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When macOS can run iOS App unmodified, are any reason iPad Pro still run iPadOS
- Thread starter Amethyst
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I prefer ipados. Needs time to get feature filled in relation to the very mature macos, but it’s a far greater pleasure to use, with far less traditional computer related issues. I can get on with my work with far far more productivity with my iPad than I can with my Mac.
I certainly don’t think macos on an iPad would be in any way shape or form a better user experience.
I operate my Mac mini headless on my iPad via jump desktop and whilst it’s usable, it still needs a mouse and a keyboard to work properly.
I certainly don’t think macos on an iPad would be in any way shape or form a better user experience.
I operate my Mac mini headless on my iPad via jump desktop and whilst it’s usable, it still needs a mouse and a keyboard to work properly.
1. Apple has not added touch screen support to Mac OS.
2. The iPad fulfills a different use case from that of the Mac platform (whether portable or desktop). Items such as multitasking, video rendering, high-end graphic design and creation, 3D modeling, etc. work much better under Mac OS than they do on an iPad because of the architectural differences in the processors and operating systems. The iPad excels as a replacement for a desktop/Wacom tablet setup (especially for the Cintiq) because of the ability to use the Apple Pencil on the screen. I know a few comic artists (both traditional print and webcomics) who will use an iPad Pro for the initial sketches, or even to jot down ideas on the go, but will always switch to their Mac notebook or desktop for the finishing work, lettering, etc.
3. Apple has stated that the processors used for the Macs will use a different SoC than the iPhone and iPad are using. This implies that porting Mac OS to the iPad Pro would not be as simple as some people have claimed, especially since the size constraints of the iPad and iPhone form factors would be necessity mean that you could not push the processor as hard as you might be able to do on a Mac with active cooling and actual airflow to keep system components cool.
Some people claim it, personally, I don't see it. Just because the menu items are a bit more spaced out does not necessarily indicates touchscreen support. But who knows, Apple has been changing a lot of things recently. I really hope that they won't do a touchscreen, it would be a big turn-off for me.
Apple has consistently stated that they don't intend to make Macs with touchscreens, however, I still always take that with a grain of salt because they said the same thing about a stylus, and then appeared the Apple Pencil (there's definitely a nuanced discussion regarding whether the pencil is a "stylus", but I digress.) I view the UI refreshing on the Mac as more about creating a uniformity between iOS, iPadOS, and MacOS design language to ensure they coexist better. Apple wants you to buy one product and then entice you via the ecosystem to get another product. Making similar UI aids in that transition, in my mind.
I'd still like to see Macs with touchscreen/Apple Pencil support. Not as the sole, or even primary, input system, but at least as an option. Doesn't have to be a black & white choice between only keyboard/mouse or just touchscreen. With AS Macs able to run iPad apps, some consumers might not understand why they can't touch the screen like they can on iPads. Plus, as has been stated, graphics professionals can find Pencil support useful. I remember when Microsoft introduced the Surface Studio thinking "Why can't Apple make an iMac like this?"
Not giving anybody much credit they hey! I’m pretty sure people who own the mac will know its not touchscreen, and won’t assume it will suddenly become touch screen because they’re running an ipad app!
My main computer use is with 2x4k + 1 QHD, soon to be 3x4k monitors. Touch makes no sense with a bunch of large monitors. I'm quite happy with laptops without touchscreen. They're not all that useful for gaming either.
I just mean that Apple would likely argue that it is "more than a stylus", and they wouldn't be wrong, per se, but it also is basically a stylus ?
Well, some elements that are shared among platforms (buttons, sliders, etc) are being redesigned to look more like their iOS counterparts. That obviously makes them inherently better for touch, since they look like their iOS counterparts.
However some UI elements that are unique to the Mac, like the traffic light buttons, have been kept the same and are hideously small targets for touch input. That points to the reasoning behind making the UI more iOS-like being a matter of design language coherence with other platforms (specially now that iOS apps are coming to the Mac) rather than a quest for reading macOS for touch.
(Other examples would be the small app bar area that can be used for dragging windows around, macOS still scaling apps to be 73% smaller on macOS when using Catalyst, )
I really hated the UI when Windows went touchscreen. They made the title bar and controls really huge which was a problem for me.
Ironically this is even more of a problem in Windows than it could ever be on macOS, since most Windows laptop displays use a 16:9 aspect ratio instead of the 16:10 aspect ratio Apple (thankfully) uses in MacBooks, so vertical space comes at a premium there.
Making menu and title bars bigger reduces the % of vertical space available for anything else a lot more in 16:9 displays than in 16:10. To me that was one of the worst parts of some design approaches like Microsoft's "ribbon" designs, and using it in apps like Word where much of the content you were creating consisted of VERTICAL documents seemed downright dumb. The available space to preview the content you were creating was too short, and a lot of space was wasted at the sides.
Obviously not a problem for bigger monitors, where title and menu bars represent a smaller fraction of the total screen height. Maybe that's why Apple uses 16:9 on all their bigger monitors (iMac's, Apple Pro Display XDR).
I have a stock charts grid display that's about 11x8 and they are all small windows. So making the title bar and controls larger reduces the number of charts that I can display. I tried a bunch of different things to shrink them. I wound up getting a 4k monitor. I would like smaller controls or even the ability to get rid of the controls altogether.
But it works absolutely flawless...
I had an Dell 7773 which is a 2 in 1 Notebook with Touch Screen...
Installed macOS on it and achieved a working touchscreen without issues.
Your first point is certainly correct. Your second not so much. It is true that many things are better done on a Mac but architectural differences in the processor have nothing to do with it since Macs and iPads use the same processor architecture and in some cases the same actual SoC. Both MacOS and iOS are built on the same Darwin core operating system and applications are developed using the same compiler toolchains and IDEs. It is true though that there are differences. Other than the touch screen UI, the major difference is that iOS is locked down and MacOS is not.
Your third point is completely incorrect. An 12.9" M1 iPad Pro has the same SoC as the M1 MacBook Air, the same amount of RAM and can have the same amount of storage. If you add a Magic Keyboard case it can also have a similar form factor (though the iPad with case is heavier) complete with keyboard and trackpad. It does also have the touch screen of course and can also be equipped with a 5G modem. It can't run MacOS apps but what is can do is run all the iPad and iPhone apps. Developers can opt out of allowing iOS apps to run on MacOS and depending on what you want to do, the iPad apps may be a better choice.
However, if what you really want to do is run MacOS on an M1 device with a 13" screen, the M1 MBA is much cheaper and lighter.
I realize this was posted in 2020 but the M1 iPad Pro is available with 16GB of RAM and 2TB of ssd which is more RAM and storage than many Macs.
Based on my work (Touchscreen working under macOS).
Made it possible back then in 2018…