Productivity & innovation, where is Apple heading?

[MortyUA]

Dear all,

I'm not trolling here ... I'm very conflicted.

For years I have been a Windows & iOS user -- I have to use Windows at work, and I started using Windows at home decades ago, so it seemed to natural to keep using Windows for my own personal productivity / programming / office work.

Then Apple revolutionized phones, and I've been using iOS for my mobile ever since, so Windows on my computers and iOS on my phone / tablet.

For my computers I prefer Apple over Wintel -- both from an aesthetics, reliability and quality feel, and both their hardware and software. After many years of living on not much money I have worked hard, and can now afford to buy my home work computer for the next years. And emotionally, I would like to switch to macOS.

But rationally I'm not sure I want to switch from Windows to macOS now, because it seems the tide has started going the other way...

Where do you see Apple's desktops and laptops be in 3-5 years for a software developer & general office apps user? How do you see Apple's innovation and improvement of the macOS ecosystem play out over the next years, versus Android and Windows, both of which are executing well now?

It's a vague question, I know. But I really feel like Apple is not delivering recently, and I don't want to buy into a platform that is very expensive if its the wrong time...

Thank you.

 

[MacGizmo]

Dear all,
Where do you see Apple's desktops and laptops be in 3-5 years for a software developer & general office apps user? How do you see Apple's innovation and improvement of the macOS ecosystem play out over the next years, versus Android and Windows, both of which are executing well now?

It's a vague question, I know. But I really feel like Apple is not delivering recently, and I don't want to buy into a platform that is very expensive if its the wrong time...

For software development and general office app use, what do you NEED or WANT with regard to "innovation?" What's missing? What has dramatically changed in the areas of software development and general office app use? With those needs in mind, what would you CONSIDER to be innovative?

It's easy for people to talk about innovation... but what are OS developers supposed to do to when little to nothing has changed about general computer use and technology in general with regard to desktop OS use?

You bring up an excellent topic for discussion and speculation. Other than making desktops and laptops smaller and faster, adding a few doo-dad features to the OS itself, I'm not sure what Apple or Microsoft could do that I would personally consider "innovative" at this point. I can't think of what's missing from macOS (or Windows, for that matter).

 

[MortyUA]

I can't think of what's missing from macOS (or Windows, for that matter).

Thank you for trying to help me with my distressed confusion. I do take your point -- that both desktop OS's are very mature at this point, and usage patterns seem solidified. But I still think there will be innovation, and that we as users will want the new stuff as it comes out.

For software development and general office app use, what do you NEED or WANT with regard to "innovation?" What's missing?

In the future I would like to see:

• Full touch screen in macOS. It works a treat on Windows.
• Better speech recognition in English, and speech recognition in my native language.
• Siri more aware of context, of previous conversation.
• Better spelling & grammar checking on text input.

So I do think there is room for innovation in desktop OS's. And I think part of my confusion comes from Apple's lack of public strategy. Google is the AI first company -- what is Apple's vision?

 

[MacGizmo]

...But I still think there will be innovation, and that we as users will want the new stuff as it comes out.

Full touch screen in macOS. It works a treat on Windows.

That's simply not going to happen. Not any time soon, and probably not ever.

Better speech recognition in English, and speech recognition in my native language.

This would be a welcome addition to the OS. While I think it's pretty good (in English anyway), it could certainly be better. There was a time when I thought speech recognition would be the future (that was about 20 years ago), but now that's it's mainstream, I can't imagine anything more archaic than sitting around in an office talking to my computer.

But this is an iterative type of change anyway, Apple isn't going to WOW anyone with better speech recognition.

Siri more aware of context, of previous conversation.

Now that would be fantastic. And I wonder how many years off we are from that. Pretty much all these virtual assistants suffer from lack of context.

Better spelling & grammar checking on text input.

Another thing I wouldn't exactly consider innovative, but something that would be highly welcome. On-the-fly grammar checking would be awesome if it were more contextually aware as well. Lots of apps already have grammar and spell checking as you go, but it's usually quite lacking in the understanding of what you're writing (typing) - so this would be welcome tech.

 

[MortyUA]

Thank you.