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iPhone 6S New Feature: Force Touch

New submitter WarJolt writes: Apple is adding Force Touch to their iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus. I'm not sure if Force Touch enough to convince an Android user like myself to switch, but there are definitely some interesting possibilities for app developers. A challenge for App developers will be to make apps compatible with both Force Touch iPhones and non-force touch iPhones. (Here's the Bloomberg report Forbes draws from.)

191 comments

  1. Force Touch by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny

    Paving the way for Force Lightening, Force Storm, Plague, Fear, Choke ... may the Force be with you, Apple.

  2. Infringment! by aaron4801 · · Score: 2, Funny

    Doesn't Apple even check for trademarks? "Force Touch" has, for decades, belonged to Bill Cosby.

    1. Re:Infringment! by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 0

      Lol, ouch.

      --
      Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    2. Re:Infringment! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More gay couples means more women in the pool for hetero men, but I guess you are the 'not if you are the last man on earth' type.

    3. Re:Infringment! by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

      That's doesn't even make a little bit of sense.

    4. Re:Infringment! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hardly. They still prefer gay men, at least over you two.

    5. Re:Infringment! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      More gay couples means more women in the pool for hetero men, but I guess you are the 'not if you are the last man on earth' type.

      Then we have all the lesbos taking them instead, fail again I see.

  3. Re:Cool by BasilBrush · · Score: 4, Informative

    Android has pressure sensitive styluses. Which have also been available for iOS for years. This is Force Touch, which as it's name implies is about measuring the force of finger touches. Android doesn't have it.

  4. Re:Cool by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

    Actually curious here...links?

  5. What is it? by ArchieBunker · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Hey janitors that run this site, don't link to Wikipedia or anything to tell us what "force touch" is.

    --
    Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
    1. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Or you could, you know...read TFA, you twat!

    2. Re:What is it? by gnupun · · Score: 1

      When a user touches the screen, the x, y touch position is passed to the app. With force touch, the amount of pressure the finger exerts on the screen is also passed to the app allowing for all kinds of interesting behavior.

    3. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Hey janitors that run this site, don't link to Wikipedia or anything to tell us what "force touch" is.

      "Force Touch" is a slightly less invasive, but more perverse, adaptation of the Sith skill "Force Push".

    4. Re: What is it? by danomac · · Score: 0

      Hopefully one of the features shows dollar signs on the display when enough force is exerted that the screen cracks!

    5. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You are a cow. A cow says moo. MOOOOOOOO!!! Mooooooo cow MOOOOOOO! Moo says the cow. YOU COW!!

    6. Re:What is it? by Noah+Haders · · Score: 2

      My watch has force touch, and I'm not a big fan. You have to push a little too much to make me comfortable, it's not a natural motion. It's also just a binary thing, you either tap or force touch. There's no gradient of pressure. We'll see what the implementation is on the watch

    7. Re:What is it? by phorm · · Score: 0

      You mean, kinda like how the article linked off the words "Force Touch" in the blurb does?

      For those not familiar with Force Touch, it detects how hard a user presses down on the screen giving an additional type of input

    8. Re:What is it? by sexconker · · Score: 1

      Like the Nintendo DS / DSi / 3DS? Or the other decades-old touch screen devices I already own?
      Why is this news? The resistive touch screen has been around for ages, and it's still superior to capacitive trash.

    9. Re:What is it? by tlhIngan · · Score: 1

      My watch has force touch, and I'm not a big fan. You have to push a little too much to make me comfortable, it's not a natural motion. It's also just a binary thing, you either tap or force touch. There's no gradient of pressure. We'll see what the implementation is on the watch

      You can really think of it as the touch equivalent of "right click". Something that touch screens do poorly is how to emulate a right-click or contextual action. Many do it as a touch-hold (press your finger to the screen for a second). If you're able to sense pressure, that lets you avoid the delay and just call up a contextual action by pressing hard.

      Though, you'd probably need feedback to show that you did press hard enough... like a tap.

    10. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      For those not familiar with Force Touch, it detects how hard a user presses down on the screen giving an additional type of input

      I wonder if the amount of force applied by various fingers can be used to uniquely identify which user is tapping the screen, kinda like a biometric web cookie?

    11. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We are talking about pressure sensitive and haptic feedback screens, not the differences between resistive and capacitive.

      It is truly amazing the level of stupidity displayed here from self avowed nerds.

    12. Re:What is it? by thegarbz · · Score: 0

      Your Nintendo DS takes the pressure of your finger on the screen and passes it to iOS apps? Amazing!

      Also no phones on the market currently do this on the capacitance sensor. A select few do it with styluses.

    13. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      From TFA (a link in the summary, like you wanted):
      For those not familiar with Force Touch, it detects how hard a user presses down on the screen giving an additional type of input. As Bloomberg mentions, it is already used in the Apple Watch and new MacBook Pros and, while we can only speculate how Apple will implement it in iOS, the potential here is huge.

      In effect (I'm a Macbook Pro user), you can press the trackpad, then you have another deeper press. In Finder this previews files, in Safari loads definitions for words from dictionaries or Wikipedia).

    14. Re:What is it? by Idimmu+Xul · · Score: 0

      it tells you in the article ...

      For those not familiar with Force Touch, it detects how hard a user presses down on the screen giving an additional type of input. As Bloomberg mentions, it is already used in the Apple Watch and new MacBook Pros and, while we can only speculate how Apple will implement it in iOS, the potential here is huge.

      --
      The problem with slashdot is that most of its users were bullied and stuffed into lockers as kids!
    15. Re: What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Fail

    16. Re:What is it? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      "Force Touch" is a slightly less invasive, but more perverse, adaptation of the Sith skill "Force Push".

      Coming soon to a TSA checkpoint near you.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    17. Re:What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      IF this is true, I can guarantee you at 100% that some random Youtuber will do a test showing the approximate amount of force required to break the display, in a very unscientific manner. With a hammer, a vice or sthg. I also can't wait the day they will get maimed doing their shit.

    18. Re: What is it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sounds doable to me

    19. Re:What is it? by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 1

      THAT IS NOT MY COW!

    20. Re:What is it? by sexconker · · Score: 1

      No, we're talking about pressure-sensitive inputs, and retards like you are acting as if it's a new thing.

    21. Re:What is it? by Skylinux · · Score: 1

      The article / website is broken as it only shows a white page when you visit with scripts disabled.
      Really bad article to post here on Slashdot

      --
      Everyone who buys Wild Hunt will receive 16 specially prepared DLCs absolutely for free, regardless of platform.
  6. Force touch? by groggy.android · · Score: 0

    So is Apple now committing a human rights violation by forcing me to touch .... or is the Iphone 6 really that 6xy?

  7. Re:Cool by vux984 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    This is Force Touch, which as it's name implies is about measuring the force of finger touches.

    For what its worth, (and probably not much) I have a new macbook pro with the force touchpad. I've never actually used it. Not once. Not ever. I tried it on the demo unit in the store to see what the fuss was... but I count it as a total gimmick.

      I really only ever use the tap-to-click; so I don't even click the touchpad, nevermind force-click it.

  8. three years from news report to making it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    at the bottom it says:

    "Bloomberg reported in 2013 that Apple was planning to add pressure-sensitive displays to the iPhone."

    so just 3 years after the news report, here they are almost ready to sell them.

    1. Re:three years from news report to making it by lucm · · Score: 1

      Yeah they had production problems, but those suicide prevention nets really did the job. Smooth sailing until the next slave uprising.

      --
      lucm, indeed.
    2. Re:three years from news report to making it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You know those foxconn factories have a lower suicide rate than China as a whole, which has a much higher suicide rate than the US. Japan, which has a much higher standard of living than China also has a high suicide rate. Suicide is just part of the culture over there.

  9. Re:Cool by ganjadude · · Score: 1

    the only thing i can think of that would get me to switch to ios over android would be if they came out of the box with the ability to sideload apps without jailbreaking

    also i want to not be stuck using the apple ecosystem and use what i want to use.

    --
    have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
  10. Self Destruct by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm working on a self-destruct app that uses Force Touch. The harder the force, the quicker it destroys the device. My early tests show pliers and vices provide the best force input. It doesn't seem to detect blenders, but that seems to work anyway, due to some unknown bug. Work in progress.

  11. Force powers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Wow the first in a series of Jedi powers! I want Force Push or Force Speed next!

    1. Re:Force powers by theNetImp · · Score: 2

      I'm waiting for the Force Choke feature. I hear Lord Vader has been working to make that happen.

  12. My balls are missing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Someone stole my balls. If anyone knows where they are, please let me know. They were here last night, but when I woke up they were gone. I'm afraid to talk to the police.

    1. Re:My balls are missing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Someone stole my balls. If anyone knows where they are, please let me know. They were here last night, but when I woke up they were gone. I'm afraid to talk to the police.

      Your wife removed them as you slept. You didn't really think she served you wine in bed because she loves and respects you did you? Tomorrow night cut out her clitoris and divorce her because she cannot satisfy you in her womanly duties. This ensures she will never be satisfied and will turn to mechanical devices which will save men the trouble of meeting the bitch.

  13. Coming soon by stox · · Score: 1

    Smash touch!

    --
    "To those who are overly cautious, everything is impossible. "
  14. Broken Screens Ahoy by mentil · · Score: 2

    A key part of the usability of these glass-covered capacitive-touch devices is that you can very lightly touch the surface and it'll react. Once you get the idea into people's minds that if something isn't working, you should try pressing harder (Force Touching) then frustrated people will think "I'm not pressing hard enough" and press harder and harder until they crack their screen. I've seen people with styluses repeatedly stabbing touchscreens like a psycho killer, because the device wasn't responding the way they wanted (usually because they were missing the button).

    --
    Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
    1. Re:Broken Screens Ahoy by Carewolf · · Score: 1

      Are you sure you can break the screen by just applying more force with a single finger?

    2. Re:Broken Screens Ahoy by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      I've seen people with styluses repeatedly stabbing touchscreens like a psycho killer, because the device wasn't responding the way they wanted (usually because they were missing the button).

      No, it's for one reason and one reason only, and that's a lack of feedback. Any control that doesn't respond instantly is a total fucking failure and the programmer should be taken out back and slapped with a wet trout. You shouldn't even draw controls until you're ready to respond to them. Wait, I lied, there's two reasons. You can't tell when a PDA or phone is grinding. That's a total idiot fail, because it leaves the user scratching their head wondering when their device will respond. Remember watching the HDD LED? That was useful. Cellphones need a CPU meter.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    3. Re:Broken Screens Ahoy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Cellphones need a CPU meter.

      Android already has in the Developer Options. However, it's too verbose for real users. Face it, lots of mainstream sites invite Joe Blows out there to use developer mode without being developers... you'd think Android would give you something like a [battery] bar meter instead of a handle-name dump that spills over with writing eclipsing your screen and is quite distracting until summarily turned off. And before you justify the 'developer mode' moniker as expected to be "just that" here's Exhibit A 'Process Stats' has a non-mandatory description that it's "*Geeky* stats about running processes". This is little more than a Android's pre-developer-mode task manager which that was originally available to all, and is ONE MORE REASON why a curious Joe Blow power user would be poking around looking for Google-abducted features

      Back on topic: speaking of force, "Show touch data" has a PRS indicator next to screen coords that react to my how hard my "Fource touch" is. I'm not sure why Apple's is news now that I see this story. Without reading the article I'll guess App devs (at least on iOS) don't really expect or use this data. To expand on what some other commenters said earlier, I can see Morgan's Law at moving UX developers to tear us a new one... they are already hard at work hiding everything behind nonsense icons, arrows and long-press menus, and we have the IE7, Google Chrome/Android and Office Ribbon to thank for that. GUIs nowadays feel like you're playing a pesky point-and-click Room Escape game where each wrong button press likely hides a death trap, or at least your productivity dies in an unnecessary learning curve. Tomorrow's GUIs might just force us to add "press everywhere again, but hard" doubling the count of things we must to unlock hidden options.

    4. Re:Broken Screens Ahoy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A stylus has a lot less are than a finger for the force to transfer too.

      I suspect people jabbing their phones will suffer from jammed fingers first.

  15. This is new? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I guess I'm confused, but we've developed Android applications for years, one of which involves an interactive water surface. We made use of pressure sensitivity and it worked fine. Is this different somehow? I thought this was a bog-standard feature for a capacitive touch screen?

    I mean, I guess you could make your UI use it like a right/left click on a mouse or something, but outside of a controlled environment it seems like it'd be kind of finicky.

    1. Re:This is new? by _merlin · · Score: 1

      Resistive touch screens typically get pressure sensitivity for free, capacitive screens do not. It's usually faked by doing tricks with contact patch area. As you push harder your finger tip flattens and contacts a larger area of the screen. I don't know whether Apple's implementation is the same or if they've actually integrated a strain gauge or something for real pressure sensitivity.

    2. Re: This is new? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Are you from the future? Can I get some lottery numbers?

    3. Re:This is new? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Force Touch uses a strain gauge.

    4. Re:This is new? by mean+pun · · Score: 1

      I guess I'm confused, but we've developed Android applications for years, one of which involves an interactive water surface. We made use of pressure sensitivity and it worked fine.

      It is true that the Android API provides a 'pressure' parameter with touch events, but as far as I know in practice this is just an estimate based on the area of the detected touch. That is, the more pixels are covered by a finger, the stronger of the touch is assumed to be. There are truly pressure-sensitive pens available for Android (and for iOS), but they are far from common. Apple's pressure-sensitive screen is something new, at least for a consumer-electroncs device.

    5. Re:This is new? by jo_ham · · Score: 1

      Apple's implementation (at least on the trackpad on the Macbook Pro) is a set of strain gauges and a haptic feedback device that simulates the "click".

    6. Re:This is new? by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      They used 'taptic' to get a 'tap' oriented proprietary term for haptic feedback. What are they going to use for this. Faptic?

      Sounds right.

    7. Re:This is new? by StikyPad · · Score: 1

      If so, I hope they use a much softer material. :(

  16. Re:Security is a better reason to "switch" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Given the numerous Android security problems and APPs with hidden data collection issues, I'ld say forget 'Force Touch' as a reason to switch.

    Nobody should be carrying any phone around, it's a trap.

  17. Re: your sig by mentil · · Score: 0

    also the Mafia, MAFIAA, and other rent-seeking organizations.

    --
    Corruption is convincing someone that the selfless ideal is the same as their selfish ideal.
  18. It has this. by tlambert · · Score: 4, Informative

    the only thing i can think of that would get me to switch to ios over android would be if they came out of the box with the ability to sideload apps without jailbreaking

    It has this. Just enroll the device as a developer device, and compile the code, or enroll it as a corporate device, if you want to use precompiled code you trust but that Apple won't allow into the App store because Apple doesn't trust it.

    If you mean thing like side-loading just random crap, like if I were a private detective hired by your wife, and had 60 seconds of access to your iPhone, I could sideload some serious backdoor onto your phone to enable me to monitor your texts, phone calls, email, Facebook, and so on ... I'm pretty sure no one wants someone else to be able to load that kind of crap on their phones, but if you can do it, they can do it, too.

    1. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      Well, I consider the ability to sideload/modify my device an important part of the contract when I buy it, so I don't understand why I should be happy to pay extra for the 'privilege'. I am not getting any additional security from this 'feature', just another hassle. And if you think that a random 'private detective' can't sideload shite on you iphone because it's an iphone, I have bad news for you - you're wrong, and it isn't all that hard or expensive. Thankfully, not even your wife would have cared where you went with that small dick of yours, so you're totally safe.

    2. Re:It has this. by jgulla · · Score: 2

      If you want to do it just for yourself (i.e. not "enterprise" wide) and are willing to compile any code, then you *don't* need to pay. Apple is making it so you can use XCode and install on your device without paying the $99 to become a registered developer. You only need to do that (and incur the fee) if you want to submit to the App Store.

      Not quite as convenient / insecure / freedom enabling (pick your sentiment) as Android, and only practical for open source / personal projects, but still better than it used to be.

    3. Re:It has this. by Noah+Haders · · Score: 0

      And if you think that a random 'private detective' can't sideload shite on you iphone because it's an iphone, I have bad news for you - you're wrong, and it isn't all that hard or expensive.

      Actually, yes it is hard. 8.4 has never been jail broken. How would you do your detective stuff on my phone?

    4. Re:It has this. by lucm · · Score: 0

      And if you think that a random 'private detective' can't sideload shite on you iphone because it's an iphone, I have bad news for you - you're wrong, and it isn't all that hard or expensive.

      Actually, yes it is hard. 8.4 has never been jail broken. How would you do your detective stuff on my phone?

      Maybe you could ask that to the 4chan people who stole naughty pics of celebs straight from their Apple accounts?

      --
      lucm, indeed.
    5. Re: It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Lol what the fuck? You are one stupid motherfucker.

    6. Re:It has this. by Noah+Haders · · Score: 1

      not even the most advanced security system will protect against weak passwords. since the fappening apple has made 2fa default and rolled it out across more services. which it should have been before. but still, choose good passwords!

      https://www.quora.com/How-were...

    7. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I would be happy to pay Apple the C-note per year just for one simple thing on iOS:

      A "#" prompt with full access to the device.

      On Android, I have this, either by ADB, or pulling up a terminal app and allowing it past su.

      iOS? Only time I have this ability is with a JB, and a JB utterly destroys the internal security model of iOS, as opposed to Android which isn't weakened, security-wise (even apps that demand su access have to have a priv for it in modern versions or else they don't even get the ability to raise a prompt.)

    8. Re:It has this. by phantomfive · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Yes. Not being able to own the device is the only reason I haven't bought an iPhone.

      --
      "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
    9. Re:It has this. by stephanruby · · Score: 1

      You mean don't use your own birthdate and don't answer security questions truthfully.

      Because according to the link you provided, passwords weren't the weakest part of iCloud's negligent security.

      Also, Apple’s “Forgot my password” system means that if you know the victim’s birthday and the answers to some security questions, you might gain access to their account.

    10. Re:It has this. by stephanruby · · Score: 2

      Actually, yes it is hard. 8.4 has never been jail broken. How would you do your detective stuff on my phone?

      You forgot the sarcasm tag.

      Not everyone knows that most of iOS users won't get iOS 8.4 until two or three days from now (June 29th or 30th).

      Android users are having similar problems with the Android M Preview. You can install the Android M Preview on a rooted device, some manufacturers will even officially give you access to their official custom Android M ROM, but you can't unroot and then reroot an existing device with Android M Preview on it. If you try to do so, SuperSU will go into an infinite loop.

    11. Re:It has this. by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

      Huh? How does JB an iPhone weaken the security in a way that Android is not similarly weakened? Running code as root is running code as root. Android doesn't include SELinux policies, you know.

    12. Re:It has this. by nmb3000 · · Score: 1

      If you mean thing like side-loading just random crap, like if I were a private detective hired by your wife, and had 60 seconds of access to your iPhone, I could sideload some serious backdoor onto your phone to enable me to monitor your texts, phone calls, email, Facebook, and so on ... I'm pretty sure no one wants someone else to be able to load that kind of crap on their phones, but if you can do it, they can do it, too.

      Well hey, now -- I've seen some wobbly straw men in my time, but that one might just take the cake.

      The hostility Apple fans have for those who still want computers (even hand-held ones) to be general purpose computing devices that are actually owned by their owners never ceases to amaze me.

      --
      "What do you despise? By this are you truly known." --Princess Irulan, Manual of Muad'Dib
      /)
    13. Re:It has this. by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      If you mean thing like side-loading just random crap, like if I were a private detective hired by your wife, and had 60 seconds of access to your iPhone, I could sideload some serious backdoor onto your phone

      As opposed to downloading a remote access program from the store? This is about as FUD as it gets. The ability to side load is not a physical security exposure. If you have a lock screen then access is blocked in any case. If you don't have a lock screen, then the mythical walled garden won't protect you. Blocking side load only makes sense when it comes to protection from user error, and even then on Android you can side load single apps without enabling universal installation of apks so the only thing you're left with is user stupidity.

    14. Re:It has this. by tlambert · · Score: 1

      As opposed to downloading a remote access program from the store?

      These programs have to be explicitly launched by the user themselves after each boot. In other words, they are about as dangerous as a tethered jailbreak, shich is to say: Not very.

      This is about as FUD as it gets. The ability to side load is not a physical security exposure. If you have a lock screen then access is blocked in any case. If you don't have a lock screen, then the mythical walled garden won't protect you. Blocking side load only makes sense when it comes to protection from user error, and even then on Android you can side load single apps without enabling universal installation of apks so the only thing you're left with is user stupidity.

      How about we turn this around: Other than pirating commercial software or installing spyware, what do you lose by an inability to side-load without a jailbreak?

    15. Re:It has this. by Time_Ngler · · Score: 2

      How about we turn this around: Other than pirating commercial software or installing spyware, what do you lose by an inability to side-load without a jailbreak?

      We'll never know the answer to this, because we'll never know what apps would have been available if side-loading existed.

    16. Re:It has this. by thegarbz · · Score: 3, Insightful

      How about we turn this around: Other than pirating commercial software or installing spyware, what do you lose by an inability to side-load without a jailbreak?

      Really? That is a question? Is that how far we've fallen down the dumb consumer hole?
      How about being able to create and share programs on phones without the blessing of some magical corporate entity, or without someone having to fork over money for a developers license?

      This isn't some pie in the sky ideal either. Writing programs and giving them to others is something people actually do. I was asked to write a simple program that did a few tasks for the local astronomy club and I happily obliged and gave people the resulting APK without getting on my knees and fellating some corporate 3rd party.

      I mean shit I expect a comment like yours from some mindless hipster drone, but this is Slashdot for fucks sake.

    17. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      How about we turn this around: Other than pirating commercial software or installing spyware, what do you lose by an inability to side-load without a jailbreak?

      I seem to recall reading about apple having a "no emulators" rule, so emulators for one. ScummVM games work brilliantly on handhelds. And yes, I own all the SCUMM games, so no, I'm not talking about piracy.

    18. Re:It has this. by Zero__Kelvin · · Score: 1

      "I'm pretty sure no one wants someone else to be able to load that kind of crap on their phones, but if you can do it, they can do it, too."

      Somebody should invent passwords!

      --
      Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
    19. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If you mean thing like side-loading just random crap, like if I were a private detective hired by your wife, and had 60 seconds of access to your iPhone, I could sideload some serious backdoor onto your phone to enable me to monitor your texts, phone calls, email, Facebook, and so on ... I'm pretty sure no one wants someone else to be able to load that kind of crap on their phones, but if you can do it, they can do it, too.

      It's THIS sort of attitude that's promoting the walled-garden approach to computing that most people hate for obvious reasons.

      You can say the exact same thing about laptop computers that people take with them.

    20. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This changed with Xcode 7 - it allows you to install on your device without it being in a dev program.

    21. Re:It has this. by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

      Grandparent commenter loves to kiss somebody's ring before being allowed to run any new particular software on his pocket computer. It's a Total Power Exchange deal.

      The idea that there are other people out there in the world who don't fetishise ring kissing raises his ire.

    22. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What the hell kind of point are you trying to make? That having full control over your own device is bad because you cheat in your wife?

    23. Re:It has this. by tlambert · · Score: 2

      How about we turn this around: Other than pirating commercial software or installing spyware, what do you lose by an inability to side-load without a jailbreak?

      Really? That is a question? Is that how far we've fallen down the dumb consumer hole?
      How about being able to create and share programs on phones without the blessing of some magical corporate entity, or without someone having to fork over money for a developers license?

      Perfectly doable, if you have source code to what's being shared, or if what's being shared is being distributed as linkable object files. Have you really not looked into current iPhone software development tools? It doesn't require paying the $99 fee to install whatever crap you want on your own device. The fee is for the ability to list on the App Store.

    24. Re:It has this. by Noah+Haders · · Score: 1

      wow. first, i did a typo and meant 8.3. the last jailbreak was for 8.1.2, so very few were at risk. but just yesterday the 8.3 jailbreak was released! so I take back what I said. http://www.techtimes.com/artic...

      This is me sucking on the dick of truth: B====D ~ ~ ~

    25. Re:It has this. by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      And the ability to share the file and send it to anyone else? Were you not reading a word of what I said? How does telling someone to register a phone as a developer phone, download the SDK, and compiling a program from source compare to say installing something you made by clicking on a link and hitting okay?

      Do you defend every company which charges premium prices for a product where they limit your ability to do something every computer has been able to do for the last 50 years, or do you have some self destructive affinity for Apple?

    26. Re:It has this. by strikethree · · Score: 1

      I mean shit I expect a comment like yours from some mindless hipster drone, but this is Slashdot for fucks sake.

      Eternal September... it is eternal.

      --
      "Someone needs to talk to the tree of liberty about its ghoulish drinking problem." by ohnocitizen
    27. Re:It has this. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Have you been living in a cave? Android has been using SELinux for some time now.

      Also, you're an idiot if you can't see the difference between:
      Abusing a software bug (stack overflow, buffer overrun) to achieve root (which means any app, or even a PDF in one or two cases can open up your device to a world of hurt)
      and
      Installing apps that are still sandboxed and run with the permissions listed up front.

    28. Re:It has this. by tlambert · · Score: 1

      Do you defend every company which charges premium prices for a product where they limit your ability to do something every computer has been able to do for the last 50 years

      Of course.

      I will happily defend IKEA for selling me a chair that is limited from being able to do *anything* "every computer has been able to do for the last 50 years".

      Except, you know, being sat on. If I can't sit on the chair, I'd be pretty unhappy. On the other hand, not every computer in the last 50 years has been large enough or flat enough to sit on. You gotta draw that line somewhere!

    29. Re:It has this. by ganjadude · · Score: 1

      anything apple decides is not approved

      --
      have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
    30. Re:It has this. by Trogre · · Score: 1

      So you can compile your own code but you can't share it with your friends without paying up?

      --
      "Nine times out of ten, starting a fire is not the best way to solve the problem." - my wife
  19. "This is a strength tester app." by tlambert · · Score: 1

    "This is a strength tester app. When I say 'go!', tap the screen as hard as you can!"

    1. Re:"This is a strength tester app." by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      This made me laugh, thank you.

      "Now try with a hammer!". "New High Score!"

  20. Force Touch ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ... Is your app Jedi compatible?!?

  21. Force Touch ... by wylderide · · Score: 2

    ... Is your app Jedi compatible?!?

    --
    This is the best restaurant I ever eat in
  22. Unsourced rumor is unsourced by radarskiy · · Score: 1

    Bloomberg printing an unsourced rumor does not magically turn it into news. Forbes citing Bloomberg printing an unsourced rumor also does not magically make it news.

  23. Convince to switch? by Gaygirlie · · Score: 1

    Why would something like Force Touch convince someone to switch from Android unless they're the kind of people who constantly rush to any new flashy thing? For one, Force Touch seems like a terrible, unintuitive gimmick that isn't easily discoverable and pretty much all the things you can do with it can be also be done without with little effort. Secondly, if someone is using Android they're likely using it because it isn't iOS; cheaper, more-varied hardware, not-so-tightly controlled lock-in and thus much better access to tools from more than one vendor, dual- and even triple-SIM phones and so on.

    1. Re:Convince to switch? by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 1

      There are some features that could tempt someone to switch. Apple's fingerprint scanner wasn't the first, but it was the first one that was (almost) seamlessly integrated into the phone's usage pattern. Plenty of Android users told me they'd love to have that on their phones. But the thing is: they didn't have to switch, they only had to wait a while; today there are a few Android phones with non-sucky fingerprint scanners, and as far as I know the OS now supports it as well. If Apple turns force touch from a gimmick into something actually useful, then it won't be long before other manufacturers follow suit.

      If anything, us Apple users are at a disadvantage here, Apple focus only on certain things and are slow to develop others. One thing I'd love is a water resistant iPhone, but as yet there are only some rumours that Apple is actuall working on this.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    2. Re:Convince to switch? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not to mention the copious amount of features Android has had for years over just a fingerprint scanner.

      NFC / Payment? Check.
      Power Saving Mode? Check.
      Widgets? Check.
      Easy way to figure out what background apps are still running? Check.

  24. Pointless gimmick by kuzb · · Score: 1, Insightful

    The order of the day seems to be trying to invent solutions for problems that don't exist.

    --
    BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
    1. Re:Pointless gimmick by fuzzyfuzzyfungus · · Score: 1

      You know how it is in the handset market, people just stop caring and start phoning it in after a while.

    2. Re:Pointless gimmick by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You know what was also called a gimmick, phones with a software keyboard.

    3. Re:Pointless gimmick by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Indeed, Are you suggesting you want Xerox to consider selling something called a "mouse" ?

    4. Re:Pointless gimmick by BasilBrush · · Score: 1

      Yeah, right, those right button clicks on a mouse are so pointless aren't they. There can't possibly be two different purposes for tapping a point can there.

  25. Another interesting rumor: the camera by Camembert · · Score: 1

    Force Touch could yield to interesting app behaviour.
    But I am more interested ln the expected camera improvements. Apple bought a company specialising in a new kind of multi sensor camera thet promises much improved picture quality, more so in low light and it could be used for 3d pictures.
    i have the 6 plus which is already capable of surprisingly acceptable pictures, and if the low light quality still improves then the phone could convince me to leave my bigger gear more often at home.

    1. Re:Another interesting rumor: the camera by AK+Marc · · Score: 1

      I'm surprised nobody is making sensors more sensitive in the UV and IR ranges, and false-coloring them into the spectrum, IR red-brown, and UV with blue-brown. The low-light results would be better, and allow for more photographic tricks.

      For that matter, make sensors that work to visible+100% on each side, and compress the entire visual spectrum to that 3x visual, so things would be a false-color outside human range. Use it as a type of tri-corder.

    2. Re:Another interesting rumor: the camera by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I'm surprised nobody is making sensors more sensitive in the UV and IR ranges, and false-coloring them into the spectrum, IR red-brown, and UV with blue-brown. The low-light results would be better, and allow for more photographic tricks.

      Nobody is saying they aren't. From what I hear, smartphone lenses haven't or can't get any bigger for their form factors --and yet resolution and quality jumped from poor grainy 3-5MP to clear-low-light 14MP... and rival much bigger point and shoot competition not just in carriability.

      After your comment, I can see it as a plausible explanation

  26. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Neat to see ios is catching up to android, you've only been able to get pressure sensitive devices with android for about four years now.

    Google Android OS is a malware infested pile of garbage better buried forever. I cannot understand supposedly technology literate people fawning over proprietary, walled-garden Google Android OS while squealing like gang-raped schoolgirls about the proprietary, walled-garden that is Apple iOS. I doubt there more is than 1% of /. readers who actually understand the computer systems they use daily much less have ever built an operating system whether a "toy OS" or contributed to an existing OS such as GNU/Linux, Microsoft Windows, Apple Mac OS, Apple OS X, etc.

  27. Re:Cool by mozumder · · Score: 0

    > For what its worth, (and probably not much) I have a new macbook pro with the force touchpad. I've never actually used it. Not once. Not ever. I

    Wut?

    Don't you use it every time you click on the trackpad?

  28. Re: Security is a better reason to "switch" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sure, just ask Jennifer Lawrence..

    Dipshit.

  29. Re:Cool by lucm · · Score: 1

    squealing like gang-raped schoolgirls

    Gang-raped schoolgirls don't squeal in real life. In those Japanese videos you've seen, the girls are actresses, and their squealing is actually a fairly sophisticated response that walks a thin line between rape simulation and forbidden fantasies.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  30. Ouch! by msobkow · · Score: 1

    Now your iPhone can scream "Ouch!" when you hit it with a hammer out of frustration. :P

    --
    I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
  31. Will force touch even be used by native iOS apps? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What I don't understand is how Apple will use this to their advantage in their own native apps. The one thing I see android apps doing well that Apple has never done is having holding your finger down bring up a menu to interact with the item you're holding down. Apple always does these hideous "swipe right to do X" and "swipe right to do Y", when in fact the most obvious and intuitive interface is to press and hold down to bring up options.

    The "press and hold for menu" is so unbelievably simple, intuitive, and allows for multiple interactive options. Swiping only allows for two possible actions, and it's bloody impossible to remember whether you delete by swiping right or left (and then what does swiping the opposite direction even do?). You don't need pressure sensitivity for this, and yet Apple has avoided this functionality. What will force touch add to the native OS experience? Probably nothing useful.

    I have an iPhone 6, previously had an iPhone 4. I prefer iOS to android, and yet this lack of the intuitive press-and-hold function irks me.

  32. Re:force touch = rape culture by lucm · · Score: 1

    There's no rape culture at Apple, unless you count the Chinese workers who are poisoned on the iPhone assembly lines for $100 per month, or the idiots in the Apple Store who are paid $100 per day to sell stuff they can't afford themselves to people who don't need it.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  33. What a name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I thought "force touch" was only something that child molesters did. I guess the words "pressure" and "sense" couldn't be combined in any way to portray what's actually going on.

  34. Re:Cool by ernest.cunningham · · Score: 4, Informative

    Your force touch trackpad does not "click" (no traditional hinge movement). The taptic engine behind the track pad simulates the click feeling for click depth without the surface depressing.

    So, every time you do or have "clicked" your track pad, you have used the force touch feature.

    Secondly, force touch on the Apple Watch works beautifully and will be useful on the iPhone too. Different use cases. Contextual menus in iOS apps will be a great addition.

  35. Re:Security is a better reason to "switch" by lucm · · Score: 1

    Given the numerous Android security problems and APPs with hidden data collection issues, I'ld say forget 'Force Touch' as a reason to switch.

    If I was a celeb I'd rather have "Android security problems" than The Fappening, As a nobody, the only people likely to steal my naughty pics are Geek Squad employees, and they can do it on IOS or Android so that's no reason to switch.
     

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  36. Switch? by Ecuador · · Score: 2

    I assume Android users prefer Android because of the things it has, not those it lacks. How would something that is not on Android convince them to switch? I have several iPhones (up to the iPhone 6 plus) due to my job, but I have never actually used them as phones, they sit on my desk due to their limited OS. Thinking about it, the thing that annoys me most when I use them is probably the lack of a "back" button that works outside just the App level. The fact that I can't connect mass storage devices to them, or at least connect them as a mass storage device is also a serious drawback considering what I usually want to do with a phone. I am not in love with Android. In fact, my first Android phone was the first phone I ever had that I considered a regression from my previous (an N9), mainly due to the OS having a much worse UI than the swipe UI of Maemo/Meego (and of course other drawbacks - I only switched because Meego was abandoned and it lacked some essential apps). So for me it does not seem hard to make something more usable than Android, others have already done it. But force touch is not what is missing.

    --
    Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
    1. Re:Switch? by samwichse · · Score: 1

      I use Android because because an iPhone 6+ costs $750, and the same-size Oneplus One costs $250.

      Also: the persistent back button... seems like Apple has kludged quite a bit to not just put a second button on their device.

      Oh, and the Shortyz crossword app.

  37. Possibly release when SW Episode 7 hits the movies by vision33r · · Score: 1

    Apple has become more about marketing than technology these days.

  38. Re:Cool by vux984 · · Score: 1

    So, every time you do or have "clicked" your track pad, you have used the force touch feature.

    Nope. My macbook pro trackpad definitely has a haptic click if I acutally push on it, and then a second click if i push harder.

    I *never* touch it with enough force to engage either.

    So, every time you do or have "clicked" your track pad, you have used the force touch feature.

    The feature is there, and I might be technically using it in the sense that I can't use the trackpad without using it. But the fact that it is 'force touch' is irrelevant to me, I find it no different to the trackpad in my previous macbook pro which didn't have it.

    Secondly, force touch on the Apple Watch works beautifully

    Meh, a gimmick on a product that is itself a gimmick?

    and will be useful on the iPhone too. Contextual menus in iOS apps will be a great addition.

    Yeah, maybe. Then again, a phone with more buttons kind of solves most of those issues too; and is more intuitive to use. Just saying.

    I'm not anti-apple; I'm using an mbp to write this... but I have no interest in their walled garden; or their watch. The force touch tech... is an evolutionary step with some uses and I do expect to see it become ubuiqitous, but its hardly anything to get excited about.

  39. The way people fondle their iPhones ... by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 1

    ... it would be more useful if it could detect "Bad Touch" vs. "Good Touch".
    As far as "Force Touch" goes, remember: No means No.

    --
    It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
    1. Re:The way people fondle their iPhones ... by StikyPad · · Score: 1

      You and me baby ain't nothin' but mammals

  40. Sorry, Misunderstood... by magusxxx · · Score: 1

    I thought Force Touch was when you were made to close ads before using the app.

    --
    Care killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back.
  41. Re:Will force touch even be used by native iOS app by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1

    I use press-and-hold in my own apps and UIKit even includes UILongPressGestureRecognizer as a pre-configured subclass to use for detecting such events. This has been available since whichever iOS introduces gesture recognizers (5 or 6, I think).

  42. Yawnnn! by rippeltippel · · Score: 1

    ronf... ronf... zzzzz... zzzzzzz

  43. Congratulations Apple! by Megol · · Score: 1, Interesting

    You have finally realized that your touchscreen controller actually provides a pressure strength and are able to hype it up like it's revolutionary.

    Not even if we realize the limitations of pressure sensing of a standard capacitive controller and add additional sensors to make the detection less granular is this something new. I don't know how long Synaptics (touchpad manufacturer) have had their capacitive+force sensor combination available but it is at least two years, but even ignoring that the idea and implementation isn't anything new.

    Bah.

    1. Re:Congratulations Apple! by jo_ham · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You have finally realized that your touchscreen controller actually provides a pressure strength and are able to hype it up like it's revolutionary.

      Not even if we realize the limitations of pressure sensing of a standard capacitive controller and add additional sensors to make the detection less granular is this something new. I don't know how long Synaptics (touchpad manufacturer) have had their capacitive+force sensor combination available but it is at least two years, but even ignoring that the idea and implementation isn't anything new.

      Bah.

      Err, no.

      Apple's implementation of force touch on the Macbook Pro trackpad (where it is current used, not counting this rumour that it will be on the iPhone) uses a set of strain gauges to measure the applied pressure. It doesn't use the touchscreen controller.

      You might want to actually look up how it works before trying to score a "sick burn" (is that what the kids call it these days?) from your armchair quarterback position.

      I also don't see where Apple are hyping it up to make it seem like a revolution. They are advertising that the MBPr and MB have it, but I fail to see how their advertising materials claim it's revolutionary. Unless you think the term "whole new way to experience a trackpad" means that, and not "this trackpad works differently than the old ones due to the numerous new ways you can use it due to the force sensors"

      Apple is frequently guilty of hyperbole when it comes to advertising, but on the force touch it's pretty understated. Did you just assume they would claim it was a revolution that had never been seen before? Given that you don't understand how Apple's implementation works I have to assume you've done zero research on it. Google (a popular search engine) can tell you quite a lot about it if you're interested.

    2. Re:Congratulations Apple! by Bogtha · · Score: 1

      You have finally realized that your touchscreen controller actually provides a pressure strength and are able to hype it up like it's revolutionary.

      Right now, Apple haven't said a word on the matter, let alone "hyped it up like it's revolutionary". There is zero confirmation from Apple, this is just a blog article based on a rumour.

      --
      Bogtha Bogtha Bogtha
  44. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    A few Android devices have a digitizer, but none of Apple's iOS devices do. Any aftermarket stylus used with an Apple device is lame compared to a Samsung S-Pen.

    Force touch could be useful, but good pen support should be a higher priority. This is one of the nice points of Microsoft's Surface Pro tablets. (Though the SP3 uses a different active pen technology, not sure how good it is.) Perhaps if Google had set a better precedent with their Nexus devices, or Jobs wasn't such an ass about pens.

  45. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You are mistaken. Force Touch uses both a pressure sensitive screen and haptic feedback. Also, the pressure of the stylus on Android is in the pen, not the screen.

  46. Re:Cool by bemymonkey · · Score: 2, Informative

    >Which have also been available for iOS for years.

    Ummm... what? I haven't seen any iOS devices with WACOM or N-Trig... everything available for iOS devices has been the high-tech equivalent of fingerpainting.

  47. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I don't watch Japanese videos nor any videos in which rape is the predominant means of interaction between characters. Go back to your anime.

  48. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Android has pressure sensitive styluses. Which have also been available for iOS for years. This is Force Touch, which as it's name implies is about measuring the force of finger touches. Android doesn't have it.

    Wrong, touch has had pressure on Android FOR YEARS, it is just not a feature because it doesn't really work all that well. It is close to useless.

  49. Honey, another delivery from Amazon just arrived by chrism238 · · Score: 1

    Great - no need to worry, any more, about butt-dialing your phone. Now, with butt-apping (TM-pending), who knows what we'll be able to achieve, or order!

  50. Re: Cool by jellomizer · · Score: 1

    How is this about Android. The OS doesn't add the hardware feature, it will only support it. They are a lot of New Android phones that don't have that feature as well.
    Now I don't expect Apples goal is to switch over Android users but to keep their devises up to date with other winning technology trends and with their vision of future tech as to keep the existing user base and try to get new to the phone users.
    For the most part if you are an Android user or an iOS user you will not switch unless their is some killer feature, or some major ball that was dropped. Otherwise there is too much investment in your device with apps and learning how to use it to switch.

    --
    If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
  51. Humble apks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I can install at the humble bundle apks I bought.

  52. Re:Cool by jo_ham · · Score: 4, Informative

    No, it really doesn't.

    Look at the teardown of the MBPr's trackpad - it doesn't physically have a clickable button any more. It is 100% exclusively totally (just for redundancy) controlled via haptic feedback.

    It does not physically click. Not even a little bit.

    It is a flat plate with no moving parts that has a haptic feedback device fixed to it.

  53. This isn't new by Solandri · · Score: 1

    I'm not sure if Force Touch enough to convince an Android user like myself to switch, but there are definitely some interesting possibilities for app developers.

    Why would it make you want to switch? Android apps have been doing it since at least 2011. Android's touch API communicates sufficient information to implement this if you wish.

    But this being Apple, they will give it a fancy name, everyone will think they invented it, and they will pretend like they invented it. Just like Siri, which came out after I'd been doing searches, sending texts, and starting apps by voice on Android for at least a year.

    1. Re:This isn't new by BasilBrush · · Score: 1

      When you can't tell the difference between literal rul-of-thumb finger pattern on a capacitative screen and strain gauges, it just makes you look stupid.

      It says nothing about Apple.

  54. Re:Cool by BasilBrush · · Score: 3, Informative

    WACOM you say? Yes they do them for iOS.

    http://uk.pcmag.com/tablets/13...

    And there are several other companies that also do pressure sensitive styluses for iOS.

  55. Higher priorities by MMC+Monster · · Score: 1

    Apple should have higher priorities than force touch.

    For instance, make a power-on button that works for more than a couple years.

    Last three iPhones my wife and I bought had the power switch become less responsive (requiring heavy pressure to register) after about three years.

    Or, of course, just expect everyone to throw away their phones in 2 years. That seems to be what everyone does, anyway.

    --
    Help! I'm a slashdot refugee.
    1. Re:Higher priorities by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      But you could make a scale from this, allowing street commerce to be more efficient. Apple is just thinking of the small business person on the street.

    2. Re:Higher priorities by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Last three iPhones my wife and I bought had the power switch become less responsive (requiring heavy pressure to register) after about three years.

      That's because the power button already featured Force Touch.

  56. If for e touch was useful... by clickety6 · · Score: 1

    If Force Touch was useful, we'd have it for mouse clicks. We don't.

    --
    ----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
  57. Re: Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And as an Android user, while I find that as an extremely cool feature, it is not enough for me to switch. I'd stil be locked into the IOS, Apple ecosystem, which I do not like. Simply put, advanced interface features abive everyone else, are not enough of an argument to force one into Apples walled garden.

  58. Re:Cool by bemymonkey · · Score: 2

    That's an edge case - a special product that doesn't work system-wide - and not a traditional WACOM stylus - the latter requires an active digitizer panel integrated in the screen, which iOS devices simply do not have. There's an entirely different level of accuracy involved, and the iOS version of the product only works with certain apps.

    Traditional "real" WACOM styli work system-wide... everywhere you can use a pointing device. And they have absolute positioning on screen.

    I am intrigued though - I wonder how the iOS version of the product works, since they're missing an elementary part of the system they usually use (the digitizer in the screen).

  59. Re:Possibly release when SW Episode 7 hits the mov by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    To be fair, they add in technology to marketing, with the end result being marketing gimmicks.

  60. Re:Honey, another delivery from Amazon just arrive by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    A whole new level and dimension of Fart Apps, of course!

    They still haven't made a fart app for the iWatch though. I guess 10,000 of them for the iPhone was more of a trend in the early App Store. But this new gimmick opens up new possibilities! (wet farts if you press hard, gurgled farts if you have liver cancer, etc.)

  61. Re:Cool by johnlcallaway · · Score: 0

    It's true that Android doesn't have it (yet) .. but Samsung Android phones and tablets have actual windowing capability; two apps can be visible and usable at the same time without having to switch back and forth.

    Far more useful for me than having even more game choices. Or drawing pictures on a screen using my finger instead of a device that actually is made for it.

    Nothing here for the majority of Android users to see ... moving along.

    Wait .. 'starting to make'?? So all of those iDrones that had to be first to buy the latest iPhone are going to be left out in the cold. Already?? Before their phone is even a few months old?

    That is the most hilarious thing I've ever heard. Will there be a a big rush on the Apple store in a few month as all of these iIdiots rush out to get the latest and greatest? Again??

    --
    I rarely read replies, it's my opinion and if you thought about your opinion a little more, I'm OK with that.
  62. Re:force touch = rape culture by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    Steve Jobs named a whole computer system (Lisa) after a child he refused to publicly acknowledge and you're claiming there is no rape culture at Apple? There is a culture of forced expropriation at the core of Apple going way back in time.

  63. Re: Cool by Bing+Tsher+E · · Score: 1

    "Too much ivestment in your device with apps" is less and less of an issue all the time.

    The Android and iOS app marketplaces are almost identical feature-wise and most of the big flagship apps are published and available for both types of cell phone.

    Plus, it's fairly hard to spend more than $50 on apps for either product without going nuts on junk games you'll probably only play an hour or two.

    The 'investment' in the app store is a throwaway consideration. Nobody is really 'trapped' on either platform.

  64. Re: Security is a better reason to "switch" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It's self degradation to keep your diary on the internet if you value the privacy of your soul.

  65. Re:Cool by BasilBrush · · Score: 1

    That was the most irrational message I've read in a while.

    A new hardware feature leaves users of older devices "out in the cold"? How is that different for iPhones than any other smartphone?

    And "after a few months"? Android manufacturers release new phones every month. iPhone has a new model once a year. How can you possibly have not worked out that your stupid criticism applies to Android not iPhone?

    And windowing? iOS has windowing on the iPad, where it makes sense. Windowing on a phone makes no sense whatsoever. It's too small.

  66. Re:Cool by BasilBrush · · Score: 1

    Are you talking about graphics tablets - separate from the screen? Can you point to an actual product you are referring to? I already came back with an affirmative on your WACOM query, if you're being more selective even than that, then be explicit and actually state what you're talking about.

    It's pretty obvious how the iOS stylus works, but if you point to what it is you are thinking of it'll be easier to explain by comparison.

  67. Re:Cool by bemymonkey · · Score: 2, Informative

    OK, from the top then :D

    Traditional tablet PCs with WACOM styluses have existed for ages - over 10 years. They use an active digitizer (built into the screen) combined with an inductive stylus, which has a pressure-sensitive tip and does not require a battery. It's the same technology WACOM uses for its separate graphics tablets, which is why the pens are, in many cases, interchangeable - I can use the pen from my graphics tablet for my tablet PC (in this case, a Samsung ATIV Smart PC tablet), for instance. This technology is highly accurate, works across the entire system (due to presenting as a [PS2 or similar] pointing device) and is highly compatible with all existing software. Many Windows and Android devices come with this hardware built in... others (such as Microsoft for their Surface line) have switched to WACOM's main competitor for these products, N-Trig - even more accurate, but require batteries in the pens AFAIK.

    iOS devices such as iPads have no such hardware built in - they have a "fat finger" capacitive touch display and no native palm rejection due to the fact that if you turn off the capacitive touchscreen, well, you lose all input - WACOM systems automatically turn off the capacitive touch when the stylus comes within a few centimeters of the digitizer screen, which incidentally also allows hovering over the screen with the stylus as a pointing device. The workaround palm rejection algorithms in these "let's use capacitive touch as a crutch for a stylus" devices and apps are almost always universally horrible. I'm hoping WACOM figured out something better for the product you mentioned, but I kinda doubt it.

    The accuracy is also quite horrendous - with most iPad styluses, you wouldn't be much worse off using a hot-dog instead.

    Hence the complicated workaround for iOS with Bluetooth (for the pressure sensitivity) and the very slow performance - take a look here for instance: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

    I dunno about you, but while the reviewer keeps talking about fast performance, I'd pretty much be pulling my hair out. That might be because of that Bamboo drawing app on the iPad though, and not because the Bluetooth connection is lagging (although that's a possibility too!).

  68. Upgrade on curent Breaking Force screens? by randomhacks · · Score: 1

    Is this just an upgrade on the standard Breaking Force feature that comes with all current iphone screens. If you are using Android then you may not know about this novel iphone feature. To enable Breaking Force on your iphone you simply touch / drop the device onto a surface. The screen then displays a spider web pattern. You then pay £100 to have it pattern removed and start again.

  69. Won't work for me... by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 1

    ...I'm not a Jedi.

  70. Re: Android by MobileTatsu-NJG · · Score: 1

    If you take that comment and swap 'iOS' and 'Android', you go from a -1 to +5.

    --

    "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)

  71. Will it suck like... by jtara · · Score: 1

    Will it suck like force touch on the Apple Watch, and the stupid microswitch on the Apple Magic Trackpads?

    I have both. The problem with the watch is that it makes both force touch and normal touch suck. You have to be dainty with a normal touch or it is not recognized. And force touch seems to require the some gorilla approach as the trackpad. Ow! It hurts my thumb!

    Fortunately, Apple long ago realized how awful that switch on the trackpads is (this started with the notebooks, and then they decided this dysfunctional design was so good that they spun it off as a separate piece for desktops...) that they fiddled the software to let you configure it to just ignore any errant click and just let you tap without activating the switch. Which is the way I use it. You know, except when you tap too hard, and then the switch does activate and you hurt your thumb.

    I want unforce touch. That is, distinguish between hovering over the surface and finger actually on the surface. It might make browser "hover" not suck again. On the other hand, naw. It will bring back those awful Microsoft-y cascading menus that are designed as a test of your skill in precision mouse pathing...

  72. Re:Cool by vux984 · · Score: 1

    No, it really doesn't.

    It really doesn't MATTER.

    There are two thresholds where it clicks - the fact that its haptic vs mechanical is irreelevent. I never ever touch it with enough force to engage either click threshold.

    So any additional functionality mapped to touching with greater force; I'm not ever using. So it may as well not be there.

  73. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You don't get it.
    What vux984 is saying is that he set up the magic trackpad so that he only has to touch the trackpad to click, and he does not have to exert a force on it.

    I personally got rid of everything that requires to exert an additional vertical force on the trackpad the day I tried to use it on my laps. I'm talking about a wireless magic trackpad of course. I replaced everything with two and three fingers gestures, and it feels so confortable that I setup my laptop the same way, and never looked back. So force touch for me doesn't make sense, but I have to admit that I have not tried a force touch enabled magic trackpad.

  74. Re:Cool by jo_ham · · Score: 2

    No, it really doesn't.

    It really doesn't MATTER.

    There are two thresholds where it clicks - the fact that its haptic vs mechanical is irreelevent. I never ever touch it with enough force to engage either click threshold.

    So any additional functionality mapped to touching with greater force; I'm not ever using. So it may as well not be there.

    Ah, so you're changing your argument. Fair enough.

    I was just pointing out that you were factually incorrect and based an argument on it. Next time you say that you don't use any part of a technology that you literally have to (because that's how the trackpad works in its entirety) you'll know a little more about it.

  75. Re:Cool by jo_ham · · Score: 1

    You don't get it.
    What vux984 is saying is that he set up the magic trackpad so that he only has to touch the trackpad to click, and he does not have to exert a force on it.

    I personally got rid of everything that requires to exert an additional vertical force on the trackpad the day I tried to use it on my laps. I'm talking about a wireless magic trackpad of course. I replaced everything with two and three fingers gestures, and it feels so confortable that I setup my laptop the same way, and never looked back. So force touch for me doesn't make sense, but I have to admit that I have not tried a force touch enabled magic trackpad.

    I do get it. He is saying that he has never used the force touch feature when that's literally impossible, even if he taps it lightly enough to just register his finger - the cap sensor and the strain gauges work together on the new trackpad. Je just didn't understand that.

  76. Re: Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It was pretty clear what he meant, you were just being a dick.

  77. Re: Cool by jo_ham · · Score: 1

    It was pretty clear what he meant, you were just being a dick.

    If you're following the comments, why didn't you log in?

    It was clear that the original poster didn't understand how the technology worked.

    Also, if my comment to him is considered "being a dick" then my goodness he must have a thin skin. He'd better be careful on the internet. What specifically about it is me "being a dick"?

  78. Re:Cool by vux984 · · Score: 1

    Ah, so you're changing your argument. Fair enough.

    I'm not changing the argument. My position was and remains that I don't use the force touch feature.

    Next time you say that you don't use any part of a technology that you literally have to [...]

    If I have a variable speed blender, and I only ever use one speed, then I am not using the variable speed feature.

    The variable speed FEATURE is the ability to vary the speed. The fact that I always use one speed means I'm not using variable speed feature.

    Then someone comes along arguing that the fact that the one speed I always use is technically a selection of one of the variable speed settings... who gives a shit? I'm still not varying the speed, so the variable speed feature is irrelevant.

    Force touch is the same thing. I know damned well I'm technically using the force touch trackpad when I tap on it. I'm not using the force touch feature though, because I never vary the force; nor use variable force to access additional functionality.

    You are just being a pedantic twit.

  79. Re:Cool by exomondo · · Score: 1

    Don't you use it every time you click on the trackpad?

    I don't even click the touchpad

  80. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Im not sure whether you're actually unable to understand the point or you're being deliberately obtuse. If it's the former then please state the point you think he is trying to make so you can be corrected and that will help you understand.

  81. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    And windowing? iOS has windowing on the iPad, where it makes sense. Windowing on a phone makes no sense whatsoever. It's too small.

    Oh who gives a shit, if you dont think it is useful then dont use it. Why the hell do people get so wound up and defensive over their choice of smartphone, it isnt like he is criticizing you personally and if your choice of smartphone does or does not include a feature that you find useful or not useful it really doesn't matter and you don't have to go and defend it.

    I have a hammer that has indentations on the handle for grip, my friend has one that has raised parts on the handle for grip. We don't argue about which is better or get worried that our choice says something about us personally, it is just a tool for a job. And if the company that makes my hammer includes a line of hammers that have the raised parts as opposed to the ones with the indentation I don't expect my friend would be gloating about it nor would I feel defensive or upset that this somehow was a reflection on me. Sure there are some people that define themselves by the hammer they use and feel insecure about their choice so have a need to defend it but thankfully these are the minority. It is just so odd the way that some people think the fact that they chose a product says something about them relative to somebody who made a different choice to the degree that they actually get emotional about it.

  82. Re:Cool by jo_ham · · Score: 1

    Perhaps if you log in we can discuss it. It's pretty obvious.

  83. Re:Cool by jo_ham · · Score: 1

    Do you touch the trackpad to make it work?

    Then you're using the force touch feature, even if you don't click.

  84. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Perhaps if you log in we can discuss it.

    We already are discussing it. If you need a pseudonym then call me "Frank", not sure why you need that though. In the space it took you to write that post you could have told me what you think his point is.

    It's pretty obvious.

    If it were obvious to you then you wouldn't be arguing with him about it, by definition it is *not* obvious to you. So what do "you" think the point is he is making?

  85. Lesson from Sony Dualshock 3 vs 4 by spire3661 · · Score: 1

    There is a reason Sony dropped pressure sensitive buttons on the DualShock 4, no one used it.

    --
    Good-bye
  86. Re:Cool by exomondo · · Score: 1

    Then you're using the force touch feature, even if you don't click.

    Given that use case, would it be any different to doing that on a trackpad that doesn't have Force Touch?

  87. Re:Cool by KGIII · · Score: 1

    Exactly how many schoolgirls have you raped to make this determination?

    --
    "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  88. Joy! Another way to fat finger by anachronous+diehard · · Score: 1

    We already have enough technologies to make user input ambiguous: (1) My Synaptics touchpad thinks my index finger is a two finger gesture about half the time. There doesn't seem to be an adjustment to reduce sensitivity for this. (A middle finger gesture doesn't work any better, tempting as it is.) (2) Kindle Fire sometimes thinks that holding it by the black border, well outside the screen area, is a tap on whatever is the nearest screen-edge icon. (3) Disuse of the Accelerator Key input method, making me aim my carpal tunnel at everything (including targets obviously sized in the days of 14" 800x600 pixel displays).

    There are many ways Force Touch might miss: An arm-length reach for a phone on the table will not have accurate force input. Perhaps potholes, too much coffee, or Parkinson's or other tremor disease. ([sarcasm]Assuming smartphones are otherwise disability-friendly.[/sarcasm])

  89. Re:Cool by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I do get it.

    No you dont.

    He is saying that he has never used the force touch feature when that's literally impossible, even if he taps it lightly enough to just register his finger - the cap sensor and the strain gauges work together on the new trackpad.

    Right so if I told you that on my iPhone 6 I am not using TouchID you would infer that this means that I am not ever touching the home button yes?

  90. Re:Cool by lucm · · Score: 1

    My best friend has been gang-raped (by adults) when she was in middle school. It lasted for 6 hours, and she required extensive medical care after that event, including reconstructive surgery in multiple areas (genitals, colon, dental and facial). For the parts that she recalls, she did not "squeal".

    As it happens, one of our common friends is a porn producer that specializes in hardcore stuff. So we have discussed the whole rape fantasy thing extensively over the years.

    None of this makes me an expert, but I don't think anyone in this thread has better information on this subject than me.

    --
    lucm, indeed.
  91. Re:Cool by KGIII · · Score: 1

    I am going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you are correct. I dare say that it is not a subject I am an expert in. At first blush this may sound bad but I have had sex with a school aged girl. Of course she was older than I and I was young but this did happen more than once. Also college chicks but they do not count. I have never raped anyone of any age so I am really going to defer to your expertise as I have just shared the entirety of my knowledge on the subject or, rather, my lack of it.

    --
    "So long and thanks for all the fish."
  92. Re: Forst Post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Norbody lorks onions?

  93. Re:Cool by B1ackDragon · · Score: 1

    I dunno about you, but while the reviewer keeps talking about fast performance, I'd pretty much be pulling my hair out. That might be because of that Bamboo drawing app on the iPad though, and not because the Bluetooth connection is lagging (although that's a possibility too!).

    That's definitely a big part of it, I've reviewed a few different stylus/tablet solutions (except for some of nicer Android solutions I couldn't easily get my hands on like the note) and part of the problem is the smoothness of the ipad screen and the stylus nib; because it's so very smooth many apps do a lot of interpolation of the data to create more natural lines introducing a noticeable lag. This can be adjusted in some, with the tradeoff of an unnatural writing experience. Some (like the bamboo paper app) can be set to use the bluetooth/stylus exclusively for effective palm rejection which is pretty much a must. Sadly, many ipad applications also don't make much use of the pressure levels provided, perhaps the despite the 1024 levels of the bamboo fineline I have it's too noisy to make good use out of.

    Another big issue I've found with the ipad stylus solutions is the accuracy simply because of the parallax due to the thickness of the display stack; where the "ink" appears is too far below the surface. At the surface of the glass the accuracy is pretty solid (imo). I did borrow a surface pro 3 during some of my tests, which gets a lot of things right: very little parallax, a resistance-inducing nib for natural writing and low latency.

    --
    The snow doesn't give a soft white damn whom it touches. -- ee cummings
  94. Re:Cool by BasilBrush · · Score: 1

    What you don't appreciate is that there is always a cost to adding UI. If the phone has windowing then there has to be some means of activating it. And that's extra UI. And if that extra UI has to work with the iPhone, then that has implications for how it's implemented on the iPad.

    The windowing system on the iPad is really sweet. It uses the dimensions of the screen really well. Why potentially fuck it up for no gain by implementing windowing on iPhone?

    What people miss about the essence of good design is it's as much about what you leave out as what you add.

  95. Re:Possibly release when SW Episode 7 hits the mov by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If by 'these days' you mean "always", then yes. Or does the iconic the I'm a mac/I'm a PC campaign, the fruity iMac design ads (no specs or mention of the whammy that is the first major OEM to remove floppy drives --but "whoa, the colors!" sold tons) and even the iconic Apple 1984 ad two decades ago.
    I barely skimmed this find, but here are some yewels about this 30-year old piece of evidence for what you call 'these days':
    * A quote that "It was the first time that anybody did something so outrageous on the Super Bowl"
    * and: [quote]The commercial was also pivotal to Apple as it positioned itself as an innovator in the field. The Macintosh computer itself was revolutionary in that it was the first affordable, personal computer to include a graphical-user interface and allow even novice computer users to easily operate the machine with its mouse. The ad helped cement Apple's reputation as an innovator, and presented a contrast between itself and the staid marketing of industry giant IBM. [quote]
    If helping cement someone's reputation as *anything* with a single 30 second ad spot on the most expensive airtime slot ISN'T marketing, and isn't proof that 30 years ago they were just as brand conscious, then something's seriously missing from time perceptions. And that was with a near-failed ad project, too.
    I loved my college powermacG3 chugging along in a mac-ruled campus, but there are tons of little heavy-handed design regressions that I cannot forgive any company. I reluctanctly pass on many new products because no advertisement can *accurately* give you half the information in a single 10-line spec list... nobody wants to alienate their users with gigabytes, hard numbers or even detailed product mugshots until you're already on their website making product comparisons with their javascript eyes letting them breathe down your neck

  96. training videos for men! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    women shout, "Yes - they can finally teach men various degrees of touch pressure!"

    sorry...couldn't resist what with being a woman and all...

  97. Re:Cool by beastofburdon · · Score: 1

    You are missing something very important. For a large number of users of apple products the product does define who they are.