Apple's 'Fanatical' Attention to Detail Revealed in Apple Campus 2 Report

[MacRumors]

Reuters on Tuesday published a revealing insider report on the Steve Jobs-approved design and ongoing construction of Apple's new "spaceship" campus in Cupertino, California, which is expected to be finished this spring.

The write-up draws from interviews with nearly two dozen current and former workers involved in the $5 billion project, and focuses on the "fanatical" attention to detail demanded by Apple managers throughout the development which is said to have delayed the original 2016 completion date.

According to the report, Apple's in-house construction team enforced many strict rules. For instance, no vents or pipes could be reflected in the surrounding structures, despite the fact that the campus features the world's largest single pane of curved glass.

In another example of the stringent demands that construction workers were subject to, the guidelines for the special wood used throughout the building is said to have run to some 30 pages.

Tolerances, the distance materials may deviate from desired measurements, were a particular focus. On many projects, the standard is 1/8 of an inch at best; Apple often demanded far less, even for hidden surfaces.

The company's keen design sense enhanced the project, but its expectations sometimes clashed with construction realities, a former architect said.

"With phones, you can build to very, very minute tolerances," he said. "You would never design to that level of tolerance on a building. Your doors would jam."

According to architect German de la Torre, who worked on the project, many of the building's proportions were directly inspired by Apple products, from the curve of a rounded corner, to the elevator buttons, which struck some workers as resembling the iPhone's home button.

One of the most vexing features was the doorways, which Apple wanted to be perfectly flat, with no threshold. The construction team pushed back, but Apple held firm.

The rationale? If engineers had to adjust their gait while entering the building, they risked distraction from their work, according to a former construction manager.

"We spent months trying not to do that because that's time, money and stuff that's never been done before," the former construction manager said.

This obsession with minute features is said to have set back other parts of the project. For example, Apple wanted all the building's signage to reflect a sleek minimal aesthetic, but the emergency services' overriding concern was to ensure the property could be easily navigated if they were called to an incident. Discussions on the topic are said to have extended to 15 meetings with fire department representatives.

The article ends with an anecdote about the back and forth between construction workers and Apple managers over the design of a door handle for offices and meeting rooms. Discussions apparently went on for a year and a half - the door handle is reportedly still unfinished to this day.

You can read the full Reuters report here, and be sure to check out the recent drone footage of the Apple Campus 2 construction site we featured late last month.

Article Link: Apple's 'Fanatical' Attention to Detail Revealed in Apple Campus 2 Report

 

[maflynn]

I'm awed at the scale of the entire project, the size of the building is astounding, especially now as we see much of it near completion

 

[breather]

I sure would want to have a (physical) tour of the place sometime.
Hopefully they will have a 15-20 minute presentation in one of their Apple Events.

 

[Amnak]

I follow someone on SC who works on the campus construction. It still looks far from completion unless they started ramping more people. If Apple wants that level of detail who cares they are paying to have things never done before.

 

[EliasM]

If only they had the same attention to detail for their own products. It's been months now that I cannot simply turn on Bluetooth on my iPhone without the need to redo it two or three times because it simply doesn't work the first time. There are many, many othere examples of obvious bugs that go unrepaired for far too long.

 

[brvhrt]

If only they had the same attention to detail for their own products.

I came here to post this exact sentence.

 

[Kaibelf]

If only they had the same attention to detail for their own products. It's been months now that I cannot simply turn on Bluetooth on my iPhone without the need to redo it two or three times because it simply doesn't work the first time. There are many, many othere examples of obvious bugs that go unrepaired for far too long.

And most people don't have that problem. Therefore you should probably get your phone repaired.

 

[EliasM]

And most people don't have that problem. Therefore you should probably get your phone repaired.

I thought this was a known issue - I seem to remember reading about it a couple of weeks or months ago. I could be mistaken.

But that doesn't negate my general point: attention to detail in Apple products is often lacking.

 

[1050792]

Why even bother with this when they are going to make the Campus 2S thinner...

 

[yanksfan114]

And people think Apple lost their way since Jobs

 

[az431]

If only they had the same attention to detail for their own products. It's been months now that I cannot simply turn on Bluetooth on my iPhone without the need to redo it two or three times because it simply doesn't work the first time. There are many, many othere examples of obvious bugs that go unrepaired for far too long.

Of course the same person responsible for fixing bugs in iOS is also in charge of supervising construction of the new campus.

 

[triton100]

This is what separates Apple from the rest.

Haters hate for what they believe to be arbitrary detail, but when all put together make the sum of beautiful aesthetic.

Blandness normally cannot understand the levels of work involved in forward thinking creatives.

As always, after the pain staking detail and money that goes into being original, and enduring hate from jealous upholders of mediocrity, said wannabes soon follow suit with their copycat, I mean 'ideas' inspired by Apple.

 

[keysofanxiety]

But that doesn't negate my general point: attention to detail in Apple products is often lacking.

It absolutely does negate it. How old is your phone? A few years old? Brand new? What would 'attention to detail' help with a strange Bluetooth issue a few years after purchasing? If it's brand new, then you could just get a replacement from Apple.

Attention to detail in Apple products is frankly the best in the industry. I work for a reseller and the sheer volume of junk PCs and junk phones/tablets that I see and have tried are astonishing. If people have any perspective or knowledge on what you get from other OEMs, I honestly can't see how people come to the conclusion that you have.

That's not to say an Apple product is the absolute best you can always buy. But they're a far cry from being anything less than pretty damn good. And certainly they're leaps and bounds above the Fisher-Price criticisms that get flung around here.

 

[triton100]

I thought this was a known issue - I seem to remember reading about it a couple of weeks or months ago. I could be mistaken.

But that doesn't negate my general point: attention to detail in Apple products is often lacking.

Are you sure you are using an Apple phone as this is a bizarre statement.

 

[Northgrove]

And people think Apple lost their way since Jobs

?

This is Jobs' final project, he launched it.

 

[polterbyte]

Of course they care about this level of precision for a building as much as for a phone: the stick up their rear ends is precise in length to the nanometer.

 

[EliasM]

It absolutely does negate it. How old is your phone? A few years old? Brand-new? What would 'attention to detail' help with a strange Bluetooth issue a few years after purchasing? If it's brand-new, then you could just get a replacement from Apple.

Attention to detail in Apple products is frankly the best in the industry. I work for a reseller and the sheer volume of junk PCs and junk phones/tablets that I see and have tried are astonishing. If people have any perspective or knowledge on what you get from other OEMs, I honestly can't see how people come to the conclusion that you have.

That's not to say an Apple product is the absolute best you can always buy. But they're a far cry from being anything less than pretty damn good. And certainly they're leaps and bounds above the Fisher-Price criticisms that get flung around here.

I only bought my iPhone last year, I always update it to the latest version of iOS.

As far as hardware is concerned, you can't do much better than Apple, I give you that (though there is a thing or two that could be said about their batteries). But software is often lacking. It's never a huge problem, but there will always be small issues. Another example: the AirPlay icon will sometimes disappear when I want to stream a video from my iPad to my Apple TV. That's nothing a restart of the iPad doesn't fix so that's no big problem, but it's there all the same. The competition may be even worse, but that doesn't mean all is perfect at Apple. And that's my point: maybe they should pay more attention to their products and less to their door handles.

Having said that, I still very much prefer Apple products to other (Windows) products, and I resent having to use a Windows machine at the office.

 

[charlieasmith96]

'Attention to detail'

 

[I7guy]

I thought this was a known issue - I seem to remember reading about it a couple of weeks or months ago. I could be mistaken.

But that doesn't negate my general point: attention to detail in Apple products is often lacking.

Sure it does, one anecdotal case does not throw the baby out with the bath water.

 

[Swordylove]

'Attention to detail'

View attachment 687341

 

[EliasM]

Sure it does, one anecdotal case does not throw the baby out with the bath water.

It's an anecdotal case to illustrate something bigger. Surely everyone working with iOS, Mac OS regularly has come across their share of annoying bugs and glitches.

 

[69Mustang]

"With phones, you can build to very, very minute tolerances," he said. "You would never design to that level of tolerance on a building. Your doors would jam."

I hope the construction engineers won this particular argument. If not, there are going to be a ton of pissed off employees either stuck in offices or unable to enter an office. All buildings have "wiggle room" because they behave like a living, breathing organism. Expansion, contraction, and shift are all parts of the "life" of a building. It's good to push boundaries, that's how we get progress. But sometimes, you gotta know which boundaries to push. That particular boundary ain't the one.

 

[Mike MA]

I wonder how much of the details were still planned by Steve himself. Surely it wasn't Tim though
But seriously, I would love to see such a commitment again throughout the entire product line.

 

[1050792]

'Attention to detail'

View attachment 687341

Nobody has to know that! They still need to live in their fantasy world where everything made by Apple is "perfect".

 

[lamerica80]

"1/8 of an inch" - JUST SWITCH TO THE METRIC SYSTEM ALREADY!!