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Connected

195: A Conference for Liars

 

00:00:00   (upbeat music)

00:00:02   From Relay FM, this is Connected, episode 195.

00:00:12   It's made possible this week by Pingdom,

00:00:14   Skillshare, and Smile.

00:00:16   I'm your host, Steven Hackett.

00:00:17   I'm back this week from jacket shopping,

00:00:19   and I'm joined, as usual, by my two co-hosts,

00:00:23   hailing from London, England, we have Myke Hurley.

00:00:26   - Did you get a good jacket?

00:00:28   I did.

00:00:29   Good, that's good.

00:00:30   I wasn't actually jacket shopping, but it's fine.

00:00:33   And we also have Federico Vittucci.

00:00:35   Hello Federico.

00:00:36   - Hi, how are you?

00:00:37   - I'm good.

00:00:38   It's a big show this week.

00:00:40   WBC starts in just a few days.

00:00:43   We're gonna get to that.

00:00:44   Next, I say a little housekeeping right off the top,

00:00:46   next week's episode will be live at the Hammer Theatre

00:00:50   in San Jose, California for our lovely ticket holders.

00:00:53   That episode will be out in the connected feed

00:00:57   early Thursday Pacific time. So that's the goal. It won't be out Wednesday, it'll be

00:01:02   out early Thursday, and it will have the Connected segment and the other stuff we're doing in

00:01:06   the live show. So be sure to check that out. I think it'll be a lot of fun.

00:01:11   Can I make my special request now, considering we're talking about the live show?

00:01:15   Sure.

00:01:16   I have a special request I would like to make to the audience, to people coming to the live

00:01:21   show. This is a really big deal for us because we've worked really hard. Steven's worked really

00:01:26   hard on getting everything together and we're very excited about it and I want to ask of the people

00:01:34   coming to see our show, I want to ask for something from you. It is to help me live out a dream.

00:01:40   I want to feel like a rock star. I think we've all felt had this in our lives right? Surely at

00:01:46   at some point in our lives we've always wanted to feel like a rock star.

00:01:50   I used to be one.

00:01:51   Federica used to be one. So he doesn't need it, only I need this.

00:02:07   You can do this for me, I just need your energy. Like when we're coming onto the stage,

00:02:13   When everyone's coming out onto the stage, you know, we're doing it in a couple of groups, two segments.

00:02:17   So when we come out, just give me your energy. I want to feel it.

00:02:21   I want just that feeling. I've never been in front of an audience this size before.

00:02:25   Please just the energy is what I want.

00:02:27   So I ask that of you.

00:02:29   I know that this I really don't want to have to do that thing where I'm like, I can't hear you.

00:02:34   Like, I don't want to do that. Right.

00:02:35   So clap, please clap.

00:02:37   Just give me give me the energy.

00:02:39   It's all I ask of you.

00:02:41   And then you will all be my best friends forever.

00:02:43   Thank you. You can throw pieces of clothing, you can throw flowers. No throwing. No throwing.

00:02:48   No throwing. No throwing. Just noise. Noise is all I want. Just noise.

00:02:51   Okay. We'd like to use this menu again. Please don't take your clothes off.

00:02:55   Yes. Keep your clothes on. So what you're asking for is basically like a standing ovation.

00:03:02   Like you want to be praised from like the the the deepest parts of our audience's hearts.

00:03:09   They can stay seated, but aside from that, yes. Everything you just said.

00:03:15   Can it be like one of those motivational events where people go and they like, they yell and

00:03:20   they clap and they follow like this teacher on stage? Can you be that kind of teacher?

00:03:25   Well you're the teacher. The teacher.

00:03:27   Teacher, teacher. I think you're thinking of faith healing. That's a different...

00:03:31   I don't want to go that far. We don't need to go that far.

00:03:33   We're not doing that. Okay, okay. Just making sure, just making sure.

00:03:37   Yeah, so I will say as well, if you can't make it to the show, but you see us around,

00:03:43   if you're in San Jose, if you're there at WOTC, come say hey.

00:03:45   We love hanging out and meeting people.

00:03:48   They're, you know, we may have goodies on us.

00:03:50   If you have a Connected t-shirt, I believe that it was promised that Federico would give

00:03:53   you a high five.

00:03:54   Yes.

00:03:55   So, lots of exciting stuff.

00:03:56   It's a very fun week for all of us.

00:04:00   But there's follow-up to be done because we have to do follow-up.

00:04:04   We cannot eschew from tradition.

00:04:06   No.

00:04:07   can't not even on uh christmas eve wbdceve wwwdceve that's a different thing wdceve

00:04:17   it's some kind of like conference for conference for liars the worldwide deceiving conference

00:04:25   maybe that's what happened to uh airplay too you know they came out of wdceve we're all deceived

00:04:35   So, where do we start in follow-up? We start with this iPhone case thing?

00:04:41   You got the case! When did we- was this two weeks ago? It's two weeks ago we spoke about

00:04:45   that Indiegogo for the Spigen iMac G3 iPhone case and you got yours and immediately made a YouTube

00:04:52   video about it because obviously why wouldn't you, right? Like that makes a lot of sense.

00:04:55   Because I'm a YouTuber now.

00:04:57   Smash that like button when you go to Stephen's page. Smash it.

00:05:01   Please.

00:05:01   Like destroy the like button.

00:05:03   Subscribe.

00:05:04   and subscribe to the bell so the like button and and bell him and it was you

00:05:11   ended up actually liking the case more than I expected you would I thought when

00:05:18   you posted that video it was just gonna be like you were just gonna be really

00:05:23   upset and down about it but you ended up not being to the extent even though I

00:05:28   watched the video and even watching the video I was like he clearly doesn't like

00:05:32   this. But it ended up that you did and I was quite surprised about that.

00:05:36   Yeah I think where I come down is that I like it as an object but I don't want to

00:05:40   use it as an iPhone case because it's kind of thick and like it's real it is

00:05:44   it is crazy slippery like it is there's no grip or texture to this thing at all.

00:05:50   See I think that for me like in watching it I don't understand why they did it

00:05:54   the way that they did it like with it being that I had no idea that thing

00:05:58   inside with rubber, like a rubber case, which looks like a like a motherboard, basically.

00:06:03   Right. Looks like internals.

00:06:04   Then you put this like clear translucent plastic on it.

00:06:07   Like I think I would personally like it if they just made a rubber case that had like a

00:06:13   translucent layer on top and that you could like it.

00:06:16   So it was way thinner, but it was all rubber, like silicone.

00:06:19   That's what I would like. I think having this like huge three piece thing, it's too big.

00:06:25   It's too big.

00:06:26   Yeah, it's it's bulky and there's an air gap in there

00:06:29   so like you get a little piece of dust in between the rubbery part and then the

00:06:32   Plastic then you got like debris and also I know I would be taken out of all the time

00:06:37   So yeah, I mean if if it's something that you're interested in like it's a good case. It's well made

00:06:42   I have no doubt that it offers a lot of protection, but it's not quite for me. This is beautiful

00:06:47   I'm keeping it because I think it'll be fun to have it on for special events

00:06:50   This is like a Halloween costume for your phone. It's not a case. It's like a whole thing that you put on

00:06:55   looks nice but it's too much iPhone cosplay sort of yeah kinda yes yeah yeah

00:07:03   okay yeah that works things 3.6 because now we talk about every version of

00:07:09   things has a whole host of external keyboard shortcuts for the iPad I watched

00:07:17   this video they did and read through the Mac stories article I mean you can do

00:07:21   like is there anything you can't do with the keyboard Federico it seems like

00:07:24   everything is wired into a shortcut now?

00:07:26   - There's a couple of things.

00:07:28   One of them, I think, it's some kind of system limitation.

00:07:32   So you cannot change dates and times

00:07:35   from the native iOS date picker,

00:07:38   the little scrolling wheel.

00:07:39   That's not keyboard controllable.

00:07:41   And the other is that if you have a task with a note

00:07:46   and the note contains a link,

00:07:48   there's no way with the keyboard to say,

00:07:50   open this link in Safari.

00:07:52   so you need to tap the link with your finger.

00:07:54   There should be like an open link command, honestly.

00:07:58   But those are the only two things that I couldn't activate with the keyboard.

00:08:04   It's really impressive what they've been able to do.

00:08:09   It's not just, as I argued in the story, it's not just the keyboard shortcuts,

00:08:13   because a bunch of apps have them.

00:08:14   And if you look at apps like Jafs, for example,

00:08:18   or the new OmniFocus 3, which also came out today,

00:08:21   They probably have more in terms of like sheer numbers, that there are more shortcuts.

00:08:27   But it's the idea of letting you select, for example, multiple items, letting you move

00:08:32   selections around, and also the fact that every menu, every button, every option you

00:08:39   can select with the keyboard.

00:08:41   So it's kind of like the Apple TV focus engine where you can highlight, even though you don't

00:08:49   have a mouse with the cursor. And it's a similar idea, right, that even though you're not touching

00:08:55   the screen, you can still highlight, you can make selections, and you can do stuff with

00:08:59   them. And there's also the feature called Type Travel, which allows you to just type.

00:09:05   It's literally like you open the app and any screen you can press down on, any key in the

00:09:11   keyboard, and it starts searching without having to activate like a special search mode

00:09:16   beforehand and you can just travel to what you're looking for. So you can open

00:09:22   a project or a task or you know you can open an area for example. It's really

00:09:27   well done and I would love to see Apple doing more of this. I was talking to

00:09:34   a few people on Twitter for example Apple Notes it allows you to navigate

00:09:37   around with keyboard you can open you can move between folders and notes but

00:09:43   it's not the same kind of deep keyboard control that we're seeing in things, for

00:09:48   example. I would love to have this kind of concept in system features like

00:09:54   multitasking or, you know, bringing an app from spotlighting to slide over.

00:10:00   Let's not talk too much about things we might like to see. Let's, you know, hold

00:10:04   those back for a little bit later on in the episode, maybe in case you're potentially

00:10:07   ruining someone's pics. Okay, okay. Like Myke's, it seems like. I mean you're free to use it,

00:10:16   I have a whole list of things. It's not just about you, you know, we can maybe potentially

00:10:20   get to that very very specific thing later on. Maybe this is a tactic that I'm using,

00:10:24   I don't know, you will never know. Fucking all my ideas out. I'm almost annoyed by how

00:10:31   good a name type traveler name type travelers like that is very good naming i like that a lot man

00:10:38   things breaking my heart just breaking my heart every day i look at it and i'm like oh look at

00:10:44   all the fun stuff you're doing i don't know i don't know so you're still using todoist

00:10:51   yeah i'm still using todoist i don't remember the exact reasons but there are reasons but i don't

00:10:57   and what they were. Because after the last time we spoke about it, I did give it a more of a try,

00:11:02   and there was still a few things where it just wasn't working for me. I think it was stuff around

00:11:08   reminders and also Steven's problem, right, of repeating tasks, doing them early, stuff like

00:11:17   that. I realized it was just going to be too much of a struggle for me to try and bend it to my

00:11:23   system. But it does. I'm keeping my eye on things, right? Like I'm keeping my eye on

00:11:29   it. I'm seeing what they're doing. And there is a potential future for me and things, I

00:11:33   think. Who knows? Should we take our first break?

00:11:36   Let's do it.

00:11:37   All right. Today's show is brought to you in part by our friends at Pingdom, the company

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00:12:51   So before we get started on our WWDC happy-ometer, there was some iOS updates this week.

00:13:02   iOS 11.4 has snuck in just under the wire with Airplay 2 and iCloud messages,

00:13:10   or messages in the cloud, has just come out. Now Federico, as the individual amongst us with

00:13:18   more than one Airplay 2 speaker, what are your impressions of using two HomePods with iOS 11.4?

00:13:25   So I only played with it for like 15 minutes because it was late yesterday and then today

00:13:32   I just came back home to do this show. From my initial tests it's really well done. So I tried

00:13:39   with Siri and I asked on my... so I updated them both. I did not create a stereo pair

00:13:48   because I'm not sure that I want to... because they're not located in the same

00:13:52   room and I'm not sure I want to do that.

00:13:54   Yeah I feel like the stereo pair stuff works if they're in the same room

00:13:58   otherwise you're not gonna get all the music clearly right like if you have

00:14:01   them in other parts of your house it's not gonna work.

00:14:03   So what I did is I asked Siri to put the music, the song that I was listening to on the other device

00:14:11   and to just control music playback and change settings like volume. And it all worked very

00:14:17   nicely. It was fast. For example, when I was listening to a song in the kitchen and I said

00:14:24   put this on in the bedroom too. And it took like a couple of seconds to not only to put the song

00:14:32   on the other HomePod, but also to jump ahead in the current position, so to put them in sync,

00:14:38   right? Because of course you don't want to have a song like 30 seconds in and the other just starts.

00:14:42   - Oh, that's weird. So you hear it and then it starts playing, then it jumps ahead?

00:14:46   - No, it doesn't. You don't hear the jumping ahead. That's what I was saying. It takes a

00:14:50   couple of seconds to say, "Okay," and then you can hear the song with the correct position

00:14:56   in the other room. So it's all invisible, but you know those couple of seconds I understand why it

00:15:02   takes a little longer than maybe you know just like one second. What else? I tried to change

00:15:09   the volume so doing things like I was listening to the same song on two home pods and I said put the

00:15:15   bedroom at 40% and it changed from my kitchen and so the kitchen home pod took the command and

00:15:22   change the volume of the other HomePod in the other room. Yeah, I mean, it basically did everything I asked for on first try without any weirdness that is usually involved with Siri.

00:15:38   And it was fast, it was stable, Sylvia approved, so you know, it's not too technical, everybody can use these commands.

00:15:47   And I also saw the control center integration. Now you have the drop-down menu and you can basically use these checkboxes to select multiple sources at the same time.

00:16:00   Yeah, that looks cool. I like that UI. It finally makes more sense why they made the UI the way that they did.

00:16:07   It does make some sense. So yeah, I have nothing bad to say about it. If anything, it worked really well.

00:16:15   I'm considering the idea of a third HomePod.

00:16:18   There he is, there he is. Of course he is.

00:16:22   So I'm not saying that I'm gonna leave a corner in my bag when I'm coming to WWC, just for a HomePod.

00:16:30   But if somehow a corner in the bag is left, I mean, I had nothing to do with it.

00:16:35   Exactly, exactly. If things move around during the flight in the bag, it's not my fault.

00:16:41   So yeah, it works really nicely.

00:16:45   Also, Messages in the Cloud is now available.

00:16:49   It is really interesting to me that you have to manually turn it on

00:16:53   and you don't even get told about it when you update. There's no

00:16:57   splash screen, nothing. You have to go into

00:17:01   iCloud in that really bad UI of the menu, right?

00:17:05   Where the way you get into iCloud is by tapping your own name, which is

00:17:09   That's so confusing. I don't know why they did that. You know what I mean? At the top of iOS settings?

00:17:15   Yeah, yeah.

00:17:15   It's like such a strange thing. And then you have to just turn on messages. That's it. And that's

00:17:21   how you turn it on. My assumption is they don't want everybody using this yet. Like, they're kind

00:17:29   of expecting people that know about it will use it now. But like, they're still, they've obviously

00:17:35   see how problems with this. I think they're still kind of like scaling it up by not turning

00:17:41   it on for people and not telling people about it. So they'll only get a percentage of their

00:17:46   user base turning it on rather than everybody. That's my assumption because it is weirdly

00:17:51   hidden and not even made reference to. My messages are still uploading and downloading.

00:17:57   I have no idea how long this is going to take. I don't know what's going on, but it's currently

00:18:03   moved something like 17 gigabytes or something. I don't delete messages really. And I would

00:18:09   say that currently my devices are more out of sync with each other than they ever have

00:18:16   been, which is fun. It's just they're coming in slowly, right? So like messages are coming

00:18:22   in on my iPad, but my iPhone is not seeing them yet. And it seems like it's taking a

00:18:26   little bit longer for that to fix itself. I am going to say that's fine because something's

00:18:32   going on right like there's all this stuff is happening so I'm gonna wait

00:18:36   until all of my messages have been uploaded and downloaded like until those

00:18:40   progress bars stop showing up before I pass any judgment because I do have

00:18:45   multiple multiple gigabytes of messages and it's all flying around all over the

00:18:49   place so I'm just gonna kind of wait it also isn't on the Mac yet which is kind

00:18:54   of kind of funny to me as of this recording yeah there was no there's no

00:18:58   Mac OS update. Mine synced overnight. You know, it tells you, hey, you know, be sure

00:19:03   to plug in the phone, plug in the iPad. I've got 22 gigs of messages now synced to my iCloud

00:19:09   account. And I mean, so far, I don't think I've used my iPad enough today to be able

00:19:14   to tell you, definitively, oh, things seem faster, things seem better. But at least for

00:19:19   me, the the syncing situation seemed to go seemed to go pretty smoothly. I'm very curious

00:19:25   to see how this plays out, if it really means things will stay in sync, if it will get rid

00:19:29   of the deal where, you know, Myke, you tweeted the other day that you opened up your MacBook

00:19:33   Pro for the first time in months, and it took, you know, 25 minutes for messages to come

00:19:36   in. That is still probably going to be the case. But you know, hopefully they've made

00:19:42   these apps smarter. We don't get a notification for every single one of those, right? That

00:19:45   if it knows it's been read somewhere else, because it's syncing now, it just sort of

00:19:50   silently files them in, and then you open messages, and they're all there. So I am hoping

00:19:54   that this is a step forward for messages.

00:19:58   I think we've all been frustrated at times

00:20:00   when things fall out of sync.

00:20:02   Because you know you saw something,

00:20:03   but it's not the device you're on,

00:20:05   and you can't make it show up.

00:20:06   We've all been there.

00:20:07   And so I'm hopeful that this works.

00:20:09   Yeah, I did have a thing yesterday

00:20:11   where some messages-- I had like five messages

00:20:14   and a conversation on my Mac.

00:20:16   And three of those messages are just not on any of my iOS

00:20:19   devices.

00:20:20   You know, again--

00:20:21   It's fine.

00:20:22   I am just waiting until it's done, right?

00:20:24   because some of my two of my devices, I think, are still uploading and downloading.

00:20:28   So like, I'm just going to wait for that to all be finished

00:20:31   and then I'll pass my judgment.

00:20:32   Yeah, obviously it's taking some time for me.

00:20:37   I don't know why, but it just is taking some time.

00:20:39   It didn't finish overnight.

00:20:41   It's still doing whatever it is it's doing.

00:20:43   Also, the WWDC app was updated, as you would expect.

00:20:47   I mean, there isn't really anything crazy of note here.

00:20:50   The the icon design is wonderful. I love it. It looks great.

00:20:54   it's kind of boring, or obviously is in line with the WWDC kind of artwork that we've seen so far.

00:21:01   Lots of shadows and lots of 3D and stuff like that.

00:21:04   You know, some people get really upset if you say things like "I really like this 3D effect"

00:21:09   because if you liked the flat design, some people think that you're not allowed to also like 3D.

00:21:17   Some people on Twitter get really upset by this. It's like "Oh, you liked iOS 7? Now you cannot

00:21:23   also like this. It's a betrayal of thought.

00:21:26   So...

00:21:27   Well, I do and I don't care what anybody says.

00:21:29   They've got lots of cute session template names right now, as you'd expect.

00:21:35   Lots in different languages this time.

00:21:37   I don't know if that means we're going to have loads of localization sessions

00:21:41   or they're just being kind of extra cutesy, right?

00:21:44   By putting them in other languages.

00:21:47   I have no idea.

00:21:49   And the ADAs are back.

00:21:50   they're not being held in a secret room in the background anymore.

00:21:54   It was like an alley out back last year, I think.

00:21:59   That's that is literally what happened last year.

00:22:02   So there will be a ceremony.

00:22:05   I think it's on Monday after the State of the Union.

00:22:10   Which is too bad because there's a, you know,

00:22:12   we're going to the ATP folks, I think.

00:22:15   So but it's good that there's an event again.

00:22:18   it feels more official and they are giving awards to iOS, MacOS, TV, all the platforms,

00:22:26   TVOS, WatchOS. I mean, I really want to see who wins the TVOS Apple Design Award.

00:22:32   Netflix. Amazon. Amazon winner. Or YouTube. I reckon it's going to be YouTube. Everyone

00:22:41   loves that YouTube app, right? It's a great app.

00:22:43   Yeah. Well, you do.

00:22:45   I do. I actually do.

00:22:46   You think it's fine.

00:22:47   Well, I think it's better than what there was previously. That's how I feel about the situation.

00:22:52   Okay, well, so yeah, there's an event and we will celebrate the winners as usual.

00:23:00   And commiserate with the losers too.

00:23:05   Okay.

00:23:06   All right, so we're gonna take a break in a moment, but before we do, let me set up our WWDC

00:23:11   happy- happy-ometer. Now we just did this last year kind of randomly, where we basically,

00:23:17   instead of picking what we think was going to happen, we do want to talk about things that we

00:23:24   would love to happen. Some things, maybe some small, some big, that if Apple announced them

00:23:29   in the keynote next week, we will all be really happy. That's the idea. And you can hear predictions

00:23:34   everywhere, but we just want to talk about the things that would make us the happiest. Last year

00:23:40   was I think Federico was the most happy, I was the middle most happy, and Steven was

00:23:46   the least happy. However, after all of the teasing about a deeper and more open iMessage

00:23:50   framework, I think Federico came away the least happy, but that's a matter for another

00:23:53   time. So basically, the way that it works is we all should be picking things, and I

00:24:01   think we all have, that is not necessarily what we think is going to happen. These are

00:24:05   not our predictions, these are things that will make us happy, but this time we are going

00:24:09   to grade it on the tichi scale. So our live show, we're going to be talking about who

00:24:13   was the happiest. So this time we're, and then we can all be happy with each other.

00:24:18   You know, if Steven quote unquote wins, he will be the happiest and we'll be happy for

00:24:23   him, right? This isn't a strict competition as such. At least that's not how I'm playing

00:24:27   it. Maybe my two co-hosts are going to try and smash me to pieces. Uh, but we're going

00:24:31   to be grading on the tichi scale, going from nightmare all the way up to best I love you.

00:24:36   And the person closest to best I love you will win. I don't expect anyone is gonna get best

00:24:43   I love you, which I think is probably gonna be a clean sweep maybe

00:24:45   But I don't think anyone's gonna get there

00:24:48   But we're gonna see who's gonna get closest and that person will be deemed the happiest person at WWDC. Yes

00:24:54   Yeah, I mean man. Look you are taking two very complex scientific scales

00:25:01   The happy ometer and the TG scale and we're we're putting them together and and look science and mathematics

00:25:09   They're not absolutes, right? That's it's messy. There's edge cases and there's things we don't understand. There's quantum physics involved

00:25:15   It's a very complicated system. We're building here. This is very very complicated, but but very very amazing

00:25:21   I am gonna put in the show notes something that I think is a little bit of work in progress right now

00:25:26   But we'll I reckon will be completed by the episode next week

00:25:30   The wonderful Rosemary Orchard who's a fantastic connected listeners in our live chat room right now is building an interactive

00:25:38   Happy Alma to scale so you can go along and pick

00:25:43   With us and you all be schooled. It's gonna be kind of incredible

00:25:48   So I'm gonna put that in our show notes

00:25:49   So you can go along and and you can you can score it all out yourself Steven. Are you gonna make a PDF version?

00:25:56   Maybe yes, there'll be a PDF in the show notes for this episode of our choices. You can have that and

00:26:03   Be prepared. That's all there. It's gonna be there for you so you can follow along with us

00:26:08   There's lots and lots of things that you can grade and you'll be able to work out if we're happy

00:26:13   I'm expecting that the happy armature is not something you're gonna need to worry about grading live

00:26:18   I think you might be upset like overall if you're waiting for all these things to happen

00:26:24   Yeah

00:26:26   The happy I'm gonna what you're saying is it make you sad in real time possibly who knows

00:26:31   I mean we have no way of knowing because nobody knows anything about the WWDC, right? Mm-hmm

00:26:36   It's true. All right, we should probably get into it

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00:27:48   of this show. All right, so Federico as being the happiest person to leave WWDC last year

00:27:56   is going to get the first pick. Well, you were the winner of the happy arm... Well,

00:28:02   again, no winners. We're all winners. You were just the happiest person last year. You got the

00:28:08   most things. I won the happiness. That's what I did. You won all of the happiness and then we

00:28:12   we were happy for you. Yes. We're doing four categories, iOS, Mac, hardware and other.

00:28:18   So we're picking the two major platforms, hardware and then just anything else, which

00:28:23   was the same as we did last year too. All right. So for iOS, which I suppose will be

00:28:29   version 12, I would love to see a complete notification overhaul. I think it's time for

00:28:39   the iOS notification system to grow up, to get a new design, and to get more options

00:28:44   to better organize, manage, and trim your notification list.

00:28:50   There's a bunch of ideas that Apple could implement.

00:28:54   For example, bring back the old grouping by app option that Myke really loved, or just

00:29:01   give users a way to filter notifications more easily.

00:29:06   They could implement something similar to Android where you have notification channels

00:29:11   so that something more important goes to the top of the list and something that is less

00:29:15   urgent stays at the bottom.

00:29:18   Or there could also be a new design for alerts and notifications that interrupt you and come

00:29:23   up from the top of the screen and suddenly you cannot tap navigation buttons in title

00:29:28   bars anymore.

00:29:30   So I think it's time for Apple to redo the entire notification, not the framework, but

00:29:35   the design and the notification center, whatever it's called. What's the name of the thing?

00:29:41   The cover sheet? That. So, yeah.

00:29:44   I haven't heard that name in nearly a year.

00:29:47   In a long time, yeah. So the cover sheet. I think it's time to, you know, right now

00:29:54   if you look at notifications, it's just an insanely long list of messages that all look

00:30:00   the same. And I think even if Apple, you know, this is not something that is a groundbreaking

00:30:08   new design or like a redesigned home screen. No, just make notifications better because

00:30:14   right now it's not working. So improved or actually notifications overhaul. A new design,

00:30:21   new system.

00:30:23   So I had picked a variant of this. I'm just going to throw it out there. This is not my

00:30:27   but just to build on yours. I have had this dream for the last week of a workflow for

00:30:35   notifications. So using everything we know that the workflow team created to create this new

00:30:42   complex system, where you can use their idea of drag and drop in to build a system of like,

00:30:49   "These applications can bug me during these hours, and these applications can use badges on

00:30:55   on Wednesdays and like really allowing me to get deep into it if I would want to.

00:30:59   That would be almost my dream situation at this point.

00:31:02   That would be amazing.

00:31:03   So kind of building on that a little bit, my pick is going to be I want to know what

00:31:10   happened to the workflow team.

00:31:12   Why did Apple buy workflow?

00:31:16   That was my pick.

00:31:17   There you go.

00:31:17   And maybe you got one of mine.

00:31:19   We'll see you all the way around.

00:31:20   I want to know what happened to the workflow team.

00:31:22   I don't, we're going to have to just decide how we know this, right?

00:31:27   Like if, if we see something and we're like,

00:31:30   oh, OK, that looks like it could have come from that team, right?

00:31:34   It's just the thing we're going to have to decide upon together.

00:31:37   But I want to see whether this stuff gets integrated into another application.

00:31:41   If workflow becomes a part of the operating system in a more fundamental way,

00:31:47   maybe we get workflow on the Mac.

00:31:49   Like, I don't know what it is, but

00:31:52   Apple bought that team, kept the product going

00:31:55   for a reason.

00:31:57   And I want to see some idea of what that reason was like.

00:32:01   It would appear to me they didn't just hire the team because they're really

00:32:06   talented, because if they did that, they would have just been swallowed

00:32:09   into the company and workflow would have got shut down as that,

00:32:12   you know, as many other times this type of thing has happened.

00:32:15   But the workflow app stuck around.

00:32:17   And I feel like there must be a reason for that, like in the same way

00:32:20   that like Shazam didn't get shut down, right?

00:32:23   Because the Shazam app and that functionality

00:32:26   can be used in other places.

00:32:28   So they'll keep Shazam going until they replace it

00:32:31   in the operating system.

00:32:32   So I wanna see something about what happened

00:32:37   with the workflow team.

00:32:38   - And to build on this, again, this is not my pick.

00:32:40   It was going to be one, but Myke had it first.

00:32:44   There's so much that workflow could do or could be

00:32:47   from HomeKit and Siri integration

00:32:50   to an actual framework for third-party apps to communicate with each other so that developers

00:32:57   can stop using URL schemes and have an actual system feature for automation. There could be

00:33:03   integration with the HomePod. You can make custom commands for your home. There could be some,

00:33:09   and of course the Mac, it could be the new automator on the Mac. I really hope that you

00:33:15   get this wish, Myke, because I also want to know. Literally, it affects my

00:33:21   business because I have a section in my newsletter where I explain workflow and

00:33:26   I would love to know if Apple plans on keep doing workflow or not. So I'm hoping

00:33:32   alongside you, Myke, that we will get this wish.

00:33:35   All right, Stephen, what's your first iOS happiness wish?

00:33:42   Mine is consolidation of gestures. So we have competing gestures on the iPad and the iPhone.

00:33:52   That's a good one. Nice.

00:33:54   I see now. Stephen wants one gesture for everything. Like one swipe just pulled down different ways means you get notifications.

00:34:03   Yeah, one gesture to rule them all.

00:34:05   You have to just work out what I want.

00:34:07   Yeah, I mean, that's kind of how it feels now. So just cleaning that up, you know. So

00:34:13   I think this could mean, you know, control center is, and multitasking, those things

00:34:18   are just consistent. But just like spending some time in that arena, making it more fluid

00:34:23   to move between an iPad and an iPhone. Because right now, they do the exact opposite things

00:34:28   in some cases. And that's, it's not a great user experience if you go back and forth a

00:34:32   bunch. So just sort of cleaning up the gestures in iOS would make me happy.

00:34:36   Yeah, so in your mind, is it like changing them or just picking one and applying it everywhere?

00:34:46   Yeah, I mean I think if the end of the day, if it's simpler to move between the two, then

00:34:51   how they get there I don't think is as important. I mean, you know, that's like, it's happiness,

00:34:57   Myke. It's not my exact specific pick.

00:35:00   No, I'm not trying to like catch you out. I'm just wondering like, in your mind, what

00:35:04   is the best solution? Would you want all new gestures or would you like them to, for example,

00:35:11   just take the iPhone ones and apply them to the iPad?

00:35:13   I don't know. I don't like Control Center on the iPhone X, so that's what spoils the

00:35:19   whole thing for me.

00:35:20   So maybe a mix above. Maybe a mix above.

00:35:22   Yeah. Put it all on the pot and see what comes out.

00:35:26   All right, T.G., go for your second iOS pick.

00:35:28   - All right, so there's just so many that I would love to,

00:35:32   so many features that I would love to see,

00:35:33   but I gotta pick one.

00:35:35   And I'm really torn between two of them or three of them.

00:35:39   I'm going to go with the one that I put first in my note,

00:35:43   because it feels right.

00:35:44   I would love to see.

00:35:46   So keeping in the theme of notification overhaul,

00:35:49   I would love to see an improved

00:35:52   and more customizable Do Not Disturb.

00:35:56   I feel like just like notifications,

00:35:59   do not disturb as just the bare minimum amount of options for users.

00:36:06   There should be more control,

00:36:08   there should be more ways to say,

00:36:10   "I want to get notifications from this app,

00:36:12   but I don't want to be disturbed by this other app,"

00:36:15   or "I don't want to be disturbed on these days of the week,"

00:36:19   and there could be more filters,

00:36:22   stuff like, "Send me notifications if I'm home,

00:36:25   Do not disturb if I'm at the restaurant,

00:36:29   or do not disturb if I'm at the office, or whatever.

00:36:31   Location filters could be an idea.

00:36:34   Another could be-- and you tweeted about this

00:36:35   a few weeks ago, Myke-- a setting to say,

00:36:39   if I'm watching a video, there should

00:36:43   be different behaviors for notifications

00:36:45   and do not disturb.

00:36:47   I just think it's time to get more granular controls

00:36:51   for do not disturb.

00:36:52   Last year, we got do not disturb while driving,

00:36:55   which is a nice idea, but I think gray on Cortex said it feels like a hackathon.

00:37:03   It's like a weekend project.

00:37:05   Like a weekend project.

00:37:06   Which feels so harsh.

00:37:07   But it kind of encapsulates Do Not Disturb while driving.

00:37:12   It's a nice idea, but I want to see much, much more.

00:37:15   So an improved and more, if I were to sum it up, improved and more customizable Do Not Disturb.

00:37:25   I feel very confident about this one.

00:37:27   It's good.

00:37:27   I think this is going to be one for sure.

00:37:29   I feel confident about that.

00:37:31   I feel like I'm going a little bit more out there with mine,

00:37:34   and I think that's fine because I'm going to pick one now that like

00:37:38   I don't think this is going to happen because it hasn't happened.

00:37:44   And I don't think that this is one of those like the keyboard shortcuts thing.

00:37:48   I just think Apple is never going to do this.

00:37:50   But if they did this, my happiness level would be

00:37:54   through the roof. I would automatically score "best I love you" if they did this.

00:38:00   The ability on iOS to change default applications.

00:38:06   Oof!

00:38:08   Do you see why I feel like I would get this automatic score?

00:38:14   Because it feels almost impossible at this point.

00:38:16   But the general happiness this would bring to my everyday life would be insurmountable.

00:38:23   because there are a lot of applications that I think on iOS do a great job of trying to

00:38:30   do this where Apple won't. Right? So like an application like Slack will let me choose

00:38:36   to open in Chrome or you know I can in airmail I could open in Chrome or I can use like some

00:38:42   applications to open in airmail and stuff like that. Right? Like there are a bunch of

00:38:47   apps that try their best to use URL schemes to do this for me, but I just want it to happen,

00:38:56   right? Like I just want to be able to never have to open Safari if I don't want to. I want to have

00:39:02   to never open Mail if I don't want to, or the podcast app, or whatever, right? Like the third

00:39:09   part app ecosystem is so rich and is the reason, in my opinion, that the iPhone is as successful

00:39:16   as it is because the apps are so good. I think it is time that Apple need to just accept the fact

00:39:23   that they don't necessarily make either the best applications for every use or the ones people want

00:39:29   to use the most. And I think it would make a lot of their users very happy if they could change

00:39:36   their default applications. Do I think they're going to do it? No. But do I want it? Yes.

00:39:42   I said this before and I'm gonna say it again, I would love to have this feature. What I think

00:39:47   is more likely is that you're going to be able someday to change the default apps for SiriKit.

00:39:54   So when you say things like "remind me to" I could see how Apple might say "in Siri you can

00:40:01   change reminders to things or todoist" so that you don't have to append the...

00:40:08   That would be like a slap in the face to me if they did that, right?

00:40:11   That would be decent on the touchy scale at best.

00:40:14   So, we're gonna let you change default apps in Siri.

00:40:22   It's like that my favorite GIF, the heartbreaking GIF of Ralph Wiggum from The Simpsons, you know,

00:40:30   like where Bart's like doing it frame by frame, is that you can see the exact moment where his

00:40:34   heart exploded. That would be a live view of me.

00:40:37   People just get up and leave the room.

00:40:40   Oh come on! That's what you just hear from the back. That's me from my hotel room.

00:40:44   You can hear it on the stream.

00:40:46   So it's my turn to round this out. And I'm surprised that this is still available

00:40:52   because A) I think it could be likely, but B) I think it would make all three of us happy

00:40:58   and that is System-Wide Dark Mode.

00:41:01   Oh, I didn't even put that on my list!

00:41:02   a way for iOS and third-party iOS developers to easily and then you know

00:41:09   hopefully consistently enable dark modes. So I have, as everybody has, I've

00:41:15   seen the apps that I use since the inclusion of the OLED display and the

00:41:20   iPhone X slowly add dark themes and most of the apps that offer them I use them.

00:41:25   I'm using it in Tweetbot, I'm using it in a couple other apps and I've come to

00:41:31   that way of life and I would like to see that available in something like

00:41:35   messages or mail which is just blinding white light so I think I think you know

00:41:40   the iPhone 10 with the OLED display it could be could be a win there from the

00:41:44   the the looks and the energy perspective so system wide dark mode I hope that you

00:41:49   get that because I would love that that would make me very very happy we now

00:41:54   move into the Mac right and so we're doing this around Robin you got lots of

00:41:58   Mac picks over there? Oh yeah, just notes full of ideas. Yeah, yeah. So one of my picks

00:42:11   I'm gonna remove because we've kind of already spoken about it, which was Workflow for Mac,

00:42:16   but I figured that's probably in my iOS one, right? Would we count that, right? Yes, yes.

00:42:22   Yeah, that's Signs of Life. Alright then, I'm gonna swing for the fences in this one.

00:42:27   I can't believe I'm doing this.

00:42:29   Shared app platform.

00:42:31   It's like nervous laughter.

00:42:36   We figure it's going to happen at some point.

00:42:39   It's probably not going to be this year, but I'd really like it if it was.

00:42:43   I feel like as an iOS first person, I would get a lot of benefit out of this because a

00:42:50   lot of the applications that I use on my iOS devices could then in theory be brought to

00:42:56   the Mac more easily. So one of two things will happen either A) I will have more apps available

00:43:02   to me that I'm used to using or B) there will be more consistency amongst the apps that I use.

00:43:07   And for me personally either of those is a win. Do I think that maybe this WWDC will see us

00:43:16   get what is being referred to as Mazapan? No I don't. But we might see the beginning of that,

00:43:21   right? They might say, "Hey, we have this thing. It's more like UIKit, but for the Mac," to like

00:43:27   more easily let iOS developers move stuff over. And, you know, again, we'll decide depending on

00:43:36   what they announce, if they announce anything as to whether that would count towards this. But

00:43:41   this is something that I would really like to see because I would love to have more consistency

00:43:47   amongst the applications that I will typically use.

00:43:50   - Yeah, I mean it'd be great.

00:43:52   And I think it's a win, we've talked about this,

00:43:54   it's a win for people who aren't iOS first as well, right?

00:43:57   There are iOS apps that I would like to have available

00:44:00   to me on my Mac when I'm at work all day.

00:44:02   And they're not.

00:44:04   So I think it's a win for everyone.

00:44:07   And it just comes down to a million questions of details.

00:44:11   So yeah, I think that'd be great.

00:44:13   - Like even something like an Apple Music app.

00:44:15   because then you wouldn't need to use iTunes anymore.

00:44:18   Like, you'd just be able to use Apple Music.

00:44:20   You know, like, stuff like that is even,

00:44:23   like it's not even just to help indie developers,

00:44:25   which whilst it would, I don't think it's even just

00:44:27   for that, like there are,

00:44:29   there would be significant benefits to this,

00:44:32   which is why I think this idea, this marzipan rumor

00:44:37   really latched on with so many people.

00:44:38   - All right, I will stay with the theme

00:44:41   of bringing things to the Mac that are on iOS,

00:44:45   and I'm gonna say HomeKit support for the Mac.

00:44:49   There's no Home app for the Mac, Siri for the Mac

00:44:52   doesn't, can't do anything with HomeKit stuff,

00:44:55   which is just mind boggling to me.

00:44:57   And you know, people who have a bunch of smart home stuff

00:45:00   or stuff in their office and they're at the computer,

00:45:03   they should be able to execute commands on those things

00:45:05   without having to pick up their phone or iPad.

00:45:07   So it seems like something,

00:45:10   especially they could slot into Siri, you know,

00:45:12   and you don't have to bring all the setup stuff,

00:45:14   I understand that, that that's not really doable because all these apps are iPhone only,

00:45:18   but at least control of existing HomeKit stuff should be available when you're at a Mac.

00:45:25   Yeah, yeah.

00:45:27   I agree that it would be good.

00:45:31   I don't know if I think that it is the route that they're going to go down.

00:45:37   I really feel like that potentially the more party line is just get a HomePod.

00:45:43   Yeah, maybe. Right.

00:45:45   Or like just use Siri because you've always got a device around you.

00:45:48   Just use your Apple Watch.

00:45:49   Right. Like I feel like they are the things that would be considered

00:45:53   like the company's thinking.

00:45:56   But I agree that, yeah, that strategy maybe isn't completely perfect,

00:46:02   that it might just be nice to be able to scroll over to notification center

00:46:05   and turn on a human light.

00:46:07   All right, Federico, what's your first of many Mac picks?

00:46:09   OK, I would love to see from Apple

00:46:13   a recommitment to the Mac App Store. Some kind of relaunch or redesign or, I don't know,

00:46:23   policy changes, but a recommitment to the Mac App Store as a service, as a platform.

00:46:30   I would love to see some developers, you know, on stage bringing back their Mac apps to the store,

00:46:36   and I could see just how the Mac App Store has languished for so long and it deserves the same

00:46:42   treatment that Apple gave to the iOS App Store last year, which means editorial

00:46:47   creation, which means more frequent updates, means collections, it means that

00:46:54   if you're featuring an app on the front page it doesn't stay in the same

00:46:58   position for like three months, as is the case right now, because the Mac App Store

00:47:02   in its current state is basically abandoned. I want to see Apple say we

00:47:07   got a lot wrong, we listened, and now we are confident that we're bringing it

00:47:11   back in a better state. I would love to have a place where I can go and find quality stuff

00:47:20   because right now if you go to the Mac App Store and if you search or if you browse the

00:47:23   top charts, it's full of these terrible web apps and wrappers around websites that install

00:47:32   like little utilities in your menu bar that you pay $2 for. Nobody wants that. I want

00:47:38   to see...

00:47:39   It's funny that there's so much crap in the Mac App Store.

00:47:44   Like the best Mac apps are still downloaded from the web.

00:47:50   That's kind of strange.

00:47:53   Many of them were in the Mac App Store and then left because of this problem, which is

00:47:58   something they've got to address.

00:48:00   I should say, obviously there are good apps in the Mac App Store.

00:48:03   I mean every single one.

00:48:04   like a lot, a lot of the stuff that you will use every day is either not in the Mac App Store

00:48:09   or they have a non-Mac App Store version which sometimes has more features.

00:48:13   And I mentioned policy changes because Apple needs to accept the fact that if they want to keep the Mac

00:48:20   the Mac, so powerful and extensible and versatile, they need to give some, you know, there's some

00:48:28   concessions to be made to developers in terms of stuff like sandboxing, for example. So if you want

00:48:33   to have the best and the most powerful applications on the Mac App Store, you need to put developers

00:48:38   in the position of making those apps for the Mac App Store, which means, I don't know if relaxing

00:48:44   restrictions is the correct phrase and concept, but find a way through either new APIs or, I don't

00:48:52   know, some other technology to allow folks to, you know, to stuff like utilities that access the file

00:49:00   system. They should be able to make those for the Mac App Store. So I really, even though I don't

00:49:06   use the Mac, I think it's the right thing to do for developers and for users and really for everybody

00:49:14   to have a better Mac App Store. Yeah, I agree with you. I'm really swinging for the fences of my

00:49:19   Mac picks today. My second pick is going to be an indication of an ARM transition. I also think it's

00:49:28   it's too early. Frankly, I don't have many things that I can think of for the Mac.

00:49:34   So this one would make me happy because it's interesting and exciting to see something like

00:49:42   this and could do some really fun and weird and cool things with the Mac, including like

00:49:49   helping to enable my first pick of a shared app platform.

00:49:52   Like that could be a big help to it if the processor changed, like if the architecture

00:49:57   changes. So, you know, could maybe one day give life to a dual boot OS system,

00:50:04   which I don't think they'll ever do, but I would really like it if they did,

00:50:07   right, like a touchscreen MacBook, which could be iOS when in a tablet mode and

00:50:13   Mac OS in a keyboard mode.

00:50:15   I would really, really like that product.

00:50:18   Like that would be very useful to me.

00:50:20   So all of that, I think anything like that, any potential future like that

00:50:25   would start with an Arm transition.

00:50:27   So it would make me happy to see it because of some of the possibilities

00:50:31   that could be seen, possibilities that could be realized

00:50:35   post transitioning over to Arm.

00:50:37   You saying you want them to start it?

00:50:38   You use them there to be sort of like tea leaf style stuff.

00:50:42   Would you be happy with just that?

00:50:44   Yeah, I think you know how sometimes you see these things

00:50:47   and it makes it seem like something's coming, right?

00:50:50   Like, yeah, like if we can all look at a thing and collectively

00:50:54   people agree, it probably means this, then I'm happy with that. And again, this is one of those

00:51:01   things that we might not see this on stage, this might come out in the days past, and then we'll

00:51:09   know later on, they might be like in the State of the Union, they talk about this thing and it's like,

00:51:13   "Oh, I see what this is." And then we can maybe see something. But more than anything, I would love it

00:51:19   if they just got on stage like, "Oh, by the way, we're doing this. It's going to take two and a half

00:51:22   years to implement it and we're starting that transition today we recommend you

00:51:26   all start learning Swift because that's all you'll be able to use or something

00:51:28   right like whatever they probably won't do that but you never know right

00:51:34   eventually whenever they do do this there is gonna have to be a time period

00:51:38   and they're probably gonna start it small right because they can't say and

00:51:42   they won't right we're only doing our max going forward because then nobody

00:51:45   buys max for two years or whatever there's gonna be some some stuffs gonna

00:51:50   happen and it's gonna have to be slow. I don't think it's gonna happen this year

00:51:55   but it could. I don't I don't think it will but it could and because if it

00:52:02   doesn't happen this year maybe it will happen next year but it's still gonna

00:52:04   take multiple years to implement anyway so I think at this point it feels pretty

00:52:10   likely so whenever it happens it happens and if it happened this year I'd be

00:52:14   happy. Yeah I thought it's a topic for another day but I've thought a lot about

00:52:17   about the timing of that transition, the Intel transition took less than a year, or about

00:52:21   a year. But they had processors that were faster than what they were using. And Apple

00:52:26   does not have that as far as we know, for Intel to arm. So I mean, I think that's why

00:52:32   people say it's got to take time because they can't replace the iMac Pro on my desk with

00:52:35   an ARM machine that's as fast again, as far as we know. And it's an interesting topic.

00:52:40   But yeah, I think it would be I agree with you. I think it's too early. But it may be

00:52:44   that we see we start to see things that that you know sort of like paving the

00:52:49   way down that trail a little bit. So I'm up next and Mac App Store was high

00:52:57   on my list. I have to say the ARM transition was not. But I'm gonna go with

00:53:04   improvements to the core apps and so the apps that ship with Mac OS things like

00:53:10   Like mail and messages and iCal, excuse me, calendar, these sort of core system apps,

00:53:20   a lot of them feel very stagnant.

00:53:24   And it's not that they haven't been getting updates, but they haven't gotten any new major

00:53:27   features in a long time.

00:53:29   And especially mail really feels so far behind what every other third-party mail app on the

00:53:38   Mac can do.

00:53:39   really feels basic compared to those things. And I think it's time that Apple look at what's

00:53:44   popular out there and people want things like actions. They want things like snoozing. They

00:53:49   want things that mail doesn't offer. I think even more so on iOS than the Mac, but I think

00:53:55   on the Mac it's just as important. So spending some time in those core apps that build the

00:54:02   backbone of what the Mac experience is. Because you know, those apps get a lot of use and

00:54:08   the defaults and they're on the dock when you start up a new Mac and I think they need to spend

00:54:13   some time there. So we're talking some significant improvements, right, is what you're looking for.

00:54:18   Yeah, yes, that makes sense. All right, Tichy, do you have a second Mac? Yes, and I am shocked,

00:54:24   I am shocked that nobody picked this. I would love to see, honestly, a dedicated Apple Music app for

00:54:34   the Mac. I think it's insane that Apple Music is still tied to iTunes, that does a bunch

00:54:41   of things, has a store in it. I just feel like it's time for Apple to make a standalone

00:54:48   Apple Music app for the Mac, that takes basically everything you know from the iPad and iPhone

00:54:57   version and brings it to the Mac where it's just you know streaming and it's

00:55:02   got curation, it's got Beats 1, it's got radio stations. I just think it's time to

00:55:09   have a music experience that is free from iTunes and that allows you to open

00:55:14   it up and listen in five seconds instead of waiting for iTunes to spin up and

00:55:20   load whatever view we want to load. So it's one of the few things that I do

00:55:26   do before when I sit down before I do a show at my Macbook, I open iTunes and I want to

00:55:32   put like a couple of songs on before the show. And every time I open iTunes, it's so slow

00:55:36   and navigates to the iTunes store. And sometimes you search for something, but it doesn't search

00:55:42   for it in Apple Music and search for it in the iTunes Music Store, which is insane.

00:55:47   So I just...

00:55:48   Who wants that? Like if I'm an Apple Music customer, why do I ever want to search the

00:55:52   iTunes Music Store? Why do I want to do that?

00:55:55   So I don't know how Apple could reconcile the local music library thing, I don't know.

00:56:01   I just want to have an app that is called Music and that allows me to click on an icon

00:56:05   and open Apple Music.

00:56:07   So a music app that is not iTunes.

00:56:11   That's something that will make me really happy on the Mac.

00:56:15   This will probably make people mad, but my feeling is if you want to deal with local

00:56:18   music, keep using iTunes.

00:56:20   If you want to deal with stupid music, use Apple Music.

00:56:22   And I figure it's just that.

00:56:24   like it iTunes will stick around for people that want to do the local music thing.

00:56:28   And that's totally cool. Like you do you.

00:56:30   But if you want to just use the streamer stuff, here's Apple Music and you can just use Apple Music.

00:56:34   You're full. I think that would work great.

00:56:36   All right. So we still have hardware and other.

00:56:39   And then we want to just throw out some pics that we didn't get to mention, which won't be scored.

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00:57:43   I use PDF pen on my Mac. I use PDF pen on my iPad.

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00:58:33   All right.

00:58:35   So we move into hardware and Steven Europe first for hardware as we're observing the

00:58:39   round Robin, the nested round Robin.

00:58:41   I don't know what that means.

00:58:43   Double layer round Robin.

00:58:46   Hardware, so I'm gonna pick the obvious one,

00:58:51   if you're a Mac fan, and that is more reliable

00:58:56   MacBook Pros, so a MacBook Pro that keyboards

00:58:59   cannot be felled by a tiny speck of dust.

00:59:02   I'm very curious if this is a thing, or when it is a thing,

00:59:06   because I believe it is happening at some point.

00:59:09   How Apple handles that, is it a, hey, it's an improved

00:59:15   Third generation butterfly keyboard.

00:59:17   I think that's all we get.

00:59:18   And then just over time, it comes out

00:59:21   that it's more reliable.

00:59:24   So I think it's clearly an issue with the MacBook Pros

00:59:27   that people are unhappy with.

00:59:29   Developers use MacBook Pros.

00:59:32   They have a good audience there of people

00:59:35   who are pretty unhappy with their notebooks.

00:59:37   And I think it'd be a big win for Apple

00:59:40   and for the people in the audience.

00:59:41   And that's an important factor here

00:59:43   of who you're speaking to.

00:59:44   So I'm going to say MacBook Pros with an improved keyboard.

00:59:49   - Hmm.

00:59:51   Hmm, I don't know, man.

00:59:53   I don't know if you're going to get that keyboard yet.

00:59:55   It would be great, right?

00:59:56   It would be really good.

00:59:57   I think there might be an update to the MacBook Pro.

01:00:01   I don't know if it's going to be a keyboard update,

01:00:03   but I do hope so,

01:00:04   'cause I know how happy it would make people,

01:00:07   including you.

01:00:08   All right, Federico, what hardware do you want?

01:00:10   - So I'm probably never going to get this,

01:00:12   but I really want it and I'm gonna see it.

01:00:14   I want a new Mac Mini.

01:00:16   (laughing)

01:00:18   - Hey-o.

01:00:19   - Because I need to buy one.

01:00:22   - I did not think you were gonna go there.

01:00:24   So just so I can double check this real quickly,

01:00:27   considering you picked this first.

01:00:28   A new Mac Mini would make you happier than a new iPad Pro?

01:00:32   - A new iPad Pro would make me happy for sure.

01:00:35   But I really want a Mac Mini

01:00:37   because I really want a home server.

01:00:39   because I'm tired of buying things from iTunes.

01:00:44   I want to go back to my old system

01:00:46   that I don't want to describe,

01:00:47   but it involves a home server and Plex.

01:00:50   And...

01:00:51   - My second perfectly legal system

01:00:55   that I won't bother describing

01:00:57   because you all know how that works.

01:00:58   - Yes, and I want a Mac Mini because I,

01:01:02   again, I miss Plex.

01:01:04   I miss having the things that I used to do

01:01:09   on the Nvidia Shield, but I want to do from a modern Apple computer with an OS that I

01:01:14   understand. And it would also be a great way to have a backup system for Sylvia's computer,

01:01:24   for my computer. It would be just the home server that I need for entertainment, for

01:01:32   backup purposes for managing shared family stuff. I want a Mac Mini. I told you months

01:01:39   ago that I'm in the market for a Mac Mini, but Steven told me, "Don't buy the Mac Mini."

01:01:44   And I listened to what Steven says when it comes to Mac stuff, so I'm still waiting,

01:01:48   and I'm hoping that Apple will announce one.

01:01:52   It really feels to me that if we make it through this year, and there's still no Mac Mini update,

01:01:59   Like if we get through WBC, I wish I could agree with you,

01:02:02   it'd be awesome for them to do it.

01:02:03   In fact, my next hardware pick has to do with processors

01:02:06   and we could talk about that with the Mac Mini.

01:02:08   But if we make it through WBC,

01:02:11   we make it through the fall event,

01:02:13   we make it to that, you know, the sort of Apple saying,

01:02:15   hey, we're done for the year.

01:02:17   At that point, I think I believe the Mac Mini's done.

01:02:21   Because that's a long time without, even for the Mac Mini,

01:02:27   which has been slow historically.

01:02:30   That just feels like a barrier

01:02:32   that would be crossed at that point.

01:02:33   But, you know, Tim Cook says it's still a product

01:02:35   in their lineup, so I guess you gotta have some faith.

01:02:38   So I'm right there with you, man.

01:02:40   I've got a 2010 or a 2011 or something under my TV.

01:02:44   It's my entertainment system, like home server thing.

01:02:47   And it's getting long in the tooth, even with an SSD.

01:02:49   It's doing, sometimes it forgets it has an HDMI port.

01:02:52   Sometimes it doesn't have Bluetooth.

01:02:54   Like it's just, it's kind of maybe on its last legs

01:02:58   and I like to replace it, but like you said,

01:03:00   there's nothing out there.

01:03:02   - All right, so for my hardware pick,

01:03:04   I'm gonna pick something to do with processors.

01:03:06   No, I'm gonna, new iPad Pro hardware is what I'm going for.

01:03:11   Because this is the hardware that would make me

01:03:15   the most happy because I love my iPad Pro.

01:03:17   I always want more.

01:03:19   You know, I would love a new 10.5 with Face ID.

01:03:23   I would love a 12.9 with thinner bezels.

01:03:26   I would love some new iPad Pro stuff.

01:03:30   I would love an iPad Pro that would wake up

01:03:32   when I tapped on the screen.

01:03:34   All of those things.

01:03:35   And so new iPad Pro hardware would make me

01:03:38   a very happy champion indeed.

01:03:40   - So we're not gonna,

01:03:41   I don't think, unless you want to get more specific.

01:03:43   - I've learned from the past not to get specific

01:03:46   because that has destroyed me.

01:03:48   - That's where you mess up.

01:03:49   - I just wanted to just give some examples

01:03:51   the types of things I would like to see but just any new any new any revision to the iPad Pro

01:03:57   will always make me happy even if they just even if they just change some of the internals like

01:04:01   I'm always going to be happy about that just my level of happiness will change on the scale

01:04:06   significantly depending on what I get. I wonder about this one I know they did it last year

01:04:13   and it had been a while you know 18 months and then you know or so before the one before that

01:04:19   I wonder if they're going to go back to a fall release.

01:04:22   I don't know.

01:04:23   I would think that if there's, let's just say an iPad Pro with face ID coming, that

01:04:29   that would have leaked by now, especially if they're going to be up for order in any

01:04:33   reasonable timeframe.

01:04:34   And we haven't seen anything from the supply chain.

01:04:37   And that alone makes me think that this may be a fall thing.

01:04:40   I think it'd be awesome.

01:04:42   I'm sure I'm like everyone else.

01:04:44   Like I try to tap to wake my iPad.

01:04:45   It doesn't work.

01:04:46   I just stare at one password to open like, oh, right, I got to touch the button.

01:04:50   Like it feels like a device from a different era now that I've had face ID

01:04:53   on my phone for a while.

01:04:55   But I just don't know.

01:04:55   I just don't know if it's the summer or if it's this fall.

01:04:57   As we get closer and closer, I feel less likely about this.

01:05:02   I was pretty confident about this.

01:05:03   Now I feel less likely about it,

01:05:05   but I still want it.

01:05:09   All right. So I'm going to return to Mac hardware

01:05:12   because it's sort of home base.

01:05:15   and I figure you guys aren't gonna guess it.

01:05:17   I would like Apple to move the line

01:05:19   to coffee lake processors.

01:05:20   - Oh yeah, we'll know about those.

01:05:23   - I know you guys have been excited about that.

01:05:26   - Did you say coffee?

01:05:28   - Coffee lake, yeah.

01:05:29   - Coffee lake. - Coffee what?

01:05:30   Coffee lake?

01:05:32   - Coffee lake, it's a lake of coffee.

01:05:34   - What name is that?

01:05:35   - It's the current generation of Intel processors.

01:05:38   - Oh, they have names?

01:05:39   - Yes, yes they do.

01:05:40   - Well, they have multiple names though, it's confusing.

01:05:42   'Cause coffee lake processors will still just be

01:05:44   called the i9 or whatever, right?

01:05:47   - Right, yeah, it's the generation name.

01:05:49   Yeah, there's still i5, i7, i9.

01:05:50   - But they're not like public-facing names though.

01:05:53   Like Kaby Lake and stuff.

01:05:55   - They're enthusiast-facing names.

01:05:57   I mean, Apple has used those names historically

01:06:01   when introducing new devices.

01:06:03   Like, oh, it's using Haswell, it's using Broadwell.

01:06:05   So Apple does use them occasionally.

01:06:06   - They're not on product pages though, right?

01:06:08   Like, you never see them.

01:06:09   - Okay, right.

01:06:10   - Can't they just use yours?

01:06:11   - I'm just saying, I'm not trying to prove you wrong,

01:06:13   I'm asking questions.

01:06:15   They should just say, we're using the 2018 chips

01:06:18   and be done with it.

01:06:19   It's easier.

01:06:20   What this new class of processor would give Apple

01:06:24   is the option to have more cores in their products.

01:06:27   So in the class of processor Apple puts in the 13 inch

01:06:32   MacBook Pro, there is now a quad core SKU

01:06:35   that Apple could put in there, giving them quad core 13 inch

01:06:38   notebooks.

01:06:39   And even more excitingly, in the 15 inch,

01:06:41   they could go to six core.

01:06:44   I don't think that would be the base model.

01:06:45   I think Apple would have these at the high end of the range.

01:06:49   But having a six core MacBook Pro would be pretty baller.

01:06:53   Especially again, developers use these,

01:06:55   lots of content creators use these things,

01:06:59   and having more power, especially as we get more

01:07:02   and more multi-threaded in our applications

01:07:05   as shown out by the iMac Pro, I think it'd be great.

01:07:09   Coffee Lake could also go into Federico's new Mac Mini,

01:07:13   even though I'd be surprised if it gets anything that new

01:07:15   if it gets updated.

01:07:16   But the iMac as well, it could help,

01:07:18   it could really help the iMac along.

01:07:21   I think that especially the 21-inch iMac,

01:07:24   Apple has a tendency to sort of hamper that a little bit,

01:07:28   to hit those price points.

01:07:30   I don't know if this would change that,

01:07:31   but it could mean that you could have a six-core,

01:07:34   you know, 27-inch iMac,

01:07:35   that you know, get it a little bit closer to the iMac Pro

01:07:39   in terms of multi-threaded power.

01:07:41   These processors are already out.

01:07:43   Lots of Windows OEMs are shipping PCs

01:07:47   with these processors now.

01:07:49   And I think it would be great to see Apple

01:07:51   get aggressive again about using what Intel has to offer

01:07:55   and not waiting until the fall,

01:07:57   but doing it now, they're out now,

01:07:59   and getting to where they're updating the Macs

01:08:03   on a more regular basis would, I think,

01:08:04   make a lot of people happy.

01:08:05   - Where do these names come from?

01:08:07   - It's a lake of coffee, Federico.

01:08:09   It's a lake full of coffee.

01:08:10   Where do these names come from?

01:08:11   Why lake?

01:08:12   I don't get it.

01:08:13   I don't know.

01:08:14   They've used lake for a long time.

01:08:15   Yeah but like I figured they were naming these after real lakes.

01:08:20   But now I don't believe that anymore.

01:08:22   I don't believe Coffee Lake is a real place.

01:08:24   Coffee Lake could be a real place.

01:08:25   Let's see.

01:08:26   Coffee Lake.

01:08:27   It should be though.

01:08:28   It should be.

01:08:29   It should be a lake of coffee.

01:08:31   I'm up next.

01:08:33   It's in Oregon.

01:08:34   Oh it is?

01:08:35   It's a real place.

01:08:36   Huh.

01:08:37   Coffee Lake?

01:08:38   Oh, it looks beautiful. Is it brown? I take... it has a dusting of cocoa powder all over

01:08:45   the top of the lake. I rescind my complaint. I'm gonna go there. I would love to have air

01:08:55   power. Finally. I've been intrigued by the idea behind air power since its announcement.

01:09:07   I had this idea for Apple to create a wireless inductive charging mat. I'm calling it AirPower.

01:09:14   If it were coming, why would it have been yesterday with iOS 11.4?

01:09:20   I don't know. In any shape or form, whether it's a re-announcement because maybe Apple

01:09:25   had to change things, or it just makes into the store when Apple updates it with the new

01:09:31   Mac Mini and all the hardware that we're looking for. I just want AirPower, man. I just want

01:09:37   to put my new AirPods and my iPhone X and my Apple Watch down on a single little accessory

01:09:45   that's on my nightstand and that charges all my things at once and I get the fancy

01:09:50   notif- battery widget on the lock screen. I just want it. I think it's a great idea.

01:09:55   I've been intrigued by the concept of multiple devices that charge at the same time. So I

01:10:02   I hope that, you know, WWDC is the good time for AirPower finally.

01:10:07   It will make me happy.

01:10:09   So this is a this is a...

01:10:11   I think that there is a possibility that if they ship any other hardware,

01:10:14   this thing will just appear on the store.

01:10:16   I also am starting to think at the same time

01:10:19   that maybe they're going to wait until there's some hardware,

01:10:23   more hardware that makes use of it.

01:10:25   I don't know. I can't work it out.

01:10:27   Like if this is a thing that they're ready to ship at any point,

01:10:32   Why wouldn't they just put it up as soon as they possibly could?

01:10:35   Because I don't care what anyone says, it's so late at this point.

01:10:40   Like, I don't care if people like they never announced the day they didn't wait.

01:10:45   They never announced this in September expecting to release it in June.

01:10:49   That was not a thing that they did.

01:10:51   Right. They just wouldn't have done it.

01:10:52   You just wouldn't do it because it's not like there were no Qi charges.

01:10:57   Right. If air power was the only inductive wireless charging mat that was going to

01:11:01   work with the iPhone, then yeah, announce it, right?

01:11:03   But they had other ones available to sell, right?

01:11:06   They're using the industry standard.

01:11:07   They never expected it to be this late and it is late.

01:11:11   And so it boggles my mind, like if it was ready on like

01:11:17   two o'clock in the afternoon on Sunday, just put it on the store straight away.

01:11:20   Like just don't wait a second more.

01:11:23   We'll see. I am going to stay on my iPad Pro train and ask for new iPad Pro

01:11:30   accessories. I'm going to use that as an umbrella term. That's my pick. But I did

01:11:37   want to talk about something more specific, which is not my pick. I would

01:11:41   like some ergonomically focused iOS accessories. I've been having some

01:11:45   problems with my neck. And I'm seeing a doctor. And I think it may be the way

01:11:51   that I have used my iPad and just devices in general. I think I've spent

01:11:57   way too much time looking down, which I do with my phone all the time anyway like everybody

01:12:01   does, but I'm also doing it a lot of the time with an iPad. I've made some changes, I'm

01:12:06   elevating my iPad and using an external keyboard. We'll talk about all of this in more detail

01:12:11   on a future episode. But I am being more conscious and it's making a big difference. I can feel

01:12:17   it already. I'm still having problems but they are getting way better and I think it's

01:12:22   because I'm being more conscious about elevating products and not spending so much time. But

01:12:26   looking down all the time, right?

01:12:29   And this could take many forms, right?

01:12:33   The Apple could build a stand of their own,

01:12:35   or even if they just-- like they could introduce

01:12:39   some kind of pointing device, right,

01:12:41   which would mean less reaching out and touching things,

01:12:45   less need to have the iPad close to you.

01:12:48   I don't know what it would be, but I would really like that.

01:12:51   But just-- I always want new iPad Pro accessories.

01:12:53   I always want refinements.

01:12:54   I would love a new Apple Pencil, like a brand new,

01:12:57   like redesigned Apple Pencil.

01:12:59   I would love some good advancement to the smart keyboard.

01:13:02   If you're gonna change the key switches,

01:13:04   just leave it alone, it's fine as it is.

01:13:06   You know, just, I would love to see some stuff,

01:13:10   but I would love to see some economically focused ones too.

01:13:14   - Yeah, that'd be great.

01:13:15   I think there are a lot of people who struggle with that.

01:13:18   I mean, you can see there's such a huge market

01:13:20   for Mac and PC accessories in this space, right?

01:13:24   and it makes sense for Apple to,

01:13:27   even if they don't do it themselves,

01:13:31   because Apple doesn't offer a keyboard,

01:13:33   or really a mouse or a trackpad

01:13:36   that cater to those types of uses,

01:13:38   even if they said, hey, you know what,

01:13:40   new smart connector, we're gonna reboot that program,

01:13:43   it's really easy to do now,

01:13:45   just something to make that more approachable

01:13:49   for other companies even to get into it,

01:13:51   I think would be great.

01:13:52   I think a lot of what would enable it would be some kind of pointing device support, even

01:13:56   if it was just to be able to move text cursors around or whatever. I think that would open

01:14:01   the door to a lot of this stuff, because for as long as you still need to be tapping the

01:14:05   screen for 100% of everything, you're going to need to have the device within arm's reach

01:14:12   all the time, like comfortably. Federico, what do you think about all of that?

01:14:17   I think that I would love to see Apple make something like the stand that Jason Snell

01:14:24   recommended and that ever since both John and I have bought.

01:14:28   Me too, that's my thing. That's one of the things I'm using.

01:14:30   Yeah, I feel like that company owes six dollars. Huge thanks.

01:14:35   It's out of stock, or it was at least, for a bit. I'll put a link to that in the show

01:14:42   But yeah, I would love to see, it has always been a worry of mine that just these devices

01:14:49   in general, just iOS devices as a whole, like what were they going to, what's it going to

01:14:53   do to us ergonomically?

01:14:55   And I think for me at least, I'm starting to see that now.

01:14:59   So, but you know, I'm making changes, so I'm all good.

01:15:04   But I would love to see Apple maybe do something, you know.

01:15:10   a 20 inch, a 25 inch iPad would fix this, right? Because a 25 inch iPad would have to

01:15:17   be set up so differently, so maybe they should just do that and then I'll be happy to.

01:15:22   Alright, so we're moving into other now, right? This is our last round, so Federico will start

01:15:28   with you.

01:15:29   Alright, so we're free to pick anything else.

01:15:33   Absolutely anything now.

01:15:34   - Okay, and I'm going to go with something

01:15:39   that would make me really, really happy with my Apple Watch.

01:15:44   And that would be the Siri face opened up

01:15:46   to third party developers.

01:15:48   - Yeah, are you using the Siri face?

01:15:51   - I would love to use it if only it allowed me

01:15:53   to see data from third party apps.

01:15:56   I don't use reminders, even though one of my picks

01:16:01   was a new reminders app, but that's another topic.

01:16:04   I would love to see developers being able to plug data into this watch face for Siri.

01:16:14   Apps that use time-based or location-based data, so anything that is a to-do app or some

01:16:22   kind of location-based note-taking app, for example, it could end up on the Siri watch

01:16:29   face.

01:16:31   HomeKit clients, they could end up in there.

01:16:33   you know, if you're a developer and you make a home kit app with a custom, you know, accessory

01:16:38   control, it could be in there. I just wanna, I just wanna use this watch face because I

01:16:43   love the idea of proactive suggestions and like a timeline of your day and you can do

01:16:49   stuff with it. I love the idea. I cannot use it because something that I do with my Apple

01:16:55   Watch a lot is glance at my task manager, which is things at the moment. For that I

01:17:02   I use a complication on the modular watch face.

01:17:05   I would love to use the Siri face

01:17:07   because all the other things it does,

01:17:08   like music control or even sometimes Apple news,

01:17:12   which I used to keep enabled

01:17:14   when I was using the Siri face.

01:17:16   I want to use it, but it needs third party access.

01:17:19   So I hope that it's coming with a watchOS 5.

01:17:23   - Yeah, that would be really nice.

01:17:25   I'm gonna go with always on screens.

01:17:30   - Hmm, hmm, everywhere?

01:17:32   either iPhone, Apple Watch, or both.

01:17:36   They could both do it.

01:17:37   I would like to see either of them get it,

01:17:39   both of them get it, you know, however it works.

01:17:42   But we have OLED screens that can do this

01:17:45   and we don't have any devices that take advantage of it.

01:17:48   And I think that it would make big benefits

01:17:51   for both devices.

01:17:52   You know, being able to just see the time all the time

01:17:55   on my Apple Watch is something I've always wanted

01:17:57   and has been a frustration for me

01:17:59   for as long as I've owned one.

01:18:01   And I feel like my current system of Do Not Disturb

01:18:06   could be greatly improved if my iPhone

01:18:10   just ticked with notification badges,

01:18:12   like very simple, slight ones without lighting up

01:18:14   the whole screen or whatever.

01:18:16   I think that that would be really great.

01:18:18   I would love to see that.

01:18:19   I would love to just see any implementation of it.

01:18:22   I also think an always-on iPhone X

01:18:24   would work really, really nicely with dark mode iPhone X.

01:18:29   I think that they would just transition very nicely

01:18:31   between these two things, so that's what I would like.

01:18:35   - I had on my other list, the top of the list was

01:18:37   any mention of AirPlay 2 or messages in iCloud,

01:18:41   so I guess I get a point there.

01:18:44   - No, that's not how that works.

01:18:46   - I'll stick with the watch theme.

01:18:48   I would like to see new watch faces.

01:18:52   I know there's a rumor right now that there's one coming.

01:18:54   Really, either several new ones

01:18:57   or really breathing new life into the ones that are there.

01:19:00   - I don't even think that's a rumor.

01:19:02   You can like, I think, so if you change the date and time

01:19:04   on your phone, you can unlock the Pride watch face now.

01:19:08   Which is kind of funny.

01:19:10   But yeah, sorry.

01:19:11   - So new watch OS faces.

01:19:13   The majority of them we've had since the watch

01:19:17   was introduced and it feels stale and it feels

01:19:20   like there's so much you could do there.

01:19:22   You know, the Siri face kind of shows what's possible

01:19:25   but like you guys said, there's shortcomings there.

01:19:28   But I'd like to see those other,

01:19:29   more traditional watch faces get updated,

01:19:31   give us more options, give us more customization,

01:19:34   just breathe some fresh life into that thing.

01:19:36   - Yeah, I hope for a lot of changes to it in general,

01:19:42   just watch OS in general to maybe give it a boost in the arm

01:19:47   but we'll wait and see on that one.

01:19:50   Who's next?

01:19:51   Oh Federico, have you got a second other pick?

01:19:53   - I do.

01:19:54   Uhm...

01:19:55   Okay, just let me scroll through my notes.

01:19:58   You gotta pick the right one.

01:19:59   This is the final one.

01:20:00   This is the final pick.

01:20:01   I should mention that.

01:20:02   These are our final scored picks.

01:20:03   So you gotta go for a good one.

01:20:05   It cannot be in any previous category, right?

01:20:08   It has to be in either.

01:20:09   I think it can.

01:20:10   Can it be iOS too?

01:20:12   Like something else?

01:20:13   Yeah, why not?

01:20:14   Why not?

01:20:15   Yeah, we're feeling generous.

01:20:16   Go for anything.

01:20:17   This is called "other".

01:20:18   We've not given it any kind of categorization.

01:20:20   This is how he's gonna win.

01:20:22   Right here.

01:20:23   Right here.

01:20:24   often one of these things just like slides in and just picks it up.

01:20:28   All right, all right. So...

01:20:30   But again, remember, we all win if one of us wins, right? Because it's happiness. We

01:20:34   want each other to be happy.

01:20:35   Yes. Okay, so I'm just going to go for something that I strongly and personally feel that it

01:20:44   should be done. There should be an initiative from Apple on iOS to improve and monitor our

01:20:54   screen time and our digital health. This is something that I've been bringing up

01:20:58   multiple times this year. It's a topic that is really dear to me that a

01:21:02   bunch of companies are also talking about this year. I want to see tools and

01:21:10   whether it's settings or like a dedicated area of iOS where you can go

01:21:16   in and see how you're using your devices, see which apps you're using and just

01:21:23   have data, insightful data, that you can use to improve your habits. If you think you're

01:21:30   using Facebook too much or Twitter too much, just have data about what you're doing.

01:21:36   And alongside that, I would love to see Apple, as part of this initiative, I would love to

01:21:42   see Apple offer suggestions or meaningful actions that you can take to change your habits.

01:21:50   whether it's the OS being proactive and helping you curb your screen time or helping you stay

01:21:59   Facebook only for 30 minutes at a time. I don't know how, but we've seen Google try to tackle

01:22:08   this problem with the latest version of Android and I think Apple is uniquely positioned to do

01:22:13   this because Apple likes to say that they love the fact that entire families use their

01:22:20   devices. They have a dedicated web page called, you know, families. And of all the companies

01:22:26   that should have done this first, Apple, Apple should have done this first, not Google. So

01:22:32   I hope that this is a bigger topic and a bunch of people, you know, there's a ton of discussion

01:22:39   about sort of it's difficult to reconcile the fact that the same company that is selling

01:22:44   you the phone also wants you to use the phone less. I think we try to talk about this on

01:22:51   connected. I also talked about this on App Stories with John. I think it's still the

01:22:55   right thing to do to help people, you know, give them the smartphone to buy, give them

01:23:00   the OS, but also give them the tools to have a balanced use of these devices. And so I

01:23:08   Having a feature in iOS that helps me understand how much I use my phone, which apps I use,

01:23:15   when I use them, and try to use them less, that will make me really, really, really happy.

01:23:22   That's my final pick for the Happyometer WWDC 2018 edition.

01:23:28   I think that's a good pick.

01:23:29   I think it is a very likely one too.

01:23:31   I think this is going to be one of, if not the biggest focus of iOS for this year.

01:23:37   of the things that stand on stage and they're like we have a bunch of new features and it's

01:23:41   all about digital well-being or whatever Apple call it because they won't call it that because

01:23:45   Google did and they'll say we have these four things and I think it's going to be notifications,

01:23:51   parental controls and it's going to all go into screen time and digital health. So that's kind of

01:23:57   like my overall big like just prediction for WWDC this year so I think you've picked a really good

01:24:03   one. And it would also make me super happy too, because it's something that I

01:24:07   would like to have a little bit more control over too in my life.

01:24:11   My final pick is going to be a generic emoji face and emoji.

01:24:17   Those animals are cute.

01:24:19   I want just the yellow face, you know, and then you give me just the yellow

01:24:25   face and I can make any face that I want.

01:24:27   I can choose to add things like sunglasses, you know, like basically what

01:24:32   Apple tried to do with the face on the Apple Watch, but as an emoji character. That's what

01:24:40   I would like.

01:24:41   I forgot about that. It had the hands, remember the hands were in there? Some weird stuff

01:24:46   in the early...

01:24:47   Hands, hearts, and the face.

01:24:48   Would it recognize sunglasses, or would you put the sunglasses on manually in the emoji?

01:24:53   I think you would put the sunglasses on. Like you'd be able to choose a couple of things,

01:24:57   nerd glasses or sunglasses, put stars in your eyes or whatever, right? And then make more

01:25:03   faces. I think that that would be really, really fun. And I know I would use that a

01:25:07   lot more than the current Animoji.

01:25:09   Okay, okay.

01:25:11   That's good.

01:25:12   I think that's a good one.

01:25:13   I like that. So I've been sitting here looking at my list and kind of torn on where to go.

01:25:20   So I'm just gonna, I'm gonna go with one that I believe I picked last year and didn't get,

01:25:26   it would make me very happy. And that is shared iCloud photo

01:25:30   libraries. I have a photo library, my partner has a photo

01:25:34   library. And the only way we share things is with airdrop

01:25:37   because even the shared photo stream down ress your images.

01:25:41   Google's fix this and Google Photos, there are solutions to

01:25:45   this. We have an iCloud family account, our links are our cloud

01:25:49   accounts already linked. But there's no way to say I want to

01:25:53   share this album with somebody else and it's man it's time like it's just anyone

01:25:59   who has a multi-person household they all use photos they all want this and

01:26:03   everyone has their own stupid workaround because Apple doesn't support it and

01:26:07   it's time shared iCloud photo libraries would make me a very happy man yeah that

01:26:13   was one of my wishes too so I'm glad that you picked it I will be happy with

01:26:18   you if they do it? Yeah I don't want that. I don't have any problem with it. Like it's

01:26:27   just I don't think that me and Adina take pictures of things that particularly need

01:26:33   to be shared consistently. I am like almost 100% sure that when we have kids we will want

01:26:39   it. Yes. But I think that right now in our life we just don't, you know, like she doesn't

01:26:44   need pictures of my gaming PC and a photo app. Bradley, she just doesn't need that.

01:26:49   I get for you, Federico, there's probably a lot of pictures of the dogs.

01:26:53   Yeah, exactly that.

01:26:54   But we don't have a thing like that. It's like, what, I just take pictures of our house

01:26:58   because it's the only thing that we both own together?

01:27:00   I mean, maybe the gaming PC could be that thing. Maybe if you shared photos, she would

01:27:05   come to love it.

01:27:07   I think she already does. She loves some of these VR games, man. So, but yeah. I think

01:27:15   it would be a great feature. I can totally see the use in it for other people. I know

01:27:20   why a lot of my friends want it. It's just not a thing that I would immediately want

01:27:24   to use, but I can see how cool it would be. Maybe the three of us could share an iCloud

01:27:29   photo library, right? You'd be up for that.

01:27:31   Yeah. Mm-hmm. Great.

01:27:32   Rico would have pictures of his dog, Myke would have pictures of PCs he's building,

01:27:37   and I would just have pictures of Newtons. It'd be great.

01:27:40   Yes, yes. And also, Steven, you have a ton of old Phil Schiller photos for some reason.

01:27:47   I've got a couple, yeah.

01:27:50   So that's it. That's all of the pics that can be added up to our happiness meter. But

01:27:57   We all do have extras, so I guess if any of us want to throw out just some of the things

01:28:02   that we didn't get to pick, these are non-point scoring, we can do that.

01:28:06   I'm just going to throw out two of mine.

01:28:10   I want to give two of mine.

01:28:13   Keyboard shortcuts for iPad multitasking.

01:28:15   I had that.

01:28:16   I had that.

01:28:17   Yep.

01:28:18   I would love that, but I think that's not going to be this year.

01:28:21   I think that we will get it, but not this year.

01:28:23   The other one is, this is a little bit high concept,

01:28:26   but I want Apple to lay out a software release roadmap now.

01:28:31   So if they're gonna do this thing

01:28:36   where they chill a little bit, right,

01:28:38   and maybe make things a multiple year process,

01:28:41   I would like them to get on stage at WWDC and say,

01:28:44   "These are some features we're gonna add to iOS

01:28:46   "over the next year.

01:28:48   "Some are gonna come in September,

01:28:50   Some are going to come in March, some will come in June, and they just show us all of them now, but they come over like the span of a year.

01:28:58   And I think that that would be an interesting thing to do.

01:29:03   Things are still going to get delayed, but things get delayed already.

01:29:06   But it would at least allow Apple to get on stage and show a lot of good stuff, but not feel pressured to ship everything in September.

01:29:16   So it would give the balance of keeping like press media and fans happy because

01:29:22   they get to see a bunch of stuff at WWDC, but doesn't tie them into shipping it all

01:29:27   in September.

01:29:27   It's really, it's really interesting.

01:29:30   Apple used to do that like years and years ago.

01:29:34   They would say, even the iPhone, they had it, they had, this is where the idea came

01:29:38   from.

01:29:38   Cause I was thinking about the iPhone software development roadmap.

01:29:41   Well, right.

01:29:43   That was, that was a thing.

01:29:44   No, but I mean, that's my thing, right?

01:29:46   Like that's the thing.

01:29:46   I'm sure they've done it more in more detail.

01:29:49   - I was gonna say, I don't even think that event was like,

01:29:51   we're doing this over the next year.

01:29:53   It was like, oh we have an SDK, this is where we're going.

01:29:56   - Yeah, I mean it wasn't something I checked in on a lot,

01:29:58   but that just popped into my head.

01:30:00   I was like, oh that's a way they could potentially

01:30:03   try and pitch this to the world.

01:30:05   - It'd be really interesting.

01:30:07   So I'm gonna pick one out of the iOS bucket,

01:30:10   because I feel like anytime I try to do

01:30:15   some of my administrative tasks in particular

01:30:17   that very often involve files.

01:30:20   Even with Files App in iOS 11,

01:30:23   I still run into frustration points.

01:30:26   Or I have, Jason's talked a lot about this,

01:30:29   I have audio files on SD card,

01:30:31   I can't do anything with them on my iPad.

01:30:33   Like, improved Files App with external storage support

01:30:38   would really break down sort of the barriers

01:30:41   that I run into a lot when trying to

01:30:44   to do some very specific things on my iPad.

01:30:46   That's not for everybody, right?

01:30:47   Most people probably aren't pulling things off SD cards

01:30:50   that aren't images, but in my workflow for what I do,

01:30:54   it would make a big difference,

01:30:56   which is why I didn't pick it to be scored,

01:30:58   because I don't think it's gonna happen,

01:31:00   but it would make me happy.

01:31:01   - This feels like one of those things

01:31:05   that is not necessarily trivial,

01:31:07   but they've already felt,

01:31:08   I feel like they've done the hardest part,

01:31:10   which is having a piece of hardware required.

01:31:13   - They already have that, right?

01:31:16   Like they make that part already,

01:31:18   so it kind of feels like,

01:31:19   considering you already have this thing that you sell,

01:31:22   why not add this, because you'll sell more of them.

01:31:25   - Yeah, and it's not just like people with me

01:31:28   running around with field recorders,

01:31:29   but like, you know, if you're gonna have

01:31:32   external storage support, it means you can plug in

01:31:34   a USB drive with a bunch of pages documents on it.

01:31:37   Like it just makes the iPad easier to deal with

01:31:41   in the, out in the world where you don't always

01:31:43   has something like AirDrop or Dropbox available to you.

01:31:47   A physical way to get things on off the device,

01:31:50   yes, it's not very 21st century,

01:31:52   but it's realistic, I think,

01:31:55   to the way a lot of people still work.

01:31:57   Federico, you sounded upset by that.

01:31:59   There was some moaning from Italy.

01:32:01   - No, no, no. - You're good?

01:32:02   - No, no, no, no, no. - You're good?

01:32:03   You don't think it's heresy?

01:32:05   - There's a, no, no, no, I think it's fair.

01:32:08   I'm gonna give you some of the outtakes

01:32:12   from my list. Let's see. iOS. Siri improvement. Auto playback. Intents. Type to Siri becomes

01:32:24   an official thing. Chained commands, so you can ask multiple things in the same sentence.

01:32:29   And multiple languages at once, which is something that Google does really, really well. I would

01:32:33   have mentioned the group FaceTime, which is a thing that is still not possible. And also

01:32:39   the new Reminders app. I think it needs a new design. Finally, on the Mac, I'm just

01:32:47   gonna go through this list, I'm sorry. It will make me happy. A dedicated podcasts app

01:32:53   and also Apple News. On watchOS, you wanna see a more customizable workout app. I wanna

01:33:00   control the data points in the Apple workout, like I can with underscores Workouts++. And

01:33:08   And really, really finally, I want to see sleep tracking on the watch and real native

01:33:13   WatchOS apps that allow developers to use UIKit on the watch.

01:33:19   So that's all the things that will make me super happy, but they don't count against

01:33:24   our quota for the happy-o-meter, so we just throw them into the wind and these are our

01:33:31   wishes forever to be forgotten.

01:33:34   Because they don't count.

01:33:36   They don't matter.

01:33:37   matters. Those are all really good. I had a couple of those as well. I mean, FaceTime is like a relic.

01:33:45   It's, it's just, it is what it has always been. And I think apps like podcast and news and home and

01:33:55   there's, you know, other handful of iOS only apps. I think they make it to the Mac when marzipan or

01:34:02   you know, Myke's wish of cross-platform apps. It feels like I can just see Apple

01:34:08   announcing this thing, "Oh, we've done it with podcast and news and tips and, you

01:34:14   know, some other app." Like, we did it. These are our example projects. Apple likes to

01:34:19   lead the way in those things, and so if that's really coming, I would think they

01:34:23   would be hand-in-hand, but I mean, who knows? But, um, that's all really good

01:34:27   Good stuff.

01:34:28   Good stuff.

01:34:29   Yeah.

01:34:30   Yeah.

01:34:31   All right.

01:34:32   It's done.

01:34:33   There'll be a PDF of this in the show notes for you to keep up with.

01:34:36   I know we'll be watching it.

01:34:37   And an interactive scorecard too.

01:34:39   Yes.

01:34:40   And the interactive scorecard.

01:34:41   They'll all be in the show notes.

01:34:43   You can find those show notes over on the website relay.fm/connected/195.

01:34:48   You can also find them in your podcast app of choice.

01:34:53   While you're on the website, you can send us an email with feedback or you can do it

01:34:57   on Twitter and you can find us all there. Myke is I-M-Y-K-E and Myke hosts a bunch of

01:35:02   great shows on Relay FM. Go check him out. You can find Federico. He's the editor-in-chief

01:35:07   of MacStories.net and you can find him on Twitter as Vitichi. V-I-T-I-C-C-I. I write

01:35:13   512pixels.net and host the YouTube channel by the same name. And you can find me as ISMH.

01:35:20   We'd like to thank Pingdom, Skillshare, and Smile for supporting this episode of Connected.

01:35:24   Until next time, when we are together on stage, say goodbye.

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