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Apple to Launch iOS-Enabled iMac With Touch Interface?

While it'd be kind of cool to have a touch-enabled iMac screen, the only people who will really benefit from this are museums that like to use iMacs as all-in-one systems for an interactive, but then they tend to just buy add-on touch sensors or those rollerball things instead.
 
My goodness...

I'm just hoping Apple continues to make a few machines that can do actual design and coding work.

A touchscreen iPad, iPhone or touchscreen "anything" really doesn't work for that.

Some of us love Apple gear but actually want to get some efficient and creative work done.

Note to Apple: Not every device has to be a whiz-bang, wow 'em at Best Buy, touchscreen device with more reflection than a mirror and finger smudges all over it.

Speaking of which...The Mac Pro ever getting updated again Apple?
 
I don’t feel this should be a ‘Page 2’ topic in that it makes more sense as to why Apple is dragging its feet on a replacement of their 30-inch desktop display.

As for a new MacPro, I think Apple couldn't care less about professional designers anymore. It's now all about bubblegum social interaction with 16-year old bee-bopping mall kids.
 
turbineseaplane said:
My goodness...

I'm just hoping Apple continues to make a few machines that can do actual design and coding work.
Click to expand...

As long as Apple needs people to build Apps for their touch screen devices, you will have a machine that can do design and coding. They will be the workhorses that support the consumer product line of handhelds like the ipod, iphone and ipad. Don't worry, the Mac is not going away. It might get a whole lot cooler with added features, but it's going to be capable of running Xcode for a long long time.
 
guzhogi said:
I wouldn't mind an iOS-type OS on an iMac as long as it had some more features of a full-fledged desktop OS. As in:

-Multiple Users
-Printing
-Some kind of file system
-More apps of a creative side (ie movie editing, word processing, programming, etc.) instead of just media consuming apps

Note: this list is not exhaustive; there are many more features I'd like that I just can't think of at the moment.

Plus, some games/apps will need to be done, specifically those that need the accelerometers. I don't think people would want to swing around a 20/30 pound computer. But that would be a good way to make more money; people keep breaking them so they'll have to pay for repairs/new ones.



I doubt 10.7 will be such an overhaul. Probably more like Mac OS X 11.0 or a totally new naming scheme.
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You just described a touchless OS X. It does exactly that...
 
This sort of feature would be of extremely limited usefulness.

Let be clear here Touch screens are of limited usefulness in the normal desktop range of activities. You can read about ergonomics for the details or take this Tibit of experience, they are fatiguing to use. I base this on experience in industrial settings where people will often go out of their way to make use of a keyboard, mouse or other entry device instead of the touch screen. Apples quality GUI would have no impact on the negative associated with extensive touch screen usage.

The idea of a layer being used as a replacement for Dashboard has some appeal as currently Dashboard sucks. However this would only work well by emulating an ARM processor which is probably as wasteful as JavaScript. If I was Apple I'd think long and hard about that.

Further I'm not even sure I agree with the premise that a touch facility would be hard to integrate into Mac OS/X. It would seem to me that adding another layer would be more difficult for everybody concerned, especially developers. Their goal maybe an exact emulation of iOS gestures but I'm not even sure that makes sense. You really need a gesture system tailored to the desktop that hives with track pad usage.

So while I can see Apple doing something in this regard I don't think a Touch screen will be there to turn the Mac into an iOS device. Far from it infact. Even if they model the Touch screen interface on the I devices the goals and real usability will be vastly different. Even worst consummer acceptance and use wount be there. Even the geeks will quickly discover that in the vast majority of cases a Touch screen on the desktop sucks.

What will be very interesting is the minority of apps that will benefit from such an interface. It is just that many desktop users will never use such apps so the whole touch screen thing is a bit of a joke. For many users what Apple should be doing is going after voice input/dictation. Put all those cores to work on an AI that can process human language.


Dave
 
In most cases terrible is the word.

ValSalva said:
Exactly. When did the keyboard and mouse become public enemy number 1? These technologies have been perfected over years and years of real use.

If Apple introduces a touch iMac it's clearly a money grab, to sucker the public into thinking touch is somehow superior when in fact it is vastly inferior on a desktop monitor.
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Not in every case but certainly in most cases a Touch screen on the desktop, supporting most productivity apps, is a TERRIBLE idea. I work in a plant full of touch screens supporting various systems and frankly they all suck for general run of the mill interaction or data entry. There is nothing about Apples GUI that can improve this as it is more of a physical ergonomic issue.

However that doesn't mean that touch screen are never useful on the desktop. On the contrary there are apps that can effectively leverage a touch screen. The problem is these are not the apps that most people will be making use of.

In the end I believe you are right about people getting suckered into something they might not ever use. Further I'm more surprised that this rumor is desktop related as a touch screen might actually get used more on a laptop. In the end I just hope this is a bogus rumor.
 
maybe it's this multitouch peripheral or a macbook air with the touch things, beause I don't want to imagind fingerprints all over the iMac, lol
 
Now consider these facts :

- new mac mini with hdmi
- "iSlate" or "Magic Slate" coming (possibily with gyro/accelerometer) ?
- developers of iOS apps are converting apps for iPad resolution 1024x768 and/or retina display resolution 960x460

If Apple releases a new software than runs on the mac mini, can be controlled using the Magic slate and can run iPad or retina display optimized apps, with iOS4 standard apps for music, videos, mail and internet, connected to an hdmi tv....

Now this is something I would like a lot to have at home.

And you ?
 
griz said:
As long as Apple needs people to build Apps for their touch screen devices, you will have a machine that can do design and coding. They will be the workhorses that support the consumer product line of handhelds like the ipod, iphone and ipad. Don't worry, the Mac is not going away. It might get a whole lot cooler with added features, but it's going to be capable of running Xcode for a long long time.
Click to expand...

Oh, you will always be able to run Xcode on a Mac. You'll just have to buy the developer subscription for a few thousand dollars per year in order to get it activated...

Well, let's wait and see. In worst case, there are still a few hundred Linux and BSD distributions out there that can be installed on our Macs.
 
Has anyone else here used touchscreen computers? They're a pain! Verging on useless. When I had one I thought it was fun for a few minutes, then I went back to keyboard and mouse.

I hope this isn't the start of OSX being replaced by iOS. I like my compatibility and "free" OS (not being limited to a store, being able to do things without voiding the warranty, etc).
 
Snowcat001 said:
Who wants to be touching a vertically standing screen all the time, that's tiring!

Maybe this is why we didn't see OS X 10.7 info because it might include support for this...

I was actually hoping to see a completely new mac Pro with new very high res screens and wireless trackpad.
Click to expand...

imagine now nasty the screen will get really fast as we eat by the computer :rolleyes: chocolate sooooo goood. ;)
 
Dagless said:
Has anyone else here used touchscreen computers? They're a pain! Verging on useless. When I had one I thought it was fun for a few minutes, then I went back to keyboard and mouse.

I hope this isn't the start of OSX being replaced by iOS. I like my compatibility and "free" OS (not being limited to a store, being able to do things without voiding the warranty, etc).
Click to expand...

desktop are a pain with this, but laptops can have some functional reasons, could mean widgets on OSX will be going away and ipad iphone apps will come into play. I can only dream :(
 
Winni said:
Oh, you will always be able to run Xcode on a Mac. You'll just have to buy the developer subscription for a few thousand dollars per year in order to get it activated...
Click to expand...

What Apple actions would lead you to believe that would ever happen? I don’t see the logic in such fears.
 
touch screen is usefull for mobile devices because you don't have any place to put a screen, mouse and keyboard. But desktops you have room for keyboard and mic so i don't see this happening in imacs.

Steve said a D8, he believes that there will always be a place for desktops but a majority of our tasks will be done from tablets or mobile devices that are touch screen enabled.

And there are just some things that require keyboard and mice! steve acknowledges that and so does the rest of the world.
 
Touch interfaces don't NECESSARILY mean touchscreen interfaces.

The Magic Trackpad — https://www.macrumors.com/2010/06/07/apples-magic-trackpad-or-magic-slate-revealed/ — would allow for multi-touch on desktops, enabling many iOS applications to be used on a desktop computer (and obviously laptops could do the same thing with their trackpads).

There are lots of ways this could be useful. For example: touch input in a desktop environment could be useful for manipulating or selecting MULTIPLE buttons/sliders/whatever independently, and at the same time — which you can't do with a mouse.
 
gmcalpin said:
Touch interfaces don't NECESSARILY mean touchscreen interfaces.

The Magic Trackpad — https://www.macrumors.com/2010/06/07/apples-magic-trackpad-or-magic-slate-revealed/ — would allow for multi-touch on desktops, enabling many iOS applications to be used on a desktop computer (and obviously laptops could do the same thing with their trackpads).

Touch input in a desktop environment could be useful for manipulating or selecting MULTIPLE buttons/sliders/whatever at the same time — which you can't do with a mouse.

There are lots of ways this could be useful.
Click to expand...

but a replacement of keyboard and mice don't think so...
 
JoEw said:
but a replacement of keyboard and mice don't think so...
Click to expand...
I didn't say anything about replacing a keyboard and/or mouse. I'm talking about supplementing it. (You could probably replace the mouse with it, though. Lots of people are familiar with trackpads and love them. Why not?)

I already have a Wacom Cintiq in front of my keyboard. That's where most people would keep something like this.
 
Snowcat001 said:
Who wants to be touching a vertically standing screen all the time, that's tiring!
Click to expand...

e-coli said:
No chance. The ergonomics would be a disaster.
Click to expand...

Who says the screen would be vertically standing? An adjustable desktop-style iMac would work just fine with iOS. No keyboard required.

I think it’s quite likely that we’ll eventually see some sort of convergence between Mac OS X and iOS. Some more thoughts here: http://www.keithwilson.org.uk/technology/blog/Entries/2010/6/18_What_next_for_Mac_OS_X.html
 
I'm confident that you will not see any computers running both Mac OS and iOS. Apple has made it pretty clear that they are two different lines (you may think the iPad blurs that line but it is still explicitly iOS and doesn't eat into the Mac usage as much as you'd think).

Could you see the two operating systems merge one day? Possibly, but also doubtful.
 
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