Be Excellent To Each Other

I don't understand this argument. Are people incapable of shutting down their Twitter clients on normal computers, or something? Why is an iPad any more focused than running a full-screen maximised program on OS X or Windows or Linux?

I think he means that the 'few things well' approach to iPad versions of software allows you to focus better, not the single-tasking.

For example, I'm loathe to go for a crippled feature set in music software but I find on my full-spec DAW Pc I just fiddle with new things all the time and use things I've mastered as tools less often than I ought.

Having 3G on the go would be lovely but I can't afford a 3G account on top of my mobile, and anyway I live in East Yorkshire where they don't really have 3G.

There's the odd deal-breaker...

Has anyone got an iPad and a Linux PC?

What do they do for connectivity?

/edit Ubuntu supports iOS connctivity out of the box, apparently. Will check this is true of drag and drop...


..../edit 2 no, apparently a proprietary system of file management is used on iPad to prevent drag/drop compatibility because Apple are just cunts. Also enhancing their utter cuntery is a habit of iOS updates breaking compatibility with Ubuntu. As per all wilfully obstructive and divisive computer companies, Apple's rotten behaviour only serves to keep the linux coders sharp finding quick new solutions.


It's really disappointing, investigating the cutting edge of modern consumer computing. You can have affordabl hardware but nothing good is available for it, even though power requirements are met. Getting the really good software involves a willingness to pay top dollar then another £25 for a fucking USB port, install malware on your PC and not use any of the file formats that every other device you've got is fine with.

I might go for the cheapest of the next iPad iteration purely to allow me the access to the software library for it, with no expectation of playing divx files or using it as a music player or anything else normal. It's such a shame, for £400 I bloody well should be able to do what I want, and I feel that taking this option will be rewarding miserable bastards.

I think that's stopped now. It doesn't install QuickTime on Windows now, I'm fairly sure, and I think someone said the Safari prompting has stopped too.

It's not "sneaky installation" though. It's a persistent prompt to install Safari everytime you update iTunes, sure, and it's annoying, but it doesn't install anything unless you tell it to.

Yeah, by "sneaky" I just mean that because you're re-installing the full lot so often (every time an update comes out), you sometimes forget to un-tick the "Install Safari and QuickTime?" box.

I've had to reinstall Windows from scratch because iTunes installed some shit that wouldn't go, some updater software that runs in the background or other. I won't have anything auto-updating in the background, ever. Software can phone home when booted for use, fine, but anything else can fuck right off. I decide what I have running on my PC at any given time, not Apple or anyone else.

If iTunes installs nothing at all other than itself and doesn't insist on having Quicktime (I use Quicktime alternative) or safari or any other useless shit like that then that'd be an acceptable state of affairs, other than I should be able to use whatever media player I like to copy stuff to mobile devices, seeing as I could in the late nineties.

I suspect that no matter what, some little thing in processes will be an immovable update checker.

WTB - why bother updating the software at all if the old one works?

Don't buy an iPad, GY.

Or have a VM with windows and iTunes installed on it, and just use that.

I already have VM for ropey stuff, evaluating warez, etc.

In any case, I'm waiting to see what the new one is like. It might be drag/drop capable and Alyson Hannigan flavoured.

I was planning on nicking one... apparently there's this cottage in Derbyshire full of drunk nerds my mates are hoping to turn over later in the year.

Highly unlikely I reckon, it's an ideological choice from Apple, rather than a technical limitation.

Ideological my shitty bumhole. Compatibility is a naturally occurring thing once you pump electricity into a device. USB ports spontaneously manifest in all tech. This shit has to be excised forcefully and if you don't cackle at henchmen while doing it, the ports and codecs grow back by themselves.

Are you on their books or something?

No-one said it was a good or valid ideology.

No-one said it was a good or valid ideology.

There's something implicit there though, eh?

Edit | Preferences | Untick Check for new software updates automatically

How do you install drivers or compatibility software layers for arbitrary hardware on a device with a sealed OS and no user access to kernel modules? You can't, this is bigger than just compatability; it cuts to the heart of what the iPad is and isn't. Don't bank on it getting any more open.

Maybe ideological isn't the right word.

They're using the fact that people like iPods and iPhones and iPads to get iTunes/their other software installed on PCs, and force people to use it.

I didn't say it was a good thing.

That's completely wrong. If it was right, Apple wouldn't have devoted significant effort to reducing the reliance on iTunes in iOS 5 to a fraction of what it once was.

How come all pre-iOS iPods required iTunes?

Edit: And by reduced requirement, you mean that there is some stuff that you used to be forced to use iTunes to do, that now you aren't. That's not at all the same as not being forced to use iTunes any more. You're still forced to use it, just less frequently.

So Apple didn't need to support more than one sync solution.


Off the top of my head, you only need iTunes now for transferring photos shot on other devices, for some app-specific file transfer, and for music and video transfer for files not purchased through the Apple store. It is perfectly possibly to use an iOS device for its entire life without installing iTunes, so no, you are not "forced to use it" any more.

So they force you to use it if you want to use music, video, ebooks and other things not bought through them.

Almost as if not having to use iTunes is an incentive to buy stuff through them and them alone, so that they get their cut.

USB mass storage drivers have been standard for a decade. Supporting that would be simplicity itself.

Yeah, that's basically my point. They've chosen not to let people do drag and drop, rather than been unable too.

There's probably a range of reasons for that, but it's at least partly a commercial decision.

It is a commercial decision but also a user decision. The average customer for an iPad is, to be blunt, a technological incompetent. You or I could drag and drop files into a folder marked "MP3s" or something (leaving aside the coding required to organise and make it play nicely in the media player once it is there) but the device is sold on simplicity, not technology.

Oh, quite - I'm not arguing with why they do it, it's a usability no-brainer. I'm not a fan of any argument that there's a technology reason behind it, is all.

Apple are adverse to exposing the underlying file structure any, right? They'd rather you just save and let the system decide where to store things. I suspect a drag and drop system wouldn't jibe nicely with that.

I'm not arguing there's a technical reason. I'm arguing it's not a SINISTAR CONSPIRACY.

I think I'm wanting one wrong.

Actually, both. The software is often focussed and bloat-free, but I do also enjoy the single-tasking. I'm well aware you can shut everything down on a Mac or PC, but I'm easily distracted when working. The iPad forces me to concentrate on one task.


Same here. That's why I now write in stripped-back writing tools, and also why I in part compose new songs in NanoStudio and Animoog. There's still muso-arsing-about potential, but less so than on Mac DAWs.


That surprises me. I always thought iTunes ran on top of QuickTime and couldn't work without it.


I've never really understood some people's infatuation with drag-and-drop to media players and things like iPads. I have 70 GB of music in iTunes. I can't imagine ever having the time and patience to manage that via drag-and-drop; and for other files, iOS apps are sandboxed anyway, so there's no shared storage. (You can, however, use Dropbox with many apps, and you can also sideload into any app's ~/Documents folder by using iExplorer and similar tools.)


Increasingly so, yes. And my guess is that in a decade or less, file systems are going to appear as quaint and/or archaic to people as cassette tapes do to most people now. (I couldn't do without my file system for the most part, however, due to being an old git.)

I live for hierarchical folder structures

Current odds at skybet...

- Will the iPad 3 have a Retina Display?
Yes: 1/8 - Max bet: £1,600
No: 9/2 - Max bet: £44.44

Ah, now... what if the iPad that comes out Wednesday is the 2S... and the 3 comes out in a year with a retina display (may not include actual retinas)?

Luckily bookies don't ever have to pay out if they don't want to. With tech bets like that it's a terminological minefield of nomenclature shenanigans.

I should think that the only thing that would matter is if it comes out and Apple say it has a Retina display (note capital R).

Very good question. I would expect the bookies to only pay out if it is called the iPad 3 and has a Retina display.

Whereas I clearly stated "this time around".

Indeed. Bet still stands on those terms, I just thought the odds were interesting

While there's a fair chance they are right, they didn't do much to validate their assumptions. A very quick google reveals a ton of monitor that will support 2048x1536. At no point do they provide any evidence that the devices showing as running iOS 6 in the logs and the devices showing as 2048x1536 in Analytics are the same device.

So - probably correct, but poor analysis.

Also, Retina display iPhones specifically report their screen resolution as 480x320, not 960x640. So this is inconsistent.

Tomorrow we find out one way or t'other.

Money where your mouth is, folks!

Typo:

In the error message when sending the tweet goes wrong it says "copy and pastet". You don't get the option to retry, but the "Can we tweet this for you remains". (Using Chrome)

I wish I knew what the fuck caused that. Was your code displaying properly?

Tweet sending failed for me and i lost my code on trying to refresh to try I'll try again when I get to work.

Official control pad addon. DO IT

Doesn't want to tweet my code at all. Here it is for future reference.

NAME3DISP++GB=CAM++CPU+GPU+RAM=LTE-BT=SIRI+PRICE=IPAD2~IPADMIN-HOME=MSOFF-OMT_O