Everything Apple (the Mac heads thread)

The only drawback I could see is within the display settings, you can only arrange the iPad in the left or the right.
u wot m8?

I stand corrected. Thought it only worked left or right. I've never tried dragging it to another other position.

Window management, how do you work?

I came back to using a Mac as my main computer after a long hiatus.
Having used OSX at work or with friends' computers every now and then in the last years I'm somewhat familiar with how the OS changed / with the new features.

What baffles me though is window management; seriously unsure whether I'm just being a bit thick or whether it just always was like that with MacOS -

• I see the option to "zoom" with a double-click on the title bar of an active window -
  this does exactly what it does on Windows in some applications (like Mail): stretch a window both horizontally and vertically, but not covering the dock, and also keeping the menu bar (so not entering full screen, but making the window "as big as possible"). When double-tapping the title bar again the window returns to its resized state - also exactly to the place where it was before.
  This is what I like.

• With other apps like Safari for example, the behaviour is different, and quite weird: double tapping the title bar here does not make the window as big as possible, but, say, make it stretch 100% vertically, but only increase size somewhat horizontally. Double tapping the title bar continues switching between these two states.

• With the "Photos" app for example, the double-tapping on the title bar does not do anything at all - yet I can "maximize" the window by option-clicking the green button in the upper left corner.
  Wtf.

I see no option to change / set this behaviour, can somebody please tell me what's going on here?

ive used bettertouchtool for years with keyboard shortcuts to move windows into specific areas of the screen.
I believe they offer 'snap' windowing too moving windows with mouse/trackpad but ive never used it

ive used it so long and so much that i literally cant use anyone elses machine for basically anything

Also sometimes it makes the window go full screen, hiding the menu bar at the top :-/

Hmmmm I should buy an iPad Pro

Same here. Rinsed my mbp and starting from scratch with it and the hour of re-installing all those little apps feels like ages. They make a huge difference.

Window management, how do you work?

https://github.com/rxhanson/Rectangle
https://rectangleapp.com/

• Drag to the edges and it will dock to a portion of the screen.
  
• Drag to centre top and it will fill the canvas.
  
• Keyboard shortcuts will place the window wherever you wish, including moving to different display devices.
  
  

Oh, it's free and open source and configurable.

Thank you for the suggestion; would really love to make do without any third party things that I need to give broadstroke permissions though, also while admittedly I have my doubts I do think OSX is actually capable of handling this properly, would love to find out how though.

What kind of permissions are we talking about? Can a window-moving app actually do much harm?

Apple got back about the USB 2.0 issues... they can't find evidence the problem exists.

So I've written it up on Reddit so others can find it, describe it to Apple Support consistently, and know that there's a workaround:

https://www.reddit.com/r/mac/comments/gp5b1z/usb_20_issues_on_new_macbook_pro_13_2020/

It’s possible to use Safari with content blockers and also run a VPN at the same time though right?

Or would the issue in that instance be that you want to avoid Safari altogether?

In Chrome (on laptops) and Firefox (on all devices including mobile) I run:

• HTTPS Everywhere
  
• Privacy Badger
  
• NoScript
  
• uBlock Origin
  
  

And Safari doesn't seem to have all of those, and certainly not for iOS and iPadOS (but maybe I don't know how to look properly given that I don't have those devices).

Additionally I run system wide DNS blocking on every device:

• stubby on laptops (Windows, Linux, Mac)
  
• Private DNS on Android
  
  

From what I can tell by Googling... I can't achieve a system wide DNS on iPad without using a VPN... and as you cannot VPN through a VPN it means I wouldn't be able to have both DNS content blocking at the same time as any other VPN.

Both of those things combined makes me sad.

But the Mac Pro Display XDR looks nice... so maybe if I can get used to the thought of a huge monitor I should just buy that and quit my whinging. Not sure I want a big monitor though.

I have a discrepancy on the amount of space left on my MacBook Air's SSD.
System information says I have 3.32GB of space left.
Lightroom says I have 59GB free, and is using 5.78GB for a cache (set to 10% of free space for cache).

I suspect Lightroom is more likely correct - I freed up a lot of space recently . What can I do to find out what's going on?

Yeh I’ve just had a quick search of those four on the App Store and none are there.

The Pro XDR screen does look great. Big investment if you’re unsure about wanting a big monitor though!

How do you like the Magic Keyboard for the iPad pro? And did you ever try the Smart Keyboard Folio? I had the latter and even though I seem to be in the minority here, I really hated that fabric material they used.

I found this a useful watch https://youtu.be/ie6eIudvL6o

I have the final-gen lightening port iPad Pro 11 with smart keyboard and its my most used device outside of working as I love it, and the Magic Keyboard seems to resolve some of the things i dont like (plus the USBC Pro has more screen space in same smaller physical size).

Its a work iPad (although its not enrolled into corp anymore..) but if i had to give it back I would buy an 11 with magic keyboard basically immediately.

I should of bought a 11pro from Apple refurb a few weeks ago. Non around now . The “wfh” brigade have nabbed them all.

What kind of permissions are we talking about? Can a window-moving app actually do much harm?

Not too familiar with Mac permissions to be honest but the apps I looked into so far were very quick to ask for permission to "control this computer" so I don't know, if it's not necessary I'd love to avoid it.

Never had the Smart Keyboard. Before the new iPad Pro, I had a first generation iPad Mini which was starting to show it’s age.

The Magic Keyboard is really good, but there are a couple of drawbacks. In use, it makes the iPad Pro as thick as the 13” MBP. And not far off the weight.

The trackpad functionality is good (it’s got most of the multiple finger stuff) but in practice, it behaves differently in different apps. So, in Safari as I write this, I can highlight a line of text with the cursor and cut/copy/paste (with CMD-X/C/V etc). But in MSWord, I’ve got to select a word to highlight and then drag the two little bars to then select the section of text. It would be nicer if it had the same functionality across all apps, not just the Apple ones. The trackpad functionality in MSWord just feels a bit clunky.

However, the physical keyboard bit is great. Typing feels the same as on the new MBP. There’s a decent amount of “give” in the keys and they make a satisfying noise in full flow. I hammered out a weighty document on Tuesday without any issues at all, and I didn’t notice I wasn’t using the MBP.

Screen adjustment with the floaty thing is okay and it’s really stable to type on your lap sitting on the sofa. The connection between the keyboard and the iPad is fantastic, the iPad just snaps in and out of the case really easily. If you use the iPad as a tablet you’ll need to do often, as the case doesn’t flip around for tablet mode. And it doesn’t need pairing, like the Pencil. Which is also great.

App functionality will catch up.

Microsoft have already confirmed trackpad support for later this year across all their apps.

I think the apps mainly mimic keyboard inputs, often using the disability functionality provided by MacOS. Tbh I trust apple enough to not allow 3rd party apps cause too much harm

The backlight behind my "O" key has stopped working, is the light part of the key, or part of the whole keyboard assembly?

Does this sidecar business also work the other way around?
As in: using your iPad as master to host a Zoom call for example (because the camera is a lot better), but have your MacBook Pro's big screen as slave / sidecar?

try epoccam?