Has anyone seen Hidden Figures? Back when NASA was preparing to launch their first satellite, "Computer" was someone's job title. Someone who sat at a desk all day solving equations and formulas all day. If you asked someone back then, where's the computer, they'd point to the desk's seat, not the desktop. Exactly!
The meaning of many words change over time. Get over it! It's self centered and ignorant to assume that one's current vernacular will remain unchanged in the future.
That pisses off a lot of Mac users. See the MacRumors forums if you don't believe me. Mac mini was last updated in 2012. It was downgraded in 2014. Apple is on the verge of killing the MacBook Air even if their new butterfly keyboards are crap, they're so obsessed with USB-C that they're dropping USB-A even though a lot of people still ASK for them. Don't like the overpriced MacBook? Buy an overpriced MacBook Pro instead! It's like they think everyone is as rich as americans. Mac Pro? They released a freakin' no-future-upgrade-path of a cylinder tower instead. Would have been cool for a Mac mini, pointless for pros.
Tim Cook really does seem to think iPads can replace computers, including Macs.
But most people with a Mac need to have it, just as PC users need their PC. Whatever your choice of OS, computers are tools to work with, not toys to consume data.
If a stupid tablet was enough, we'd buy tablets!
Boo hoo.
If you can't afford a new cable for your USB-A device, or a $3 passive adapter, then you're the one with a problem, luddite.
People whined about the iMac when it ditched floppies and serial ports.
Two years later, you couldn't find a printer or scanner that used a serial port, nor a laptop with a floppy drive.
It's all about making iOS the dominant platform. You can see it in the way Apple deals/supports its Mac line compared to the iOS devices. You can see where it gets its revenue (75% or more from iOS). The "computer" - OSX - is a thing of the past, to be dropped into the dustbin as soon as they can replace all its functionality. Right now, Apple considers a Mac simply a means to build tools for iOS - but once iOS on an iPad Pro can do that - the Mac will go bye-bye.
Sure, moron.
That's why they just released an 18-core iMac; because you need that for iOS development.
That's why they are completely revamping the Mac Pro to make it "modular". Because you need that for iOS development.
You're one toxic piece of misinformed and misinforming Apple Hate.
How is this news? If you follow any tech news outlet, you know that every piece of Apple news is immediately jumped on by a rabid pack of trolls. For whatever reason, Apple anti-fans are the biggest vocal minority on the internet.
Because they all are jobless neckbeards, with nothing better to do than post their slime from their parents' basements.
WHY can't a bunch of computer nerds figure out how to fix the mobile site? If it can't handle posting a apostrophe then maybe they should just take the mobile site down. This is crazy!
I have never understood why Slashdot has the most antediluvian comment system on the entire internet. It's like it's 1997 in here!
A computer is a device that is user-programmable, aka you are not restricted to the apps found in the vendor's app store. The iPad is a content delivery mechanism much like a BluRay player (which has games too thanks to BD-J)
Wrong. 1. You can write apps yourself with XCode that will never be in the App Store.
2. You can write Apps yourself on the iPad with Swift Playgrounds that will never be in the App Store.
No, it's not a computer. A computer can carry out an arbitrary set of instructions. An iPad can not, and will only do those things which Apple blesses.
Really?
You can't write something in Swift Playgrounds, or in XCode, and run it on an iPad?
That sounds like a limitation in your brain, not the iPad.
I hate to tell you but an ipad IS a computer. Just because the packaging of the computer is different doesn't mean it isn't a computer. Just like your cell phone is a computer. It has a processor, memory, operating system, drive... sound like a computer?
Your fucking microwave oven has a microcontroller, with an embedded processor, memory and several other peripheral subsystems.
Does that make it a "computer"?
No it does not.
Having said that, I would also argue that an iPad (or similar tablet) likely would fit the definition of "general-purpose computing device".
I love HyperCard and HyperTalk; but it does NOT have nearly the "Natural Language" properties that Bill Atkinson and Dan Winkler thought it did. And as far as "wordiness", COBOL has NOTHING on HyperTalk!!!
Proof: One has to look no further than AppleScript, which is the syntactic kissing-cousin of HyperTalk.
That, then, raises a second question: If Apple didn't want to, or couldn't remember how to, reach back into the 80s and 90s, why not beef up AppleScript?
It's still an integral part of current OS releases, provides some level of natural text entry (or at least has DWIM syntax that's approachable by English-speaking beginners), and should provide a foundation for interfaces and modification easily enough.
There's so much that could have been done with AppleScript and OSA in general that hasn't... And yet here they are reinventing things again. Apple 2017 truly is reminiscent of Apple 1993.
Well, one thing that AppleScript ISN'T is FAST. Never was, never will be.
And there has been some interest in "updating" AppleScript, at least for iOS. Apple bought a company called "Workflow" about a year or so ago; but then... crickets. And the guy behind Automator, which is the GUI-implementation of AppleScript (kind of) for macOS, had his position eliminated; so?
Here's an interesting article on some of all this:
But FileMaker simply can't be beat for being able to bang-out a really decent-looking, and acting, application in almost zero time.
If all you want is to use it like Access, it might well be the best tool for the job. If you know you want web access out of the gate, I think it makes more sense to start with a CMS than a glorified desktop database. It was the right tool for the job at the time, but we weren't exposing it to the internet, either.
Even though they actually have the same roots (starting out as the long-forgotten "Microsoft File"), FileMaker whips all over Access AND takes its lunch money!
And FileMaker is kind of an interesting product. Closer to a Database that nearly anyone can create something useful-in. Used to have some serious limitations in its Scripting Language, and its approach to Relational Databases is, um, "unique"; but it has gotten steadily powerful over the years, and is a very good fit for a very large class of database-driven applications.
I wouldn't try to write an ERP system in it; but for one employer, I did create a huge amount (like over a hundred) applications for production scheduling, equipment maintenance and calibration scheduling, Engineering Change Notice system, QA Tracking and Discrepancy-Tracking and Resolution System, R&D Inventory-tracking and BOM-Builder for new product designs, help-desk ticket-tracking, and even a custom labeling system that could not be replaced with ANY off-the-shelf package for over 12 years.
Even though I have moved on, I recently heard that most, if not all, of those FileMaker-based applications are still in use today, a couple of DECADES later. I did finally find and use BarTender to replace my FileMaker-based custom labeling system, though.
But never write-off FileMaker as "just another Access-like Database". The mere fact that it is decidedly cross-platform makes it WAY more useful than that bitch-ass Access EVER was!
Surprised you don't know his name, Wyden has always been good on issues like encryption and is too often one of the very few voices of reason in Congress on some of these issues.
I have probably heard his name before, but before this article, it didn't "register".
That's the man that thought removing a headphone jack from a cellphone is a good idea and that having non-replaceable batteries are what customers want.
Who in their sane mind listens to an imbecile like that?
Ever seen the unit sales of iPhones, even those without a headphone jack?
And virtually NO phone has a removable battery. But in iPhones (and many others) they ARE replaceable.
I know Cook isn't an engineer, but what he is talking about has plagued computing from the start, engineers are notoriously bad at thinking out other aspects of things. This is why modern smartphones are so popular - the technology is mostly invisible. What he says is absolutely true. Now they must deal with the fact that, rightfully, *not everyone is interested in learning to code or becoming an engineer*. Kinda seems like the same clueless phenomenon all over again, yes?
Actually, Tim Cook not only has an Engineering Degree (surprised?); but he actually knows how to CODE:
Programmers are the bottleneck of the digital economy. Scare and valuable resources. So the master plan looks good!
1. Design a fun and easy language to develop powerful applications 2. Get the kids hooked on it (meaning Dad and Mom has to pay to by a Mac AND the school too) 3. Say: hey! you can put your first app on the AppStore and maybe earn monies 4. Get more adult programmers trained on Apple only dev env. 5. $$$ 6. Create another new and fun and easier language and deprecate the previous one 7. Sell migration tools and other training courses 8. $$$
Apple Open-Sourced Swift, you tool.
How does that promote Apple Lock-In, as you are alluding-to?
I am sure there is an intelligent comment in there somewhere; does anybody have any idea what he means?
I think he's referring not to the language's syntax (which isn't all that different from many other computer languages) but rather to Apple's approach to teaching the language, which involves interactive playgrounds rather than the traditional "type in a few paragraphs of mysterious text into a blank IDE and hope something happens" approach.
To me it looks like Javascript on top of ObjC with a little bit of Rust syntax here and there. Not really all that revolutionary. The thing it does for newcomers (young or old) is that it takes the C feel out of iPhone development.
Translation: I didn't invent it, so it sucks balls.
Back when people wrote code in Objective C it was easy to have some Objective C for the iOS UI, some Java for the Android UI and a big gob of portable C/C++.
Now if they write the whole app in Swift it will be easier to get it running on iOS. And it seems like there are various projects to get Swift running on Android too.
I.e. Apple have something which is a competitor to writing everything in C# and using Xamarin to target both platforms.
Xamarin has always seemed a bit horrid to me frankly. And doing the 'big gob of portable C/C++ with two sets of UI code is also horrid.
If Apple can build a platform that people use for IOS apps knowing they can run well on Android they've got a pretty compelling platform. And if it turns out not to work very well on Android they've got more iOS exclusive applications.
And unlike his predecessor, Tim Cook actually CAN code:
There is plenty of programming that has absolutely noting to do with math.
And also: assuming that one who is good at math is also good at programming is bollocks.
I'll second, third, and FORTH that!
I absolutely SUCK at math; but LOGIC is not Math, per se; and am GREAT at Logic. And have been making my living doing Software Development from Assembly Language on up, for almost 50 years.
To be fair, Apple BASIC had a nice onramp to assembly. You weren't going to make music, for example, without knowing a little about PEEK and POKE.
That prepared me to walk off a similar cliff from C to PC assembly a few years later. (I didn't notice I was walking on air until coworkers pointed it out.)
And it didn't hurt that the Apple ][ had a built-in 6502 mini-assembler!
*F666G FTW!!!
Here it is running on a later-model Apple//e, but it was actually in the ROMs of the original Apple ][.
Slashdot Mirror
Apart from the $5000 iMac and Mac Pro, Apple sells Facebook machines with limited RAM and ports.
16 GB is the top end for MANY laptops, and there is no other laptop with as much I/O expandability as the 2016/2017 MacBook Pro.
Has anyone seen Hidden Figures? Back when NASA was preparing to launch their first satellite, "Computer" was someone's job title. Someone who sat at a desk all day solving equations and formulas all day. If you asked someone back then, where's the computer, they'd point to the desk's seat, not the desktop.
Exactly!
The meaning of many words change over time. Get over it! It's self centered and ignorant to assume that one's current vernacular will remain unchanged in the future.
That pisses off a lot of Mac users. See the MacRumors forums if you don't believe me. Mac mini was last updated in 2012. It was downgraded in 2014. Apple is on the verge of killing the MacBook Air even if their new butterfly keyboards are crap, they're so obsessed with USB-C that they're dropping USB-A even though a lot of people still ASK for them. Don't like the overpriced MacBook? Buy an overpriced MacBook Pro instead! It's like they think everyone is as rich as americans. Mac Pro? They released a freakin' no-future-upgrade-path of a cylinder tower instead. Would have been cool for a Mac mini, pointless for pros.
Tim Cook really does seem to think iPads can replace computers, including Macs.
But most people with a Mac need to have it, just as PC users need their PC. Whatever your choice of OS, computers are tools to work with, not toys to consume data.
If a stupid tablet was enough, we'd buy tablets!
Boo hoo.
If you can't afford a new cable for your USB-A device, or a $3 passive adapter, then you're the one with a problem, luddite.
People whined about the iMac when it ditched floppies and serial ports.
Two years later, you couldn't find a printer or scanner that used a serial port, nor a laptop with a floppy drive.
Get over it. Time marches on.
It's all about making iOS the dominant platform. You can see it in the way Apple deals/supports its Mac line compared to the iOS devices. You can see where it gets its revenue (75% or more from iOS). The "computer" - OSX - is a thing of the past, to be dropped into the dustbin as soon as they can replace all its functionality. Right now, Apple considers a Mac simply a means to build tools for iOS - but once iOS on an iPad Pro can do that - the Mac will go bye-bye.
Sure, moron.
That's why they just released an 18-core iMac; because you need that for iOS development.
That's why they are completely revamping the Mac Pro to make it "modular". Because you need that for iOS development.
You're one toxic piece of misinformed and misinforming Apple Hate.
Go away.
How is this news? If you follow any tech news outlet, you know that every piece of Apple news is immediately jumped on by a rabid pack of trolls. For whatever reason, Apple anti-fans are the biggest vocal minority on the internet.
Because they all are jobless neckbeards, with nothing better to do than post their slime from their parents' basements.
WHY can't a bunch of computer nerds figure out how to fix the mobile site? If it can't handle posting a apostrophe then maybe they should just take the mobile site down. This is crazy!
I have never understood why Slashdot has the most antediluvian comment system on the entire internet. It's like it's 1997 in here!
A computer is a device that is user-programmable, aka you are not restricted to the apps found in the vendor's app store. The iPad is a content delivery mechanism much like a BluRay player (which has games too thanks to BD-J)
Wrong.
1. You can write apps yourself with XCode that will never be in the App Store.
2. You can write Apps yourself on the iPad with Swift Playgrounds that will never be in the App Store.
No, it's not a computer. A computer can carry out an arbitrary set of instructions. An iPad can not, and will only do those things which Apple blesses.
Really?
You can't write something in Swift Playgrounds, or in XCode, and run it on an iPad?
That sounds like a limitation in your brain, not the iPad.
I hate to tell you but an ipad IS a computer. Just because the packaging of the computer is different doesn't mean it isn't a computer. Just like your cell phone is a computer. It has a processor, memory, operating system, drive... sound like a computer?
Your fucking microwave oven has a microcontroller, with an embedded processor, memory and several other peripheral subsystems.
Does that make it a "computer"?
No it does not.
Having said that, I would also argue that an iPad (or similar tablet) likely would fit the definition of "general-purpose computing device".
Its 2018 not 2008 grandpa. Linux printing works great now. Thanks Apple for your work on cups.
Which they COULD have snatched-away from the Open Source world.
But didn't.
And in fact, just announced that they are switching it to the Apache 2.0 License.
Remember that, Apple Haters.
I fail to see how this makes news on slashdot oh wait it's anti apple that might be how
It's not even anti-Apple, we already know Apple only makes toys for the mentally impaired.
You know what's the definition of "mentally impaired"?
Calling the most successful company of ANY type on the planet a "Toymaker for the mentally impaired".
Congratulations you invented LOGO!
Or, they could've dug through their own software catalogue:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HyperCard
I love HyperCard and HyperTalk; but it does NOT have nearly the "Natural Language" properties that Bill Atkinson and Dan Winkler thought it did. And as far as "wordiness", COBOL has NOTHING on HyperTalk!!!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Proof: One has to look no further than AppleScript, which is the syntactic kissing-cousin of HyperTalk.
That, then, raises a second question: If Apple didn't want to, or couldn't remember how to, reach back into the 80s and 90s, why not beef up AppleScript?
It's still an integral part of current OS releases, provides some level of natural text entry (or at least has DWIM syntax that's approachable by English-speaking beginners), and should provide a foundation for interfaces and modification easily enough.
There's so much that could have been done with AppleScript and OSA in general that hasn't... And yet here they are reinventing things again. Apple 2017 truly is reminiscent of Apple 1993.
Well, one thing that AppleScript ISN'T is FAST. Never was, never will be.
And there has been some interest in "updating" AppleScript, at least for iOS. Apple bought a company called "Workflow" about a year or so ago; but then... crickets. And the guy behind Automator, which is the GUI-implementation of AppleScript (kind of) for macOS, had his position eliminated; so?
Here's an interesting article on some of all this:
https://www.macworld.com/artic...
But FileMaker simply can't be beat for being able to bang-out a really decent-looking, and acting, application in almost zero time.
If all you want is to use it like Access, it might well be the best tool for the job. If you know you want web access out of the gate, I think it makes more sense to start with a CMS than a glorified desktop database. It was the right tool for the job at the time, but we weren't exposing it to the internet, either.
Even though they actually have the same roots (starting out as the long-forgotten "Microsoft File"), FileMaker whips all over Access AND takes its lunch money!
And FileMaker is kind of an interesting product. Closer to a Database that nearly anyone can create something useful-in. Used to have some serious limitations in its Scripting Language, and its approach to Relational Databases is, um, "unique"; but it has gotten steadily powerful over the years, and is a very good fit for a very large class of database-driven applications.
I wouldn't try to write an ERP system in it; but for one employer, I did create a huge amount (like over a hundred) applications for production scheduling, equipment maintenance and calibration scheduling, Engineering Change Notice system, QA Tracking and Discrepancy-Tracking and Resolution System, R&D Inventory-tracking and BOM-Builder for new product designs, help-desk ticket-tracking, and even a custom labeling system that could not be replaced with ANY off-the-shelf package for over 12 years.
Even though I have moved on, I recently heard that most, if not all, of those FileMaker-based applications are still in use today, a couple of DECADES later. I did finally find and use BarTender to replace my FileMaker-based custom labeling system, though.
But never write-off FileMaker as "just another Access-like Database". The mere fact that it is decidedly cross-platform makes it WAY more useful than that bitch-ass Access EVER was!
Surprised you don't know his name, Wyden has always been good on issues like encryption and is too often one of the very few voices of reason in Congress on some of these issues.
I have probably heard his name before, but before this article, it didn't "register".
I found it ordinary, I didn't say it sucks balls. What are you 12?
Just emulating the usual Slashdot-speak.
I am glad that Wyden had the courage to call out the crap that the FBI has been spewing.
Me too!!!
That's the man that thought removing a headphone jack from a cellphone is a good idea and that having non-replaceable batteries are what customers want.
Who in their sane mind listens to an imbecile like that?
Ever seen the unit sales of iPhones, even those without a headphone jack?
And virtually NO phone has a removable battery. But in iPhones (and many others) they ARE replaceable.
I know Cook isn't an engineer, but what he is talking about has plagued computing from the start, engineers are notoriously bad at thinking out other aspects of things. This is why modern smartphones are so popular - the technology is mostly invisible. What he says is absolutely true. Now they must deal with the fact that, rightfully, *not everyone is interested in learning to code or becoming an engineer*. Kinda seems like the same clueless phenomenon all over again, yes?
Actually, Tim Cook not only has an Engineering Degree (surprised?); but he actually knows how to CODE:
https://www.macrumors.com/2018...
So there!
Good move from Apple serving his own interests !
Programmers are the bottleneck of the digital economy. Scare and valuable resources. So the master plan looks good!
1. Design a fun and easy language to develop powerful applications
2. Get the kids hooked on it (meaning Dad and Mom has to pay to by a Mac AND the school too)
3. Say: hey! you can put your first app on the AppStore and maybe earn monies
4. Get more adult programmers trained on Apple only dev env.
5. $$$
6. Create another new and fun and easier language and deprecate the previous one
7. Sell migration tools and other training courses
8. $$$
Apple Open-Sourced Swift, you tool.
How does that promote Apple Lock-In, as you are alluding-to?
I am sure there is an intelligent comment in there somewhere; does anybody have any idea what he means?
I think he's referring not to the language's syntax (which isn't all that different from many other computer languages) but rather to Apple's approach to teaching the language, which involves interactive playgrounds rather than the traditional "type in a few paragraphs of mysterious text into a blank IDE and hope something happens" approach.
BINGO!
Of course not. If the CEO of Apple says something, that DOES mean he's full of shit.
You can say that; but he still knows how to code:
https://www.macrumors.com/2018...
To me it looks like Javascript on top of ObjC with a little bit of Rust syntax here and there. Not really all that revolutionary. The thing it does for newcomers (young or old) is that it takes the C feel out of iPhone development.
Translation: I didn't invent it, so it sucks balls.
I dunno, I think he's smarter than he looks.
Consider.
Back when people wrote code in Objective C it was easy to have some Objective C for the iOS UI, some Java for the Android UI and a big gob of portable C/C++.
Now if they write the whole app in Swift it will be easier to get it running on iOS. And it seems like there are various projects to get Swift running on Android too.
E.g.
https://medium.com/@ephemer/ho...
I.e. Apple have something which is a competitor to writing everything in C# and using Xamarin to target both platforms.
Xamarin has always seemed a bit horrid to me frankly. And doing the 'big gob of portable C/C++ with two sets of UI code is also horrid.
If Apple can build a platform that people use for IOS apps knowing they can run well on Android they've got a pretty compelling platform. And if it turns out not to work very well on Android they've got more iOS exclusive applications.
And unlike his predecessor, Tim Cook actually CAN code:
https://www.macrumors.com/2018...
And even better, his example in the above article sounds like it was a real-time control application, which has its own special difficulties.
There is plenty of programming that has absolutely noting to do with math.
And also: assuming that one who is good at math is also good at programming is bollocks.
I'll second, third, and FORTH that!
I absolutely SUCK at math; but LOGIC is not Math, per se; and am GREAT at Logic. And have been making my living doing Software Development from Assembly Language on up, for almost 50 years.
To be fair, Apple BASIC had a nice onramp to assembly. You weren't going to make music, for example, without knowing a little about PEEK and POKE.
That prepared me to walk off a similar cliff from C to PC assembly a few years later. (I didn't notice I was walking on air until coworkers pointed it out.)
And it didn't hurt that the Apple ][ had a built-in 6502 mini-assembler!
*F666G FTW!!!
Here it is running on a later-model Apple //e, but it was actually in the ROMs of the original Apple ][.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...