With the news that Apple would be bringing several iOS apps to the Mac with Marzipan, such as Music, TV, etc, I was wondering if this means that several older apps will be rewritten as well. I'm thinking of Messages, which is years behind on the Mac compared to iOS. but, this also includes Books, Maps, Reminders, Calendar and Automator. Am I right with my assumption?
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Apple rewriting some older apps with Marzipan?
- Thread starter Lounge vibes 05
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Some of them might be. Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future.
I don't foresee Automator becoming a Marzipan app. Shortcuts might migrate but not replace Automator.
The little I've read about Marzipan, which was mostly speculative, suggests that Shortcuts on iOS uses a completely different underlying mechanism to control the apps than Automator on macOS. I would hope that Automator will be able to control Marzipan apps, but that seems more like a hidden adapter of some kind between AppleEvents (macOS) and the iOS Shortcuts API.
EDIT
One of the articles I read recently:
https://leancrew.com/all-this/2019/04/whats-next/
I don't foresee Automator becoming a Marzipan app. Shortcuts might migrate but not replace Automator.
The little I've read about Marzipan, which was mostly speculative, suggests that Shortcuts on iOS uses a completely different underlying mechanism to control the apps than Automator on macOS. I would hope that Automator will be able to control Marzipan apps, but that seems more like a hidden adapter of some kind between AppleEvents (macOS) and the iOS Shortcuts API.
EDIT
One of the articles I read recently:
https://leancrew.com/all-this/2019/04/whats-next/
Last edited:
While I agree about Automator and shortcuts, there are still so many apps that Apple should re-write with UI Kit. Here’s my list:
Books
Calculator
Contacts
FaceTime
Calendar
Maps
Notes
Reminders
Messages
There are also many apps that should come to the Mac:
Clock
Weather
Health
Wallet
Music
TV
Podcasts
Shortcuts
Phone
[doublepost=1556897294][/doublepost]Also, there are so many little changes that they should make to make iOS and macOS more similar:
Rename System Preferences to Settings
Easy AirPods setup
Add Control center
Also, it’s a small thing, but an Apple Store Mac app would be very useful
So that when Apple adds new features to the iOS versions, we don’t have to wait 2 or 3 years for it to come to the mac. Also, UI Kit is the future of the Mac, and these apps will run great when the Mac goes to ARM.
[doublepost=1557078580][/doublepost]Example, bubble and screen effects from the messages app that were introduced back in iOS 10 back in 2016 still arn’t on the Mac. It’s a small feature, but it really can make a difference if both operating systems have feature parity
It will be baseline parity and it comes at the expense of the richness that Cocoa can provide, but Cocoa Touch cannot. It is likely a one-way transition: from iOS to macOS, not the other way round. Marzipan is a good start for iOS developers that seek an easy entry into the Mac ecosystem or for simple apps that cannot or should not be enhanced much for macOS. For anything beyond that, Cocoa Touch is not the answer.
Messages on macOS used to have many more features than Messages has on iOS, until Apple removed pretty much everything from it in macOS Mojave.
It would be downright depressing if Apple discontinues existing Mac projects in favour of Marzipan. It could lead to more, much less ambitious Mac apps.
It’s already happening. iTunes is being killed, in favor of UI Kit music, TV, podcasts, and books apps. Sorry, but that’s just what the future of the Mack is going to be. All the simple built in apps will become UI Kit. That way, when Apple announces future upgrades to the app, they can simply just add them both at the same time because the apps are the same. If a new feature comes to messages on the iPad, it also comes to the Mac.
[doublepost=1557276631][/doublepost]
They don’t have to rewrite the apps, because they’ve been running on iOs’s ARM processors.
Along this line, Calendar and Reminders took until iOS 9 iirc to get close to Mac versions (and still not quite on parity).
Contacts is a horrific app on iOS, while Mac version is a fairly powerful/useful tool.
iOS Notes, Maps do not bring anything to the Mac table.
I do see the media apps maybe being a step forward from the cluster-f of iTunes, but anything else, no value add or steps backwards, imo.