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Socoder -> Hardware and Technology -> Apple WWDC 2023

Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 05:29
Jayenkai
Apple Event, tonight. £3K headsets incoming!!!

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Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 05:29
therevillsgames
More AR/VR the better, but 3k who would buy it... oh wait Apple fans
Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 09:53
cyangames
I'd rather spend £3k on anything else!

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Web / Game Dev, occasionally finishes off coding games also!
Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 09:57
Jayenkai
I know what I'd spend it on!
Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 12:56
Kuron
There was a time when I was ready to move to Apple, but the new butterfly keyboards kept me from moving. Held off, bought a couple of nice high end Windows laptops for the price of one Apple laptop and have now bought a fairly high end Chromebook as my new daily driver and could NOT be happier. Quick, no fan, killer screen and can do anything I need and I get advertised battery life.

Use my Windows lappies for audio & video editing/processing/mastering although I could do most of that on my Chromebook. Do all my writing on my Chromebook, now, too. Do not miss Windows at all.
Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 13:03
Jayenkai
Mac
15" Air M2 - same connectivity as the smaller Air, same notch, same keyboard, still no numpad.
Starts at $1299
Next week

13" Air M2 is now $100 cheaper

Mac Studio M2 - M2 Max, faster, etc
M2 Ultra, faster faster faster, double double double. 76 cores? Fuck me!! Up to 192Gb?!
Starts at $1999

Mac Pro - with M2 Ultra, and PCI Expansion, up to 192Gb (? That's the same...?)
Supports Gen 4 PCI Express
Starts at $6999!!!!

-=-=-

iOS 17
Main 3 apps (phone, messages, facetime)
Contact "posters", instead of just avatars
Live Voicemail - this is one of those features we'll never see over here. They still charge us a fucking ludicrous amount of money for voicemails!!
FaceTime Voicemails.
Messages : Search filters. Transcribes voice messages.
More stickers : Live Stickers. Use anything from your photos, using the AI cut-out thing. They also work in other apps.. "anywhere" you use Emoji. We'll see if that works!

Airdrop : Name Drop = hold your phone up and "bloop" just like the early 2000s, your contact info is shared!

Text Input : Extra intelligence, a new version of Autocorrect.
GMail level predictions for whole sentences.
Dictation uses this, too, so is good at guessing what you're saying.

Journal : Apple-blogs, with suggestions from photos, musical tastes, etc.
Secure : No-one can access it! .. what's the point of that, then?

Standby : finally a horizontal clock for iPhone!!! Fuck!!!

No "hey" to activate Siri.

-=-=-

iPadOS

Widgets and Lockscreen updates : interactive widgets, and the personalised lockscreens from the last iOS.
Live Activities : Track food orders, timers, etc. looks like the Standby features.
Health : see all the data from your phone. Gud gud!!
PDF : A.I. fields for names, addresses, etc, and "safe signature", etc. PDFs in Notes for keeping related notes together, as well as live-collab.
More Stage Manager features, and Freeform tools like brushes and more.

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MacOS
Sonoma (!?!)
Most of the above features.
New screensavers
Widgets on the Desktop. Gosh, it's 1995!! They fade when you're using another program.
Widgets from your phone, where the phone sends the data to the Mac, without any extra installs.

Gaming ... .. on a Mac?
Game Mode : reduces background tasks, reduces controller lag by increasing Bluetooth speed.
Game Porting Toolkit : Quickly evaluate how well your game runs on Metal.

Kojima!! - Death Stranding : Director's Cut. And future titles, too.
Preorder Death Stranding, "soon"

Video Conferencing
Overlay : uses AI to cut you out, and paste you over the video.
Works in lots of video conferencing apps

Safari
OMG TEH Fast!!
Privacy : locks the browser window. (?)
Passwords and Passkeys can be shared to a group. Don't share your passwords!!!
Profiles : cookies, favourites and more can be grouped into different profiles.
Web Apps : "File - Add to Dock" hurray! Shoebox of Games in your dock!

-=-=-

Audio & Home

AirPods : Adaptive Audio, Conversation Awareness, etc. lots of AI enhanced volume stuff.
AirPlay sharing - automatic sharing to random devices just when you don't want them to automagically do them. Like when your Mum's watching something on TV, but you want to watch this Apple Presentation, and the TV will fight to airplay the stream..

AirPlay in Hotels. .. good luck finding a hotel that has that!!!
SharePlay in cars. *shrugs*

TVOS : New control center.
You can select your own photos as a screensaver. (Couldn't you do that before??!)
FaceTime on Apple TV, connects to iPhone or iPad cameras.
They seem to have a lot of fancy new docks for the iPhone, here.

-=-=-

WatchOS. "The most advanced wearable OS"
We'll see how this pans out in a bit, I suppose.
There's a very fancy looking video of swirly circles and things, but. Yeah, unless that battery's going for days at a time, it can piss off.

Turn the crown to scroll the watch face to see widgets.. did that not do that already?
Gosh, the world clock now changes colour based on the time. Wowie.
Two new watch faces. Glory be.
Snoopy comes to Apple Watch

Cycling "tracking", connects to Bluetooth enabled bikes.
Can monitor your FTP, and do power zones, I have no idea what any of this is.
OMG, now your cycling can appear on your phone. OMG!!!!!?!!!?

Hiking : Compass now tracks where the last mobile data was available, so if you get lost/etc you can find your way back
New Workout APIs, including when swinging a golf club or tennis racket.
It can sense your wrists movement, and can help you train your .. um.. wrist movements.. .. .... to move your wrist better.

Mental Health : identify your emotions. Tell your watch how you feel, and why you feel like that.
Also available on iPhone and iPad
Tracks your mental health, and helps you understand things.

Vision Health : why is everyone's eyesight getting worse? Why not squint at your tiny watch to read information about what could be causing this.

-=-=-

New OS developers later today

-=-=-

Here we go!!!
Initial thought : that looks bigger than I expected.
Apple Vision Pro

Eyes, hands and voice. No controllers?
Big wire hanging out the back of it... battery or phone?

"Spatial Computing"

Eye tracking and your hands will do all the work. Cameras below the device will watch your hands whilst they're resting.
Your eyes display on the screen at the front of the device.

Apps, Apps, Apps.. they show a lot of normal 2d apps, but in a virtual space.
Lots of "you can simply turn your head!" use cases. None of that is good for me!!!
But this looks a dream, as far as AR goes. .. if it does work this well.
Virtual keyboard, Apple dictation,etc.

FaceTime : you can see everyone around the room!!!
(But.. what do they see? They didn't say that!!! Is it you with a great big slab on your face?)

2D photo app
Panorama photos sound cool.
The device itself can be used as a 3D camera.. but you know those videos are going to be wonky as hell as soon as you dare to move your head whilst capturing.

Watch movies on a big screen. Just like every other VR headset.
They try to make this sound super impressive, but.. ffs, this feature is a default!!!
"3D movies are amazing!" Sure they are, I agree.. until you move your head, then wonky-fuck-time starts!!

"Play Apple Arcade titles on a big screen"
No. I want to play in VR!!!

Disney...!?!
"Ways that were previously impossible", shows the same cinema screen features but with Star Wars environments, and National Geographic videos like on the Quest.
Disney Plus will be available, on day one! Omg. How exciting..
:/

Now we're onto the "wow, we made a whole new thing! We are amazeballs" bullshit.
Mmmm, big glass front that you can smash.
Mmmmm...
Comfort, wearability, etc,
Modular, so you can make it "for you" so you won't ever share your incredibly overpriced device, and have to buy them for all your family.
"Zeiss optical lenses" for people who need prescription lenses, so you know they're fucking expensive.
And the add-on is just a battery.

23 million pixels, more than 4k per eye.
Fancy pants lens, with "true 4k resolution", fine text, etc.
Spatial audio system. Personalised sound, to you and the room, so don't you dare go moving anywhere.

Dual-chip design.
M2 for the main stuff, then an R1 side-chip, which handles all the inputs.

It "looks transparent" .. my arse!

Now they're talking about the "what you look like in FaceTime" thing. You use the front of the headset of capture your face, then it animates that when you're chatting. .. hmmm..

A 3D heart
A 3D car
A 3D PTC production tool
A music thing
A planetarium
Excel. Word. Teams
Zoom, and other chatty crap
Xcode, Swift, AR kit and more all work with it.
iOS apps work in the new OS.

Unity - Full OS access.. but sounds like it's still in 2D, but on a virtual screen?
Hmmm..

Privacy and Security - Optic ID. It's in your eyes!!!
"Where you look stays private". Works like a mouse click, so browsers and such don't know what you're looking at.

OMG, it isn't possible! OMG, so many patents. OMG, all the entertainment!! OMG, 3D photos..
Here comes the "if you buy all this, it'll cost..."
Starts at $3,499
Fucking hell!!!

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Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 13:21
Jayenkai
RE Win vs MacOS.. I think I've switched all the way, now.
I have UTM installed on the Mac. It's a Virtual thing, and has Win11Arm running on it.
I occasionally use it for running Blitz code, and testing out the odd bit of software, but ..

yeah, that's about it.
Blitz3d, and OpenMPT are pretty much the only "main" tools that I don't currently have a replacement for, on the Mac, now.
I honestly didn't expect that transition to be as seamless as it was. And switching back from Mac's Alt+X/C/V, etc to Windows' Ctrl+X/C/V seems to be a LOT harder than switching the other way around. I didn't expect that, either.

But it isn't easy, and if you've found the perfect laptop already, then I probably wouldn't recommend it unless you're doing Video Editing.
Out of everything I've done on here, that's my biggest "That's the power of a Mac" moment.

Mmmm...

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Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 13:45
Kuron
Video/audio editing is why I hold on to my Windows lappies. Since I had to leave behind all of my old computer stuff and the majority of my backups, in many ways I am starting fresh. I tried a nice high end Linux laptop about a year ago, but the screen was horrid and I returned it.

HP has a new high end Chromebook with a 1,000 nit screen, but it is Intel based and as tempting as it is, I have also broken away from Intel/AMD and enjoy the performance and battery life I get now. Only complaint with Chromebooks is the letters on the keys are lower case, instead of capital and it is a bit harder for my bad eyes. Only complaint.

Like the games I have on it (golf game and pinball game) and I have a good drawing program and a nice stylus. For future development, I guess I would use Spider Basic. Online versions of all kinds of software nowadays and really enjoying that and not having my system cluttered.
Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 14:29
cyangames
I'll stick with my current PCs
Mon, 05 Jun 2023, 15:26
Kuron
I generally like Apple's OSes, but, egads! Sonoma's screenshot is darn near as ugly as XP's Luna. Really has a Malibu Barbie look to it. Looks like Jony Ive got rehired.




*If everybody in the world did a face palm at the same time, it would just begin to express how I felt when looking at that screenshot for the first time.*
Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 05:33
therevillsgames
Apple Vision Pro looks like a really awesome headset, the M2 chipset is really powerful.... but how was $3.5k hanging around for it?
Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 06:24
cyangames
I don't really see anything too bad with that OS image myself, it looks like it's doing it's best to keep the essence of the wallpaper behind it which is kinda neat, although heaven forbid you do something crazy and set a checkerboard pattern as your background, ha!. It'd be cool to see how it would deal with different backgrounds accordingly if that's the case.

-=-=-
Web / Game Dev, occasionally finishes off coding games also!
Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 08:43
steve_ancell
I would sooner spend £3K on retro computers or part of it on a ZX Spectrum Next than an Apple headset.
Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 13:07
Kuron
Think my main issues with the OS, is looks like it belongs more on a touch device, besides the simplicity. The highlights on the calendar look exactly like things we were doing 15 years back. The weather gadget looks nice, but also "old style". *shrugs* UI is such a personal thing, just looks cartoony, and more aimed at a touch interface to me.

But, I have gotten so used to more modern dark themes, and largely flat UIs. However, I know rounded is "in" and Google is moving to that, as well, with "Material You". At least Google currently has a nice dark theme on the Chromebooks that pretty closely matches what I use on Windows 10, although this is my favorite UI & Theme.

I am sure (hoping) there are other themes for Sonoma, although the gadget style seems to be more my issue.
Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 14:22
Jayenkai



MacOS currently only has two themes, Light or Dark, and I don't believe there's anything more than that on the horizon. You can also set the colour "accent", but not much more than that. It's wallpapers or nothing, I'm afraid!
You can turn the semi-transparency/blurred window effect off, so in the folder view you can see the subtle blue bar in the wallpaper showing through. I quite like that, but it can be turned off.

I much prefer the dark theme of MacOS. It seems a little more rich, to my eyes, with a bit more contrast to the many greys, as opposed to the light theme which seems to be much more white white white.

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Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 15:03
Kuron
Guess the best way to describe it, is the Sonoma screenshot REALLY screams METRO! Especially the gadgets in the lower left corner. Metro is horribly dated by today's standards, IMHO. I do like the wallpaper. Guess I am a bit biased as I also have kept an empty desktop for 10+ years. Here is my desktop on my Chromebook I am on, now.
Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 15:39
Jayenkai
MacOS has this really odd habit. For the most part it doesn't want you using the desktop for putting icons on, and gives you things like an easy to reach downloads folder and what not, to keep the desktop tidy.

Then it randomly shoves icons on the desktop at will, and you end up searching for them for ages, only to find them there.
WTF is that about, MacOS!?!
My desktop icons are top-left, main drives and essential daily use shortcuts. Bottom left, essential folders for dev'ing.
That's all. Other than that, the daily Platdude desktops cycle endlessly. (3066 and counting)

For the most part, MacOS itself isn't "currently" too much like the widgets. The widgets are very much "iOS Style", and do kinda look a bit out of place on MacOS. But I'm not really sure how else you'd do those kinds of little things.
Any thoughts, post a pic!!

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Tue, 06 Jun 2023, 16:22
Kuron
When I use Windows, have been doing a lot of audio editing and converting lately, hence lots of need to empty the recycle bin. To do that, I unhide the desktop icons and am always amazed at how much stuff default installs an icon there.

Back when I did a LOT of work on Windows, I used "fences" to keep the desktop organized and I like "groupy" -- both by Stardock. Guess now, with so much audio and video processing and needing all the UMPH I can get for the tasks at hand, superfluous things that might interfere and cause a glitch, I just avoid.

There is no perfect system, and what works best for one person, may not work best for another. I really liked the old days of 3.1 and Program Manager.

Was explaining to Wifey the other day about Bob and how bad it was, but how awesome Bubba was and how much I used it.

With Windows 10, I use an add on and my start button/menu do not work much different than they did on Windows 95. Super easy for me to navigate and find what I need.

There was a time when I mainly did programming, that I used my desktop to organize things, but that slows the system down so much, IMHO.

*shrugs* Believe the Aussie expression is Horses for Courses. Have always loved Apple's OSes, and even used Safari for Windows until it quit being supported. That browser was literally the only time Windows had decent font smoothing, as MS's font smoothing is pants. Apple gets font smoothing right, even on Windows and Google has it perfect on Chrome OS.
Wed, 07 Jun 2023, 15:43
Kuron
Very interesting review:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/06/hands-on-with-apple-vision-pro-this-is-not-a-vr-headset/
Mon, 12 Jun 2023, 14:33
Kuron
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-12186037/Dont-want-spend-3-499-Apples-Vision-Pro-Tech-giant-plans-release-CHEAPER-model.html
Mon, 12 Jun 2023, 16:57
Jayenkai
A) Fucking daily mail.
But B ) .. I think that was obvious by the name "Vision Pro", and really, all the rumours going in where that this was aiming for devs and the like first.
It's a shame, IMO. I think a cheaper-model first would've really helped spur things on.

I'm not sure why Apple seem to hate being super-awesome, and are merely content with just being worth Trillions of dollars.
..
Oh, no.. wait.. .,.
Aaah, I see..

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Sun, 25 Jun 2023, 18:18
Kuron
Top strap for Apple's Ski Goggles to be sold separately.

https://www.engadget.com/apples-vision-pro-headset-may-not-come-with-a-top-strap-in-the-box-160601556.html