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I think the TBar might be useful, but I'm glad we can set it to display Function keys if we want. I built up a lot of shortcuts and macros for Pro Tools using Keyboard Maestro - many of these rely on the F keys!
 
When you've got 30+ tabs it's not efficient to tab through them all.

and i'ts easier to single out one and press it on that tiiiiny little screen? please

I don't think scrolling through photo albums, tabs or much really, will be useful using the touch bar, just think about why it would be superior to using your keyboard or trackpad, which should be just as fast and more precise.

Only thing I can think of that could be useful, is having things on the touch bar, which don't have (and can't have) keyboard short cuts. I don't know how many use cases there would be for this, but there ya go.
 
Just had a look on the French review video that's knocking about and must say, I'm still underwhelmed here....hopefully get to check it out in person before xmas!
 
I'm not sure about the Touch bar. They probably should have made it an option, considering how much your paying. I can't believe they are so confident. Makes you wonder.
 
Ribbon bar or touch bar. Both cluttered useless interfaces in my opinion. Everyone of us can touch-type right? You learn it in school at least last time I checked. I still see SOME use to a broader touchbar attached as a dongle, a peripheral, with slider controls and configurable input for your favourite, most used apps. No need to annoy your whole bunch of customers with that hardware only a small fraction of them will use, if even.

Adding something that removes your focus from the screen and makes you look down on the keyboard is just backwards.
All opinions only of course.
The ribbon was a clutter because it takes up a significant space on the screen. If I use Office, I tend to hide the bar to get more screen space.
I can see the touch bar as a solution for this. Maximize the UI on screen for the content I'm working on while delegate the menus and buttons to the touch bar. They are out of the way, but they are instantly accessible at the same time.
Can't wait to see Adobe utilize the touch bar for Lightroom.

If you don't like the touch bar, you can buy the non-touch bar version, or just have it to show the old function keys only. I don't see why Apple should cater just to you if they want to design something new.
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Would seem others also looked at the concept of a Touch Bar some time ago, equally they have not brought anything to market if ever at all...

Q-6
Bringing in something new like that requires money.
Considering most PC OEMs are operating at razor thin margin, they don't have time to try things like this. They would rather keep making the same thing they have been making since it involves almost no extra cost.

Just look at the Surface Pro clones. It takes Microsoft to create that new form factor, then the OEMs just copied it, since they don't have capacity to come up with it themselves. Same thing on Android phones. Google has to make the Nexus One, the first super phone, for the OEMs to move up from the G1 (literally all Android phones that time are just a variation of the G1 internals, nobody wants to use the faster snapdragon SoC until Google did it with the Nexus One).
 
Bringing in something new like that requires money. Considering most PC OEMs are operating at razor thin margin, they don't have time to try things like this. They would rather keep making the same thing they have been making since it involves almost no extra cost.

Just look at the Surface Pro clones. It takes Microsoft to create that new form factor, then the OEMs just copied it, since they don't have capacity to come up with it themselves. Same thing on Android phones. Google has to make the Nexus One, the first super phone, for the OEMs to move up from the G1 (literally all Android phones that time are just a variation of the G1 internals, nobody wants to use the faster snapdragon SoC until Google did it with the Nexus One).

Microsoft has more than enough money & resources, equally they clearly went in a different direction. Post is a point of interest little else. IMHO I would not be surprised if we see more of the same from the Windows OEM`s. The value the "Touch Bar " brings remains to be seen, for all...

Q-6
 
The new touch bar is so close to the screen, it's probably within your visual field anyway.

And I have never developed muscle memory for any F keys, personally
Ditto for me. And besides, I haven't used the F keys as function keys in... well, I can't remember when. I use them for volume controls and maybe screen brightness, and that's about it (which means that eight of the twelve keys go unused... and oh yeah, there's an eject key, I forgot...).

I don't want to have to be regularly touching the screen because I keep trying to read the screen. It's okay with a phone, and not awful for a tablet, because they're easy to wipe clean -- in a pinch, you can just swipe them across your shirt or pant leg. Cleaning a laptop screen sucks every time you do it.

I don't really like using an iPad with a hardware keyboard anyway. A touchscreen laptop would effectively be a fat, heavy tablet with no onscreen keyboard option. Does that really sound good to anyone?
 
Do you look at the keyboard on your iPhone when you type? I don't, muscle memory.

I'll have to comment on this.
As Apple made the choice to link the keyboard map with the input language (and spellchecking), every time i have to switch input language (which I do every 5 minutes, and being a European/healing y'all) also the respective positions of keys change: ergo, very little muscle memory.

There is a risk that this will apply to the touch bar as well.

RGDS,
 
I'm not sure about the Touch bar. They probably should have made it an option, considering how much your paying. I can't believe they are so confident. Makes you wonder.

Because Apple. They are driving the future caring little what a few conservative users might think. Im excited that the (for me) useless function keys are finally being replaced by something cool, new and useful. To be able to do basic photo editing with full screen, assist with music making, video editing, flipping between tabs in Safari, etc, etc. Plus the applications are endless since its all software too and its fully customisable.

The next gen will have precise haptic feedback too making it feel like a proper button and probably force tough too (switch to email, force touch for new email or word => new document)

I LOL at some of the criticism here, "i will have took down to do something" omg. Most of us "look down" when pressing a function key unless you like acidentally muting when trying to lower the volume.
 
Just had a look on the French review video that's knocking about and must say, I'm still underwhelmed here....hopefully get to check it out in person before xmas!
Link to that video? The one I found it says is private :(

It seems like they have deleted it. (Maybe Apple didnt allow it till it's oficially released at stores)
 
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It is my hope that developers get really creative about the usage. If they do, it will be fine.

I liked how the Photoshop team during the demo event had set things up so that you could use your fingers on the Touch Bar and the track pad in concert. I think the presenter changed colors continuously on the Touch Bar with one finger while painting with another on the track pad. I assume that they will allow you to change brush size or opacity or hardness on the fly on the Touch Bar while brushing on the track pad. Could be really useful and more fluent than tapping my short cut keys repeatedly as I do today to achieve that same thing.
 
I think it looks like a really interesting concept and its been implemented much better than what I imagined it to be when I first saw the rumours and I suspect as a feature it will mature over time as developers get to grips with it.

There's some scenarios where I can't see it replacing the large track pads and the gestures we can use on those, but there's lots of things where I can see it becoming an essential bit of my workflow. That said, its not something that was a buying decision in my MBP, not least because for the bulk of my time I use my laptop in clamshell mode!
 
Link to that video? The one I found it says is private :(

It seems like they have deleted it. (Maybe Apple didnt allow it till it's oficially released at stores)

Yeah, sorry, it's been taken down. :(
Not be long now until they're out in the wild :)
 
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My biggest question still is, why didn't Apple use the haptic engine for the touchbars? That way you can simulate a click and still integrate the same software features.
Now this is a good point, and I think it would come in future versions. This is the version 1, and I think Apple focused more on the security first for TouchID.
 
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How should this work when the buttons are dynamic and not always on the same positions?
In my eyes, thats a permanent problem between hardware and software.
 
How should this work when the buttons are dynamic and not always on the same positions?
In my eyes, thats a permanent problem between hardware and software.

Buttons are probably on the same place as you set them. It is like how you game and for different games/characters, you have to press different places for different abilities - you get used to it (For game/character 1, ability 1 is on key Q, for another game, it can be Z). The location of Q and Z don't move, neither does the location of the area's of the touch bars.

If you have a set of binds for Photoshop, and another for say Pages, after a while, I guess you get used to it? Or maybe I am overly optimistic.
 
Buttons are probably on the same place as you set them. It is like how you game and for different games/characters, you have to press different places for different abilities - you get used to it (For game/character 1, ability 1 is on key Q, for another game, it can be Z). The location of Q and Z don't move, neither does the location of the area's of the touch bars.

If you have a set of binds for Photoshop, and another for say Pages, after a while, I guess you get used to it? Or maybe I am overly optimistic.
Exactly. They keys will change on every app, but they will allways be the same in that app. The videogames example is a perfect one. Even on normal programs, when you use Microsoft Word there are some shortcuts with keys, and when you use Premiere those same keys do something else. I don't see the problem, you just memorize what they do in each program.
 
Still don't get it. What's the profit for a taptic engine integration?
And as you can see, the positions of the touchbar buttons switch all the time, so the area where you click wont be responsive but the whole touchbar.
That's my point. If you are a smartphone user, you dont get a response from your screen and nobody missed it.

MacBook-Pros-Touch-Bar-examples-1024x300.png
 
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