It's funny how my tone shifted in the last year. I went from referring to the iPhone as a computer to correcting people when they referred the iPad as a "tablet computer." These devices aren't computers and they don't do the things that computers can do extremely easily. What they are is a transition to between a paper-based culture into a digital culture. The Internet has changed the way content is consumed and created and so the devices we have to access that content must also change. The PC or laptop is not the optimal tool to comfortably read on, it was the tool that we had available.
Computers will always be needed. I don't see people actually writing; prose or code; doing art, tweeking photos, editing audio and video, or doing one of a million things that make computers useful in day to day life. The iOS devices are inching closer to doing some of those things in a basic way but those will always be for people who just want to play around. Professionals are going to need hardware capable of running Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, ect.
The vast majority of consumers will still have some kind of computer in the home. People who don't really care about owning a standard computer, because their hobbies or profession doesn't require it, will own a tablet or other simple digital device that can access the internet.
The iCloud stuff is interesting. Now that the iOS devices don't require a computer the people Apple always wanted to target with them, people who don't normally spend $999 on a laptop, will be even more eager to buy them. I know a lot of people who have iPhones that never plug them into a computer and so they never have a backup of their data or Applications. It terrifies me when if I don't back up my phone even for a few days. Just having the auto-magic backup and restore feature in iCloud makes it a big win, most of the other features are redundant because of Google and Dropbox, with the exception of the Photo stream. Having those photos automagically appear on multiple iOS devices and on your PC is going to make a lot of people extremely happy. Imagine buying your parents an AppleTV or iPad so they can see photos of their grandchildren as you take them, with no extra work from the enduser. That feature is a whole lot of win.
Computers will always be needed. I don't see people actually writing; prose or code; doing art, tweeking photos, editing audio and video, or doing one of a million things that make computers useful in day to day life. The iOS devices are inching closer to doing some of those things in a basic way but those will always be for people who just want to play around. Professionals are going to need hardware capable of running Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, ect.
The vast majority of consumers will still have some kind of computer in the home. People who don't really care about owning a standard computer, because their hobbies or profession doesn't require it, will own a tablet or other simple digital device that can access the internet.
Exactly. That's Apple's point of view where they distinguish between "trucks" (i.e. desktop and laptop computers as we now think of them) and "cars" (tablets and smartphones). Apple, and me to an extent, agree that there will always be a need for "trucks" for professionals and enthusiasts. However, people like my mom don't need a "truck" when a iPad will suit them just fine. Now the big question is how many of consumers will still want a full blown computer and how many will be happy with a tablet-style device. Apple seems to think that the majority of average consumers will be happy with a tablet. Quite a few people in this forum disagree. Me, despite playing the part of Apple's advocate in this thread, I'm not quite sure either way as I can see merit to both arguments.
The iCloud stuff is interesting. Now that the iOS devices don't require a computer the people Apple always wanted to target with them, people who don't normally spend $999 on a laptop, will be even more eager to buy them. I know a lot of people who have iPhones that never plug them into a computer and so they never have a backup of their data or Applications. It terrifies me when if I don't back up my phone even for a few days. Just having the auto-magic backup and restore feature in iCloud makes it a big win, most of the other features are redundant because of Google and Dropbox, with the exception of the Photo stream. Having those photos automagically appear on multiple iOS devices and on your PC is going to make a lot of people extremely happy. Imagine buying your parents an AppleTV or iPad so they can see photos of their grandchildren as you take them, with no extra work from the enduser. That feature is a whole lot of win.
I agree. If it works as well as they claim, it is a whole lot of win.
I think for Apple to really implement this, they need flash on the iPad. Until the day when you can watch every single video online that your pretty little heart desires and play every stupid flash game you want to kill time with on an iPad, they can't fully implement this. It's not just the formatting issue, though that is a big one. If I want to watch the music video for Cee Lo Green's most popular song in its uncut format on his official page, as of last check I could not do it on an iOS device, it's blocked. Here is the link if you want to try it yourself. People who don't care about formats and are happy to live in Apple's DRM'ed, blocked off little world still want to be able to watch their Youtube videos. EDIT: I just checked it. Still no good.
I think for Apple to really implement this, they need flash on the iPad. Until the day when you can watch every single video online that your pretty little heart desires and play every stupid flash game you want to kill time with on an iPad, they can't fully implement this. It's not just the formatting issue, though that is a big one. If I want to watch the music video for Cee Lo Green's most popular song in its uncut format on his official page, as of last check I could not do it on an iOS device, it's blocked. Here is the link if you want to try it yourself. People who don't care about formats and are happy to live in Apple's DRM'ed, blocked off little world still want to be able to watch their Youtube videos. EDIT: I just checked it. Still no good.
HTML5
Also, iCloud really has nothing to do with online videos or games. Nor does Apple's choice to not allow flash on their devices have anything to do with DRM.
True enough, Andrew, the DRM comment was an unnecessary side comment, nor does the iCloud change this. Perhaps I should have stated things better. If we are to go to tablets, the iPad in particular, in the way that Lou has described, it needs what I have stated. That is what I meant.
it needs what I have stated. That is what I meant.
HTML5
It's not ready to go yet. Viddler said it would be getting all of its videos into HTML 5 like a year ago and they're still not up and running there. Viddler is a tiny speck of dust compared to Youtube. It will take them forever to get all of those videos converted and ready to go. Even if they get it done right away, that is now 5 years they have been selling a crippled device as the future. Even if we go from the birth of the iPad, that's a whole year. There will be another year, most likely, before Apple corrects this if they do. Forget about me and my tech biases and you and every geek on this forum. If you are John Q. AverageInternetUser, and you want to watch all your favorite videos on Youtube on your shiny new machine, you don't want to do it a day from now, a month from now, 6 months from now, or a year from now. You want it to work RIGHT NOW because you put your money down RIGHT NOW. It's not like the iPad is competing with old DOS machines or even a world where Ubuntu is king. PCs and Macs are extremely user friendly and they will play your favorite video RIGHT NOW, or after the 5 second download of Flash. If you think rationally and consider the desktop/laptop or the iPad, and you look at it rationally, unless you have absolutely no need for Flash, the iPad cannot replace a proper computer. If Apple wants us all to move to the iPad unless we have some special reason to buy a full computer, they are absolutely shooting themselves in the foot.
I've used Flash on Android phones and tablets. While I don't like Apple's decision to outright ban it, I think steering away from it is a wise choice. My experience has been that Flash does not resize well on the smaller screens of tablets and phones. It also doesn't really jive with input style of touchscreens when it was designed for a mouse. Now maybe they can fix these issues, but they've had a year+ and I've seen no change.
If you are John Q. AverageInternetUser, and you want to watch all your favorite videos on Youtube on your shiny new machine, you don't want to do it a day from now, a month from now, 6 months from now, or a year from now.
Maybe that's why there is a Youtube app that comes with iOS.
Also, it's not Apple's fault if sites haven't converted to HTML5. In fact, none of them would probably ever make the change without the iOS forcing function. I applaud Apple for moving away from Flash.
cause someone knows a little HTML and JS is enough to write a secure website. Eventually, the number of layers of abstractions will break the camel's back. If you think a stackoverflow is only that website you go to to get answers to your JQ
That is true and Rochelle's pic is awesome but at the moment I would still use an Android device or fully functional PC to browse the internet rather than be shackled with an iOS shiny piece of crap that will be rendered redundant within 6 months.
If you are John Q. AverageInternetUser, and you want to watch all your favorite videos on Youtube on your shiny new machine, you don't want to do it a day from now, a month from now, 6 months from now, or a year from now.
Maybe that's why there is a Youtube app that comes with iOS.
Also, it's not Apple's fault if sites haven't converted to HTML5. In fact, none of them would probably ever make the change without the iOS forcing function. I applaud Apple for moving away from Flash.
The app doesn't work with every video, and no it is not Apple's fault, but it remains a huge blind spot of theirs to not have Flash on their devices. If HTML 5 becomes the standard, then great, they don't need Flash. Until then, you cannot replace a computer with an iPad for most users.
The app doesn't work with every video, and no it is not Apple's fault, but it remains a huge blind spot of theirs to not have Flash on their devices. If HTML 5 becomes the standard, then great, they don't need Flash. Until then, you cannot replace a computer with an iPad for most users.
I don't think the problem is with the app. I think the problem is that for whatever reason certain videos (such as any music videos from currently popular pop stars) only play on desktop/laptop-based browsers and nothing else.
They said the same thing about the Newton back in the 90's. Look what happened there. I see tablets mostly as an alternative for a laptop. Perhaps you have a desktop at home, and don't want to carry a heavy bag around. Besides, the tablet world is dominated by Apple right now, with only a few options coming around afterwards. If something should happen to Apple, it is possible the tablet market could crash. (I'm no economist, so take that with a grain of salt.)
Honestly, the faster we get to the real Post-PC era the better, and I'm starting not to care how we do it. I feel like computers in general get in my way more and more often. I had Windows tell me the other day that it was no longer genuine and stop booting because I dared to boot it in a VM. Our Linux server went balls-on-top retarded, dropped 50 revs of our SVN repo, and rendered the entire thing useless. My OSX install took me way more effort than it should have on my beige-box, and still gets speckly-bits in the display after a reboot. (You have to sleep-unsleep cycle it to get it to work again.)
I jailbroke my iPad the other day. It made it unstable. Restoring it back to exactly the state I had it in was a one-click operation. Then it "just worked." I finished reading Contact and read about Quarks and Wormholes for the rest of the night. It was nice.
I'll keep one OSX install around to do all my development. Everything else is getting done on the closest "post-PC" device I can find.
Conrad, you just have way too many computer problems all the time. Don't blame the computers. It's definitely something you are doing. It's like you are complaining about some broken computer every other day on Twitter. Nobody else as technologically competent as you has that many issues. My suggestion, stop trying to screw around. I could have told you that you can only run Windows in a VM if it is a brand new copy that was never used before. There's a reason I use Git instead of SVN. Installing OSX on a beige box. It's a hack, of course it's not going to work smoothly, what did you expect?
You said it yourself. The iPad "just worked" not because it is an iPad and is somehow different from other computers. It's because you didn't fuck with it. When you did try to jailbreak it, it failed just like everything else.
Leave everything as the default settings as much as possible, don't do unsupported things, and always use legitimate software. If you follow this advice, you will see almost all of your problems disappear.
The only trouble my PC has given me is when I tried to overclock the front side bus for more bandwidth. It refused to remain stable and I abandoned the project. It immediately was rock solid stable again.
It's work, and while I have a strong say in policy I'm not the only player. I get one copy of Windows for my machine and we use SVN. Our primary development environment is MonoDevelop, which, while strong, is not particularly stable outside of Linux I've found (ostensibly due to the fact that it uses GTK-Sharp). The alternative is to throw down $500 for a registered copy of MSVC#, which won't be approved right now. The other day I managed to crash the MSVC++ 2008 compiler by calling gcnew. I'm stuck in digital purgatory over here, man!
Your point about OSX is well taken however, I'll probably just buy a Mac next time.
Mono is pretty great. MonoDevelop is pretty good, but use it for 10 hours a day and you'll find anything wrong with just about any program. It just happens to be the thing that stands between me and getting my job done most days, so I take a lot of rage out on it.
It's work, and while I have a strong say in policy I'm not the only player. I get one copy of Windows for my machine and we use SVN. Our primary development environment is MonoDevelop, which, while strong, is not particularly stable outside of Linux I've found (ostensibly due to the fact that it uses GTK-Sharp). The alternative is to throw down $500 for a registered copy of MSVC#, which won't be approved right now. The other day I managed to crash the MSVC++ 2008 compiler by calling gcnew. I'm stuck in digital purgatory over here, man!
I know much of your work problems, and I'll repeat my oft-stated opinion one more time. It's absolutely unacceptable.
Let's say I own a demolitions business. I hire a bunch of union guys to smash some buildings. Oh, but I don't have a wrecking ball, and I refuse to pay for one. It's an absolute necessity for the job. The union guys now have a choice of quitting, not doing the job and being fired by me, using their own money to buy a wrecking ball, or steal a wrecking ball. None of those are in any way acceptable. I have to provide the employees with the tools necessary to complete the task. The only exceptions are for jobs such as chef, where people bring their own knives, or perhaps other jobs where people own their own uniforms.
You've basically been asked to do the impossible, and you have the balls to accept it and actually try to do it. I salute you. I would just tell the boss the truth, that he's asking the impossible. I would demand he provide the tools, and quit if I'm denied.
Every place I have ever worked has always provided all of the tools necessary to get the job done. It's not always perfect exactly what I want, but it's satisfactory. It helps that I use 90%+ free and/or open source software. Still, the 24" Ultrasharps for the whole tech department are not too shabby.
They play on Android devices if you visit the full web page (not the mobile version) and have Flash installed.
Interesting. It may be specially coded for Android's browsers then. My PS3's browser supports Flash and it doesn't work there (at least it didn't last time I checked). I also assume that my Tivo also uses for playback and it also doesn't work there.
Interesting. It may be specially coded for Android's browsers then. My PS3's browser supports Flash and it doesn't work there (at least it didn't last time I checked). I also assume that my Tivo also uses for playback and it also doesn't work there.
Nope its just that Android supports full featured flash as Google embraces flash as long as it is present.
The PS3 will only support Flash lite so not everything works.
I have no tolerance for people who steal OS's and software like windows and then complain that it doesn't work right. You need to either get an Open source OS, pay for windows, steal it and deal with the issues or STFU. If your job doesn't provide you with the tools you need to execute your responsibilities then you need to find a new job and draft a letter of resignation that clearly states they did not provide you with adequate tools. The longer you sit there and passively accept the circumstance the longer the employer will think they can get away with it. They will not act until they start losing something. This is something I feel really strongly about since I was in the military during the George "dubya" Bush years and the budget was so crunched because of the military being so over extended that we couldn't even buy hammers. I will never tolerate an environment like that because my tolerance of such conditions is implicit support of those conditions. They are unethical and abusive and in the end if you cannot come through on a project you will be held responsible and "lit up" in your evaluation for not performing properly. I have seen too many exceptionally skilled and good people ruined over this bullshit.
It's work, and while I have a strong say in policy I'm not the only player. I get one copy of Windows for my machine and we use SVN. Our primary development environment is MonoDevelop, which, while strong, is not particularly stable outside of Linux I've found (ostensibly due to the fact that it uses GTK-Sharp). The alternative is to throw down $500 for a registered copy of MSVC#, which won't be approved right now. The other day I managed to crash the MSVC++ 2008 compiler by calling gcnew. I'm stuck in digital purgatory over here, man!
While I do agree with Scott's and Bruce's opinions on the matter, if you absolutely cannot leave this job for some reason, one alternative might be to purchase MSVC# (which btw, I thought it was free now -- at least the express version free when I got it) and then deduct it on your taxes as a work-related expense (this is fairly legit based on my own experiences, though you may want to double-check with an accountant/tax expert of your own before you do so). The deduction would help offset the cost of you purchasing it. Not an ideal situation, but if you have no other option...
FYI, have you tried MSVC# Express for this project? Is there something you're doing that requires either the full version or MonoDevelop to get the job done?
Still, I would try to find other work before jumping through this hoop. The requirements your boss is putting on you are completely unreasonable.
I have no tolerance for people who steal OS's and software like windows and then complain that it doesn't work right
Woah, woah, who said anything about stealing? This was a legit copy of Win7 Home Pro that I had installed on an iMac via Boot Camp, then booted with a legitimate, full copy of Parallels Desktop. I use legit copies of Unity3D for my development. Even my OSX at home install came from a retail DVD I purchased in a CompUSA when Snow Leopard came out. I explicitly have not pirated MSVC, despite it being a superior solution to MonoDevelop. Someone's a little jumpy about software piracy.
FYI, have you tried MSVC# Express for this project?
Yep, I have. The solution leaves a lot to be desired. In particular the feature it doesn't support is: "open files from external applications." It's definitely not $500 worth of inconvenient, but it definitely leaves something be desired (especially when using remote desktop.) I have been pretty pleased with it for an OnLive integration package I'm writing though, so I don't think I need the upgrade anyway. (Also the $500 won't get the 2008 compiler to stop crashing when I call gcnew )
Regarding Win7: I'll admit that I tested the patience of the WGA gods. I knew the risks of booting Windows in the VM and I did it anyway. It bit me and I shouldn't be surprised. Part of me thinks that, as an end user, I shouldn't give a shit how I boot the $300 piece of software I^H my company bought. The other part is more rational. I know we should have kept better backups of our SVN repos, and I shouldn't complain when I'm stressing OSX to the edge of it's hardware support. There's a more even-keel side of me, but unfortunately doesn't make it onto my digital presence enough. (I'm an angry tweeter/forum poster, what can I say?) Having successfully released the back-pressure from my frustrating work day yesterday I can more easily appreciate the points made in this thread.
Comments
Computers will always be needed. I don't see people actually writing; prose or code; doing art, tweeking photos, editing audio and video, or doing one of a million things that make computers useful in day to day life. The iOS devices are inching closer to doing some of those things in a basic way but those will always be for people who just want to play around. Professionals are going to need hardware capable of running Photoshop, Final Cut Pro, ect.
The vast majority of consumers will still have some kind of computer in the home. People who don't really care about owning a standard computer, because their hobbies or profession doesn't require it, will own a tablet or other simple digital device that can access the internet.
The iCloud stuff is interesting. Now that the iOS devices don't require a computer the people Apple always wanted to target with them, people who don't normally spend $999 on a laptop, will be even more eager to buy them. I know a lot of people who have iPhones that never plug them into a computer and so they never have a backup of their data or Applications. It terrifies me when if I don't back up my phone even for a few days. Just having the auto-magic backup and restore feature in iCloud makes it a big win, most of the other features are redundant because of Google and Dropbox, with the exception of the Photo stream. Having those photos automagically appear on multiple iOS devices and on your PC is going to make a lot of people extremely happy. Imagine buying your parents an AppleTV or iPad so they can see photos of their grandchildren as you take them, with no extra work from the enduser. That feature is a whole lot of win.
EDIT: I just checked it. Still no good.
Also, iCloud really has nothing to do with online videos or games. Nor does Apple's choice to not allow flash on their devices have anything to do with DRM.
Also, it's not Apple's fault if sites haven't converted to HTML5. In fact, none of them would probably ever make the change without the iOS forcing function. I applaud Apple for moving away from Flash.
I jailbroke my iPad the other day. It made it unstable. Restoring it back to exactly the state I had it in was a one-click operation. Then it "just worked." I finished reading Contact and read about Quarks and Wormholes for the rest of the night. It was nice.
I'll keep one OSX install around to do all my development. Everything else is getting done on the closest "post-PC" device I can find.
You said it yourself. The iPad "just worked" not because it is an iPad and is somehow different from other computers. It's because you didn't fuck with it. When you did try to jailbreak it, it failed just like everything else.
Leave everything as the default settings as much as possible, don't do unsupported things, and always use legitimate software. If you follow this advice, you will see almost all of your problems disappear.
Your point about OSX is well taken however, I'll probably just buy a Mac next time.
Let's say I own a demolitions business. I hire a bunch of union guys to smash some buildings. Oh, but I don't have a wrecking ball, and I refuse to pay for one. It's an absolute necessity for the job. The union guys now have a choice of quitting, not doing the job and being fired by me, using their own money to buy a wrecking ball, or steal a wrecking ball. None of those are in any way acceptable. I have to provide the employees with the tools necessary to complete the task. The only exceptions are for jobs such as chef, where people bring their own knives, or perhaps other jobs where people own their own uniforms.
You've basically been asked to do the impossible, and you have the balls to accept it and actually try to do it. I salute you. I would just tell the boss the truth, that he's asking the impossible. I would demand he provide the tools, and quit if I'm denied.
Every place I have ever worked has always provided all of the tools necessary to get the job done. It's not always perfect exactly what I want, but it's satisfactory. It helps that I use 90%+ free and/or open source software. Still, the 24" Ultrasharps for the whole tech department are not too shabby.
The PS3 will only support Flash lite so not everything works.
FYI, have you tried MSVC# Express for this project? Is there something you're doing that requires either the full version or MonoDevelop to get the job done?
Still, I would try to find other work before jumping through this hoop. The requirements your boss is putting on you are completely unreasonable.
Regarding Win7: I'll admit that I tested the patience of the WGA gods. I knew the risks of booting Windows in the VM and I did it anyway. It bit me and I shouldn't be surprised. Part of me thinks that, as an end user, I shouldn't give a shit how I boot the $300 piece of software I^H my company bought. The other part is more rational. I know we should have kept better backups of our SVN repos, and I shouldn't complain when I'm stressing OSX to the edge of it's hardware support. There's a more even-keel side of me, but unfortunately doesn't make it onto my digital presence enough. (I'm an angry tweeter/forum poster, what can I say?) Having successfully released the back-pressure from my frustrating work day yesterday I can more easily appreciate the points made in this thread.