Digital Revolution

There are three features announced in WWDC22 that didn't appear in the previous blog post: Passkey, Stage Manager, and Collaboration. They are huge groundbreaking features, and comparisons with competitors are helpful. The Passkey feature is based on industry standards backed together by Apple, Google, and Microsoft. There is no doubt Passkey is the way to go, but the widespread adoption may run into problems just like Retina Display and USB3. Unlike Apple, Google and Microsoft don't control the majority of the hardware their OS runs on. The adoption thus depends on the capability of Google and Microsoft to persuade hardware vendors to integrate biometric authentication into computers. The likely scenario is that some hardware vendors won't follow suit and we are stuck with coexistence of passwords and Passkey by and large for the near future. Stage Manager further shows Apple's attention to GUI. Google and Microsoft never care much about good GUI, but copying Apple...

There are many reasons why PC's aren't as good as Macs. But vast population doesn't understand them. Regulators attempt to regulate a market where they have no expertise. Apple's PR encourages magical thinking that further obscures the dynamics of its own success. Thus it seems appropriate to analyze the differences between PC's and Macs to find out what Apple's approach is really successful and why regulators' fashionable Apple-bashing is dangerous. One object that works very differently on PC's and Macs is function keys. On PC's, function keys are rarely used beyond F1 for help documentation. Their bindings are arbitrary and hard to figure out. Comparatively, Macs build function keys into the OS for display brightness, Expose, Launchpad, etc. Each with explicit purpose and properly decorated, function keys on Macs serve as fast shortcuts to frequently used OS controls. It's clear that Mac's function key design offers much better utility th...

Microsoft announced Windows 365, a cloud virtual Windows desktop. A variety of devices, including smartphones and tablets, can access cloud virtual Windows desktop anytime anywhere. Windows 365 attempts to place Windows in the hands of a even wider audience that some speculates that the future of Windows isn't Windows 11, but Windows 365. Will cloud virtual Windows desktop replace PC desktop? The majority of PCs already run Windows. Windows on Windows really seems like a very Microsoft idea. But what are the uses? While there are use cases like training AI for research, aerodynamic simulation, 3D animation rendering that cloud virtual machines excel, it's difficult to find common office tasks more conveniently executed on the cloud rather than locally. The ambition to replace PC desktop with cloud virtual machines likely will end up like Linux. Linux aimed to provide a free and open alternative to Windows on desktop, but became largely a enterprise server/cloud component. Win...

As a person who entertained the possibility of flat-panel devices of various sizes in 2004, it's necessary to explain the form and function of such devices for historical account, especially when the anticipated devices resemble modern smartphones, tablets, and smartwatches. Talking about form and function sounds like a designer's perspective, but the issue is actually pervasive in engineering. Consider a universal Turing machine with a infinite tape. If modern computers faithfully preserved the form of such Turing machines, they would never become useful for a great deal of applications, but remain a academic interest. Transistors, integrated circuits, multi-touch sensors, and GUI, etc. all matter to make modern gadgets so powerful and easy to use. It's about form and function. The starting point is modern surveillance gadgets that take advantage of on-device or cloud AI to perform intelligent tasks for the user, like keyboard autocorrection, handwriting recognition, maps...

Microsoft has a lot of strengths, but UI isn't one of them. Does it matter? Microsoft's monopoly in workplace computing likely won't improve much even if the company miraculously decides to roll out better UI. As long as Office for Mac remains slightly incompatible in document rendering, there is no worry that Mac would spur a workplace revolution to challenge Windows. Markets rule. But bad UI is disrespect for users. Windows 8 UI was so wrong that usability experts described it as throwing users under the bus . Had Windows 10 not been freely upgradable for Windows 8 users, millions would suffer confusion indefinitely. The install base for Windows 7 and 10 is much larger than Windows 8 in many places, which tells something. Still, even with Windows 10, Microsoft is lagging far behind Apple in terms of UI. A task as simple as browsing for apps requires lengthy scrolling and continuous examination under the rigid and small Start Menu. Why not take advantage of screen size an...

So far, there are two broad approaches to app GUI. The approach adopted by Apple is to produce two different apps oriented toward cursor and touch, respectively. The approach adopted by Microsoft is to produce a single app. From the perspective of usability, Apple clearly triumphs over Microsoft. The fundamental characteristic difference between mouse and finger calls for distinct sets of GUI considerations. Mouse may perform double click that's awkward for fingers. Imprecise fingers often justify big buttons that appear dumb for mice. Although Microsoft Surface might cost less than a MacBook plus a iPad, the user experience simply isn't right. From the perspective of app programming, there is a case for Microsoft's universal approach that a single app is easier to maintain than two apps. Apple partially addressed the issue with the introduction of M1 that may run iOS apps on macOS, at the cost of clumsy GUI. There is a possible third approach that separates app logic and G...

The fact that Mac vs. PC commercials are so successful reflects not only the Mac/PC divide, but also a sober truth that Microsoft's focus on enterprise computing has left the PC world stagnant, lagging further and further behind Apple. PC today is not oriented toward personal computing, but a component to fortify Microsoft's dominance in workplace. Office, Windows Server, and Azure, etc. are Microsoft's agenda for continued monopoly, not personal computing. Microsoft's strategy likely spelled doom for its own smartphone ambition. Smartphones, after all, are deeply personal objects. The distinction between personal computing and enterprise computing can be illustrated if we compare Apple Pages and Microsoft Word. Pages templates provided by Apple are professionally designed to help people create quality documents, while Word templates fall far short and largely rely on enterprise CIS for layout. Since most people aren't great designers, and enterprise CIS is not desi...