j2fusion

It’s going to be interesting to see how this all plays out. A desktop/laptop is not a phone. One of the reasons the Mac never gained much traction was compatibility. People had to share documents with each other and, even though there have been enormous strides over the years, particularly in the office documents realm, there are still annoying differences. In the phone world it didn’t matter. The only document most people shared from a phone was a picture or video and that was already in a universal JPG or H.264 format so operating systems or processors didn’t matter.  It was the user experience that made all the different hence Apple, with its unparalleled user experience, completely changed the phone world. Desktops/laptops are much more dependent on interacting with each other and the annoying differences affect the user experience. When Apple changed to Intel, those differences were much less significant and were mitigated by the fact you had bootcamp and if you really needed to, you could run Windows. I’m in IT so people would ask me what kind of computer to buy and I would alway tell them to get a Mac because you and run Windows on a Mac but not MacOS on a PC. Now the world has changed since the introduction of Intel Macs but it will be interesting to see if the lack of ability to run Windows will affect sales. I do hope companies like VMware introduce an emulator. 

Sarkany said:

j2fusion said:

I really wish the law required companies to allow access to hardware without an account if it is not needed for the device to function. For example, I have to create an account to update the firmware on certain HomeKit devices. I just bought a gimbal for my iPhone and I have to create an account to “register” it. It will not function unless it is registered. I have example after example where I have I have to register by providing my email and creating a password which has nothing to do with the function of the product. Every time you create an account, it is just another possibly of your information getting hacked.

Create an account with fake information.

Many still need a valid email address. 

I really wish the law required companies to allow access to hardware without an account if it is not needed for the device to function. For example, I have to create an account to update the firmware on certain HomeKit devices. I just bought a gimbal for my iPhone and I have to create an account to “register” it. It will not function unless it is registered. I have example after example where I have I have to register by providing my email and creating a password which has nothing to do with the function of the product. Every time you create an account, it is just another possibly of your information getting hacked.  My guess is they use this information to generate additional income by selling this information to advertisers.  A person that buys a gimbal for their phone might be more likely to buy clip on lenses for example. 

One of the things I found with HomeKit is it is not always the vendor that has issues. For example, I have Fios at my house and I’ve had a lot of problems with iDevices products going off line. Yet I have another location I help out with that has Comcast as the IP for, among other things, HomeKit and have never had an issue. Turns out the older Verizon Actiontec routers do not properly follow the RFC guidelines for DHCP and iDevices have issues although they are not the only ones. On Comcast where it is much easier to use your own router, I have an AirPort Extreme providing DHCP and almost never have issues with HomeKit. Before I realized it was the Actiontec, I thought the iDevices were junk. One could argue that iDevices should be more forgiving with DHCP but they are not the only vendor I’ve had issues with using the Actiontec. Verizon makes it difficult to use a router other than their own because the guide, on-demand, caller ID and the DVR all require a special IP connection to operate that only a Verizon router provides. 

The thing I don’t like about Wemo they require an account for updates etc. My credentials are on enough servers, I don’t need any more. I wish a HomeKit requirement from vendors was not to require an account for updating.