numenorean

fotoformat said:

DED wrote, "Despite all this confident insistence on what people really want, we have the results from a democratic vote where people cast ballots in the form of dollars..."

That's quite an eloquent and memorable turn of phrase!

Though true, and agreed for the most part. There's one thing missing in the whole analysis. The only supplier of computers that run MacOS is Apple. If I don't like their current product, I can't run to another supplier and use the MacOS there. Sure, I can use a frankenstein and violate the licence agreement, but that's not really a solution. If you love MacOS and find it better than anything out there, your only pro laptop solution is the one Apple offers.

I'm casting a vote with my dollars, but the choices are Apple silver or Apple space grey.

Other than that, I found this a nice editorial.  

Just pondering...

I've been using the 15-inch MBP with Touch Bar for around 9 months now, and have found the Touch Bar pretty useless. I find that I use it mostly for brightness and sound, and some function key use but it's a lot slower and less productive than the traditional keys it replaced. Sure, there's an ESC key on the touch bar, but it's slower and because it's touch, you can't rest your finger on it to press it over and over without activating it. Remapping is a solution, but removing the functionality of a different key to have the functionality of every other keyboard on the planet, illustrates the failures of the current touch bar and overall keyboard design. There's also no touch feedback and the keys change so you have to stop and look down to use it, making it a lot less productive throughout a day of use, as well as more tiring, which the current keyboard also causes (without mentioning all the accidental presses). Keyboard shortcuts and the trackpad are quicker, more useful, and can do everything the touch bar does without ever looking away from the screen, so the touch bar ends up as dead space that actually removes functionality and practicality.

Is there potential for something similar to the touch bar? Yes, but with a different implementation in my opinion. Is it useful for beginners and iOS switchers? Probably. But for most seasoned Mac users and Pros? Probably not. Would a touch screen be better as this review suggests? Perhaps, especially under certain circumstances and with iOS apps. I wouldn't be surprised if there was an intense internal debate at Apple about this and they went with the cheaper "happy medium". I wish they would have given us the option of having the top of the line with a "normal" keyboard though (without going into the keyboard keys debate which is an entirely different problem which they're finally beginning to accept). Maybe they have a killer implementation in mind for the future, but we'll have to wait and see, with no other choice currently for 15 inch MBP users.

Just pondering...

P.S. For those annoyed by the Siri button's accidental presses, remember, not only can you remove it in settings, but you can also fill that space with "dead" spaces so you don't accidentally press anything on the TB every time you use the delete key. It removed the annoyance, though you're still stuck with the accidental presses on every other key, even if it's less prevalent than the right corner Siri button.  

foggyhill said:

numenorean said:

Contrary to popular belief, Apple didn't invent the notch. The iPhone X wasn't the first with a notch. Andy Rubin's Essential phone was revealed in May 30, 2017 with a notch for the front camera a couple of months before Apple's notch. It's a smaller notch, more akin to the one shown here in Android P, and not like the Apple knockoffs we've seen recently. Just pondering...

That's a hoot.

The notch had ALREADY been rumored coming from Apple BEFORE the essential phone reveal (you know, there are leaks every single year) and the essential phone was released just 3 week before the X. So, what "invention" did he do exactly.

For 99.99% of people who certainly never heard of the "essential phone" and certainly didn't buy it... the notch is an Apple thing.

That's like saying touchphone are not an Apple thing because a low volume producer had one out a few month before (and they did); nobody remembers and nobody cares,.

1. Apple didn't announce the iPhone X in June, so no, it wasn't 3 weeks, but nearly 4 months.
2. There was a lot of hype surrounding the Essential phone, because it was created by Andy Rubin, former Apple employee and creator of Android, and since smartphones take years to develop, no, it wasn't designed based on rumors of anything, and it was an innovation, if you can call any notch that cuts the screen an "innovation". Other manufacturers were already doing full screen cover phones, but none had done it to the top until Essential (with a small notch for the single camera dot cutting into it), and quickly after, Apple (with the large notch everyone is now imitating).
3. Whether no one bought the Essential phone is irrelevant. If you READ the article here, it's about Android integrating a SMALL notch into its system, very much like the Essential notch and NOT like the Apple notch. Considering Android was created by Andy Rubin, it makes even more sense, whether everyone is now copying Apple's notch or not (which is why the headline is wrong on the article).
4. Whether or not anyone cares is irrelevant, though you obviously do, a lot, considering your answer (and others do as well).

What I find interesting about your response is that you took it as an attack on Apple, when I'm just pointing out a fact relevant to THIS article and its headline. I even specified that the notch in the article, like the Essential notch, has nothing to do with the Android knockoffs that were announced and so obviously copy Apple's. Now, THAT's a hoot.

Just pondering...

Contrary to popular belief, Apple didn't invent the notch. The iPhone X wasn't the first with a notch. Andy Rubin's Essential phone was revealed in May 30, 2017 with a notch for the front camera a couple of months before Apple's notch. It's a smaller notch, more akin to the one shown here in Android P, and not like the Apple knockoffs we've seen recently. Just pondering...

The problem isn't support per se. Obviously, no one expects Apple to continue to support such an old product. The problem is that locked devices like this are useless once support ends. That's what's wrong here. Let's say for example that my perfectly working old Apple TV is donated to another family member. Once it's reset, they (or even yourself) can't download or access anything if support ended because there's nothing there to download or acquire. Remember that you're not buying a subscription, but a hardware product and in the case of apps, a software product that you expect to run on your device. If you could backup your Apple TV, you wouldn't have to re-download apps from Apple, but unfortunately you can't and they're the only provider of what you paid for.

Apple fixed this problem with the iPad by allowing you to download the last working version of that app for as long as the developers allowed it. That made it possible for me to donate my perfectly working first gen iPad to a family member who enjoys it to this day. It should be possible to do the same with an old Apple TV. It can't be that difficult for Apple to do this or have at least a limited workaround to not have to throw away a perfectly working device.

Just pondering...