Zawinski: iPad just-slightly insufficiently futurey

http://jwz.livejournal.com/1284712.html

by fogus • 16 years ago

92 60 16 years ago

jwz.livejournal.com

yanowitz• 16 years ago

Dammit. I keep resisting the lure of the iPad, but when jwz weighs in...

Must. Wait. For. Next. Version.

You know, the smaller one with the front facing camera. So my kids can do FaceTime with their grandparents.

Or the one with a (dare I hope) retina display. I guess that's probably a few versions out.

glhaynes2• 16 years ago

I think you're talking about an iPhone 4. :)

lancer383• 16 years ago

I would love to see Retina Display picture quality on iPad, but can you imagine the resolution of that screen?

Today the screen is 132 ppi - taking that up to 326 ppi would make it somewhere in the vicinity of 2528x1896. Would Safari then be blowing up web sites so ~960px width sites don't look tiny on that resolution?

ugh2• 16 years ago

Quadrupling the number of pixels is what they might do (in a few years). That’s 2048x1536. Quite high for a ten inch screen today but realistic in a few years. Also not quite iPhone territory but close. That would bring the resolution up to 264 ppi. The big question is whether they want to wait until they can make that kind of jump or whether they will increase the resolution before that.

jackvalentine• 16 years ago

My computer here is 146 DPI (1080p 15" screen) and I have everything blown up to 125% of it's original size so it isn't too small. So in answer to your question: Yes!

masklinn• 16 years ago

> Today the screen is 132 ppi - taking that up to 326 ppi would make it somewhere in the vicinity of 2528x1896.

They wouldn't actually do that. They'd "just" double the resolution so the applications can easily be scaled up losslessly, as with the iPhone 4. So you'd get a 2048x1536 screen at 264dpi (one thing to consider is that you'd probably hold your iPad further from your eyes than your iPhone, so the you can have slightly bigger pixels).

Modern hardware absolutely isn't able to provide such pixel densities on such a small surface at an affordable price, and even less able to drive those things using mobile CPUs and GPUs (we're talking about the resolution of your average 30" screen, which still kicks modern GPUs in the teeth)

cletus4• 16 years ago

The lack of a front facing camera is a common complaint but honestly (owning an iPad that I love and use all the time) I don't think the use case is as cut and dried as that.

Video calls are most often made with a desktop computer or laptop. Laptops have a camera at the top of the screen. Most Webcams are attached to the top of monitors. So you are typically eye level with a desktop webcam or just above with a laptop. That's a fairly natural position.

With an iPad it is most often put on a table, your lap, held in your arm on an armrest or your lap or propped up on your lap or chest when lying down.

All of these cases would have a highly unflattering view if using video. "Looking up someone's nostrils" is how I'd describe it. I could see it working in the keyboard dock, if you have that (which I don't) but that mimics a laptop setup.

I'm not saying they won't add a front facing camera but just think about the practicalities of it.

As for Gen 2, I've gotten so much use out of mine that I won't think twice about selling it to buy the new one. I simply use it that much that it's a complete no brainer. Few devices I own, other than my PC, get that much use.

I'd like to see more memory. Not because I need it but because more applications will be possible with it. I'd also like to see digital out. There is a VGA out connector but it's analog and has idiotic restrictions on it like you can't play iTunes video on it, I guess as an appeasement to the idiots at the MPAA.

But front facing camera? For me it's pretty low priority.

As far as form factor goes, there might be a smaller one. Rumours of a 7" iPad persist. I'm frankly unconvinced. Even if there was one I wouldn't buy one. A 10" screen for a portable device is truly wonderful. I'm not going backwards, I don't care how much lighter it might be.

And as far as Android/WebOS/Windows tablets go, my own view is that the competition is AT LEAST two years behind. Sure in the next 6 months you're going to see any number of crappy tablets coming out but it will be at least 1-2 years before they'll have the polish, battery life and especially the ecosystem of the iPad.

michaelbuckbee• 16 years ago

Not quite digital out, but with the new Apple TV (another 99 bucks to Steve) you should be able to play iTunes video through to your TV from your iPad via the AppleTV.

loewenskind4• 16 years ago

>I'm not going backwards, I don't care how much lighter it might be.

I agree. It doesn't weight much more than a paper tablet (or at least it doesn't feel like it) and that's one of the things it replaced for me. For me the size is perfect.

noja• 16 years ago

> I'm not saying they won't add a front facing camera but just think about the practicalities of it.

What if the camera wasn't fixed in one direction?

saurik• 16 years ago

I'd love to know what you actually do with yours. Every single use case I could come up with for the iPad was totally destroyed by the iPhone 4, which has 80% the resolution but fits in my pocket. If a new iPad came out with a reasonable screen I could totally see it being an awesome device, but at 1024x768 people really just need to learn to hold their iPhone 4 closer to their face.

rbanffy2• 16 years ago

I have set up my mother with a big Intergraph 21" from my collection (she is 75 and her eyes beg for big pixels). When I got X configured properly, the monitor started in 2048x1536.

I configured her account so that she got a humble 1024x768 screen, so she could read what appeared on the screen. I know I could just tell X to use twice as many dpi as it wants, but this was a lot simpler.

OTOH, when I have to use her computer, I am always surprised by the endless screen real-estate. And, with the pixel-density properly configured, fonts are exquisitely drawn. And that's on a somewhat big screen. I can only imagine what would happen on a iPad-sized thing.

jsz0• 16 years ago

One of the perks/tricks of Apple ownership is the hardware retains its value. When next year's model comes out I'll probably flip my iPad for ~$75-$100 less than I paid for it. (depends if Apple drops the price or not)

davidw• 16 years ago

... mind wanders...

I see the potential to merge two great internet themes: apple fans and gold bugs. Rather than harken to yesteryear, we should use Apple products as a "store of value"!

absconditus• 16 years ago

So you want the new iPod Touch?

http://www.apple.com/ipodtouch/

jwr• 16 years ago

No user that owns an iPad complains about the lack of a front-facing camera. Also, no user that has used an iPad for a week or so considers it to be equivalent to an iPhone.

Those aren't things you can explain — you have to experience using the iPad for several days to understand. It really is a different device from everything we are used to.

josefresco2• 16 years ago

I have an iPad but have never had an iPhone or even Android device. Not having a camera sucks as it completely rules out many apps that both myself and my kids would enjoy thoroughly. So I guess there's one iPad user that is complaining; me.

cletus4• 16 years ago

You saw this a lot in the early days of the iPad: there were opinions from those who had used the device and opinions from those who hadn't.

A lot of the second group didn't "get it". Once they used it many of them were convinced. Basically, those that haven't tried it tend to be more negative about it as a whole.

There is something about the experience that is hard to articulate. The feel of it, the convenience of it, the fact that's instant on, the UI... just the whole package really.

statictype• 16 years ago

It's an instant-on appliance with a real web browser and real mail reader on a real screen.

I guess that's the selling point right there. It's not a computer that requires booting and starting up system services and logging in. It's an appliance you can immediately turn on and start using.

weaksauce• 16 years ago

That is precisely the reason I love my iPad. (iPhone too when on the go)

_delirium2• 16 years ago

That particular point doesn't seem like a huge win to me, as someone who never shuts down his laptop. I just open the lid and it's on, then close the lid and it's "off". The form factor/weight seems like the bigger win, at least for me. Although if you're going to carry around a Bluetooth keyboard to use it, like jwz apparently does, that seems like it eats away at the advantages there a bit?

joezydeco• 16 years ago

Just curious: when you close the lid on your laptop, are you hibernating/sleeping, or is the CPU always running?

When I do the closelid/openlid thing on my Debian laptop, it takes a good 10-20 seconds for my wifi to reacquire...and that's after I log in. Then I need to tickle Chrome or my mail client to sync up. I'd say maybe 30 seconds before I can see new email or load a web page.

In playing with the iPad, I've found it just comes up right away and I can see mail in 10 seconds. I can also scoop the iPad off the counter with a drink and some other items and plop on the couch. Not as easy to do with my laptop.

ugh2• 16 years ago

Well, you sort of can use current laptops that way. I rebooted my MBP last two weeks ago (probably because of some update) and wake from sleep works reliably fast.

I can see how the much longer battery life and the much more compact and unintimidating appearance helps with that.

xal• 16 years ago

That being said, the ipad needs user profiles so badly it's not even funny.

wazoox• 16 years ago

Apple sells it as a personal device, so you have to buy one for each and every family member. Do you have user profiles on your phone? Of course you don't.

tomjen3• 16 years ago

By that estimate my computer is an appliance too - I just open the lid, and it is on.

Why more people don't do this, I don't know.

loewenskind4• 16 years ago

That is handy but it is not the same thing. When you close the lid things are getting written to the hard rive. This means you shouldn't move it around until the light starts "breathing" or you risk data loss (afaik this doesn't apply with an SD drive however). With the iPad there is no startup/shutdown time.

simonsarris• 16 years ago

How is that a selling point versus all of the other laptops and netbooks that can do the same? Almost all modern netbooks are like that now. Even my large HP Envy can do that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant_on

jakevoytko• 16 years ago

JWZ is wrong to count overheating against the iPad's futurey image. If cutting-edge consumer laptops are any indication, everything will overheat in the future. Cars will need a 4 minute iBreak on the way to work. Your lamp will throw off any color you want, but only for an hour at a time. And I have bad news about the coffee maker.

jacquesm• 16 years ago

> our lamp will throw off any color you want, but only for an hour at a time.

Unless you want infra-red, then it can do it all day long, right?

famousactress• 16 years ago

I'd add.. I was surprised how quickly touch typing came. I'm not nearly as fast as I am on a normal keyboard, but still much faster than my thumbs on an iPhone. Certainly fast enough to write chunky emails or blog posts.. if anything, the minor slowdown is an encouragement to write more vigorously.

megablast• 16 years ago

I expected bad things as well, but it very useful. You get used to not pressing as hard as you would on a normal keyboard, since you don't have to depress any buttons.

thought_alarm• 16 years ago

The keyboard is fine.

The problem is the complete lack of copyediting shortcuts. There are no keys for moving the cursor, or selecting next. There isn't even a forward-delete key.

When I write long text and long emails I will invariably need to go back and copyedit my work, and iOS gives me very little to make that job easier. (Android is even worse.)

It bugs me so much I actually drew up a prototype iPad keyboard [1].

3 years in with iOS and I'm still far more comfortable and productive writing long text on my Blackberry than on an iPhone or iPad.

[1] http://a.imageshack.us/img16/425/ipadarrowkeys.png

ZeroGravitas• 16 years ago

They probably need a new name for touch typing on glass, since the flat uninterrupted surface means you aren't typing by touch, and the size of the screen means you're almost certainly looking at the keyboard to some degree and touch typing implies you aren't.

daladd• 16 years ago

I'm of two minds re: jwz's comments on the modifier key handling: (1) Yes! Absolutely! iSSH would be so much better if I could control my emacs with it (2) Why? that's not what it's for.

ergo98• 16 years ago

Everyone always leads in with the "I thought it was useless" bit.

Did they really? Haven't they used a digital picture frame and though "Gosh, wouldn't it be cool if this could show the weather...and had a web browser...and let me play movies from my server..."

I find it difficult to believe that so many intelligent people (of which jwz is definitely one) purportedly couldn't see the obvious appeal.

I've been using small devices as PMPs for a while (whether smartphone or touch or zune) and the desire for something larger is, again, obvious.

Though I'll hold my breath for the Galasy S Tab.

arebop2• 16 years ago

> Haven't they used a digital picture frame and though "Gosh, wouldn't it be cool if this could show the weather...and had a web browser...and let me play movies from my server..."

Yes, I have had those thoughts. I also thought "I'd be willing to pay $5 for that. Oh well." So sure I understand that these things are appealing for coffee tables or salesmen, but I (still) don't see myself using one very much.

loewenskind4• 16 years ago

Is there anything you would pay a realistic price for? You seem to vastly undervalue what things are worth. Of course you'll probably say "that's what it's worth to me", but is that correct? Is the time saving and convenience really only bringing $5 worth of value to your life? That would mean it saves you about an hour of time across the entire lifetime of the product (assuming a very low value for what your time is worth).

gamble2• 16 years ago

It is a $500+ device. At that point most people are looking for some guarantee that it's going to be useful.

The iPad is an unusual product, because doesn't address an obvious need. Laptops were just portable desktops. mp3 players were digital Walkmans. Smartphones are a combination of PDA, mp3 player, and phones. Most new classes of electronics are just an extension of an existing product in an obvious but technically-challenging direction. The iPad is more like the original PC - superficially similar to its predecessors, but used quite differently.

People use their iPads in their own way. For me, the killer app was as an e-reader. I could easily read books and pdfs on my laptop, but the tablet form-factor is far more pleasant for reading. Reading on a laptop is a chore, whereas reading on the iPad feels quite natural.

What trips people up about the iPad is that it isn't about the functionality. My MBP is more capable in almost every way. It's value lies in the fact that it does certain things extremely well that no other electronic device has been good at until now.

ido2• 16 years ago

    The iPad is more like the original PC - 
    superficially similar to its predecessors, 
    but used quite differently.

A bit OT, but how was using the original PC categorically different than using an apple2/atari 800/trs-80/etc?

jerf• 16 years ago

'Everyone always leads in with the "I thought it was useless" bit.'

Experience. The iPad is far from the first device in the tablet form factor, and far from the first tablet device to promise a revolution. It is, after all, not even the first Apple tablet device.

I think the problem has been that tablets have always lagged behind even laptops in what they could afford in terms of processing power and such; it wasn't until the Great Stagnation of CPU speeds and the relatively recent focus on low-watt-yet-powerful CPUs and GPUs that the segment became viable. No longer does it feel like you've stepped ten years back in time when you turn on a tablet. You have, except with a much better graphics card, but a ten year old-ish machine with a better graphics card is still a decent machine for most uses, so you don't feel it. Smartphones rode the same wave a few years ago. (Plus the work on faster browsers helps a lot too, even an older machine feels a lot faster on those.)

It's also pretty easy to think that a laptop is good enough. I know, because I still think a laptop is good enough for me. Perhaps my usage is abnormal but I spend a lot of time on my laptop typing, and I don't just mean for programming.

ido2• 16 years ago

    Haven't they used a digital picture frame and though
    "Gosh, wouldn't it be cool if this could show the
    weather...and had a web browser...and let me play 
    movies from my server..."

I never saw a digital picture frame, let alone used one - and my initial reaction was to think those would be pretty useless :)

rbanffy2• 16 years ago

> but I couldn't possibly imagine that Apple would handicap third-party applications to give their own product line a first-mover advantage

Sadly, I could.

ohyes• 16 years ago

""Shiny black slab" was an attractive design choice, but it may not have been the best choice if you want the device to be able to function in the presence of sunlight. Sigh. This is a shame, because the screen is surprisingly readable when it's not suffering from i-sunstroke,""

OK, from an engineering standpoint, this probably isn't the best. (It seems that apple sometimes ignores the fact that computers get hot...)

But I think we could turn this into a marketing selling point; Vampires are hot right now, vampires hate the sun.

The iPad, the latest in Vampiric computing.

Then you can sell it with sexy twilight/trueblood vampires. (In black mock turtlenecks/sweaters, of course).

It'll be awesome.

d0m2• 16 years ago

This matrix style hurts my eyes.

Herring• 16 years ago

http://lab.arc90.com/experiments/readability/

d0m2• 16 years ago

I already used it. But it just make no sens to me. It's like if I create a blog with light yellow written over light green where nobody can read a thing and then tell them to use another application to be able to read it.

But to be fair, 6 years ago, my terminals were like that. So I guess this hacker/matrix mode goes away with time.

cpg• 16 years ago

Damn. Jamie still around?! :)

OT, but I pictured him in a deserted island with big LCD monitors in the walls of the hut running kool screensvers!

OK, back on topic - I find the iPad a bit tiring to be held reading a book. My hands need rest from typing when I am not at my desk!

It's eady to drop and also calls home all the time, which I do not enjoy. It feels like every app is watching you.

Overall, it's a good device though. I hope for others that are much more open, soon!

Zawinski: iPad just-slightly insufficiently futurey

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