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Apple Plans Combined iPhone, iPad and Mac Apps To Create One User Experience (bloomberg.com)
An anonymous reader shares a Bloomberg report: Apple's iPhone and iPad introduced a novel way of interacting with computers: via easy-to-use applications, accessible in the highly curated App Store. The same approach hasn't worked nearly as well on Apple's desktops and laptops. The Mac App Store is a ghost town of limited selection and rarely updated programs. Now Apple plans to change that by giving people a way to use a single set of apps that work equally well across its family of devices: iPhones, iPads and Macs. Starting as early as next year, software developers will be able to design a single application that works with a touchscreen or mouse and trackpad depending on whether it's running on the iPhone and iPad operating system or on Mac hardware, according to people familiar with the matter. Developers currently must design two different apps -- one for iOS, the operating system of Apple's mobile devices, and one for macOS, the system that runs Macs. With a single app for all machines, Mac, iPad and iPhone users will get new features and updates at the same time.
So how has this worked out for Windows so far?
And this will probably precede yet another CPU architecture shift to their own chips.
macOS and iOS use 2 different UI frameworks (CocoaTouch and UIKit, respectively). And this causes problems when trying to compile the source code between the two platforms. Ex: things like color and girth are defined specifically in each framework (NSFont and NSColor versus UIFont and UIColor). If they combine these frameworks, it makes the design and maintenance of cross platform software a lot easier (it'll still be difficult), and the at the very least, you wouldn't have to stub out a bunch of class names and files.
BUT - the most important work is still on the developer to ensure that their app runs great on iPhone, iPad and Mac and has a cohesive UI that scales and takes advantages of the different technologies. It's no different from Responsive Web Design or the shift from iPhone to iPad (and vice versa). Kudos to Apple for the courageous approach to their failure of an app store on desktop.
We all grew used to MS being the copycat and doing everything Apple does a few years later.
But the other way around? Really? Especially after pretty much everyone, even the dimmest computer illiterate noticed that touch-oriented input is simply atrocious for desktop GUIs and that you can't really design an interface that works well for clicking with a mouse and touching with fat fingers?
Well, ok, go ahead. Back with Steve still on the helm I'd say, maybe they know what they're doing, maybe they have a solution for this design problem that MS failed at.
But with Timmie calling the shots? Nope.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
This makes perfect sense. Why do I need to keep buying apps for different platforms? Now we should be able to buy one app or subscription and use it on up to 10 devices.
The problem is the restrictions in it. These restrictions are both technical and commercial.
Technical first - the sandbox is great in iOSland. In Macland I want to run things like VMware, or command line utilities, or emulators, or hardware drivers, or...you get the idea. The sandbox stops all that.
The next one is commercial - I am used to paying upgrade prices, not junking and paying full price each time. Definitely needs an upgrade model in the store. I actually think that this is the largest of all the obstacles in the Mac update store.
Apple should not have hired the Windows Vista/8 product manager.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
Remember the failure of the Amphi-car? it was neither a very good boat nor a very good car...
This is how I see apps that are trying to be all things .. phones / tablets / desktops have very different UIs ..and for good reason.
Play to each platforms strengths.. Microsoft tried to do this with its windows store Universal Plaform stuff and well, I can't speak for anyone else, but even on my Surface pro, I never run those "apps" .. I use it like a PC.. keyboard and touchpad/mouse
The Digital Sorceress
UIKit is a part of Cocoa Touch. I believe you meant AppKit.
Separating content from presentation, graceful degradation, etc have very strong unix roots. It was in the context of character terminals interacting with graphical displays, but still, nroff, troff, LaTeX, TeX, original HTML are all really markup languages interpreting data appropriately for the devices that consume them.
So done correctly, it could work
Apple has a track record of doing it right. So it could work for Apple, though a similar attempt by Microsoft was pathetic.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
I'm reminded of the FatBinary approach Apple took with applications that ran on PowerPC chips and x86 machines. It is a step in the right direction... but there are a ton of things that can't really be unified across iOS and macOS:
1: The UI frameworks as the parent stated. This is a major issue. /Applications and pretty much can do whatever they feel like.
2: UI events. Microsoft tried to unify this and failed, because there is a reason why the UI on a 5K screen is different from a 5-7" wide smartphone. Stuff like right-click dragging makes no sense when it comes to iPhones or iPads.
3: The frameworks are different. Apps on iOS reside in their own little jailed worlds. Apps on macOS sit in
4: Companies can't really release iOS apps the same time as macOS.
As an option, this might be useful, but forcing devs to do this might be an exercise in failure.
The thing is that Xcode compiles iOS apps for Intel anyway and they run natively on the Mac. It won't be rocket science to get cross-platform apps. And then Apple will have it much easier to switch to their own SoCs for MacBooks.
I believe this is the reason Macbooks don't have touchscreens yet - Apple has been working on some way of bringing iOS UI / app compatibility to OSX for a full integration, but they haven't been able to pull it off from the software standpoint. Thus no touchscreen until that happens. Think about it... there are only three options for introducing a touchscreen. 1) Merely another input device, which won't work well at all because widgets are too small for touch interaction and none of the apps would support gestures, multi-touch, touch and hold, etc. 2) Yet another UI for touch interface somehow bootstrapped into OSX (make widgets bigger, make controls respond to dragging - IE what Microsoft did). 3) Integration of iOS and OSX in some hybrid way that brings the best of both into one device, and suddenly makes Macbooks way more appealing since they can run the massive library of iPad apps immediately.
You better believe that back in the Apple labs there are Macbooks with Apple ARM SOCs embedded in them (A11, etc) that can run iOS apps natively that have touchscreens, but they haven't managed to refine the OS UI to an acceptable point so far. This Slashdot story is a step in that direction, getting OSX developers on board and preparing their OSX apps for that environment. The iOS apps should be trivial - just need a touchscreen. iOS apps that can benefit from hardware keyboard, etc, already have that support anyway.
Better known as 318230.
Jesus, what is with the UIX designers? Did they see the windows 8 debacle and think, "I want me some of that!"
Here's some free knowledge: Different devices require different usage profiles. Desktops are more multi-purpose and have the advantage of a mouse and keyboard, meaning a touch interface makes no damn sense on them. Tablets have more screen than your average phone, so your designs should take advantage of that. Phones are the lowest screen space and usability, so you need an entirely different UIX methodology.
Seriously, someone write this down so we don't have to go through this nonsense again.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
Apple confirms it's a mobile device company, and is going to finally rid itself of the antiquated albatross that is the Mac line.
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
Unless or until I can develop and publish iOS apps with only an iOS device, they cannot possibly claim to offer a combined experience on a single device.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Since everyone who has tried this "unified app" thing so far has done little more than demonstrate that it's a pretty terrible idea, I'm curious to see if Apple has some approach that could actually make it not suck.
Apple has always copied. Apple's strategy has never been of the innovator. The strategy has always been the fast follower strategy. They let other be on the bleeding edge and learn from their mistakes and come in with a much more polished, dumbed down and well integrated version. What this does is by the time Apple brings a product to market the market is ready for it but also frustrated with the incumbents and ready to accept fewer functionality for greater reliability and ease of use.
The Mac was a copy of Xerox PARC
Mac OS is a copy of Unix
The iPod was a copy of various cheap mp3 players
The iPhone is a copy of the Motorola Rokr - the first phone to play iTunes as well of various Windows Phone 6 Touchphones from HP
The iPad is a well put together version of countless Samsung tablets
The Watch is a copy of various Android gear smartwatches
Apple Pay is a copy of countless systems which have been there in Japan for almost 25 years now
The Homepod is a copy of Alexa, Google Home etc
Almost nothing Apple does is original . It just does it better and takes over a market.
**Life is too short to be serious**
[old man rant]
I'm sure that whatever they end up doing will bump up the share price, and for that I am grateful.
However, I got into this Mac thing because I had work to do. I have things I need to get done — things that people pay me to do. 20+ years later, I am concerned by the lack of user-upgradeable pro-quality machines. $5k for an iMac seriously??? And don't get me started on the iPhone with its non-replaceable battery and lack of expandable storage.
I want a computer and phone that just work. I want to be able to add RAM or a new SSD when I want. I might even like a monitor larger than 27" and an upgradeable GPU. But who am I kidding? I'm just one guy with a collection of old Macs and a few shares of stock that I'm holding onto until I can retire.
Bah, humbug!
[/old man rant]
Macs are toys after all.
After all, if memory serves, it worked so well for Microsoft.
what about finder for IOS?? or will mac os get locked down like IOS?
The problem with mobile-based applications is not their reliance on a touch interface, but the fact their functionality is severely crippled compared to their desktop counterparts. This is true for store apps on mac and windows too, and this is why unifying the two concepts is a really bad idea.
Apple's latest update for Garageband for iOS has all kinds of substantial features that the desktop version didn't get.
https://www.apple.com/ca/newsroom/2017/11/garageband-brings-new-sound-library-and-classic-beat-sequencer/
Apple also killed the Mac by not updating their computers FOR YEARS while their competitors update every year.
Why would I pay the same price for a 2014 Mac mini in 2017? For a computer with a CPU that is four generations behind, a slow 5400 RPM laptop drive and RAM that cannot be upgraded later on?
Apple doesn't want to make Macs anymore, the "great things in the pipeline" is the most bullshit line I've ever heard from them.
#DeleteFacebook
https://i.imgur.com/9ZOgqGO.pn...
#DeleteFacebook
Scaling is a big problem for iOS. When Apple made the Mac, they Did It Right. Both MacOS and OS X are DPI-aware (dots per inch). When you plug a monitor into the Mac, it queries the monitor for the model, looks it up in a database to determine the screen size Then it takes the display resolution, divides it by the screen size to calculate a PPI (pixels per inch). Then scales the UI elements appropriately. Apple originally had to develop this for their Postscript laser printer way back in the 1980s. They integrated it into the Mac so when page layout artists were working on a Mac, an 11 point font on the screen was exactly the same physical size as when it was printed out.
That's why the Macs had no problem with switching to the high-PPI Retina displays, while Windows still has lots of problems with 3k and 4k screens. Windows isn't aware of your screen's size and DPI, OS X is. Microsoft fixed this with Windows 8, so the system fonts, icons, and menus scale (based on a % you set, not on the screen's physical size). But apps which don't use the system fonts and menus don't benefit from this. That's why the UI in Adobe's apps are microscopic when you run them on Windows on a 4k screen. Adobe eschewed Windows' built-in menu system to build their own (probably so they could implement tear-off menu bars). That's why when you try to run an older Windows app with any scaling other than 100%, the fonts look blurry - Windows is simply rescaling the bitmap of the font, instead of substituting a correctly-scaled font which takes advantage of subpixel rendering.
Then Apple made probably their biggest blunder with iOS. They ditched this tremendously successful DPI-aware model, and made iOS dependent on a fixed resolution and screen size. Apparently Steve drank too much of his own kool-aid and decided since 3.5" with a 4:3 aspect ratio was the "perfect" screen size and There Would Never Be any other screen size, iOS didn't need to be DPI-aware. That's why they stuck with the original 3.5" screen for so long, why when they did increase the resolution they did it by doubling the DPI, and when they increased the screen size they initially did it by stretching the screen (adding more to the top/bottom). Because that was the only way to do it without breaking the UI of older apps. This is most apparent in the iPad Mini - it uses the same resolution as the iPad, but on a smaller screen. Resulting in everything it displays being smaller than on a regular iPad. They could add scaling to iOS now, but it would be like the situation with Windows and every app in the App Store would need to be re-written to be DPI-aware.
Ironically, Android is DPI-aware. Google didn't know the sizes of the Android devices manufacturers would make, so they had to make Android DPI-aware. A lot of Android apps ignore it, but the setting is in there. When properly used, the icons and fonts on Android are the same size whether you run the app on a phone or a tablet. And unlike the Mac where it's fixed depending on your monitor size, you can override it in Android. When I got a tablet for my elderly parents, I rooted it and set the DPI as if the screen size were 33% smaller than it really was. That had the effect of automatically making all of Android's icons and fonts 1.5x bigger, which really helped my parents use the tablet.
Every iOS app has been able to query the UIScreen object for its scale and size in points. What apps do with that is up to the developer. I know that it's not exactly the same as PPI, nor DPI, but it serves well enough.
Apple has become what its 1984 super bowl ad implied it was liberating us from.
Looks like Apple is ripe for being liberated from.
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it"
This idea worked so well for Microsoft...
General Relativity: Space-time tells matter where to go; Matter tells space-time what shape to be.
So how has this worked out for Windows so far?
Doesn't really matter unless Apple copies what Microsoft did. The idea of apps that work across different devices with common development underpinnings is a very reasonable one. It's just not super easy to pull off. But the first company to do it well will probably make some serious bank so it's worth working on. And frankly Microsoft, Google and Apple are all working towards harmonized apps in one way or another and have been for a long time.
Unfortunately, what you write is just not true.
MacOS does not support arbitrary scaling. While the graphics system was built on Postscript, non-integral scaling factors turned out to bring too many problems. Fortunately, the technological progress in screen technology made high DPI-monitors possible and so Apple decided to stick with integral scaling factors. This is why all early Retina-displays exactly double the dimensions of older displays.
This works exactly the same way on macOS as on iOS btw.
For intermediary resolutions, macOS maintains a higher resolution backing store and uses graphics hardware to scale down the resulting image.
Apple's best, least offensive product, and they've decided to go to a lot of trouble to make it suck. Brilliant. I think this is Apple's way of saying "it's time for everyone to move on from Mac OS. There's Windows, Linux, and maybe whatever Google's pushing this year if you're dumb enough to fall for that. Good luck, former users!"
And why is this happening? Because of all you self-loathing fuckwits who bought iOS devices. You voted with your wallets that shitty, uncontrollable, anti-user operating systems are ok. So now you don't get Mac OS anymore, because some bean counter is looking at how many of each, they're selling.
Who killed Apple? Its customers! No, you didn't kill them financially, but you did remove them from relevance in the tech world, essentially. All by lowering your standards to such an extreme degree. You didn't have to do that. Apple could have remained a symbol of quality (which at times it really has been), but now they're considered lower than the cheapest malware-infested Chinese imports. They were capable of keeping up and even occasionally leapfrogging into leadership, but you told them to give up and suck. That's what happens when you throw money at shitty products. Your vote matters and this story is a great example of the consequences.
Sorry, former Mac fans. If you're one of the people who had average (or higher) expectations and therefore couldn't tolerate the thought of downgrading to an iPhone, maybe it's not directly your fault, but I bet you know someone who gave no fucks and you didn't say anything. So here we are. It's like this: you may have voted against Trump but he's still your president. Maybe you should have said something.
The introduction of the iMac Pro, and the reinforcement of commitment to an updated Mac Pro would belie this logic.
Apple also killed the Mac by not updating their computers FOR YEARS while their competitors update every year.
Why would I pay the same price for a 2014 Mac mini in 2017? For a computer with a CPU that is four generations behind, a slow 5400 RPM laptop drive and RAM that cannot be upgraded later on?
Apple doesn't want to make Macs anymore, the "great things in the pipeline" is the most bullshit line I've ever heard from them.
Really? Then explain the introduction LAST WEEK of the iMac Pro, and their reinforcement of committment to an upgraded Mac Pro.
A few years ago, Apple replaced its Mac OS iPhoto app with Photos. This removed a lot of functionality in order to have a more consistent experience between Mac and iPhone photo apps.
If that's the future of more Mac OS apps, I'm not looking forward to it.
I guess that's why the "Tech specs" page for the mac mini only says " dual-core Intel Core i5 " so it's not quite as obvious it's a 4000 series mobile CPU from 2014.
Bots should sign up for accounts.
The scale and size in points give you JUST the actual resolution. You still have no idea how large items are, which was the GP's point. I mean, I won't go in the debate of how much better a DPI method would be, but you respond to a post saying on iOS you only know the resolution and that is a problem, by explaining how you can calculate the resolution...
microsoft promised that for windows 7. canceled. then they promised it for windows 8. they even got 8.1 mobile. canceled. then they promised it for windows 10 to the extreme - phones, tablets, xboxes, desktops, one uwp system to rule them all. canceled. good luck with that apple. especially with how everything is going so /swimingly/ for yall without steve jobs.
what about the Macbook Pro? They've thinned that out to where its just a shell of what it once was. I still have my 17" that had a headphone jack, SD card slot, a great GPU(for its time) , 4 USB slots , etc etc.
When did macbook pro users ever say anything about losing function or useless form?
The other aspect of this is Apple should build in legacy support so that all old software, all the way back to the Apple I, works on modern Macs, iPads, iPhones, iPodTouch, etc. Heck, they already have, sort of, Windows support and they could bring that in native too. With just a bit more work add CPM, full Linux, DOS, PDP, Cray, Howell, etc support too. Then all those legacy hardware systems could be upgraded to new Apple hardware. That would open an enormous market for them.
So glad I kept my Cubase license active.
Remember kids, if you're not paying for the service, YOU ARE THE PRODUCT THAT IS BEING SOLD.
Technically, you can build apps in Qt and run them on any device but the results can be pretty messy.
Toys for the rich and the hollywood industry, not the common users.
#DeleteFacebook
kool design maker is best graphics designing company in the USA https://www.kooldesignmaker.co...
FYI, Cocoa Touch is the iOS version of Cocoa. Apparently you've missed Apple's Metal 2 UI, which is basically Apple's recommendation for macOS 10.11 onwards. Metal 2 is the same API for macOS, iOS and tvOS, https://developer.apple.com/me...
On macOS they've basically stopped supporting OpenGL at 4.0, Carbon (mostly deprecated in OS X 10.5, 10.7 and finally 10.9) and Cocoa (nothing new since OS X 10.3).
what about the Macbook Pro? They've thinned that out to where its just a shell of what it once was. I still have my 17" that had a headphone jack, SD card slot, a great GPU(for its time) , 4 USB slots , etc etc.
When did macbook pro users ever say anything about losing function or useless form?
The current MacBook Pro (2016/2017 versions) :
1. Still has a Headphone Jack. Please try to keep up.
2. Has a GPU that provides for the most External Display capability in a "mobile" GPU. Which is why Apple chose it.
3. Doesn't need no steenking USB-A or SD Slots; it has (in the 15" version) 4 USB-C/TB 3 Ports that can easily and inexpensively be broken-out into an almost endless variety of up to FIFTY-SIX Legacy Ports, DEPENDING ON YOUR APPLICATION. That easily trumps ANY other Laptop's I/O capabilities, then, or now.
Toys for the rich and the hollywood industry, not the common users.
No.
TOOLS for the Pros, not the common users.
They already HAVE the MacBook Air, Mac mini, MacBook and iMac (not to mention the iPads) for that market segment.
Please try to keep up.
design a single application that works with a touchscreen or mouse and trackpad
So ... it will only work with a touch screen because that will be the least common denominator?
Why do we even have keyboards now? Let's deprecate them also.