and I could always hackintosh, although I would get tired of the upkeep. It would be a stretch to pay a premium price in 2016 for a MBA with a 2014 processor and a 2012 display when the solutions have been available for a long time. If the Current MBA was say, USD350 less I probably wouldnt be so bitchy about it. And I would pay the current price if it had current specs.
Apple needs to go address all the older iApps that they have left dying on the vine for so long along with many of their pro apps. Sad that a company known for hardware/software integration has dropped the ball so bad on the software side. Garage Band, Photos, iMovie, iTunes, iWorks, Final Cut Pro, etc. Anyone care about these apps at Apple anymore?
Maps suffer from the lack of a proper system data cache. This is why if you try to drive with a zoomed in satellite view, tiles tend to load just as they are about to slide off the screen leaving you with a black and white grid instead of a map. Apple can fix this by caching multiple levels of detail in a system data cache. This is a cache of any online or temporary system or app data. It uses all the unused storage space on your device. If you have a 64GB iPhone and have used 32GB that leaves over 30GB unused space for temporary cached data. That is a vast amount of storage for caching maps and other data you may want to reuse. If you want to see this in action, I implemented it in my Scenic Map (free) app. It uses its own data caching scheme since iOS does not provide one but has no trouble at all keeping up with your drive using satellite images via Apple's own Maps SDK.
However: "Apple could offer a limited 1-2 year term of licensing fee abatements, where partners could save big on HomeKit licensing fees if they meet aggressive unit cost reduction goals to reach new customers and broaden the popularity of HomeKit "
This makes no sense whatsoever. How can you abate a license fee that does not exist?
Comments
In my experience software application development is usually done by a relatively small group of engineers who take ownership of a specific app. Working with a product manager they implement improvements in the code over time. Leaving aside the major platform code bases, Apple has a relatively small portfolio of end user apps. Given their financial resources that makes it even more puzzling that key apps seem to get ignored for extended periods of time. What are they doing differently that keeps them from updating important apps like Maps, iLife and iWorks with some regularity? Your points about the Maps app are especially relevant given the importance of maps in the mobile ecosystem. I have used Maps to get me to my driving destinations in several countries so I know that the basic functionality is there but, as you suggest, it could and should be so much better.
" In fact, there hasn't ever been more opportunity for Apple to pursue in the history of the company. "
"This could greatly simplify the setup of HomeKit's locks ..."
Their smartphone market share is now absurdly low.
And where is Skylake and usbC/TB3 in the MacBook range? Let alone retina and a reasonable amount of RAM in std MBAs? Imagine Mac sales would have been if Apple had released updated laptops before Christmas, like their competitors managed even earlier. What is going on?
To get back on topic, let's hope that macs through low prioritisation don't end up like Windows phones.
edit: disclosure. In Australia the school year starts the end of January. I need to buy three laptops for my kids. I have have held off past Christmas waiting for MBA updates, but I doubt Oz's small market factors into Apple's release schedule. I cannot justify paying premium prices, particularly with the falling exchange rate, for outdated tech. I need future proofing as much as possible. I will have to buy within three weeks. It's looking like HP (spectre pro x360) or Dell (XPS or Inspiron 7000) will get my money, which will make me sad and give me the irrits with Cook and his priorities.
Even if you think it's overstated, I think the premise is clear in the first and last paragraphs. Apple can't just be exacting in its hardware. The ecosystems that support premium hardware also need serious work.
As for other models, they come when all the parts are ready, and no sooner. I find it hard to believe a spec bump matters so much to kids' usage that you'd jump ship to Windows PCs so easily as opposed to buying the best Mac available now.
I need something for my kids now, and it needs to be future proof, thus using the latest parts, which are readily available in wintel machines. Current win 10 offerings are big improvements over win 8 machines, and I could always hackintosh, although I would get tired of the upkeep.
It would be a stretch to pay a premium price in 2016 for a MBA with a 2014 processor and a 2012 display when the solutions have been available for a long time. If the Current MBA was say, USD350 less I probably wouldnt be so bitchy about it. And I would pay the current price if it had current specs.
Some good points in the article about HomeKit.
However: "Apple could offer a limited 1-2 year term of licensing fee abatements, where partners could save big on HomeKit licensing fees if they meet aggressive unit cost reduction goals to reach new customers and broaden the popularity of HomeKit "
This makes no sense whatsoever. How can you abate a license fee that does not exist?