The filesystem thing is a goodness/badnews kind of thing. Certainly the security of having only certain programs accessing certain files is worth something.
My biggest issue with Apple is their stone-walling on common defects when I call customer support. Twice now in the past 4 years I've had a defect that Apple knew about and that thousands of other people had complained about, and they acted as if I was the first person with the problem, to the point that they escalated and had a 1-hour call with me every week until miraculously the problem went away with the next point upgrade on the OS, even as we were still doing the 1-hour phone calls about it. No. I don't think so. The problem was that the cloud based email database was not readable for one of my family's accounts and OS X locked up shortly after starting MAIL.APP. The second time a bug/support incident like this happened I killed it, but not until spending 2 hours going through an arduous process on the iPhone and after they started talking about escalation and callback schedules to check out how my hardware seems to be the only device in the universe with a GPS tracking problem. When I did research and discovered the plurality of complaints on the same issue I told Apple I charged for my services. That was the end of that. I'll wait for the point upgrade WITHOUT spending my unpaid time on the phone about it. Hell, for the cost of labor I put into the stupid MAIL.APP problem. Argh. The iPhone with the problem is a 6. Meh.
My second biggest issue with iOS is the ecosystem. It would be really comforting if I could get an iBook reader that would run on something that IS NOT Apple hardware. Same with playing my iTunes purchases. Can those be used if Apple goes away? Or on a competitor's product? I know I can convert my iTunes purchases to MP3 just by burning them on to a CD and reading them back in, but what about my eBooks? or movies&tv shows? How about a facility to LOAN a book or movie?
I suspect both of these issues exist in other company ecosystems but I don't know. I'm already sucked into Apple's ecosystem. If I got a new phone or a PC of a different OS, I couldn't use any of my purchases. It used to be that I'd have to upgrade apps and what-all anyway so moving to a new OS wasn't a big deal, or cross-licensing was available. Does this work with ebooks, iTunes music or Movies? How about APPS?
Those days are gone. Pick your poison. Be stuck with it. Or rent everything. I think Apple will go to renting iPhones any time now because of the right-to-repair legislation.
I don't understand why anyone in their right mind would choose an iPhone knockoff. Unless money is a problem I can't wrap my head around it.
As an app developer for both iOS and Android, I always have an iPhone and a Android phone in my pocket. Some things are clearly better an Android - the back button. This is for me the key feature why I pick my Android phone iso my iPhone for most of the tasks. - being able to buy a very decent phone for 250 Euro / $ (Something I could not for years, but since 2016 I can) - better keyboard widget. I am typing really lousy. I make at least twice as much typo's on a iPhone, especially when I have to type a password (e.g. to access the App Store) - better time and date selection widget. The iOS widget looks better but the Android one is much more intuitive and faster to use - up to now: dual Sim Card. This summer the EU has enforced free roaming so this becomes less an issue. - FM radio. I am commuting a lot in the train, this is very convenient. Using a data connection in a train is not ideal in terms of quality (cage of Faraday) and cost - SD card, not to store additional apps, but to use it as a good affordable local cache for photos, videos and music files. - some apps that are not allowed by Apple. The Wifi analyzer app is a great example. It has made one of my colleagues (a die hard Apple fan) really jealous - the use of intents and the access to the file system for the user data (I don't care about the system files, which are hidden anyway). This enables me to open any data file with any app in a very convenient way.
Does this means that Android is better. Absolutely not. iOS has indeed some unique features, that are hard to beat: excellent hardware quality, very tight security and smooth integration of HW and SW. The list just shows that some fanboys are really blind for the merits of a competitor.
Heretical is an understatement, LOL. Its seems like someone twisted his arm to migrate to an iOS phone, and yes, if you are writing on an Apple-centric site and aren't saturated in Apple devices then something is not right. Its just impossible to have an opinion ion something yo haven't loved with for some time, and it makes you seem more list a person that wanted a writing job but is not already an expert on the complete platform and all its devices, in fact it seems that you're not much of a mobile user. How can I tell? If your priority is skinning and finding cheap models then your heart and or mind just in not deep enough into technology for us to trust that your opinion actually matters. When you write here, you are on a stage that most of us don't have and if you don't believe in your role completely then you are just reading the script and spitting out lines, which does us no good.
In my experience, both in Silicon Valley and traveling across the country, iPhone users tend to extract a lot more functionality out of their devices than Droid users do. Droid users get excited about skins and widgets because there is little depth to their usage so making it look pretty or placing the one or two functions they actually use on the home screen pretty much satisfies all the use they want from that device.
iPhone users tend to have a lot of apps of which they use often, they perform tasks, communicate and do meaningful things which makes their lives easier or enriches their lives or helps others. Doing something like accessing the filesystem is just not exciting nor useful to us because we want the functionality of the app, not to have to fuss with maintaining order in the filesystem. We have sync and share that work so we never have to dig down into the file system, which is an Eighties way to manage your computer, something that is just not needed, thankfully, on the iPhone of the 21st Century. Yes, Apple is bowing to pressure and allowing file system access in iOS 11 but it is not for any actual need, we have not needed it for ten years, no one has suffered for a lack of it, because there is no lack. If you have productivity software, like Keynote, Numbers or Pages then you can have multiple documents and all those documents are visible from those apps, no need to rummage around in the file system to get your task done.
Low cost iPhones have often been available. I recall several times getting "free" iPhones on contact, whose contract cost exactly the same as "free" Droids, so there is no excuse there. In fact, there are ads in my area for a free iPhone 7 (the current flagship model) without a contract. There are plenty of deals out there for those that look for them (and are sometimes patient, because they do come and go) so the cost argument really doesn't hold water in the big picture.
Adding SD cards is rarely helpful in the real world, in my observer of Droid users around me, because they invariably lose those tiny cards, i they left the one they need at home or its full and they can't/don't want to erase anything, or just get tired of having to futz through the file system because they can't ever find what they want when they are on the go (its a mobile device after all, we are actively on the go most of the time we use it, so fussing with a file system is a unnecessary drudgery) so that doesn't hold water, and if you really had to, you can get third party Lightning Port plug-ins that allow you to expand your photo storage greatly and they are just big enough that they are hard to lose or leave behind.
This story sounds like a writer that wanted a job and is grudgingly using Apple devices because he has to. It appears he has no use for them other than cashing a paycheck every week, which makes me wonder if I want to continue visiting Appleinsider every day because maybe the staff really doesn't understand Apple products to the depth that I want and need them to.
FWIW on the customization front: I can change the background, customize notifications on a per-app basis, rearrange what apps appear where, and (to the extent the developer allows) customize apps to work how I want them to. I can assign special ringtones (or custom ringtones) for certain people, assign VIP status to certain people for alerts on my devices, and now there is Universal Clipboard, which I've found to be delightfully useful.
The need for "customization" beyond that ... well, I'm not a kid anymore, so ugly/trendy skins don't interest me, and that's about all I can think of that I'd want to customise that I can't already. So while I readily admit you can do more of that sort of thing on Android, I can't see any practical reason for me to do so, particularly as in my previous experience doing that (on Macs and my original iPhone after I jailbroke it), it turned out to be largely a waste of time.
This story sounds like a writer that wanted a job and is grudgingly using Apple devices because he has to. It appears he has no use for them other than cashing a paycheck every week, which makes me wonder if I want to continue visiting Appleinsider every day because maybe the staff really doesn't understand Apple products to the depth that I want and need them to.
Perhaps you should take a closer look at our content, then, rather than making assumptions.
Hmm... you got me scratching my head over the expression "ran like butter"!
Don't believe that's actually a saying!
"OS ran like butter 95 percent of the time"
Perhaps, you meant:
"Ran like clockwork"
or
"worked as smoothly as butter" or "was as smooth as butter", although even those..
If it ran like butter, then it melted, oozing all over the place! Not a pretty sight, or what one would want in a phone, event metaphorically!
While not the phrasing I'd use because of the literal sense you apply to the term, it's still a perfectly valid term, one that has been used enough that you shouldn't bat an eye, and you clearly understand what the author meant, so should it really be questioned for literal accuracy? If you want to start tilting at that particular windmill you might be biting off more tan you can chew because this is my wheelhouse and I can state idioms at the drop of a hat and I'm pretty sure others will jump on the bandwagon when a conservation about language ensues. See what I did there?
The lack of guaranteed updates in a world where there is ever more (and cleverer) malware is the real gotcha for me with Android. I don't want to be forced to get a new phone every 12 months or so, when I am totally happy with my current one, just to be safe on the airwaves.
What is really ridiculous is you won't get updates if you buy an unlocked Samsung phone.
I don't understand why anyone in their right mind would choose an iPhone knockoff. Unless money is a problem I can't wrap my head around it.
i) Access to File System (The most important one. I know everyone in this forum would laugh at this point - only to be hypocrites 1 year later when Apple opens it up in iphones as well, apart from opening it up in iPads this year)
ii) Better battery life (of course not through optimization, but by use of larger batteries)
iii) Customization (yes, even basic customization options can go a long way in improving user experience, which is just NOT possible in IOS)
And a salute to the author for sharing his viewpoints openly, particularly about Android - which WILL infuriate MANY people in this forum.
Yes, not surprisingly there are many Fanboys on this site for whom Apple can do no wrong. I think the author did a nice job of sharing his experiences, both good and bad after switching.
The file system is something that probably an issue for fairly few people when it comes down to it. Apple may make some modifications to the system, but I doubt they will open it completely.
As far as battery life, my cousin has a Samsung something phone and she is *constantly* charging it. Kind of ironic, since one of the original reasons she chose a Samsung phone over an iPhone was so she could swap out the battery. Hmm. I use my 6s as much as she uses her Samsung and I still have 30% left at the end of the day.
One of the reasons I like and stay with Apple products is that in general, they work more consistently and longer than Android (and windows) devices. My wife had an iPhone 4s that finally died a year ago but was perfectly functional until then and my father is still using one. You can't say that about many android phones.
Some may laugh, but I *honestly and truly* trust Apple far more than any other tech company with my security and privacy. Their business model aligns with it.
I agree with you. This article from 4 years ago describes in detail some of the unusual and even extreme measures Apple takes to keep our stuff private and secure.
The part where Apple destroyed the administrator access cards for their HSMs (hardware security module) blew my mind. That is not normal for a consumer electronics company. Anyone who says Apple doesn't do things any different from Google/Android or Facebook or whoever, needs to read this article. This is the sort of thing that keeps me with Apple. That and the fact that I haven't found another OS, mobile or desktop that suits me as well. Personal preference bolstered by peace of mind - good combo.
Some may laugh, but I *honestly and truly* trust Apple far more than any other tech company with my security and privacy. Their business model aligns with it.
I agree with you. This article from 4 years ago describes in detail some of the unusual and even extreme measures Apple takes to keep our stuff private and secure.
The part where Apple destroyed the administrator access cards for their HSMs (hardware security module) blew my mind. That is not normal for a consumer electronics company. Anyone who says Apple doesn't do things any different from Google/Android or Facebook or whoever, needs to read this article. This is the sort of thing that keeps me with Apple. That and the fact that I haven't found another OS, mobile or desktop that suits me as well. Personal preference bolstered by peace of mind - good combo.
They absolutely do things differently, but I can't fault Google or FB for many of these core differences because the core products for these companies are different. Apple has a vested interest in protecting our data because we are the customer while we are the product with Google and FB
i) Access to File System (The most important one. I know everyone in this forum would laugh at this point - only to be hypocrites 1 year later when Apple opens it up in iphones as well, apart from opening it up in iPads this year)
Can you list a few use cases where that's helpful? I can think of a few outlier cases (copying MAME ROMs into an app comes to mind.)
For my media iTunes does a pretty good job of syncing my files. I'd hate to have to manage my music manually. And it's easy to send PDFs to my phone to get added to iBooks.
I really cannot think how this is a big advantage. (And yes I know Apple is adding this feature in iOS 11.)
1. Delete ALL photos ONLY from whatsapp, leaving all the photos taken/downloaded by you intact - On the go, without connecting to a computer or internet
2. Select multiple images, compress them and send the zip file in an email as attachment
3. Open the same video/song/movie in different media players (like default player AND vlc player) - Not that useful in a phone which is not shared with anyone else, but very useful in a tab which is shared by a family (in which case, different people will have different preferences)
I don't understand why anyone in their right mind would choose an iPhone knockoff. Unless money is a problem I can't wrap my head around it.
i) Access to File System (The most important one. I know everyone in this forum would laugh at this point - only to be hypocrites 1 year later when Apple opens it up in iphones as well, apart from opening it up in iPads this year)
ii) Better battery life (of course not through optimization, but by use of larger batteries)
iii) Customization (yes, even basic customization options can go a long way in improving user experience, which is just NOT possible in IOS)
And a salute to the author for sharing his viewpoints openly, particularly about Android - which WILL infuriate MANY people in this forum.
Yes, not surprisingly there are many Fanboys on this site for whom Apple can do no wrong. I think the author did a nice job of sharing his experiences, both good and bad after switching.
The file system is something that probably an issue for fairly few people when it comes down to it. Apple may make some modifications to the system, but I doubt they will open it completely.
As far as battery life, my cousin has a Samsung something phone and she is *constantly* charging it. Kind of ironic, since one of the original reasons she chose a Samsung phone over an iPhone was so she could swap out the battery. Hmm. I use my 6s as much as she uses her Samsung and I still have 30% left at the end of the day.
One of the reasons I like and stay with Apple products is that in general, they work more consistently and longer than Android (and windows) devices. My wife had an iPhone 4s that finally died a year ago but was perfectly functional until then and my father is still using one. You can't say that about many android phones.
Regarding battery life, there are many factors that contribute to poor battery life in a phone (Android or IOS) - Inefficient SoC (my guess is something like 70% of current Android devices fall into this category, with 0% iPhones - a phenomenal achievement which is not praised enough by tech media), way too many unused apps/background processes (particularly in Android), overnight charging everyday, poor quality battery, poor quantity battery for that phone specs, poor OS optimization by OEMs with heavily skinned Android, heavier usage than what that phone was built for etc.
If something is not working out, people should try other options (including switching platforms) instead of just living with it.
I don't understand why anyone in their right mind would choose an iPhone knockoff. Unless money is a problem I can't wrap my head around it.
- some apps that are not allowed by Apple. The Wifi analyzer app is a great example.
I have a few old android tablets in the cupboard collecting dust, but once in a while I whip out the old Lenovo tablet, know it still has battery (weeks if not months later) because that was it's main strong point and fire up the Wifi Analyser app. For whatever reason, there is no alternative on iOS - Sky engineers in the UK have an in-house company app that is very similar which they use to setup a mesh wifi in customer's homes but it's not for public use sadly.
I had to install email and other stuff on my neighbors Samsung galaxy S7 they just bought, never having a smartphone before. Elder people. Anyway, wonderful screen, smooth as butter, easy setup. I really liked the phone. Like mine better (6s), but it sure is a fine phone.
Apple's smooth OS has been beating competitors since the mid 1980's beginning with the Macintosh. If you do not own an iPad, iPhone, or iMac you are simply missing out on the best computer integration system in the world. Period.
Comments
My biggest issue with Apple is their stone-walling on common defects when I call customer support. Twice now in the past 4 years I've had a defect that Apple knew about and that thousands of other people had complained about, and they acted as if I was the first person with the problem, to the point that they escalated and had a 1-hour call with me every week until miraculously the problem went away with the next point upgrade on the OS, even as we were still doing the 1-hour phone calls about it. No. I don't think so. The problem was that the cloud based email database was not readable for one of my family's accounts and OS X locked up shortly after starting MAIL.APP. The second time a bug/support incident like this happened I killed it, but not until spending 2 hours going through an arduous process on the iPhone and after they started talking about escalation and callback schedules to check out how my hardware seems to be the only device in the universe with a GPS tracking problem. When I did research and discovered the plurality of complaints on the same issue I told Apple I charged for my services. That was the end of that. I'll wait for the point upgrade WITHOUT spending my unpaid time on the phone about it. Hell, for the cost of labor I put into the stupid MAIL.APP problem. Argh. The iPhone with the problem is a 6. Meh.
My second biggest issue with iOS is the ecosystem. It would be really comforting if I could get an iBook reader that would run on something that IS NOT Apple hardware. Same with playing my iTunes purchases. Can those be used if Apple goes away? Or on a competitor's product? I know I can convert my iTunes purchases to MP3 just by burning them on to a CD and reading them back in, but what about my eBooks? or movies&tv shows? How about a facility to LOAN a book or movie?
I suspect both of these issues exist in other company ecosystems but I don't know. I'm already sucked into Apple's ecosystem. If I got a new phone or a PC of a different OS, I couldn't use any of my purchases. It used to be that I'd have to upgrade apps and what-all anyway so moving to a new OS wasn't a big deal, or cross-licensing was available. Does this work with ebooks, iTunes music or Movies? How about APPS?
Those days are gone. Pick your poison. Be stuck with it. Or rent everything. I think Apple will go to renting iPhones any time now because of the right-to-repair legislation.
- the back button. This is for me the key feature why I pick my Android phone iso my iPhone for most of the tasks.
- being able to buy a very decent phone for 250 Euro / $ (Something I could not for years, but since 2016 I can)
- better keyboard widget. I am typing really lousy. I make at least twice as much typo's on a iPhone, especially when I have to type a password (e.g. to access the App Store)
- better time and date selection widget. The iOS widget looks better but the Android one is much more intuitive and faster to use
- up to now: dual Sim Card. This summer the EU has enforced free roaming so this becomes less an issue.
- FM radio. I am commuting a lot in the train, this is very convenient. Using a data connection in a train is not ideal in terms of quality (cage of Faraday) and cost
- SD card, not to store additional apps, but to use it as a good affordable local cache for photos, videos and music files.
- some apps that are not allowed by Apple. The Wifi analyzer app is a great example. It has made one of my colleagues (a die hard Apple fan) really jealous
- the use of intents and the access to the file system for the user data (I don't care about the system files, which are hidden anyway). This enables me to open any data file with any app in a very convenient way.
Does this means that Android is better. Absolutely not. iOS has indeed some unique features, that are hard to beat: excellent hardware quality, very tight security and smooth integration of HW and SW. The list just shows that some fanboys are really blind for the merits of a competitor.
In my experience, both in Silicon Valley and traveling across the country, iPhone users tend to extract a lot more functionality out of their devices than Droid users do. Droid users get excited about skins and widgets because there is little depth to their usage so making it look pretty or placing the one or two functions they actually use on the home screen pretty much satisfies all the use they want from that device.
iPhone users tend to have a lot of apps of which they use often, they perform tasks, communicate and do meaningful things which makes their lives easier or enriches their lives or helps others. Doing something like accessing the filesystem is just not exciting nor useful to us because we want the functionality of the app, not to have to fuss with maintaining order in the filesystem. We have sync and share that work so we never have to dig down into the file system, which is an Eighties way to manage your computer, something that is just not needed, thankfully, on the iPhone of the 21st Century. Yes, Apple is bowing to pressure and allowing file system access in iOS 11 but it is not for any actual need, we have not needed it for ten years, no one has suffered for a lack of it, because there is no lack. If you have productivity software, like Keynote, Numbers or Pages then you can have multiple documents and all those documents are visible from those apps, no need to rummage around in the file system to get your task done.
Low cost iPhones have often been available. I recall several times getting "free" iPhones on contact, whose contract cost exactly the same as "free" Droids, so there is no excuse there. In fact, there are ads in my area for a free iPhone 7 (the current flagship model) without a contract. There are plenty of deals out there for those that look for them (and are sometimes patient, because they do come and go) so the cost argument really doesn't hold water in the big picture.
Adding SD cards is rarely helpful in the real world, in my observer of Droid users around me, because they invariably lose those tiny cards, i they left the one they need at home or its full and they can't/don't want to erase anything, or just get tired of having to futz through the file system because they can't ever find what they want when they are on the go (its a mobile device after all, we are actively on the go most of the time we use it, so fussing with a file system is a unnecessary drudgery) so that doesn't hold water, and if you really had to, you can get third party Lightning Port plug-ins that allow you to expand your photo storage greatly and they are just big enough that they are hard to lose or leave behind.
This story sounds like a writer that wanted a job and is grudgingly using Apple devices because he has to. It appears he has no use for them other than cashing a paycheck every week, which makes me wonder if I want to continue visiting Appleinsider every day because maybe the staff really doesn't understand Apple products to the depth that I want and need them to.
Don't believe that's actually a saying!
"OS ran like butter 95 percent of the time"
Perhaps, you meant:
"Ran like clockwork"
or
"worked as smoothly as butter" or "was as smooth as butter", although even those..
If it ran like butter, then it melted, oozing all over the place! Not a pretty sight, or what one would want in a phone, event metaphorically!
The file system is something that probably an issue for fairly few people when it comes down to it. Apple may make some modifications to the system, but I doubt they will open it completely.
As far as battery life, my cousin has a Samsung something phone and she is *constantly* charging it. Kind of ironic, since one of the original reasons she chose a Samsung phone over an iPhone was so she could swap out the battery. Hmm. I use my 6s as much as she uses her Samsung and I still have 30% left at the end of the day.
One of the reasons I like and stay with Apple products is that in general, they work more consistently and longer than Android (and windows) devices. My wife had an iPhone 4s that finally died a year ago but was perfectly functional until then and my father is still using one. You can't say that about many android phones.
http://www.networkworld.com/article/2174973/smartphones/apple-reveals-unprecedented-details-in-ios-security.html
The part where Apple destroyed the administrator access cards for their HSMs (hardware security module) blew my mind. That is not normal for a consumer electronics company. Anyone who says Apple doesn't do things any different from Google/Android or Facebook or whoever, needs to read this article. This is the sort of thing that keeps me with Apple. That and the fact that I haven't found another OS, mobile or desktop that suits me as well. Personal preference bolstered by peace of mind - good combo.
1. Delete ALL photos ONLY from whatsapp, leaving all the photos taken/downloaded by you intact - On the go, without connecting to a computer or internet
2. Select multiple images, compress them and send the zip file in an email as attachment
3. Open the same video/song/movie in different media players (like default player AND vlc player) - Not that useful in a phone which is not shared with anyone else, but very useful in a tab which is shared by a family (in which case, different people will have different preferences)
Regarding battery life, there are many factors that contribute to poor battery life in a phone (Android or IOS) - Inefficient SoC (my guess is something like 70% of current Android devices fall into this category, with 0% iPhones - a phenomenal achievement which is not praised enough by tech media), way too many unused apps/background processes (particularly in Android), overnight charging everyday, poor quality battery, poor quantity battery for that phone specs, poor OS optimization by OEMs with heavily skinned Android, heavier usage than what that phone was built for etc.
If something is not working out, people should try other options (including switching platforms) instead of just living with it.
Anyway, wonderful screen, smooth as butter, easy setup. I really liked the phone. Like mine better (6s), but it sure is a fine phone.