There are many who hate the idea of form over function, and people also hate people claiming that they invented something that was already around before they made their claim. Apple only takes ideas that others have come up with and then put them in a pretty package, but that does not mean they invented the idea. This is why Apple needs to be taken down a few pegs as far as the public perception, because they are NOT being terribly innovative. Being the first to jump on a new technology that another company has invented also does not make them innovative.
True innovation tends to come from those who actually develop new technologies, including but not limited to Intel, AMD, Microsoft, and many others. Notice that MacOS is still on version 10, and no small addition of features over the years will change that, iOS has not really changed much in terms of the UI, and any CHANGE has been fairly minor. Yea, innovation, it means trying something new, and it doesn't always pan out. Stagnation is when people or companies are stuck doing things the same way because people are afraid of change.
When you go to google.com, it encourages people to get Chrome. Firefox does not have that huge advertising push. I suspect that once people figure out that they have a choice to use something other than IE, they suddenly start looking around for what they like the best and then use THAT.
What we are seeing is version number inflation, and nothing more. AOL is the company that really drove this change, where a minor change to the UI or adding a minor feature caused a major version number change. For Firefox, from 4 to 14, the rendering engine has evolved, but most of the changes have been about the features, memory handling, etc, and has not been about major rendering engine upgrades. The same can be said for most companies with their products these days, where a minor cosmetic change will yield a change to the version number of the product.
Look at the Gecko engine version in the various versions of Firefox to track how quickly the BIG changes to Firefox come out.
The problem with your argument is that the problem is with the UI change, not in all the "technology" changes behind the scenes. I would NOT want to have to lean forward to use a touch screen when I can reach a keyboard and mouse far more easily. Why not let the main UI be different between devices based on user decision, and let it be left at that? Why FORCE a UI change when the UI should have very little to do with how the OS works? Keeping the OS itself uniform between platforms is fine, but the UI should be more appropriate for the design of the machine you are using.
Vista had two big INITIAL quality issues, and the UI was not one of them. Vista had poor driver quality issues at launch, including NVIDIA driver issues which resulted in over 30 percent of the BSoD problems. Between that, and it being more RAM hungry(2GB being the minimum you SHOULD have had), plus needing a bit of tuning, that is why there were so many performance issues in the first six months after launch.
People who had AMD based machines with AMD/ATI graphics and 2GB or more of RAM had very few problems with the changes in Vista.
Now, the big issue with Windows 8 is not the stuff behind the scenes, but is more about the doubt about if Metro is an acceptable UI for the desktop. What works best on a phone for a UI(not talking about the fundamental OS the UI sits on top of) is NOT going to work as well on a desktop. Even the idea of pushing touch screens on the desktop fails to understand that people will NOT want to be reaching out to touch a screen when they have a keyboard and mouse. It is all about controls, and a touch screen does not work as well on the desktop as it does on a hand-held device.
There is the added complexity when it comes to "obviousness" here as well. Thinner, or smaller for example can't be patented, because they are OBVIOUS improvements based on the laptop design getting smaller and thinner. The "home" button at the bottom might be something that could be a part of this(which Palm had beaten by the gesture area below the screen on the phones). The big thing is that unless you come up with something really really distinctive, these sorts of design patents should not be considered valid. The operation of a device should be seen as what makes a device different these days, and lets face it, Apple has iOS, which almost no other company would WANT to use. Modifications or even minor changes can make iOS unstable, which doesn't make iOS a great OS, and also explains why Apple is so strict about locking it down.
Except that Apple doesn't make and did not invent the items inside the case, they just license for early control of the manufacturing rights of parts invented by others. Samsung should just pay the money to do an early termination of parts for Apple, and watch Apple burn.
The problem for RIM has come from MANY sources when it comes to tablets. The first, that apps written for one Blackberry device do not automatically work on all Blackberry devices is a huge issue, and that makes it very difficult for developers and even consumers, because you never know if the app you want to use will work on your particular device. Now, tablet sales are almost directly in relation to how well the PHONES are selling, so the fact that RIM is having problems with their phone sales will also cause people not to bother buying the tablet.
Palm/HP had the same problem, where a lack of good advertising, combined with a low consumer mindshare for the webOS phones meant that people were not running out to by a Touchpad until the price came down to the $200 range. The $200 and under range is where people are willing to spend the money on a tablet without being concerned about apps and such, while a $400+ price means people need to WANT one before they spend the money.
There is one other issue that the tablet market has, the price of a normal laptop. If you can get a fully functional laptop running Windows 7 for $400, then why buy a tablet for $500 or more that in general won't be as functional? Reading books would go to the Kindle, or long battery life would be the big reasons, but what if you are not sure that a given product will do what you want it to do? This is where advertising, but also the need to generate HYPE for a product is needed, but prices really do seem a bit inflated in the tablet market, and that is the problem. Companies that want to compete with Apple need to be willing and able to sell products at virtually zero profit for three to five years to get enough market presence to increase prices. Sell tablets for $200, or offer financing to get the price down that people need to spend, and people will buy.
Applications are SLOWLY making better use of multiple core machines, and that means that as time goes forward, more cores makes for a better experience. The problem you are seeing, that many people are not stressing the system is caused by applications not making good use of system resources. In most cases, even multi-threaded apps are using what, two or three threads when they should be using six or more for what is being done.
Basically, we are seeing most developers failing to re-write applications to make better use of what systems can handle, and the lowest common denominator is what programs are designed to work with. Dual-core is the target, and things don't scale up for 4+ core machines for the most part. Once quad-core becomes the norm in another two to four years, then we can expect better use of hardware.
Now, you shouldn't be surprised that older users don't do much that would stress a modern system, but over time, that will change.
If you are using a remote desktop, that eliminates the whole discussion about replacing your WORKSTATION at work with an android device+docking station in the first place. I was not saying that there is no point to a docking station approach in SOME situations, but if the idea is to replace your normal workstation with an android device plus docking station, that generally won't work.
If you have a desktop machine as a workstation ALREADY, you don't need a docking station for your phone/tablet. If you are looking at something like an intelligent "terminal", then the question is if the docking station for your phone is more cost effective compared to a thin-client or even a low-end workstation. $350 for a docking station for your phone, or $350 for a real computer that will run your apps natively with a workstation that can be locked down for security?
Palm/HP had come up with the perfect solution for this already in the concept of "Tap to Share", which would allow a HP Pre 3 to tap the screen of the HP Touchpad, and have whatever web page, text messages, and so on to sync across to the other device. That would do the job here as well since the idea of a "docking station" doesn't end up being terribly cost effective when screen, keyboard, and other connectors add so much to the cost of devices anyway.
Many offices need more than just general compatibility with MS Office, but need it to be 100 percent in terms of format and such. This is what many people forget, that "it does this" is NOT the same as doing it well, or properly. How many times have you seen comparisons between the advertised product and more established products with a check-box list of features, but people who use the features discover that how well a used feature WORKS is more important than just having the feature available.
The idea of a docking station is good, but people are currently treating phone or tablet applications from the point of "good enough for phones", and don't look at the question of "is it good enough to replace what is used in the office?" question. Openoffice, or Libreoffice are decent for document editing, yet you don't see these used as the primary office suites used in offices. The same applies here, replacing what is used in an office, is it good enough, and compatible enough.
Palm had come up with this sort of thing called the Foleo. It never took off, but since HP bought Palm(and then killed it), HP does have access to the idea as well. The issue I have with the article is that performance has never really been evaluated in a proper comparison between an ARM based laptop and an AMD or Intel based laptop. What is acceptable on a phone or tablet may not seem enough for the normal load put on a laptop.
This is where you run into problems. The very idea of "The Internet" is a combination of many networks, some privately financed, and others publicly financed. In some countries, their national network is funded by taxes, while in others, it is ALL done by private businesses. This is where those who want to tax "The Internet" will run into trouble, because there isn't a central "Internet" that can be taxed at this point.
Anyone who connects to the Internet becomes a part of it, and if you see a market, there is nothing stopping YOU from providing Internet access in that market. It may have been started as a government sponsored network, but it has evolved so far beyond that point, it can't be recognized as such anymore.
Software DOES wear out, when three OS versions later your old code no longer works without some sort of update. There are a fair number of custom apps out there that were written for Windows XP that will not work without modification under Windows Vista, and Windows XP mode is NOT a good long term solution in many situations. What happens when Windows 9 comes out, and Windows XP mode is no longer supported?
Even under Linux, or another UNIX-like OS, there does come a point where kernel and library changes will make older binaries not run, and a re-compile would be needed, possibly with some code updates to handle changes. Even with a new Linux install, you need to be aware of what libraries are needed by your apps, and in five years, what libraries are "standard" vs. needed for your apps will potentially make setting up a new system that runs older programs more of a challenge. This is the sort of issue where support by application vendors is important. At that point, you start to wonder about the responsibility of the developer(s) to provide support.
These days, there is a growing issue of applications written for Windows XP that don't work under Vista or Windows 7. While Windows XP mode is fine for some things, it doesn't handle EVERYTHING, and won't take full advantage of the power of newer computers. So, you see these old apps needing to get updated, and some clients expect the original developer to just make a new version available for free. With Windows 8 this year, the compatibility issue will become even more of an issue here, so people want new versions of the software their company paid for.
The big problem is that when companies feel that their products are "good enough", they stop trying to improve things. 1920x1080 is the standard for TVs these days, so why bother making a larger screen that has a higher resolution? My feeling is that while higher and higher resolutions on SMALL screens are not needed, though getting your average display quality up to the point of the "Retina Display" isn't a horrible idea. At the same time, when phones all have the high end displays, it opens the door for 7 inch displays with a higher resolution, and then we will see 14 and 15.4/16 inch displays that will have that high quality, and then 23 inch screens, then up to 30, and so on.
Just because people don't pay attention does not mean that display or audio quality should NOT be improved. Many people didn't notice the difference between SD and HD television, but once they were watching HD for a while, going BACK to SD made them notice. The same will happen with display technologies, people may not pay attention to these things NOW, but once they make the transition, going back to inferior technologies will be painful.
It has nothing to do with the computer, but is all about how the display handles different resolutions. In the old days of CRT displays, the screen would support multiple modes. Trying to make a display use an "unsupported" resolution results in some VERY ugly results. What we have today are displays that have an "ideal" resolution, and you are penalized if you choose ANY other resolution.
There isn't anything wrong with them trying to develop a new and potentially better technology. I just want to see these better technologies make it to computer displays since I don't like the idea of being limited to 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 no matter how large the screen may be. Apple has ONE advantage in laptops and desktop machines right now, the high quality displays with higher resolutions. I am waiting for these to be the norm across the entire computer industry, not the exception.
You assume that battery technology will not improve over time. If/when carbon nanotube technology makes it into mass production, we may see that longer term battery life, or much more powerful mobile devices.
You clearly did not pay attention to the documentation for your Tomtom then. GPS overall can take three minutes or so to find your location(getting the info from satellites and then calculating your location, but also not knowing where the satellites are can take a few minutes). Tomtom has a download(if you actually hook your GPS up to your computer with the software installed) where you download the locations of the satellites, and this will reduce the time it takes to calculate your location down to under a minute.
When I don't bother to update my GPS for several months, it takes a few minutes to figure out where I am. That is when I know I need to do the update, and the problem goes away.
I wouldn't be too sure about that. Quad-core vs. dual-core makes a fair bit of difference. The storage system also makes a huge difference, so going SSD is worth it if you have the budget for one. Screen size is also an important thing since a larger screen is a better choice for many people, and not just for the improved resolution that TENDS to go with it.
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There are many who hate the idea of form over function, and people also hate people claiming that they invented something that was already around before they made their claim. Apple only takes ideas that others have come up with and then put them in a pretty package, but that does not mean they invented the idea. This is why Apple needs to be taken down a few pegs as far as the public perception, because they are NOT being terribly innovative. Being the first to jump on a new technology that another company has invented also does not make them innovative.
True innovation tends to come from those who actually develop new technologies, including but not limited to Intel, AMD, Microsoft, and many others. Notice that MacOS is still on version 10, and no small addition of features over the years will change that, iOS has not really changed much in terms of the UI, and any CHANGE has been fairly minor. Yea, innovation, it means trying something new, and it doesn't always pan out. Stagnation is when people or companies are stuck doing things the same way because people are afraid of change.
When you go to google.com, it encourages people to get Chrome. Firefox does not have that huge advertising push. I suspect that once people figure out that they have a choice to use something other than IE, they suddenly start looking around for what they like the best and then use THAT.
What we are seeing is version number inflation, and nothing more. AOL is the company that really drove this change, where a minor change to the UI or adding a minor feature caused a major version number change. For Firefox, from 4 to 14, the rendering engine has evolved, but most of the changes have been about the features, memory handling, etc, and has not been about major rendering engine upgrades. The same can be said for most companies with their products these days, where a minor cosmetic change will yield a change to the version number of the product.
Look at the Gecko engine version in the various versions of Firefox to track how quickly the BIG changes to Firefox come out.
That is lock-in caused by the idiots who write for ActiveX. Anyone else would have gone with something else that allows for some choice in browsers.
Strange, any app I open comes up as a full screen app without needing to move things around, unless I change it after the initial launch.
The problem with your argument is that the problem is with the UI change, not in all the "technology" changes behind the scenes. I would NOT want to have to lean forward to use a touch screen when I can reach a keyboard and mouse far more easily. Why not let the main UI be different between devices based on user decision, and let it be left at that? Why FORCE a UI change when the UI should have very little to do with how the OS works? Keeping the OS itself uniform between platforms is fine, but the UI should be more appropriate for the design of the machine you are using.
Vista had two big INITIAL quality issues, and the UI was not one of them. Vista had poor driver quality issues at launch, including NVIDIA driver issues which resulted in over 30 percent of the BSoD problems. Between that, and it being more RAM hungry(2GB being the minimum you SHOULD have had), plus needing a bit of tuning, that is why there were so many performance issues in the first six months after launch.
People who had AMD based machines with AMD/ATI graphics and 2GB or more of RAM had very few problems with the changes in Vista.
Now, the big issue with Windows 8 is not the stuff behind the scenes, but is more about the doubt about if Metro is an acceptable UI for the desktop. What works best on a phone for a UI(not talking about the fundamental OS the UI sits on top of) is NOT going to work as well on a desktop. Even the idea of pushing touch screens on the desktop fails to understand that people will NOT want to be reaching out to touch a screen when they have a keyboard and mouse. It is all about controls, and a touch screen does not work as well on the desktop as it does on a hand-held device.
There is the added complexity when it comes to "obviousness" here as well. Thinner, or smaller for example can't be patented, because they are OBVIOUS improvements based on the laptop design getting smaller and thinner. The "home" button at the bottom might be something that could be a part of this(which Palm had beaten by the gesture area below the screen on the phones). The big thing is that unless you come up with something really really distinctive, these sorts of design patents should not be considered valid. The operation of a device should be seen as what makes a device different these days, and lets face it, Apple has iOS, which almost no other company would WANT to use. Modifications or even minor changes can make iOS unstable, which doesn't make iOS a great OS, and also explains why Apple is so strict about locking it down.
Except that Apple doesn't make and did not invent the items inside the case, they just license for early control of the manufacturing rights of parts invented by others. Samsung should just pay the money to do an early termination of parts for Apple, and watch Apple burn.
The problem for RIM has come from MANY sources when it comes to tablets. The first, that apps written for one Blackberry device do not automatically work on all Blackberry devices is a huge issue, and that makes it very difficult for developers and even consumers, because you never know if the app you want to use will work on your particular device. Now, tablet sales are almost directly in relation to how well the PHONES are selling, so the fact that RIM is having problems with their phone sales will also cause people not to bother buying the tablet.
Palm/HP had the same problem, where a lack of good advertising, combined with a low consumer mindshare for the webOS phones meant that people were not running out to by a Touchpad until the price came down to the $200 range. The $200 and under range is where people are willing to spend the money on a tablet without being concerned about apps and such, while a $400+ price means people need to WANT one before they spend the money.
There is one other issue that the tablet market has, the price of a normal laptop. If you can get a fully functional laptop running Windows 7 for $400, then why buy a tablet for $500 or more that in general won't be as functional? Reading books would go to the Kindle, or long battery life would be the big reasons, but what if you are not sure that a given product will do what you want it to do? This is where advertising, but also the need to generate HYPE for a product is needed, but prices really do seem a bit inflated in the tablet market, and that is the problem. Companies that want to compete with Apple need to be willing and able to sell products at virtually zero profit for three to five years to get enough market presence to increase prices. Sell tablets for $200, or offer financing to get the price down that people need to spend, and people will buy.
Applications are SLOWLY making better use of multiple core machines, and that means that as time goes forward, more cores makes for a better experience. The problem you are seeing, that many people are not stressing the system is caused by applications not making good use of system resources. In most cases, even multi-threaded apps are using what, two or three threads when they should be using six or more for what is being done.
Basically, we are seeing most developers failing to re-write applications to make better use of what systems can handle, and the lowest common denominator is what programs are designed to work with. Dual-core is the target, and things don't scale up for 4+ core machines for the most part. Once quad-core becomes the norm in another two to four years, then we can expect better use of hardware.
Now, you shouldn't be surprised that older users don't do much that would stress a modern system, but over time, that will change.
If you are using a remote desktop, that eliminates the whole discussion about replacing your WORKSTATION at work with an android device+docking station in the first place. I was not saying that there is no point to a docking station approach in SOME situations, but if the idea is to replace your normal workstation with an android device plus docking station, that generally won't work.
If you have a desktop machine as a workstation ALREADY, you don't need a docking station for your phone/tablet. If you are looking at something like an intelligent "terminal", then the question is if the docking station for your phone is more cost effective compared to a thin-client or even a low-end workstation. $350 for a docking station for your phone, or $350 for a real computer that will run your apps natively with a workstation that can be locked down for security?
Palm/HP had come up with the perfect solution for this already in the concept of "Tap to Share", which would allow a HP Pre 3 to tap the screen of the HP Touchpad, and have whatever web page, text messages, and so on to sync across to the other device. That would do the job here as well since the idea of a "docking station" doesn't end up being terribly cost effective when screen, keyboard, and other connectors add so much to the cost of devices anyway.
Many offices need more than just general compatibility with MS Office, but need it to be 100 percent in terms of format and such. This is what many people forget, that "it does this" is NOT the same as doing it well, or properly. How many times have you seen comparisons between the advertised product and more established products with a check-box list of features, but people who use the features discover that how well a used feature WORKS is more important than just having the feature available.
The idea of a docking station is good, but people are currently treating phone or tablet applications from the point of "good enough for phones", and don't look at the question of "is it good enough to replace what is used in the office?" question. Openoffice, or Libreoffice are decent for document editing, yet you don't see these used as the primary office suites used in offices. The same applies here, replacing what is used in an office, is it good enough, and compatible enough.
Palm had come up with this sort of thing called the Foleo. It never took off, but since HP bought Palm(and then killed it), HP does have access to the idea as well. The issue I have with the article is that performance has never really been evaluated in a proper comparison between an ARM based laptop and an AMD or Intel based laptop. What is acceptable on a phone or tablet may not seem enough for the normal load put on a laptop.
This is where you run into problems. The very idea of "The Internet" is a combination of many networks, some privately financed, and others publicly financed. In some countries, their national network is funded by taxes, while in others, it is ALL done by private businesses. This is where those who want to tax "The Internet" will run into trouble, because there isn't a central "Internet" that can be taxed at this point.
Anyone who connects to the Internet becomes a part of it, and if you see a market, there is nothing stopping YOU from providing Internet access in that market. It may have been started as a government sponsored network, but it has evolved so far beyond that point, it can't be recognized as such anymore.
Software DOES wear out, when three OS versions later your old code no longer works without some sort of update. There are a fair number of custom apps out there that were written for Windows XP that will not work without modification under Windows Vista, and Windows XP mode is NOT a good long term solution in many situations. What happens when Windows 9 comes out, and Windows XP mode is no longer supported?
Even under Linux, or another UNIX-like OS, there does come a point where kernel and library changes will make older binaries not run, and a re-compile would be needed, possibly with some code updates to handle changes. Even with a new Linux install, you need to be aware of what libraries are needed by your apps, and in five years, what libraries are "standard" vs. needed for your apps will potentially make setting up a new system that runs older programs more of a challenge. This is the sort of issue where support by application vendors is important. At that point, you start to wonder about the responsibility of the developer(s) to provide support.
These days, there is a growing issue of applications written for Windows XP that don't work under Vista or Windows 7. While Windows XP mode is fine for some things, it doesn't handle EVERYTHING, and won't take full advantage of the power of newer computers. So, you see these old apps needing to get updated, and some clients expect the original developer to just make a new version available for free. With Windows 8 this year, the compatibility issue will become even more of an issue here, so people want new versions of the software their company paid for.
The mistake is in thinking that having their brains "on" would actually help. The problem is that we let stupid people reproduce.
The big problem is that when companies feel that their products are "good enough", they stop trying to improve things. 1920x1080 is the standard for TVs these days, so why bother making a larger screen that has a higher resolution? My feeling is that while higher and higher resolutions on SMALL screens are not needed, though getting your average display quality up to the point of the "Retina Display" isn't a horrible idea. At the same time, when phones all have the high end displays, it opens the door for 7 inch displays with a higher resolution, and then we will see 14 and 15.4/16 inch displays that will have that high quality, and then 23 inch screens, then up to 30, and so on.
Just because people don't pay attention does not mean that display or audio quality should NOT be improved. Many people didn't notice the difference between SD and HD television, but once they were watching HD for a while, going BACK to SD made them notice. The same will happen with display technologies, people may not pay attention to these things NOW, but once they make the transition, going back to inferior technologies will be painful.
It has nothing to do with the computer, but is all about how the display handles different resolutions. In the old days of CRT displays, the screen would support multiple modes. Trying to make a display use an "unsupported" resolution results in some VERY ugly results. What we have today are displays that have an "ideal" resolution, and you are penalized if you choose ANY other resolution.
There isn't anything wrong with them trying to develop a new and potentially better technology. I just want to see these better technologies make it to computer displays since I don't like the idea of being limited to 1920x1080 or 1920x1200 no matter how large the screen may be. Apple has ONE advantage in laptops and desktop machines right now, the high quality displays with higher resolutions. I am waiting for these to be the norm across the entire computer industry, not the exception.
You assume that battery technology will not improve over time. If/when carbon nanotube technology makes it into mass production, we may see that longer term battery life, or much more powerful mobile devices.
You clearly did not pay attention to the documentation for your Tomtom then. GPS overall can take three minutes or so to find your location(getting the info from satellites and then calculating your location, but also not knowing where the satellites are can take a few minutes). Tomtom has a download(if you actually hook your GPS up to your computer with the software installed) where you download the locations of the satellites, and this will reduce the time it takes to calculate your location down to under a minute.
When I don't bother to update my GPS for several months, it takes a few minutes to figure out where I am. That is when I know I need to do the update, and the problem goes away.
I wouldn't be too sure about that. Quad-core vs. dual-core makes a fair bit of difference. The storage system also makes a huge difference, so going SSD is worth it if you have the budget for one. Screen size is also an important thing since a larger screen is a better choice for many people, and not just for the improved resolution that TENDS to go with it.