All iPads iPadOS Really Needs Its "Mac OS X" Release

[bcortens]

Have you ever done IT support? Non technical users will ALWAYS find a way to stumble into modes/settings that were never intended for them.

Never got a call from someone who accidentally brought up the Inspector view in a web browser?

I see no reason to complicate iPadOS for the masses to please the whims of some tech nerds (myself included) 🤷‍♂️

I think allowing VMs is fairly reasonable as it hides the complexity behind an App, an App they have to seek out and download, and then they ahave to figure out how to get Windows/macOS installed in the VM. I think this would add enough hurdles to protect most users.

 

[bcortens]

Yeah, agreed, it makes no sense at all.

It makes no sense for modern Tim Cook Apple, Steve Jobs apple was always more willing to cannibalize themselves to push towards the future.

 

[FeliApple]

It makes no sense for modern Tim Cook Apple, Steve Jobs apple was always more willing to cannibalize themselves to push towards the future.

But the future isn’t obliterating the iPad.

 

[Abazigal]

Disagreeing with what? What compromises are you talking about?

I wouldn't use the word "compromise" here. But I don't have a word for it at the moment either. Perhaps the closest would be "blasphemous". What I am giving up is not something tangible like performance or battery life that can be quantified on a spreadsheet. Rather, it's like the very "essence" of the device that's at stake here.

An iPad with 2 separate OSes on it may sound like the best of both worlds in that users could in theory just boot up whichever option they wanted at any one time, and you are probably right in that I wouldn't lose anything apart from some space to housing an OS I may never really use. However, I feel it goes against the grain of what drew me to Apple products in the first place - their minimalism, their "zen", and above all, the trust that Apple does know best.

This is why I like product designs that are opinionated. The best example to me is the 12" MacBook with 1 usb c. Yes, it was slow, had only 1 port, and you can probably list off a ton of other comprises, and that to me was the whole beauty of it. That Apple had the conviction to say "we believe that this one feature (ultra-portability) is worth more than every other tradeoff combined". It may not have been very popular, but the important thing was that Apple believed, and they believed it enough to put all their engineering and marketing behind it.

And that, I respect. Even if the end product isn't to my liking, and even if compromises have to be made to fit said product into my workflow (like tons of dongles). Maybe it's sunk cost fallacy speaking, but I did invest a lot of time and effort into making my iPad, and work well it did for the stuff that I did use it for, and I am thankful that the iPad was sufficiently differentiated from my Mac because the work I was doing on it couldn't be readily replicated on a conventional PC form factor to begin with. That's why I sought out something different in the first place.

That's also why I feel it's a shame the current line of MBPs did not stick with their all USB-C port selection. I can admit that having a HDMI port can make it infinitely more useful in some situations, and users did get MagSafe back, but at the same time, there was this elegance and purity in a device having nothing but usb-c ports. Heck, the sides even looked better. But hey, the new line of MBPs do seem to be better received, and I guess the market ultimately speaks out louder than I ever can.

I have gone through more than a decade of people screaming at me online about how Apple products are overpriced and how Apple deliberate gimps them and how I can get more for less elsewhere, and I continue to remain an Apple user throughout. To me, Apple products have never been about having the most features, or being the "most useful", but about distilling the purest mixture of form and function possible. That to me is what I look for in an Apple product, not a huge feature list. Having multiple OSes on an Apple device just feels antithetical to the design-led philosophy that Apple espouses.

I don't know if I am making sense here.

 

[bcortens]

I wouldn't use the word "compromise" here. But I don't have a word for it at the moment either. Perhaps the closest would be "blasphemous". What I am giving up is not something tangible like performance or battery life that can be quantified on a spreadsheet. Rather, it's like the very "essence" of the device that's at stake here.

An iPad with 2 separate OSes on it may sound like the best of both worlds in that users could in theory just boot up whichever option they wanted at any one time, and you are probably right in that I wouldn't lose anything apart from some space to housing an OS I may never really use. However, I feel it goes against the grain of what drew me to Apple products in the first place - their minimalism, their "zen", and above all, the trust that Apple does know best.

I think that the user experience compromises of having a mode switching or dual booting iPad would work against the elegance of the iPad experience.

That's also why I feel it's a shame the current line of MBPs did not stick with their all USB-C port selection. I can admit that having a HDMI port can make it infinitely more useful in some situations, and users did get MagSafe back, but at the same time, there was this elegance and purity in a device having nothing but usb-c ports. Heck, the sides even looked better. But hey, the new line of MBPs do seem to be better received, and I guess the market ultimately speaks out louder than I ever can.

I wish they hadn't brought back integrated MagSafe, I'd take an extra USB-C port over MagSafe because (almost) everything else in my life uses USB-C to charge. I actually don't have any of the MagSafe cables plugged in because I'd rather replace them with USB-C cables and use the nice 97W power bricks to charge my iPad or my MBP.

 

[Basic75]

A Mac Pro running Fortnight is a toy.

A Mac Pro only running Fortnight might be considered a toy because of its role, yes.

An iPad running MS Office, Procreate, Logic Pro, LumaFusion, AUM, Cubasis, etc… is a professional computer.

It might be considered a professional computer by people for who it fits that role, but that's not me.

Even if we exclude heavy hitters like virtual machines and the Terminal, how tedious is it to set up a backup solution for an iPad? And no, the single built-in cloud-based backup is not enough for a professional computer, that barely even deserves the name "backup".

 

[Basic75]

I think that the user experience compromises of having a mode switching or dual booting iPad would work against the elegance of the iPad experience.

I still can't understand why people here are talking about dual booting and mode switching. Below the UI layer iPadOS and macOS are essentially the same operating system. I see no reason why both "modes" couldn't be used at the same time by different apps on different virtual screens.

 

[MayaUser]

Boring ? for so many replies for something useless or an constructive discussion hoping Apple is reading this and takes it into consideration?!

 

[nj-morris]

I feel sorry for the OP for this thread devolving into hundreds of posts of yet another destructive debate about a topic that MacRumors has discussed ad nauseam for over a decade, just because people didn't bother reading what the original post actually said.

 

[Zest28]

So who owns here an iPad instead of a Windows Surface tablet? I rest my case, the iPad is fine as it is.

 

[Zest28]

And who said that? Steeve Jobs 14 years ago? Things have changed, we have an iPad pro since 2015 and iPadOS since 2019, what Jobs said is no longer relevant, especially for pro iPads

They haven’t changed. The iPad is still the market leader by far despite being tablets out there running Windows. Now if the Windows Surface tablet was the market leader, then you would have a point that iPadOS needs to change.

But as of now, Apple clearly seems to know how to give the best tablet experience.

 

[Zest28]

So WHY is the option to have MacOS on iPad such a threat to the iPad community here? Are you afraid users might actually come to like it and relegate your iPad experience to the "below iPad Air" SKUs? You do know that MacOS can run iPadOS apps if the developer allows it?

Why should your desire for iPad purity trump others desire for a one device solution?

Steve jobs was all about user experience, simplicity and that the hardware and software is fully integrated. So that’s why Tim Cook won’t do it as Mac OS wasn‘t designed for touch devices. And Steve Jobs was right, because the iPad is the most successful tablet on the market.

Best is to sell your iPad and buy a Windows Surface tablet instead.

 

[Basic75]

So who owns here an iPad instead of a Windows Surface tablet? I rest my case, the iPad is fine as it is.

That might be the wrong question in the context of the original post. The right question would be "who owns an iPad instead of a Windows Surface tablet without needing a Mac or other computer?"

Because I own an iPad, and I'm happy with it, but it can't be used for my "real computer work" by a long shot. For me it's the perfect companion device for content consumption and some light gaming.

 

[Zest28]

That might be the wrong question in the context of the original post. The right question would be "who owns an iPad instead of a Windows Surface tablet without needing a Mac or other computer?"

Because I own an iPad, and I'm happy with it, but it can't be used for my "real computer work" by a long shot. For me it's the perfect companion device for content consumption and some light gaming.

Most people do actually, because they go to work and work in the office behind a Windows based machine free from work. The people who you see in Starbucks “working” on their MacBook Air’s is not really how most people work.

But the point is, Mac OS is designed for a mouse and keyboard and not a touch screen device. So Mac OS on the iPad won’t have the typical “Apple experience” that you can expect when buying an Apple product, so this is why it will never happen.

 

[bcortens]

I still can't understand why people here are talking about dual booting and mode switching. Below the UI layer iPadOS and macOS are essentially the same operating system. I see no reason why both "modes" couldn't be used at the same time by different apps on different virtual screens.

Right in your reply you are close to understanding why this would be a terrible user experience.

Say you're in iPad mode with a few apps open, say DaVinci Resolve, Mail, and Safari,
You dock your iPad
What happens to every iPad app window, every Mac app Window?

For iPad apps that the developer has made available on macOS (with the exact same codebase) you can just keep working because they have no UI changes to worry about.

For iPad only apps they are just straight unavailable, you can't use them, gone. Hopefully you were working in an App that has an iPad and Mac version, but since they are not the exact same app then you just can't pick up where you left off automatically, you have to make sure that app has autosave and if it doesn't you have to manually complete your work and then reopen that work in the Mac app.
Do these Apps stay alive in memory? Are they in the macOS dock so you can quit them?

I could take this thought experiment further but this is enough right here.

An iPad that, out of the box, has the capability (even if behind a setting button) is going to end up with some people putting it into transforming mode when they shouldn't and then they will wonder what happened to their work. Why is the thing they had open in some app not open and in the same place when they switch modes? Why are some apps missing in desktop mode? Why are some apps missing in iPad mode?

This is a terrible solution to such an incredibly niche use case (people who want Mac apps on their iPad).

To make a transforming iPad work would require years of focus from developers of every Mac app and every iPad app to make it work. That focus just isn't going to happen.

Just switching the OS is the easy part, it's everything that comes after that wouldn't work.

 

[Ludatyk]

Say you're in iPad mode with a few apps open, say DaVinci Resolve, Mail, and Safari,
You dock your iPad
What happens to every iPad app window, every Mac app Window?

For iPad apps that the developer has made available on macOS (with the exact same codebase) you can just keep working because they have no UI changes to worry about.

For iPad only apps they are just straight unavailable, you can't use them, gone. Hopefully you were working in an App that has an iPad and Mac version, but since they are not the exact same app then you just can't pick up where you left off automatically, you have to make sure that app has autosave and if it doesn't you have to manually complete your work and then reopen that work in the Mac app.
Do these Apps stay alive in memory? Are they in the macOS dock so you can quit them?

I have a M1 iPad Pro... I hardly ever come across apps that don't stay in memory. And even then... I use Stage Manager to keep my activity on course.

The difference in UI boils down to the fact macOS utilizes the menu bar whereas the iPad cannot... that's why devs tend to build an iPad app from the ground up.

 

[Digitalguy]

I constantly have windows next to each other for comparison or applying instructions read off the other one.

Those USB C powered travel monitors are becoming more and more interesting to me for when I’m on the go…

I have several USB C monitors but I find tablets a much better solution. They don't drain the battery of my laptop and work even better than USC monitors with the right apps. Have much better battery life than any of the rare battery powered monitors.

 

[Digitalguy]

They haven’t changed. The iPad is still the market leader by far despite being tablets out there running Windows. Now if the Windows Surface tablet was the market leader, then you would have a point that iPadOS needs to change.

But as of now, Apple clearly seems to know how to give the best tablet experience.

The base iPad (should say iPads since currently we have 2) is the market leader, that's what sells the most, together with the mini.
The pro is a more niche device that is as expensive as a surface pro.

That Apple visision hasn't changed is totally false. We didn't have pro iPads back then, or the same chips as MacBooks or iPadOS etc.
Things have changed... a lot.

And above all the iPad is not one thing, it's many things to many people.
I own several iPads pro and minis and I use none them like Jobs intented (never used one on a couch). Still I use them more, at least combined, than the typical iPad user, including for my work.
iPadOS will change, is changing already, slowly, but it's changing. And we are starting to have a separation between Air/Pro and the regular iPad even in software. And that's a good thing.
A larger iPad ultra could arrive at some point with more features that will separate it even more from the traditional iPad, hardware wise and software wise.
And iPads purists are welcome to ignore it (or say it's blasphemous)

 

[bcortens]

I have a M1 iPad Pro... I hardly ever come across apps that don't stay in memory. And even then... I use Stage Manager to keep my activity on course.

The difference in UI boils down to the fact macOS utilizes the menu bar whereas the iPad cannot... that's why devs tend to build an iPad app from the ground up.

My point wasn't really that the iPad Pro doesn't have enough memory, it was more around what do you do with Apps that don't exist on both sides of the divide. Do you just keep these apps in the background for whenever you next switch modes? How long in a single mode before you push the app out of memory? These are questions that have difficult answers and no matter what you do you have a degraded experience compared to a pure iPadOS or pure macOS device.

Secondly, the difference in UI has gotten ness over the years but the macOS UI is still very different than the iPadOS one. The assumption that a pointing device exists means that there are a lot of places where hover state is used, and a lot of places where the pointing/touch targets are way way too small for the finger.

The menu bar is actually fairly easy for iPad devs to add these days because it uses a lot of the same APIs (in catalyst apps) that are used to show the menu that you get when you hold down the command key on iPadOS.

The reason for mostly building native iPad UIs is because of the assumptions made around the presence or absence of a permanent pointing device.

Edit: Don't get me wrong, I love the iPad, I love using it and I love developing for it. I think the things holding it back are mostly around policy decisions at Apple and third party companies rather than the technical limitations of iPadOS. Most companies still don't bring full versions of their apps to iPadOS which is unfortunate. There are a number of features that iPadOS could use that would improve it but the number shrinks every year.

 

[Digitalguy]

I wouldn't use the word "compromise" here. But I don't have a word for it at the moment either. Perhaps the closest would be "blasphemous". What I am giving up is not something tangible like performance or battery life that can be quantified on a spreadsheet. Rather, it's like the very "essence" of the device that's at stake here.

An iPad with 2 separate OSes on it may sound like the best of both worlds in that users could in theory just boot up whichever option they wanted at any one time, and you are probably right in that I wouldn't lose anything apart from some space to housing an OS I may never really use. However, I feel it goes against the grain of what drew me to Apple products in the first place - their minimalism, their "zen", and above all, the trust that Apple does know best.

This is why I like product designs that are opinionated. The best example to me is the 12" MacBook with 1 usb c. Yes, it was slow, had only 1 port, and you can probably list off a ton of other comprises, and that to me was the whole beauty of it. That Apple had the conviction to say "we believe that this one feature (ultra-portability) is worth more than every other tradeoff combined". It may not have been very popular, but the important thing was that Apple believed, and they believed it enough to put all their engineering and marketing behind it.

And that, I respect. Even if the end product isn't to my liking, and even if compromises have to be made to fit said product into my workflow (like tons of dongles). Maybe it's sunk cost fallacy speaking, but I did invest a lot of time and effort into making my iPad, and work well it did for the stuff that I did use it for, and I am thankful that the iPad was sufficiently differentiated from my Mac because the work I was doing on it couldn't be readily replicated on a conventional PC form factor to begin with. That's why I sought out something different in the first place.

That's also why I feel it's a shame the current line of MBPs did not stick with their all USB-C port selection. I can admit that having a HDMI port can make it infinitely more useful in some situations, and users did get MagSafe back, but at the same time, there was this elegance and purity in a device having nothing but usb-c ports. Heck, the sides even looked better. But hey, the new line of MBPs do seem to be better received, and I guess the market ultimately speaks out louder than I ever can.

I have gone through more than a decade of people screaming at me online about how Apple products are overpriced and how Apple deliberate gimps them and how I can get more for less elsewhere, and I continue to remain an Apple user throughout. To me, Apple products have never been about having the most features, or being the "most useful", but about distilling the purest mixture of form and function possible. That to me is what I look for in an Apple product, not a huge feature list. Having multiple OSes on an Apple device just feels antithetical to the design-led philosophy that Apple espouses.

I don't know if I am making sense here.

I am with you on one thing. The 12" Macbook is amazing, for me it's the best MacBook and the only one I want to own (in addition to many Windows devices). I will keep my maxed out 2017 one for many more years and I am not buying any Apple Silicon Macs until a similar one is made.
But the only reason for me is portability.
Contrary to you, function for me is much more important than form.
You once told me you are an Apple fanboy and proud to be one. I am far from one.
But I can understand some people are and happy to be. I respect that, even more we they are honest about it. And you are the Jony Ive type. And that's fine.
But as you said, most people, even among Apple fans, prefer function over form.
And Apple, in turn, will always go where there is the most money to be made.

Currently there is no money to be made in having MacOS run on iPad in any form. So it won't happen.
But not because of aestetics or because Apple has better taste or any reason some iPad purists invoke. But because of money. And that's how capitalism works and that's ok with me.
The day Apple finds a way to make a lot of money with macOS on some iPad ultra or foldable, they will do it, minimalists and purists be damned.

I don't care about Apple, Samsung or Microsoft, I buy the best products from them at the cheapest price.
I don't even care what most people want, I care about what works best for me.
But I respect that everyone is different, and appreciate constructive dialogue (which doesn't always happens on these forums), including the one with you.

 

[Zest28]

The base iPad (should say iPads since currently we have 2) is the market leader, that's what sells the most, together with the mini.
The pro is a more niche device that is as expensive as a surface pro.

That Apple visision hasn't changed is totally false. We didn't have pro iPads back then, or the same chips as MacBooks or iPadOS etc.
Things have changed... a lot.

And above all the iPad is not one thing, it's many things to many people.
I own several iPads pro and minis and I use none them like Jobs intented (never used one on a couch). Still I use them more, at least combined, than the typical iPad user, including for my work.
iPadOS will change, is changing already, slowly, but it's changing. And we are starting to have a separation between Air/Pro and the regular iPad even in software. And that's a good thing.
A larger iPad ultra could arrive at some point with more features that will separate it even more from the traditional iPad, hardware wise and software wise.
And iPads purists are welcome to ignore it (or say it's blasphemous)

Do you have any facts to back up these claims? Because for iPhone, it is the most expensive model (iPhone 15 Pro Max) that sells the most.

Kuo: iPhone 15 Pro Max to Remain Best-Selling Model in Early 2024

Apple's iPhone 15 Pro Max will continue to be the best-selling iPhone model in the first half of this year, according to Apple analyst Ming-Chi...

www.macrumors.com

 

[Zest28]

The base iPad (should say iPads since currently we have 2) is the market leader, that's what sells the most, together with the mini.
The pro is a more niche device that is as expensive as a surface pro.

That Apple visision hasn't changed is totally false. We didn't have pro iPads back then, or the same chips as MacBooks or iPadOS etc.
Things have changed... a lot.

And above all the iPad is not one thing, it's many things to many people.
I own several iPads pro and minis and I use none them like Jobs intented (never used one on a couch). Still I use them more, at least combined, than the typical iPad user, including for my work.
iPadOS will change, is changing already, slowly, but it's changing. And we are starting to have a separation between Air/Pro and the regular iPad even in software. And that's a good thing.
A larger iPad ultra could arrive at some point with more features that will separate it even more from the traditional iPad, hardware wise and software wise.
And iPads purists are welcome to ignore it (or say it's blasphemous)

Look at the numbers below. The iPad Pro is the most popular model.

Nice spreading of misinformation man.

 

[Digitalguy]

Look at the numbers below. The iPad Pro is the most popular model.

Nice spreading of misinformation man.

Instead of posting a picture, post a link from where you took it and where data can be checked. What are these percentages based on? Link, please, then we'll talk

 

[Digitalguy]

Do you have any facts to back up these claims? Because for iPhone, it is the most expensive model (iPhone 15 Pro Max) that sells the most.

Kuo: iPhone 15 Pro Max to Remain Best-Selling Model in Early 2024

Apple's iPhone 15 Pro Max will continue to be the best-selling iPhone model in the first half of this year, according to Apple analyst Ming-Chi...

www.macrumors.com

iPhones and iPads are different devices and different markets

 

[Zest28]

Instead of posting a picture, post a link from where you took it and where data can be checked. What are these percentages based on? Link, please, then we'll talk

Apple's most popular iPad shifted to this model in 2023 - 9to5Mac

In October 2022, Apple updated its tablet lineup with new iPad Pro models and the launch of the entry-level iPad...

9to5mac.com

It’s CIRP data which is a source that is used by investors, analyst and market participants.

Now where are your facts, you still haven’t posted it?