Rumor: 14” iPad Pro

[Yoused]

I hope they put the camera on the long edge.

I want the camera set in a slot on the short end bezel, with a little facetime mirror on the end and a gooseneck on the other end so you can lift it out of the slot and take pictures/movies with your iPad without having to aim the whole damn slab. One camera instead of two.

 

[Cmaier]

I want the camera set in a slot on the short end bezel, with a little facetime mirror on the end and a gooseneck on the other end so you can lift it out of the slot and take pictures/movies with your iPad without having to aim the whole damn slab. One camera instead of two.

It‘s never occurred to me to use the rear camera on my ipad. I’ve never done it. Not sure what the use case would be for me.

 

[Yoused]

It‘s never occurred to me to use the rear camera on my ipad. I’ve never done it. Not sure what the use case would be for me.

A quick image of a paper document could in theory prove useful (perhaps, in a pinch, a tad faster than scanning). I just think a single camera could be more cost-effective (and thus, perhaps, better quality).

 

[Nycturne]

Almost, though. When’s Microsoft going to give us real office?

Define “real office”?

 

[Cmaier]

Define “real office”?

An office that has at least most of what mac office has, even if the interface is different. There are things you simply can’t create in iPad word, for example - I can use it to review or edit certain types of legal documents, but not to create them.

 

[Yoused]

Define “real office”?

Real Office

n. collection of unimaginitive software bloat employing difficult-to-reverse-engineer proprietary file formats, an irritating papeclip that periodically makes you shout "Stop helping me!" and a sophisticated scripting engine that provides a massive attack surface for malware​

 

[Cmaier]

Real Office

n. collection of unimaginitive software bloat employing difficult-to-reverse-engineer proprietary file formats and a scripting engine that provides a massive attack surface for malware​

It is what it is, but what some people call bloat, other people call “necessary features and functionality.” There are plenty of more streamlined alternatives for people who don’t need everything that Office does. As for file formats, courts actually often require documents to be submitted in .doc or .docx format (thankfully most seem to be done with wordperfect finally), and you don’t want to be That Lawyer who saved a document into Word format from your ”better” word processor, only to find that the judge can’t open it, or the margins or fonts are a little off when the judge opens it. I’ve seen lawyers get sanctioned because their font didn’t meet the requirements of the judge’s standing order.

As for spreadsheets, I haven’t been handed one in years that has NOT made extensive use of pivot tables and other “advanced” features that are not supported well, or at all, in the alternatives.

 

[Nycturne]

An office that has at least most of what mac office has, even if the interface is different. There are things you simply can’t create in iPad word, for example - I can use it to review or edit certain types of legal documents, but not to create them.

Yeah, I mostly ask because people tend to be vague on what features they are missing and I'm curious where the gaps still are. Even if I moved on years ago.

Real Office

n. collection of unimaginitive software bloat employing difficult-to-reverse-engineer proprietary file formats, an irritating papeclip that periodically makes you shout "Stop helping me!" and a sophisticated scripting engine that provides a massive attack surface for malware​

Funny you bring up the scripting engine. Apple's own store guidelines as they stand seem to preclude VBA on iOS. Fun.

 

[Cmaier]

Yeah, I mostly ask because people tend to be vague on what features they are missing and I'm curious where the gaps still are. Even if I moved on years ago.



Funny you bring up the scripting engine. Apple's own store guidelines as they stand seem to preclude VBA on iOS. Fun.

Just jumping to mind, things that I run into all the time are creating tables of contents, working with pivot tables in excel, creating endnotes, customizing styles, etc. The way iPad word handles revision tracking (particularly in how it displays revisions and comments) is also essentially unusable in the sorts of workflows I am involved in, where there can be hundreds of edits made by a dozen different authors. There are also limitations on what you can do with custom indents and stuff in iPad Word. Also, selecting text (when using a trackpad) doesn’t quite work the same as on a mac.

It’s definitely been improving with new versions every few months, but now that the hardware in an iPad Pro is essentially identical to that in a Mac, we’re at the point where there can be feature-for-feature equivalence, even if the user interfaces are a little different. (Though, with trackpad and mouse support on iPads now, the user interfaces can begin to converge, too. Most people using word aren’t going to do so without a keyboard. Maybe there’s room for the existing Office on ipad for light work and editing, using primarily touch, and a more direct port of Mac Word to iPad for use with setups that have a pointing device (trackpad, mouse, or Apple Pencil).

 

[Nycturne]

It’s definitely been improving with new versions every few months, but now that the hardware in an iPad Pro is essentially identical to that in a Mac, we’re at the point where there can be feature-for-feature equivalence, even if the user interfaces are a little different. (Though, with trackpad and mouse support on iPads now, the user interfaces can begin to converge, too. Most people using word aren’t going to do so without a keyboard. Maybe there’s room for the existing Office on ipad for light work and editing, using primarily touch, and a more direct port of Mac Word to iPad for use with setups that have a pointing device (trackpad, mouse, or Apple Pencil).

I will say UITextInput on iOS is... not great. Especially if you are trying to port an existing AppKit app. UIKit and AppKit handle text input completely differently, and Apple decided that direct event access was not something that would be available on iOS which breaks a lot of the old event loop driven stuff. And keyboard input is filtered through UITextInput. Maybe Apple has finally gotten around to fixing it, but but back in the iOS 7 era, it was a bear to work with.

While the port is already pretty "direct", it's the fact that you have to rebuild the UI layer in UIKit to re-expose all the functionality. Too bad there isn't some reverse Catalyst to let you link against AppKit to produce an iOS app.

 

[B01L]

The 'latest' from The Other Place...

 

[Cmaier]

Well, if this is true, the 14” version becomes a lot less interesting. Would be very weird for regular iPad to have a 14” version and Pro tops out at 12”, though.

Young: 14" iPad to feature LED panel, ProMotion unlikely, scheduled for early next year

Last week, analyst Ross Young said Apple could launch a 14″ iPad Pro as early as next year. Now, Young has corrected his information by reporting that Apple might not be readying a new iPad Pro, but a regular tablet instead. The analyst shared the information seen by 9to5Mac in his Super Follow...

9to5mac.com