Apple's Liquid Glass sounds like Aqua

 I want to like Apple.  I've been a Mac user since 1993.  I've had an iPhone since the iPhone 4S.  I had an iPod, albeit an HP version because it was on clearance for a good price with maximum storage.  They're doing good things with ARM-based System on a Chip designs.

 I didn't watch the WWDC keynote.  I looked at MacRumors here and there for relevant information.  Since Apple doesn't announce hardware at WWDC, it is interesting, but just.

They're introducing Liquid Glass to all operating systems.  It's what they've been using in VisionOS.  It reminds me of what they did with Aqua when Mac OS X was being created.  Every progress bar and button had a rhythm and they had depth.  The eye candy was tough on systems so they kept smashing it until they stopped using it.

Now, there are Apple Silicon SoCs that have enough power.  woohoo.  However, you can disable it in the beta test release.

For the record, I'd really appreciate if they took care of all the !@#$ bugs first.  The Adobe way of software development isn't critical.  Then again, the thin-is-everything design isn't either.  Adding new functionality before you get the previous functionality to a stable point is risky because there is a good chance that you'll never find the problems. 

They've introduced Foundation Models Framework, a set of APIs to allow access to Apple Intelligence (whatever that may comprise at the time) for integration into applications.  They're still not ready with Personalized Siri, but whatever.

I remember posting on MacRumors that I would wait for iOS 20.7.1 (I was running 16.7.1 at the time) for Apple Intelligence to be ready and working.  Now that they've flipped the numbers up to 26, I guess I can't get that.  What I thought would be three major releases later to be a safe, working release with AI.  We'll see if 28.7.1 will be safe.

Oh, macOS Tahoe is the last release for Intel-based hardware.  Maybe, they can clear out some of the crap and code more effectively for the next release.

Update 2025.09.17: Oh, the complaints are starting to flow.  I remember how cool Aqua looked with the rhythmic light show on the default button, but how much processing it took to do that was too much, if you wanted to accomplish some work.  Do you think that iOS 28 will be good?  Will a couple of years of development help?

Update 2025.10.25: They're already trying to reduce battery drain.  History repeats itself, and Apple's development team is attempting to reduce the problem.

Update 2026.02.13: I saw a report this week that Apple is not going to remove Liquid Glass.  Sounds as though discussions have been happening for a while.   It seems as though it's working out like Aqua.

Update 2026.03.15: I'm using 26.3.1 now, so I'm using Liquid Glass.  I'm not sure it's responsible for the battery drain or not.  Apple has a long way to go if x.3.1 is still this rough.  Liquid Glass is not awful or great.  It's just different. 

I chose the Phone 15 over iPhone 16e

Friday evening, I bought an iPhone 15.  I considered the 16e but I felt that it was an experiment I didn't want to try.

The 60 Hz OLED display and the Apple modem seem okay, but for someone else to try.

 Obviously, the iPhone 15 has been out for about 1.5 years and that's good.  There won't be any surprises. Whichever device I bought, the inane gestures are part of the package.  I've become so accustomed to using the Home button (since the iPhone 4S) that I will have some trouble switching.

 Given that the iPhone 15 was only about US$1.50 more per month for 24 months than the iPhone 16e, it wasn't a difficult choice.  It still has a newer SoC than the 2022 iPhone SE/iPhone 13 but it's only one generation newer.  They only had black and pink phones and I chose a black 256 GB model.  Immediately, they wanted US$99.99 upfront, plus $36 activation fee plus tax.

 AppleCare+ will be quite a bit more expensive.  I'm expecting it to be around $10 higher but it would also be higher for the 16e.

I ordered a Spigen Liquid Air case that I'd been watching for a few months.  It's supposedly 50% off at US$14.99.  I've used one on another phone and it was agreeable without being too heavy or bulky.  It's not as strong as the Ballistic cases I used to buy, but I'm not sure they're in business any longer.  I could throw the phone in those.  I ordered through Amazon, but there aren't many ways to do this now, and without a car, I just can't go to multiple stores looking for a case.

I'm not sure about the phone-to-phone transfer but restoring the phone from my Mac at USB 2.0 speeds takes too long.  I tried to do that for someone who got an iPhone 15 when iOS 17 was new and not stable and it did not work.  I'll make a backup and try the WiFi transfer.  I'm not completely sold on iOS 18, but I suspect I won't be able to replace it with iOS 17.  I'm not ready to update my Mac to Sequoia, but that may happen, as well. 

Wish me luck!

Update 2025.03.10: The phone arrived.  I asked the UPS driver to wait because T-Mobile customers have been receiving empty boxes from UPS.  After the problem I had recently with the local UPS location losing something else, I was concerned.

The Quick Start phone-to-phone transfer did not work.  It managed to transfer my SIM contents to the eSIM but that's about it.

 I backed up my phone Sunday evening and restored to the new phone on Monday afternoon.  It was better than usual.  I remember starting the restore and going to bed.

 The phone is a bit bigger and definitely needs a case because the camera module sticks out.  I wouldn't want to drop it on a table and damage it.  The Liquid Air case has such an unusual feeling.  It's grippy but smooth.  The price was right, also.  It took some time to get everything to where I can use it and shop.  I can't seem to get away from using Face ID, but I'll be damned if I want it.

The phone is faster but I don't see that it's really fast.  There is only a one generation difference between the SoC in the 2022 iPhone SE (A15) and the iPhone 15 (A16). 

Update 2025.03.18: It's been a week.  The iPhone 15 works well enough.  It's not as huge as I thought it would be because of the smaller display of the iPhone SE.  I don't like the pill-shaped opening, but it ill be okay.

 I tried the Kishi V2 controller.  It didn't work with the Nexus app, which is very different from Android.  Then, I looked at the Razer website and they mention the iPhone 15.  I suspect that they mean any USB type-C iPhone, but they only mentioned one as not working.  Maybe, in a few years, they'll have the app working with this port and not the Lightning port.  Oh, second try.  The Kishi V2 works.  The Kishi V2 Pro that comes with the Razer Edge does not.  That's the one with Force Feedback.  Oh, the Kishi V3 works with iPhone 15 and 16.  I'm not spending another US$100.

I haven't played as much but I haven't seen any scrolling problems, so the OLED display must be quick enough.

Update 2025.04.06: I'm thinking that I chose at the correct time.  The tariffs from the White House will have ruined the market for electronics and more.  I noticed that a photographic lens has already risen in price on Amazon.  Prices of Apple's phones may be as high as US$1000 more. 

Update 2025.05.11: I've been playing a few games.  Moonlight Mahjongg that I've been playing since around 2008, on the 2nd generation iPod touch originally, seems just as tough on the iPhone 15 as it was on all of the other devices.  That's odd.  Other games seem okay, but it makes me wonder if Apple went out of their way to push people to the Pro models.

Thankfully, I've gone through the transition period and I can just use the phone now.  Call quality is reasonable, as is the photo quality.  The only thing that really bothers me is that the bezels are so small that the case covers some of the display.  At least, it's not like the Razer Edge where they put some artificial material  to surround the display and cut off part of the display.

iOS 18 is buggy.  I don't have to worry about Apple Intelligence, but still, they really need to work on a superior experience and repair the operating system, and their apps. 

Update 2025.09.15: Having seen the iPhone 17 series, I'm glad I have the iPhone 15.  Tried-and-true products don't cause worry.  Now that the iPhone 15 series has been stopped, it looks as though everyone will get some form of Apple Intelligence, some of it useful.  By 2035, hopefully, Siri will finally work well.

Update 2025.12.14: Apple is trying my patience again.  Getting the USB type-C cable to remain inserted seems to be a challenge.  Google and OnePlus use a special port on the Pixel 6a and 13R, respectively, and the cable doesn't slip out of the socket.  If I sneeze (or practically anything else) near the iPhone 15, it seems to loosen the connection.  You think the $0.50 that Apple saves is worth the headache?

Update 2026.03.02: The iPhone 17e was announced.  I'm still glad that I got the iPhone 15.  Siri is still about the same.  The C1X modem will be replacing the C1.  Better rates will be useful.

Update 2026.03.15: I bought an Anker MagSafe-compatible portable power bank.  The more expensive model was on sale for almost double this one.  It works well enough, but I had to buy a different case.  Considering that I've tried to use my portable power bank with a cable and the cable slips out of the iPhone 15's port, this will be consistently useful.

Updated Mac, Apple Watch, and iPhone to the latest operating systems

 I took the leap to update all three devices around the same time.

Apple Watch Series 7 was on watchOS 9.x, 2022 iPhone SE was on 16.7.2, and MacBook Air was on macOS Monterey.

I usually wait until the x.x.1 version of the operating system, but lately, Apple has not been as good.  I was going to wait until the release that happens right before Christmas.  None of them want to deal with problems over the Christmas holiday, so they usually do a better job of bug elimination.

However, the Mac has been two generations back from Sonoma, and it shows when I want to back up the iPhone.  There is a need to download a compatibility patch of some sort.  I wouldn't be two generations of macOS back except that Ventura has had so many bad reports, I didn't want to encounter any of the problems.

I remember too well how my PowerPC machine was having trouble with Leopard and later, Snow Leopard.  It just never was so good again.  However, the people with Intel-based machines were really happy with the performance.  Transition time anywhere is not so easy.

So, I clicked on Install, and Sonoma was downloaded and around 30 minutes later, was running.

 Downloading 17.1.1 was just as simple and the update process was free from errors.  The time to process the update seemed forever but was suddenly finished.

Requesting the Apple Watch update from the iPhone app was interesting.  At one point, it said "1 Day" and later, it seemed to lock onto "16 Hours", which was way too long.  I restarted the phone and the watch, and then, started the update from the watch.  It requested agreeing to the Terms and Conditions on the phone, which went back and forth four times.  The screen had things overlapping, as if they hadn't really tested the installer.  However, it claimed 2 Hours once everything was handled correctly.

Everything is up to date for the moment.  Battery life on the phone and watch seem less than ideal, which I expect with every new release.  Usually, macOS has some checking and cataloguing to be done for days, and that hasn't seemed to have happened.  It just went to work immediately.  It seems fairly steady.

I hope that it will all be good before the releases in February.  Hopefully, the battery life will be improved with the releases before Christmas.

Update 2023.11.24: The updates are generally good, although the battery life for the watch and phone have been less than ideal.  They have not entered the dreaded red zone yet, though.

People have been mentioning that Sonoma has been quite a bit faster.  Maybe, I'm not seeing it because I don't use Safari as my web browser, plus, I never used Ventura.

That said, I keep waiting for GOG Galaxy and Steam to become Universal applications and speed up a lot of things.  Steam will be the last one of all, I'm almost certain.  With dwindling Mac game play through Steam, Valve doesn't really care to invest much effort.  Perhaps, when the last of the Intel-based machines are on the obsolete list, Valve will do something more.  I really liked playing Half-Life 2 and Portal 2 on my Mac.  It's a shame that I loaded Catalina on my older, Intel-based Mac because I could still play those 32-bit games before Catalina.

Hopefully, with Sonoma' Game Mode running successfully, more developers will arrive with good ports of their games.  Feral Interactive has done well on conversions, and Larian Studios has Macs in mind when developing.

Update 2023.11.30: Sonoma 14.1.2 is out with bug fixes and security updates, as well as iOS 17.1.2.  Updates went smoothly, so I'm hoping for the best.

Update 2023.12.14: My Apple Watch decided that I wanted to update to watchOS 10.2 and did it without asking.  I'm waiting for macOS 14.2.1 and iOS 17.2.1 before I go further.  Those should be out in the next week or two.

Update 2023.12.20: macOS and iOS are on my M1 MacBook Air and 2022 iPhone SE.  They are both working relatively well.  Given that there won't likely be another update until February, I'm satisfied with the performance.  Everything needs better battery life, though.  People with Intel-based Macs are complaining about Sonoma but it's macOS is finally getting better for Apple Silicon-based Macs, in the way that Leopard made Intel-based Macs better, and messed up PowerPC-based Macs.

Sonoma's Game Mode does help, but my SteelSeries Nimbus+ controller is not working, possibly due to a fall.  It disconnects intermittently, even when using a cable.  Why are game controllers so fragile?

Update 2023.12.31: I continue to see users complaining about random bugs and I wonder how many used developer or public beta test versions before using a production version.  I would have that happen occasionally in the early days of Mac OS X but haven't had that happen lately.

I started the mid-2012 MacBook Pro, with Catalina, the other day.  I'm considering a Linux-based distribution, so that I can turn it into a decent game machine.  I can't decide on a distro.  I'm leaning toward Arch or Kubuntu, in hopes that I can load the SteamOS Proton layer in order to play Windows games.  However, with only 512 MB of VRAM, it might not be enough.  Even the full 1 GB of VRAM might not be enough for recent games from my experience with the Omen by HP with a GeForce GTX 1050 with 2 GB of VRAM.    This latest Windows machine has an RTX 3050 Ti with 4 GB of VRAM.

Still, the old MacBook Pro is a good heater with that quad-core Intel i7-3770.

Update 2024.01.28: This week, Apple pushed iOS 17.3, macOS 14.3, and watchOS 10.3.  I don't usually go until the x.x.1 release is ready.  They were pushing a lot and they mentioned a security flaw that might have been exploited, which usually means that it had been exploited.  Ugggh.  So, I updated.  It may have been a fluke but cellular connectivity doesn't seem as stable.  Battery life is still not right.  Hopefully, the x.x.1 update will be ready before Valentine's Day.

I'm still glad to have the M1 MacBook Air on Sonoma.  I wish Apple would really take software development seriously and produce better software.  The only good thing is that we're not paying for bad releases, as we were in the System 7.x and MacOS 8.x, 9.x days.  When I would pay US$79.99 for a release and it wasn't really any better and then, they would discontinue things that really helped, it was rather frustrating.

Update 2024.01.31: I wanted to make room for Death Stranding: Director's Cut and I started deleting games and more because I only had about 153 GB available in Finder.  So, I went through Steam and looked at the games I wasn't playing or that we're as important.  I also deleted so other various stuff, and found through Settings(Control Panel) where various data was too much.  I checked and the available space was 2 GB smaller.  I waited for fseventd to finish and I restarted the machine.  No significant change was shown.  I deleted more and still no change that I could see.  I used the application WhatSize to help me find things that macOS wouldn't let me access easily.  I deleted more but there still was no visible change, even after a restart.  I left it along for a while and it had gone from 151 GB to about 298 GB available.  Today, it was showing 458 GB available.

Apple apparently doesn't have any long term developers watching what they're doing.  It's a bit scary that they've handed off development to people without oversight.  Someone should be checking the quality and fixes should be issued as soon as possible.

Sadly, they only seem to handle security flaws when they're on the news.

I live out in Central Valley and many people from the San Francisco Bay Area live out here now, including people from Apple, HP, and Google.  I wonder how many are so tired from their three hour commute that they're just not productive.  I'm hoping that someone cares but I'm not so sure about that, either.

Update 2024.02.08: Updated to 17.3.1, 10.3.1, and 14.3.1, which is the best fix for a while.  They had a fix for a major inconvenience in editing text on iOS or macOS.  Hopefully, they fixed a lot of other little bugs, as well.

Update 2024.03.22: Updated to 17.4.1 on iOS.  There were some serious problems to fix.  I'm hoping for 14.4.1 and 10.4.1 updates soon.  These are usually ready just before WWDC and the newest major releases.  Then, we wait until August or September.  I suspect that things are better on my iPhone with this newest release, but there are probably loads of bugs remaining.  It seems that Apple just wants to add feature after feature without fixing problems ahead of adding features.  They've become like Adobe.

I'm not ready for iOS 18, especially if they're going to push AI integration.  With the car project halted, AI developers are available, but should they experiment in the background more and wait to move such work into the real world?

Update 2024.08.07: iOS 17.6.1 and macOS 14.6.1 are available.  Apparently, they weren't quite finished with the bug fixes, but got them out just a couple of days later, rather than two or three weeks later.  That may be everything for the current operating systems.  I'm not ready to move to the next, even more buggy versions.

Update 2024.09.17: Warning!  Updated to iOS 17.7 and macOS 14.7 today.  Went to California DMV to renew my license.  Filled out the application on my phone through the process to be ready for the window.  I got a notification and my application was GONE.  I could not log into the system through the California DMV app but Apple should have been checking since so many people working there live in California.  Maybe, someone at headquarters will return with a story and the fix will be out next week.

Update 2024.11.20: Apple is pushing for me to switch to iOS 18.1.1 and macOS 15.1.1.  I might be ready by 18.7.1 and 15.7.1 but I'm thinking to wait until 19.7.1 and 16.7.1.  I hope that they'll have things not completely awful by then.  They have not shown me that they can handle fixing things.

Update 2024.12.11: Yesterday, I saw that the latest iOS and macOS had arrived.  I looked for security updates.  I found macOS 14.7.2 hiding.  As I was trying to update to it, Apple started pushing 15.1.1.  I had to restart twice and downloaded, etc. 14.7.2 again.  After the restart, it was installed.  Apple has a lot of nerve to push an update in the middle of my update.  I don't care about their adoption numbers.  I want them to fix the bugs that they already have.

Update 2025.03.10: I've been trying to avoid upgrading operating systems.  My 2022 iPhone SE has a battery problem after almost three years and I couldn't wait much longer.  I decided that I didn't want the iPhone 16e and I bought the iPhone 15.  The deal, with trade-in, is about US$1.50 per month more than the iPhone 16e would have been at the introductory price for 24 months.

 Anyway, I have the iPhone 15 up and running but of course, I'm on 18.3.1, so I'm upgrading t he macOS version to 15.3.1 and later, the watchOS version. 

Update 2025.12.23: Apple recently released iOS/macOS/watchOS etc. 26.2 with security fixes.  They released the previous macOS with security fixes around the same time.  They did not show the iOS version 18.7.3 with those security fixes, but only 26.2.  This bothered me because it's not ethical to push people in a certain direction for the sake of statistics.

Someone at MacRumors noticed that iOS 18.7.3 was available, if you had beta updates enabled.  They posted that method and I updated quickly.  Within a couple of hours, that method was removed.

I appreciate that they want to show the shareholders the statistics; however, honest statistics would be better.   Since their botched AI attempts and their last few years of poor software quality, I prefer to wait as long as possible. 

Update 2026.01.26: Imagine that Apple made iOS 18.7.4 available somehow but did not allow a person to update to it.  They are seriously broken when their metrics mean more than keeping people's devices safe.

 The iOS 18 Beta Updates say that 18.7.3 is the latest.  I'll probably end up finding the full download and download it to the Mac and then, hopefully, I can update that way, but this is ridiculous. 

Update 2026.03.04: Updating to 26.3.1 now.  Hopefully, it's reasonably safe. I'm not feeling trusting since they keep pushing without giving me an alternative on the iPhone.  My MacBook Air has re-booted a couple of times, so they must be installing firmware updates or security updates to the separate SoC behind Touch ID.  It just re-booted again, so I hope that it's not in some infinite loop.  It just showed 80% then 91% finished.  "About 8 minutes remaining..." probably means 30 minutes.

 Looking at an M5 MacBook Air because I've had the M1 MacBook Air for around three years and it's a 2020 model. 

The iPhone 15 is taking some time in the "Preparing" stage.  It probably needs to weed out the Apple Intelligence crap since the iPhone 15 doesn't support it. 

iOS 12 on my iPhone 8 now

I am generally the voice of caution.  I have had too many experiences when incompatibilities hurt my productivity when doing operating system upgrades/updates.

Why would I jump to iOS 12 so soon?  It seemed that it was truly past the beta test stage, unlike previous releases.  Also, Apple plays a guessing game with device security.  You can never tell how dangerous your situation is.  I have upgraded to the latest major release in the past because there were so many security fixes.

I felt that way today and certain articles I've read recently suggest that iOS 12 is more likely to protect me, broken or not.

1.35 GB seems a crazy load for a handheld device but it has become more common to exceed 1 GB with updates and upgrades.  Games are especially heavy on storage.  2018's operating systems are hardly the machine language monitors that needed to fit into 8 KB of RAM in the late 1970s.  What could fit into a well-ventilated room now fits into your hand, except for the keyboard and keypunch.

First off, shutting down and starting are very, very quick to happen.

Usually, there is the wheel, barely visible, churning until the system shuts down.  I didn't even see it--the system was just finished.  I held the power button and it was ready for my PIN very soon after that.

Backing up the updated phone is taking quite a long time.

Everything seems a bit more responsive and some things are extremely responsive.  I'm not sure if they changed the game interfaces' performance but games feel more fluid now.  Text scrolling seems smoother than warm butter.

Obviously, an iPhone 8 shouldn't have any issues because it was new only 1 year ago.  Still, the operating system's latency made the experience seem to lag.  I hope that this is not a temporary speed-up that will be crushed by bug fixes.  Mac OS X was really awful from Public Beta and got better with each release.  At 10.4.11, it seemed the best it could be, and Leopard was uncomfortably buggy and slow.  Things never seemed to improve, which may be why I'm on Windows 10 now.

iOS 12 gives me hope, as does WatchOS 5.

Update 2018.09.26: Certain apps seem unresponsive at times and have to be ended and re-launched.  Overall performance is good but occasionally choppy.  There have been around 5-10 app updates each day.  I suspect many more will come as they actually test their development efforts (or lack of same) with actual users on iOS 12.

Update 2018.10.07: Nothing more interesting has happened, thankfully.  Hopefully, the next update will improve stability.  I'm happy for those on older phones who are getting a big performance boost.

Update 2018.11.04: Woke up and the time was not reset to Pacific Standard Time today, even though Daylight Saving Time had ended for this year.  Version 12.1 doesn't seem to be completely better, but 12.1.1 is in the beta test period now.  There were some nasty security issues squashed with 12.1 though, so it was well worth the risk.  I hope that Apple are looking at security 24/7/365.

Update 2018.12.08: I've been on 12.1.1 for a couple of days.  It corrected a few bugs, including the time zone issue.  I'm not sure how stable it is but it seems to be okay at the moment.  There are loads of app updates, as companies realize the problems their apps contain.

It's likely that there will not be any update until February, unless they find something significantly broken.

Update 2019.01.27: 12.1.3 is on my phone now.  There were several bug fixes, but I'm not seeing any useful performance change.  It's certainly less slow than iOS 11, but it's more laggy than expected.  Since 12.2 is in beta test now, we might see positive changes through April.

It's interesting to see that Apple are having trouble selling phones, and with Qualcomm being dorks and digging it for the double-dipping harvest (they want licensing fees from Apple as well as those supplying products where licensing fees are already being paid), some phones are not available in various locations.

Apple currently make phones that I don't want.  They can't offer me an iPhone 8 replacement because they don't have one.  They also don't have an iPhone SE replacement.  Considering how easy it is for someone to look at the phone, FaceID is not a true security measure, in my opinion.  They have said that TouchID is less secure but show me how someone can force me to use the correct finger first time.

Beginning again with iPhone 7

Just a day later, Sprint sent me a Gold iPhone 7.  Considering how many people are waiting for Jet Black, I feel as though I've jumped in line ahead of them.

This was an easy choice.  My iPhone 6 is nearly two years old.  It has been good enough for a long time, but I've noticed trouble charging it.  Thinking back, I stopped using a cable because it didn't seem to charge the phone well.  Maybe, it has always been a slight issue.

In any case, the extra power and extra battery life will help.  I tried one running Asphalt 8, which I play, and it was smoother.  It could have been the demo version, but I suspect it would have been a bit erratic on any iPhone 6 also.

Set up is a bit dodgy, considering that I'm doing everything myself, including the activation from home.  Sprint's instructions are not incredibly clear--but they know what they meant.  It's similar to their vanity Speedtest.net pages where they don't know the difference (8 times) between MB and Mb.  I sometimes wonder if their performance in some areas should be rated in the impossible mb.

I connected the new phone to the computer and let iTunes restore the data and settings from the old phone.  After that, I clicked to activate on Sprint's web site.

Now, the phone is resolving all of the new apps and data.  It's taking quite a while because I have so much.  Going from 64GB to 128GB will give me breathing room.  I had around 8GB free in general.

It shows iOS 10.0.2 is ready to be installed, and before the phone was even ready to be used, a new set of carrier settings was placed on the phone.  I suspect that there may be a few.  T-Mobile and Verizon both needed updates.  Hopefully, 10.1 will provide a lot of bug fixes in the near future.

The Home button works much, much, much better than the demo units I've tried.  It reminds me of the MacBook Pro trackpads.

The phone itself seems very close to the iPhone 6, so it will probably be okay in my current Ballistic case until my iPhone 7 cases arrive on Friday.  The company had a good deal and I bought one black and one black/white case at US$19.99 each, instead of the US$34.99 that I paid for the other Ballistic case two years ago.  Considering the price of a repair when dropping one of these US$749 phones, the price of a heavy duty case isn't much.

I will likely get a glass screen protector, as the last one has been good.  It is only cracked a little around one edge and definitely seems worth US$29.99.  With more competition, perhaps ZAGG has dropped their price or increased its ability to be smudge resistant.

I'm not always enamored of Apple but their phones have been just short of great, for me.  Their operating system quality often makes it more difficult than it should be.  It's been that way on the computers as well.  After all the fuss about downloading operating system updates without permission, they did it to me on my Mac with macOS sierra.

I'll talk about my first impressions of use shortly.

Update 2016.10.31: The phone is up to iOS 10.1.1 now.  Since 10.1, App Store can't count and the badge count is smaller than the actual update count.  At first, it was only showing non-Apple apps to be updated, but now, there doesn't seem to be a logic.  It's just an incorrect number.

I didn't get the glass screen protector.  With AppleCare + handling screen replacement at $29, and it was $129 for the warranty, I'm not so sure whether to bother.  The case is working very well.

 The phone's construction is very good and phone calls are fairly clear.  The last phone that I felt was extremely clear was a Sanyo PM-8200 flip phone that was oh, so thick.  Ten years have passed and we apparently want everything thin, thin, thin.  It's better through the ear buds.

The audio adapter works fine.  I've tried it on my now dead Sennheiser ear buds and my Beyerdynamic studio style headphones.  There is no crackling sound.

I'm not sure about the battery life.  I don't believe that it has improved.  Given that the iPhone 6 wasn't as powerful or efficient, I expected more.  The iPhone 7 is definitely more powerful and games work more smoothly but is the battery life better when the phone is idle?  It feels as though the battery is being drained more quickly than the iPhone 6.  It isn't awful and it may be corrected by firmware sometime in the future.  Perhaps, I set my expectations too high.

The display is good, better than expected, at times.  I've been using personal computers since 1981 when I first attached a black and white TV to my machine.  Displays have usually been awful, especially if they were compatible with a wide variety of machines.  Phone displays are rarely great, despite what numbers they calculate in a laboratory.  Do you live in a laboratory?  I don't.

The only displays I've seen that look truly great are those of the LG 4K OLED TVs.

Unfortunately, the software quality has a large effect on how the phone works and Apple is still trying to get this under control.  When I got the iPhone 6, I was concerned but the 64-bit processor was introduced in the iPhone 5s, and I felt safe enough to take the leap.  It seemed that they were more concerned with the size of the displays.

This time, there are a lot of little glitches and I'm sure they'll work them out eventually.

I enabled two-step authentication on my MacBook Pro with 10.12.1 and the next time I went into a game, Game Center wanted me to enter a code.  I couldn't really read the whole window because it was squeezed to fit.  I really wasn't sure what was supposed to happen since the phone was the target of the text messages.

Once, I asked for the code to be sent again, I got no text message and authentication automagically took place.

I must say that I'm fairly happy.  It's better and it's faster and the extra $1.50 per month and the $100 upfront don't hurt too much.  Paying for AppleCare + again and getting new cases added to the expense but every two years, that isn't that horrible.

Update 2016.11.22: At iOS version 10.1.1, things seem okay but not quite good.

The phone seems powerful but not at its full potential.  There are inconsistencies where it will lag but not such that I could point to one app.

LTE seems much better with the Qualcomm chipset.  It hangs onto the signal much longer than the iPhone 6 did.  I suspect that throughput will also be much better, but I haven't been in a lot of Sprint signal friendly areas lately.  I got 68 Mbps at the local skate park with the iPhone 6, but I haven't checked with the iPhone 7 the one time I was recently there.

I noticed that the display brightness was set far too low, probably to show impressive battery life.  Unfortunately, I also need to be able to see what's on the display.  According to the battery monitor, most usage applies to audio.  Using the ear buds might help battery life then.

Update 2016.12.17: I'm learning how frustrating it can be to wear gloves and work an immovable Home Button.  I have to remember to use the power switch to temporarily disable the phone until I can remove my gloves to actually use the phone again.

iOS 10.2 is out and beta testing for 10.2.1 is underway.

I haven't seen a noticeable performance increase at all.  It may be better, but it seems as though they implemented bug and security fixes this time.  I feel bad for the people on version 9.3.5 who will never get the security fixes.  I would have paid for the fixes in order for my phone not to be commandeered.

The phone seems to work well most of the time.  It holds onto my LTE connection well.  Since it's in a case, I don't notice (or care) how slim it is.  It doesn't seem to be overly hot when running games.  The display color seems better.

For me: tvOS 10 good, iOS 10 on hold (iPhone 7 and iOS 10 now)

Yes, September 13, 2016 has come and gone.

tvOS 10:

No one seemed to mention that Apple TV generation 4 was getting an update on the 13th but it was there just the same.  It would seem to have been about 500 MB, although I didn't check too closely.

I'm usually leery of updating too quickly but tvOS is so unstable that I want every update at this point.  It's a lot like the early days of Mac OS X where I was eager to be able to print for the first time, copy reliably to a CD-R, or some such basic functionality.  Way back then, I had to switch back to MacOS 9 a lot.  With tvOS, you just have to live with what is there.

The update itself went smoothly.  The only real change I've used is the dark theme.  There was an informational display prior to being able to use the update and the only other one I remember at this point was searching with Siri.  I tried using Siri initially but it didn't really help.  I still don't have it enabled on my phone, either.

Performance has been improved somewhat.  The Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising game is a great indicator of how well the Apple TV and tvOS are working, as were the older games in the series.  I haven't seen as much of a slowdown when things get busy.  I believe I saw only one Network Connection Lost error while I was playing.

Within a month or so, Apple should make another update available to fix some bugs and improve performance further but it's going to be a rather long time until they get a production quality product.  Sadly, it may take until the 6th generation Apple TV product before it's truly Apple-like.

iOS 10:

If people look at my history, they'd see that I'm generally slow to update iOS because of so many early adopter problems.  With almost every major release of iOS or Mac OS X, there have been problems connecting to WiFi.  This wasn't really a problem for me with Mac OS X because in the early days, I was connected by Ethernet cable.  Of course, trying to use a networking cable is quite impossible at this point for an iOS device.

Thankfully for many people, iOS 10 was not easily available.  Some people have had trouble with getting the update from the servers and Apple has already updated (10.0.1) the update, due to (bricking) problems.  I remain skeptical and slow to update.  When version 10.1 is made available, I'll be more willing to update my phone.

While there are some enhancements, I didn't see anything compelling for me.  What would compel me to update would be some huge security flaw in 9.3.5 and it seems as though things are stable with security problems being fixed in 9.3.4 and 9.3.5.

Update 2016.09.20: macOS Sierra (10.12) has been made available, so it seems that everything is finished, except for the bug fixing.

If Siri access is the main reason for the new version, I'm not sure I would bother.  I don't use Siri or the phone, and when I tried it on Apple TV, it was less than helpful.  I used to use the PlainTalk interface way back in MacOS 8.5 around 1998, which was especially helpful when I was getting ready in the morning.

According to reports, iOS 10 is being implemented much more quickly than iOS 9 was.  I saw some article title which seemed to be complaining that iMessage has become the MSN Messenger of iOS.  Having used MSN Messenger, I hate to think about that.  However, it doesn't surprise me.  After years of working to make things simple, Apple seems bent on making things convoluted.

Update 2016.09.26: Encrypted iTunes backups created on a Mac or PC are protected by a password that can potentially be brute forced by password cracking software. The backup method in iOS 10 "skips certain security checks," allowing Elcomsoft to try backup passwords "approximately 2500 times faster" compared to iOS 9 and earlier operating systems. 

 iOS 10 is up to 10.0.2 already, with several bug fixes.  I suspect that there are plenty of more minor bugs and the fixes are being collected for version 10.1 instead of being sent in incremental releases.  I'm not ready to take chances.

I got a quick look at it on an iPhone 7 display at Target last night and didn't notice enough of a difference to form an opinion.

The iPhone 7 click-less Home button was interesting but didn't feel like the same technology used in the Mac click-less trackpads that work so well.

Update 2016.10.05: Verizon customers are having trouble keeping LTE active.  Apparently, the problem has not been solved with the iOS version 10.1 beta release.   Apparently, this is a problem that has been there for some with earlier phones.

I'm still not seeing a reason to change my iOS version.

Update 2016.11.05: About three weeks ago I switched to the iPhone 7, and naturally, iOS 10.  It's up to version 10.1.1 now.

It's not exactly finished.  Software Update, for example, can't count and has different numbers outside than inside.  IMO, humble or not, iOS is almost right when they move to another major version.  iOS version 9.3.5 was good but still needed some work, but here I am waiting for them to get to a stable, quick, fully-functional version.  iOS 10 should be really good around June.

Having iMessage plug-in apps is interesting, but are they really useful?  Automatic birthday celebrations are interesting also.  I suppose I worked in software development too long to find these things great.

I was browsing my photos that had been saved to my Mac and found that there were video files for most every photo.  This has something to do with Live Photos.  Unfortunately, the Camera app defaults to this behavior and until iOS 10.2, you're stuck with it each time you start the app.

I paid for the Camera+ app a few years ago and it's back on my phone now.  It's good to be able to handle post processing in the same app I'm using to capture the image.  I just have to remember to save to Camera Roll.  I also have Snapseed but that works after the fact and is still confusing after quite a long time.

Notifications are driving me up the wall.  For a brief moment (iOS 10.1?), the notifications were separated by app and I could clear notifications for a single app and leave others.  This doesn't work right now and I either leave or clear them all.  I believe there is a way to slide to the left and delete individual notifications, though.  I seriously doubt that Apple will ever get these working smoothly--it's only been 9 years, right?  It's like the MacOS/Mac OS X/OS X/macOS Finder application.  It has traits of the 1984 Mac's Finder but was re-worked in 2000 with the NeXTStep fusion.

tvOS 10 is interesting.  I've been able to make folders of apps.  It works fairly smoothly.  Otherwise, I'm still seeing performance problems.  I thought that the A8 processor was capable of handling the iPhone 6 Plus, so why can't it handle the Apple TV box and output a 1920x1080p signal without slowing down?

Apple have a long way to go.

First Impressions of my 4th generation Apple TV

I bought a 4th generation Apple TV yesterday, along with a Steelseries game controller.

I've been waiting a while, since the Ouya Android-based game micro-console.  The Nvidia Shield micro-console looked particularly good recently.  I have an Apple iPhone 6 and a 2013 Google Nexus 7 tablet, so I'm familiar with both mobile operating systems and their games.

However, as far as connecting anything to the TV, I've only connected my old DVR, DirecTV DVR, and my Blu-Ray player.  The TV and Blu-Ray player have many connections to the outside world, so buying an older Apple TV, Roku, or Google box had no appeal.

Connecting the Apple TV wasn't difficult.  I wanted to connect it to the computer first, so it would take my current iTunes library of movies, TV episodes, music videos, and music and store them in the extra storage the 64GB model would have.  There is no such connection.  In fact, the only cable was a USB to Lightning cable for the remote control, for charging.

So, the actual connections are power and HDMI, and they don't include the HDMI cable.

As it was starting, I had some extra "fun" with my TV complaining that the signal didn't match the Deep Color that was expected.  I had to make some setting changes on the TV that most people will not have to make.

It wanted to connect to my phone but they could not meet in the middle.  It detected my phone over Bluetooth immediately, but since I didn't have the phone connected to the local network over my mobile hotspot, it wasn't able to grab the settings from my phone.  (They haven't found each other over Bluetooth since then.  The phone is on iOS 9.1 and I wonder if it's just too buggy still.)

The Apple TV wanted to connect to the internet, which I did through the odd keyboard.

You have to slide across the keyboard and select by clicking on a character.

The keyboard was alphabetical, which I suppose is easier than showing QWERTY, AZERTY, QWERTZ, or whatever pattern each country uses, but it made entry slower for me.

There really wasn't much to set up.  I selected my country and language, and it did some configuration.

There wasn't much included except for the apps to buy music, TV episodes, or movies and those apps to connect to the computer and get other apps.

I immediately downloaded the YouTube app, but couldn't decide on games or anything else.  Later, I bought and downloaded the Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising game, as I've been playing the series since the original iOS version of Galaxy on Fire.

The YouTube app required a link through an activation code to connect to my YouTube account.  The game wanted to connect to Game Center, of course.  It also downloaded more content, much like the Android-based version of Galaxy on Fire 2 HD does.  Perhaps, the iOS version does this, but it doesn't mention it or make you wait.

The game uses the remote control.  It is both simple and frustrating.  It seems to lose calibration easily, and it is much easier to go left than to go right.  The game is quite amazing looking, as with their previous games.  For playing only a few minutes, I feel as though it will be a great game with more familiarity, and with fixes.

When I was in an Apple Store, I tried the Geometry Wars game and it seemed to work well with the remote, but I had no idea how to play the game.  I think the games that use the remote, and using the remote to play them will take acclimation time.

I have a Steelseries game controller and I have yet to pair it to anything.  There is a companion app on iOS, and I downloaded that.  I'm currently charging the controller, which uses a Lightning connector.  The box has graphics indicating that it works with iPad, iPhone, Apple TV, and Mac.  US$50.00 doesn't seem that much.

As Asphalt 8 Airborne is available, I'm thinking that the controller will be very useful.  I've got the game now and it not only works well, but it looks great.  The game controller is useful but the control scheme isn't yet comfortable.  The best thing about the game may be a bug--my purchases from the handheld game are available, as I downloaded the iCloud data.  This was another that downloaded more content quite often.  Given that the iOS/Android app runs about 1.5 GB and the tvOS app was about 450MB, I would expect every unplayed course will have to be downloaded, as well as cars.

I was intrigued by the Pangea games' 3D capability.  I haven't played any of those games for years, but Bugdom was a bit of fun.  I have 3D capability on my TV, as well as 4K resolution, so this should be interesting.

Oh, and this version of Apple TV does not support 4K.  I get the feeling in a year, they'll put out a version with upgraded hardware capable of 4K, especially since the Nvidia Shield already supports the resolution.

I'm looking at potential more than anything else right now.

Update 2015.11.11: The minor software update to the operating system was very minor.   I haven't noticed any differences.

Update 2015.11.26: How is it that the remote control is worth US79.00 when the Wii Remote Plus is only US$49.99, and the Steelseries game controller Apple is selling in their stores is only US$49.95?

You'd think that it would be easier to grip since it is meant to be used with games.  You'd think that there would be a strap included instead of being available for another US$12.99.

You might also think that the remote might have a headphone jack, so you could listen remotely.

I like the latest Apple TV.  I'm just annoyed that it seems to be experimental at this point.  I expect Google to sell products in this way but Apple should know better.  The MacBook Air took a long time to become desirable to me, and then, they brought out the MacBook that was even more extreme.

As this year is ending, they will most likely push out some small change and a bigger change around February.  Eventually, it will feel good and all other products will feel ancient and clunky.  Right now, it works, just.

Update 2015.12.02: Thankfully, the games can be played without an internet connection.  Unfortunately, music, music videos, movies, and TV episodes cannot be seen because they are not copied to the device.

So far, I have three games: Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising, Asphalt 8: Airborne, and Geometry Wars 3.  The Galaxy on Fire games have been intense.  When I played the first, I often had to power off/power on the 2nd generation iPod touch.  Even when I had moved to an iPhone 4S, Galaxy on Fire 2 was often very intense for the phone and then, the HD version came along.  It's only with the iPhone 6 that it's been particularly good.

It will take a while for Apple to fix tvOS and the games will need to be smoothed out plenty of times.  The hobby needs to be given a higher priority.

Update 2015.12.04: I finished the story mode of Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising but I have to say that the performance was so slow when busy that the game wasn't much fun.   Even the network connection was dropped a couple of times.

The trouble will probably be alleviated by April with various efficiency improvements between tvOS and the game but it's obvious that this box is underpowered at the moment.  That's probably why it doesn't support 4K, even though it's technically possible with the CPU and GPU.

Update 2015.12.05: Since Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising was updated to support game controllers, I waited a while and tried it today.  The game isn't fighting me.  Supposedly, there is a problem with the remote control.  Strictly, performance isn't any better but I've managed to complete waves much more quickly and get time bonuses on some.  Since I can actually focus on one enemy vessel and it doesn't move much, I can get rid of it quickly.  It was enough of an improvement that I went from something like 219,000 to 326,000.

Previously, I thought the achievement badge (in Game Center) of getting through 30 levels was completely nuts and now, it seems that 10 levels should be easily repeatable.

Still, it's not smooth yet.  Between the controller and the TV, the movement is a bit jerky but it goes where I want it, mostly.

Update 2015.12.08: The tvOS 9.1 update has smoothed things a bit.  The remote control itself works better in GoF:MR.  It still seems as though the game is fighting me, compared to the game controller, but it is close to being what it should be.

Manual Update seems much like iOS on the phone

It still doesn't help when the system is too busy.  Seeing that it has disconnected from the network is troubling.  When I was playing a game with the remote, it also said that the game controller had been disconnected.  Since the game controller has only one real function, I'm fairly sure that it wasn't the one which disconnected from the Apple TV.

Update 2016.03.22: tvOS 9.2 arrived and I saw a minor performance improvement.  I'm still seeing the network connection go away during Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising, which is a very busy game.  It seems to me that the Apple TV should have been tested and tuned much better than this.  I hoped that almost all of the problems would be fixed with this release, but that's definitely not true.  Of course, they added a lot of functionality into this release, such as enabling Bluetooth keyboards, that was available in the previous generation.

Update 2016.10.04: The 3rd generation Apple TV has been discontinued.  With tvOS 10, my 4th generation Apple TV seems good, but still not great.  You'd think that the A8 processor would be enough but it doesn't seem to be.  They haven't improved performance enough, which is sad.  Hopefully, getting rid of the 3rd generation model will give development resources to the 4th generation model.

Update 2016.12.14: tvOS 10.1.1 is out and they've included a new TV app that helps you attach to your other apps, if they're compatible, and connect to the store.  So far, it only connected to the CW app, but I suppose others will make their content compatible for easy access in one place.  I have seen some fight for control of TV, which is why generation 4 of Apple TV is a set top box and not a whole TV line.   Apple should probably just buy a cable company and make enhancements, as SBC/AT&T has recently done to create DirecTV Now.

I'm not sure whether the performance of tvOS is enhanced or not.  I played Galaxy on Fire: Manticore Rising for a few minutes and only got one network disconnection message.  I suspect not much has changed and it was only my short play time that caused the difference.  I didn't get powerups that normally slow things down.

However, I am happy with the box.  I've been able to watch local news, TV shows, and more as though they belonged on the TV.  Even YouTube videos look good.

Update 2017.03.27: tvOS has been updated yet again, this time to 10.2.  There are few changes and I haven't used it much yet.  It's naturally becoming more stable, but it's still not finished.

I remember expecting excellent performance by April 2016.  It's almost one year later and it still isn't great.  The fact that they're only supporting a maximum of 1920x1080 makes me think that they're making a load of money on the box.  If Android boxes can support 4K resolution, why didn't Apple?

There has been one notable recent change for me.  When Apple TV asks for text entry, my iPhone wakes up and presents me with a keyboard.

Apple didn't bring Elvis back, either

Another Apple announcement--nothing to report, really.  Yes, I'm kidding.

I've already seen the fanatics on both sides hammering out comments.  Geez!

I suspected that unless the company brought back Elvis, there was nothing really important, and the company would go out of business in short order.  It's an obvious conclusion, isn't it?

I'm glad to see a number of phone choices with realistic storage sizes.  (It's odd that my 32 GB iPhone 4S was enough but not my 32 GB iPhone 5c.)  Double the storage is good, especially since the world has changed.

The fingerprint scanner will be available for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus.  That's a good thing because they're introducing a rather comprehensive payment system and payments can be done with a touch of your thumb.

Do the new phone sizes (4.7 and 5.5 inch) change things?  They will make a difference for those people who think bigger is better without being able to discern much of anything else.  Of course, for people with huge hands, the 5.5 inch model will be helpful.  The bigger model's 1920x1080 resolution ticks another box as it meets full HD resolution.

The operating efficiency enhancements are more important and they've switched to more powerful and more capable processors, switched to larger batteries, and you may get better battery life in your real world experience.  Of course, a lot of your battery life depends on your carrier, and how much you use those new, bigger displays.

I'm a bit enamoured of the LG G3's display but of course, not with the battery life.  Samsung has also been showing its best components with little regard to real life usage but they do have great displays.

My only question is whether a bigger phone will suit me?  I remember looking at the HTC One (M7) and thinking that it was too large, along with its Android competition.  I was so close to buying one of those or the LG G2 and I wanted something smaller.

I'll be looking forward to iOS 8 at some point, but I doubt I'll be an early victim, errr, adopter.  Too often Apple doesn't finish their thoughts and leaves users hanging.

Is anyone interested in the Apple Watch?  I wish that I was.  It is interesting, but starting at US$349, I won't be buying one.  Do I wear a watch now?  No, so it would be something new for me to take off and forget somewhere.  I have a load of watches I have not worn since 2004, so it would take a very good reason for me to wear one.

The user interface looks incredible and I think they've got good ideas in there, unlike the other brands--something Samsung will want to borrow.  (Even if you don't like Apple, it's obvious that Samsung has used products from Apple, Nokia, Motorola, BlackBerry and others as design templates for many products, coming close to verbatim copies in many cases.)

I've seen people who are crazy about watches, and I know for a fact that shopping channels like ShopNBC/ShopHQ have special programming just about watches.  There are customers out there.

I've been wondering how Apple will collapse not just health-oriented watches and monitors business but the industry of runners' watches.  I could see the company buying Polar and other smaller companies in the business.

The only real surprise I got was the lack of iPad replacements.  Update: Late October launch event?

Oh, and what's not a product but a change in the way we'll all do business is Apple Pay.  Strange to think about it but it may finally put to rest checks, cards, and even cash within 20 years.  Apple has a way of putting together procedures to make life easier.  I'm not saying that it will be perfect and it will take a few generations of devices before it's into everyone's wallet, but it has a good chance of making payments easier.

There need to be a lot of things in place before I would trust it, but I say that about everything.  I'm not trusting of current physical cards and procedures.  I want to sign for purchases of $10 or more--not $50 or more.

Of course, the government will have to do some research because Apple is claiming some counter fee that card issuers should pay it for sales going through their system.  It should be interesting.

Update 2014.09.19: The iPhone lines are being satisfied all over the world.  I can't imagine how or why people would switch so often.   Would I pay the ETF (early termination fee) to get a newer phone?  It had better wash dishes and cook for me, if I'm going to pay extra.  They cost enough with or without subsidies.  I know both sides of the story, and yes, if we didn't have contracts but could get similar service without it, I would pay the full price for a phone.  Standing in line for a new phone that hasn't been tested by millions of people yet?  No, thanks.

iOS arrived the day before my birthday this week.  I'm interested but considering the typical flaws, I would rather wait until version 8.1 but considering how long it took them to get to 7.1, I might turn blue in the face holding my breath.  We'll see how many security issues are outstanding in 7.x.

Oh, and if you're on the iPhone 4S, you might want to wait--there may be issues, as there were with iOS 7 and iPhone 4.

Update 2015.01.01: I had updated to iOS 8.x and was constantly up against my storage limits.

About three weeks ago, I got an iPhone 6, even though the products were in somewhat limited supply still.  I went from the 32 GB iPhone 4s and iPhone 5c to a 64 GB iPhone 6.  This was the second iteration of the 64-bit processor, so I felt a bit comfortable.  However, the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus are still not fully supported by third party apps.  There are some strange bugs, also.  iOS 8.2 is in beta testing.

Performance is great, and battery life is better, even though the display has increased in size.  It seems odd being past 480x320 pixel displays.  It also seems odd having switched once a year.

Apple gets "it" again?

I'm skeptical.

I've seen bits and pieces of the announcements this week, in-between packing, loading, and cleaning and getting ready to move.

My trouble with Apple is that they never seem to finish anything any longer.  I understand that they're big and important now, but the bugs are bigger and more frequent now.  Pleasing the whole population by adding feature-after-feature, while ignoring the bug list just screams Adobe.

Apple does seem to test, when they feel like it, which is better than Google.  Google only seem to test while they're creating their software.  I have a 2013 Google Nexus 7 tablet with Android version 4.4.2 on it, and it seems to have all sorts of little issues which make the tablet unlikeable.  Those little issues of course, are exacerbated by little issues in third party software.

I'm still having silly issues with (Mac) OS X 10.8.5, and 10.9.4 isn't ready yet, so I'm not moving.  Equally, iOS 7.x seems buggy but Apple leaves mobile users hanging in the breeze quite often, security issues and all.

One thing that struck me that Apple gets it again is the mobile hotspot functionality that you can start from your Mac running Yosemite.  When I use my iPhone 5c as a mobile hotspot, they have the cheesy little links icon to show that Apple products are happy together--at least, when they work together.  (Do I seem more bitchy than usual?  I'm not sure the lack of sleep is helping.)

For developers, the Swift language seems to be quite useful.  The one thing that will cause resistance is that it's not one of the already-established languages.  Microsoft copied a lot of Java to create C# but they had developers stuck in their development platform.  Google has been grooming developers with their summer coding programs.  Apple has often been knocking heads with developers, rather than courting them.

Mind you, Objective-C is a fine language, and it's been around since the mid-1980s.  Apple extended it to work with C++ somewhat in Objective-C 2.0.  Naturally, in the mid-1980s, C++ wasn't much.  People were still coding in Pascal and making the switch to C.

However, all of those iOS game developers will like where Swift is going because of its interactivity, if it doesn't slow down performance or throughput in development.  Remember CASE tools?  Magic has its price.

I look forward to updating quite a lot and getting my hands dirty.  I haven't done much independent development for a while, and if Swift can re-kindle my interest, all the better.

What if Apple was in your car, your house, and on everything mobile you had?  Would it be a nightmare or a dream or both?  My history with the company says that it would be both.  "Two steps forward, one step back." always seems to apply.

On the other hand, I don't see Google being much different, just in a different form.  However, they have to deal with everyone who wants to create something from their open source code and still call it Android.  By the way, have you seen anyone using a Chrome OS computer?  I have not, though I expect my near future proximity to the San Francisco Bay Area may change that.  (It's odd to see the new Maps for OS X practically pointing to my new home.)  It's just that a lot of the country is still not connected so well.  Google doesn't get that.  Apple doesn't get that.

Should I be amused when apps help me with my location?

Today, Google Wallet let me know that one of my rewards cards' stores was close.  I'm not sure whether to be concerned or thrilled.  It's more than the other, Key Ring, ever let me know.

Last week, the Speedway app let me know repeatedly that one of their filling station/convenience stores was near.

It's definitely useful, but should I be concerned?

I've said in the past that the best privacy on the internet is to delete yourself and stay off the internet.  That remains true.  It is the safest way to privacy.  It's also not a good answer when you have a phone or other mobile device.  You will connect to the internet at some point.

Apple has been working with a company to provide in-store proximity alerts.  i.e., when you're in the vicinity of a product they think you'll like, they send you a message of some sort.

Now, if this happens as part of an explicit choice I make--fine.  If it happens without my control, and I have no choice, that doesn't work for me.

To a certain extent, I get check-in alerts when I use the Yelp app.  Stores with which they have an advertising agreement will put up a coupon of sorts that you can use or discard.  In general, as I use the Yelp app, I am agreeing to such advertising.  Obviously, they're a business trying to make money.  They can't host all the information for free.  I've only made use of a few of the deals, such as service discounts with my car dealer.

While I appreciate the notice about things around me, I'm a bit concerned that it will become so rampant that I will start to remove apps in order to control the flow of information, especially if they give me no effective option to shut off alerts.  (I've had plenty of apps where you tell it to stop, and it ignores the setting.)

Will iPhone size balloon to hold a 5.5 or 5.7 inch diagonal display?

When I switched from the iPhone 4s to the iPhone 5c, the display size was somewhat altered with the 3.5 to 4.0 inch display change.  It's not as comfortable as I would hope.  I was reasonably happy with the smaller display.  Putting another row of icons on the display wasn't my priority.

We're expected to believe that the iPhone 6 will have two sizes, such as 4.7 inch for a typical model, and a 5.5 or 5.7 inch phablet-sized model.

I know that some people have larger hands and yes, typing with thumbs can be a problem.  It's especially a problem with Android-based devices, as I've found with the LG Optimus S, 2012 Google Nexus 7, and 2013 Nexus 7.  You'd think on a high resolution, larger-display device that the keyboard would be spacious, but it is still a bit cramped, though better with 4.4.x than with 4.1.x.

Apparently, displays are becoming less expensive somehow, as we reach for intense densities.  Otherwise, how can they afford to put such displays in smaller hand-held devices such as phones?  Phone carriers aren't going to accept more subsidies/discounts degrading their profits.  Besides, in some parts of the world, people have no subsidies at all.  Often, their contract (or lack-of-contract) deals are better than those in the U.S.A. or Canada.

Of course, with a larger display, efficient or otherwise, more battery power will be required.  Since the case is bigger to hold the display, that automatically provides some thin real estate in which to add batteries.

If the display requires more power than the current displays, of course, it will need more battery capacity just to stay even with the current phones.  Hopefully, they've found some magic beans, errr, magic screens.

My first color display-using phone required too much recharging.  So did my first 3G phone, and thankfully, the iPhone 5c chipset for LTE seems a bit more thrifty than the previous chipset in the iPhone 4s, although in 3G mode, it seems to quickly drain because of poor connectivity, tower or phone-related.

When I see reviews about an airport, they often mention electrical outlets.  Isn't it sad that we're so tied to hand-held devices that we need to find outlets?

I'm not sure of the actual sizes, but it seems obvious that Apple will put together some bigger devices, perhaps, as they did with the MacBook Pro--three sizes, to compete with the larger Android-based devices.  I'm just not sure I'll be ready for them.

Update 2014.05.08: I saw something the other day suggesting that tablet sales have dropped a lot, in favor of phablets.  If that's the case, then, Apple should be targeting the space with both 4.x and 5.x devices.   I'm still becoming acclimated to the 4 inch display.  I think it is good but a bit on the large size.  Other hands will disagree.  As long as the pixel density is similarly tight, I will be fine with a larger phone when I switch.  I can't imagine having a phone with a display larger than 4.5 inches but things may happen and I'll have to go with the crowd.

Update 2014.12.17: 4.7 and 5.5 inches for these two.  I got an iPhone 6 at the smaller of the two sizes and it's not quite comfortable.  I moved to the 4 inch iPhone 5c fairly easily from the iPhone 4s, and to that from the second generation iPod touch.

As far as I'm concerned, a phablet wouldn't work for me, nor would a tablet that of 5.5 inches.  It's both too big and not big enough.

Why do Apple and Google and Microsoft want to be in the car?

Do I want to integrate my phone or tablet more closely everywhere I go?

When I switched from my 1999 VW Golf GLS to the 2012 VW Golf TDI, the car wanted to know about my phone.  My mobile sound system can route calls and play my music.  In fact, it's not just the music on the phone, but iHeartRadio, Pandora, and Spotify that can be used.

Apple announced today, for the Geneva, Switzerland auto show that they were pairing with several car makers to extend their reach past simple integration for playing music.

http://www.macrumors.com/2014/03/03/apple-announces-carplay/

http://www.macrumors.com/2014/03/03/carplay-video-wi-fi-soon/

Chevrolet had already announced Siri in the car, and Google and Audi recently announced Android in the car.  Ford had Windows in use for a while, but they seem to be moving away from that.  Were software crashes causing traffic accidents?  No, of course not but people made jokes.

Using my car's touch screen for various controls isn't very efficient.  If I don't remember something, I can go back and forth too many times trying to find some setting.  I wish the car makers and sound system makers such as Alpine, Kenwood, and Pioneer would come up with a unified graphical interface and let everyone plug into the back end.  That way, if you're in your car, a rental car, your friend's car, you know how things work.

I had a terrible time when I changed phones and it's not really resolved as much as I'm using a workaround.  I went from an iPhone 4s to an iPhone 5c.  iTunes let me use the previous configuration and name.  The car didn't like that but it wouldn't let me delete the name, either, so that I could re-use it.  So, after 10-15 attempts, I deleted a few characters and it works--most of the time.

Of course, the cable (30-pin still, but the new phone has the Lightning connector now) is a problem but that was a problem last year anyway since the tiny space for the phone is cold as ice in the winter, and  that's not good for the phone.

In any case, I think it'll be more than five years before the dust has settled.  It took a couple of years to get the iPhone connected to cars but many companies have the option now.  Getting an Android option shouldn't be difficult but it probably is at this point.  Collaboration--the world needs more of it.

Apple security risk and fixes: update your devices soon

If you haven't heard, Apple iOS 6.x 7.x, and OS X 9.x have a rather large security issue.  It's such a huge issue that the company went out of their way to provide a patch for iOS 6.x, which is uncommon, as they usually only patch the current release being sold with devices.

http://www.macrumors.com/2014/02/21/apple-ios-706/

http://www.macrumors.com/2014/02/25/osx-update-ssl-facetime-audio/

If you haven't patched yet, you need to do that as soon as possible.

Apple iOS 7: 50 reasons why I didn't wait to update

I'm cautious.  I don't want anyone in my business, as much as it can be avoided.  That said, internet privacy is impossible and guarding your phone or other mobile device is essential.

When I read that Apple has left us hanging again with 50 open security issues, I was ready to update.  Why they don't provide security updates is beyond me.  If Al Franken is so worried about the ridiculous finger print scanner security, why isn't he worried about the 50 open security issues (or making Congress do some work, like the budget)?

Over and over, I've updated to the newer release of the operating system, not because I thought that it would be fun, but because Apple haven't been providing security updates.  If their own people are using the phone knowing that there are problems, why aren't they worried about their own security?

In any case, I went to the Apple Store in Cincinnati in Kenwood Towne Center and had to remove a few things before it would download and install the update.  It took quite a while, but it gave me a chance to become more familiar with the store and the newer products.  I really didn't know that Thule was making computer and phone-related products.  The MacBook Air and iPad case looked amazing.  I have one of their bike racks, so I find the company interesting, although I wouldn't go out of my way to buy all sorts of their products.

The phones felt very light, but I have an Otterbox Defender on my iPhone 4S, which weighs it down.  One of the store associates mentioned that I wouldn't need it and I suggested that we go to the phones and do some drop testing.  She declined.

As with my white MacBook, I think the polycarbonate iPhone 5c will be fairly good, as long as it lands on its back, but I would still add a silcone case.  Being that the iPhone 5s is mostly alumi(nium/num), I would think that it would dent easily, but obviously not shatter the way the iPhone 4S does.  It was odd but they had their own cases in display cases toward the center of each table.  I wasn't sure why the iPhone 5s cases were made of leather, but I suppose the people who would object won't be shopping at the Apple Store anyway.

I guess the company is doing well with the new phones.  Certain display models were missing, so I can only assume that they've already been sold.  The Gold iPhone 5s was missing and so was the White iPhone 5c.  They both seemed like upscale products, even though the colors of the less expensive model were extremely bright and saturated.  I'd have to think twice about the Green or Yellow and four times about the salmon but having good LTE support would be a step up, even if LTE carrier support is still very limited.

Update: the phone with iOS 7.0.2 is working fairly well.  For the most part, it's not had a problem that wasn't there in 6.1.3.  It's not as smooth or quick but that's to be expected until 7.1, which will likely arrive in January.  Currently, they're finishing a version for the new iPad models to be introduced next week, so that's a priority.  I'm surprised that the performance is as good as it is.

Update 2013.10.25: iOS 7.0.3 is out and it has improvements, though I'm not really feeling them.  Performance is sufficient until January when version 7.1 should be available.

Update 2013.11.14: iOS 7.0.4 is out and supposedly it only addresses a Facetime bug.  I haven't downloaded it yet, simply because it hasn't been shown to me yet through Software Update.  I'm sure iTunes will show it to me but at nearly 900 MB, I don't think so.  I'll download it through my mobile hotspot and get the much, much smaller version. 

Update 2014.01.17: iOS 7.1 is supposedly being delayed until March and there apparently is nothing else in-between.  I've become acclimated to the performance, so I can live with it--as if I had a choice--but it's definitely not at its full potential.  The good thing for me is that I switched to the iPhone 5c and it performs better than my iPhone 4s anyway.

Apple and Upgrader's Remorse

I haven't upgraded to iOS 7 for two reasons: it wasn't presented to me yet, and I usually wait until the x.1 release weeks later.

Having been a moderator in some of the world's largest Apple-related forums, I've seen way too many people ask "How do I go back to the earlier release?"  The answer is all too painful: delete everything and start over.  No one wants to do the tough stuff, but they don't want to wait to see the new stuff, either.

The couple of times I've upgraded before the x.1 release, I was treated to all sorts of problems.  However, iOS 6.1.3 isn't exactly working well.  I'm still receiving notifications for events in the past 13 hours, sometime longer than that.  Rather than fix the difficult problems, most software companies would rather ignore them because they require no money and no work to ignore and fixing requires both.

I suppose when iOS 7.0.1 arrives within a week or two, I'll be on it, 728 MB or not.  Does that sound like a lot?  The old iOS 4.x releases were 225 MB almost every time.

Sadly, being forced into an upgrade is a problem that you can't stop.  This article showed up on MacRumors: http://www.macrumors.com/2013/10/18/apple-sued-over-automatic-ios-7-downloads-to-ios-6-powered-devices/

What's impressive is the unending barrage of comments berating the person who filed the lawsuit.  The first two "oh, just upgrade" kind of comments come from people who own the iPhone 5s, which shouldn't have a problem with the latest operating system.

However, I've seen many, many comments about upgrading the iPhone 4 to iOS 7, and people could barely use their phones afterwards.  I experienced a similar problem with iOS 5 and my second generation iPod touch.  Apple didn't think what they were doing to their own customers.

There should be an option to not upgrade, ever.  The person in the lawsuit wanted his phone back to the way it was and $50.  That's not exactly a fortune.  It's sad to see fanatics jump on such a reasonable person.  You'd almost wonder why I stopped being a moderator there.

Update: I upgraded simply because there were 50 outstanding security issues that were fixed.  I'm now on version 7.0.3 and the performance isn't great but casual use is fine for my iPhone 4s.  iOS 7.1 won't likely be available before the first of the year, so it will be a while before the performance problems go away.  I was trying to play a graphics intensive scene in Galaxy on Fire 2 with an add-on pack, and it was extremely unresponsive.

Update 2013.11.08: I've been watching what's been happening on (Mac) OS X Mavericks/10.9 and it's crazy.  They're giving away the iWork (Keynote, Pages, and Numbers) applications to anyone on iOS or 10.9, but they've stripped away features in order to re-write the applications as 64-bit code.  I'm not sure why this would have any bearing on the functionality of the software, having developed quite a bit of architecture-agnostic software.  I can only think that they ran out of time, or they just didn't want to pay the costs of adding things that they weren't going to sell.  However, word count seemed a simple function that is now scheduled to be re-inserted into (Pages, I'd guess) the applications.  As with Final Cut Pro X, they're going to add things after upsetting customers.  Strange Public Relations, yes?

Apple's stock price on the downslide, re-evaluated

If you've read my entries on stock pricing, you might remember how I talk about stock "anal"ysts.  They can't follow trends.  They can't follow forecasts.  They don't notice the run-up in Apple stock price prior to an announcement and the sell-off after the announcement.  However, they know everything there is to know.

Apparently, the new iPhone 5c has caused Apple to be on the way out of business.  It's too expensive for emerging markets, and it's likely too expensive to make.  So, three of the world's finest stock brokerages/investment firms have downgraded Apple, after which the stock price dropped due to a sell-off.  (Update: As of the end of October, the stock price has rebounded and Apple has sold too many of the iPhone 5s and not as many of the 5c but they are re-working production to help with the demand.)

Could Apple go out of business because of one product?  It's not likely.  I think they learned their lesson with the Cube.  Those were hard times and yet, they didn't go out of business.  They just threw away some money and frustrated some people.

Is the iPhone 5c too expensive?  (If you have to ask, you can't afford it?)

I've only seen the unlocked price for T-Mobile and that was the 32 GB version for US$649.  That seems US$50 too high, compared to other phones selling on-contract for US$199.  Is T-Mobile in an emerging market?  No, and we don't know the pricing for every country, do we?

I don't expect that everyone in the world will be buying a premium phone, and while cheaper than the iPhone 5 or 5s, the 5c is still a premium phone.  At the lowest level, it has 16 GB of storage, most of that is usable by the user.  Compare that to a free Android phone that maybe contain anywhere from 512 MB to 2 GB of storage, and may only have 170 MB available to the user.  I recall this quite well from my LG Optimus S, which wasn't free at the time and gave me frequent messages about a lack of available storage.  The original 8 GB Google Nexus 7 tablet was infamously short on usable space.

So, will someone who can barely afford to eat buy an iPhone 5c?  I wouldn't think so.  Food is important.  Will someone with a good job who already eats well and lives cheaply buy an iPhone 5c?  I'd bet they'll take a serious look at it, along with a look at some inexpensive Android-based phones.

Can someone who eats well, owns whatever they want, and manipulates people into buying stocks that they may not want understand how the rest of us live?  I doubt it.  Of course, they could eat snails because they like them, and the poor could eat snails because those are available.  Maybe, the rich really do understand the dirt poor.  That was sarcasm, if you didn't notice.

How Apple will survive is anyone's guess.  More innovation would be good, and for me, more bug fixing.  Being conservative on popular products isn't a great way to handle things, but I don't see a bunch of people dropping Apple products.  Those who like Google and Android are there already, and the undecided will search and try things.  I'd like to try the LG (Optimus) G2 or Google Nexus 5, but after my Nexus 7 "fun" and my LG Optimus S, I'm not sure I can live with a broken phone.

Update 2014.12.11: Apple has recently had all-time record stock prices.  This week, they're falling, but the company is still doing well.  It seems that they're still the company in the world with the largest valuation--on paper anyway.

I got one of the new iPhone 6 models with 64GB of storage.   I can understand why it is popular.  I'm still finding it a pain to switch but it's better than switching to another company's phone.  I like Android but my 2013 Nexus 7 tablet hasn't been incredible, with version 4.3.x, 4.4.x, or 5.0.x.  The operating system is getting better but it's still a bit like a product in its infancy, unfortunately.  You'd hope that it would be more mature.  It's probably a lack of real-world testing.  Apple does very little real-world testing, but it's a bit more than what Google does.

I wonder what will happen with the Apple Watch.  I suspect that will really cause the stock price to drop.  The good thing is that they don't need agreements with anyone else to make it work, a la Apple TV.  By that time, Apple Pay should be firmly entrenched.  I haven't used it yet.  I don't trust iOS 8.1.1 completely and I know that 8.2 is in the beta process, and of course, there will be an 8.2.1.

I'm guessing that Apple Pay will help offset Apple Watch.

Google's new Nexus 7

Ifr you missed the announcement on Wednesday, Google has replaced the Nexus 7 with the Nexus 7.

It uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Pro--quad core CPU and Adreno 320 GPU with 2 GB of RAM total to power the 1920x1200 pixel resolution display.

The older one used an nVidia Tegra 3 quad+1 core CPU with nVidia's own GPU and a 1280x800 pixel display.

Obviously, it's quite a change.  Having had two of the previous version and returning them for various reasons, I wonder if the newest version will please.  Hopefully, they won't have any quality issues because there were plenty early in each run.  Thankfully, they went with the current 16 and 32 GB storage options.  I also wonder about performance issues.

The older one left me wondering whether I had a defective device or not.  It would be smooth for the longest time (like I'd not seen from Android) and suddenly, it would pause a couple of seconds, and start again suddenly.  There never seemed to be a pattern, and it happened with both the 16 GB version that was then top of the line and after being replaced at the top, the 32 GB version.  You'd think that nVidia (and Google) would have noticed that in testing.

I'm amused at the Apple fanatics who say that there is nothing to the Nexus 7 in comparison to the iPad mini.  What are they missing?  The iPad mini wasn't competition for the original Nexus 7, so how is it that it beats the newer one?  (Update 2013.10.25: Obviously the revised iPad mini with the higher resolution (the same as the full-sized iPad) display is on a more even testing ground with the newer Nexus 7.  Given that both the newer iPad mini and newer Nexus 7 have very powerful processing available, it's simply a matter of taste.  Oh, and the US$170 difference leads to some powerful thoughts.  Google is trying to sell their ecosystem and services while Apple is trying to sell hardware.)

I like Apple products and I was disappointed with the iPad mini by the time it arrived.  There were rumors about the time of the second generation iPad and a 7-8 inch mini version with a 1024x768 pixel display was reasonable then.  As time passed, the specifications remained the same, and the processor was barely newer.  Adding insult to injury, they wanted a premium price for it.  I had zero desire to buy one.

Having had two Nexus 7 tablets and feeling a bit cheated by the experience, I'm not sure I want a tablet at all but I feel it's a good way to display my photos.  If I buy a tablet, it's going to be from 7-8 inches for the display.  The Nexus 7 and iPad mini would still be the likely items.

Right now, Apple is having trouble lining up displays for the iPad mini, so they need to have a fire sale because I don't see how they're going to sell what's now a US$149 tablet using Android.

Update 2013.11.14: I tried the 2013 version of the Nexus 7 briefly and found it to be more agreeable than the 2012 versions.  Even though there is a rather massive difference in display surface area, I'm not sure it's going to be a huge deal for people wanting a tablet that they can hold in one hand.  While I was in Micro Center yesterday, I saw people buying a US$50 tablet as though it would solve everyone's deepest needs.  I suspect, being that cheap, the people behind the tablet have zero mechanisms for dealing with software updates so what you see is what you get, even if you somehow naively think you're getting a Nexus 7 equivalent.

Update 2013.12.03: I've had a 2013 Nexus 7 for a couple of weeks.  It's everything I hoped with none of the bad.  The fact that I got it US$30 cheaper than the regular price helped sway me to part with the money.  The new iPad mini is good, but not very good, and for less money, the 2013 Nexus 7 is so much better.  It's the tablet I expected from Apple before they even had anything ready for the public.  It's too bad that Apple decided to raise the price, rather than dropping it.  Of course, Google raised their price also, but the new tablet is much, much better than the 2012 version.

Update 2014.03.15: I've had my Nexus 7 for a few months.  It got the Android 4.4.2 update not long after I bought it.  I still have my doubts about Android.  It works as though it is tested for functionality, but not for the user experience at all.  The 2012 Nexus 7 is evidence of that.  If anyone had actually tried that tablet, they never would have let it go to market.

Still, in a casual setting, the newer Nexus 7 is stable and except for the occasional glitch performs well.  For games, a lot is dependent on the game but they all seem more unhappy than their iOS relatives.  That's sad because this is the Google tablet.  If they can't get Android to perform correctly on products labeled as their own, how can they handle other products correctly?

Update 2015.04.27: The Nexus 7 has been said to no longer be available via Google.  It's surprising that they didn't replace it already, but it doesn't look as though they care to replace it at all.

With the latest Android version 5.1, mine doesn't seem to be working all that well, even though that was the performance fix release for 5.0.  I can only imagine how horribly the 2012 version of the tablet is struggling to work.  Maybe, it is time to call it quits.

WWDC -- iOS 7 -- 1984 is back!!

I'm both shocked and amused at the visual changes to iOS with version 7.

The technical changes are of more interest to me, but I was rather shocked looking at the revisions to what is usually eye candy.  It feels as though the original Macintosh operating system interface has been given a renewed life.  Back in 1984, we had a white with black interface, but iOS 7 is getting a white with colour interface, for whatever reason.

After seeing it, I can say that it's not blue and it's not silver/brushed metal/whatever.  The huge emphasis on blue since the original Mac OS X public beta in 2000 drove me mad.  If you're going to use a colour, use one that I want.  i.e., make it flexible to my whim.  However, Apple only once was ready to give us that ability and they pulled it away from us after displaying it--Themes in Mac OS 8.x.

Monday's announcement and images show us something different.  They said that they ran out of green felt for Game Center.  Okay, we get it, you didn't like trying to mirror real life because it would only be a pale (or perhaps, over-saturated) comparison.

The variety of colour in the latest screenshots make me wonder if Apple will be supplying iPhone in multiple colours to match iPod touch.  What I've seen doesn't seem completely good with the current black or white phone bodies but might be considered sufficient with a variety of colours, and black and white.

I read that Apple put their marketing people in charge of the new icons somehow.  I thought that they either hired the laid-off Nokia artists who made the child-like icons for their phones prior to Windows Phone or Apple copied elementary school children's art work.  They've said that it's a work in progress.  The last time I remember knowing marketing people who were in charge, our product was named Computron 7000.  Never, ever let marketing people do anything unattended!

I'm not sure about the rest.  Control Center sounds good but how do they know what we need and will it be flexible?  I don't care for their calculator, so if it cannot be replaced, I'm probably going to go to mine.  I already have a flash light app, so I could go to that also.    My point is that Apple, in their desire to provide the best experience (and that's important) for the majority of the people, don't always get it right but they, and we have to live with their decisions.

I'm thrilled that they've figured out how to put more things in a folder 6 years later.  It feels a bit like they're making the same mistakes over and over and over again, from Apple II to Mac OS to Mac OS X to iOS.  It's good that they've re-worked Notifications.  I'm still getting notifications hours later, after I've seen them and dismissed them.  I may be assuming too much, but I'm guessing that iOS 6 will never be fixed.  I wonder if iOS 7 will just give us a new nightmare.

This might sound incredibly negative.  I'm actually pleased that they're making progress but adding things like multi-tasking for all apps, support for game sprites in 2D games, and an official set of APIs for physical game controllers.  I'm thinking that Steve Jobs and Scott Forstall stood in the way of functionality.  I'm with Steve Jobs that the customer should have a great experience, and the user interface needs to be honed, but without progress, you will find your competition winning at something you hold dear.

Update 2013.09.25: I've had iOS 7 on my phone since two days ago.  It really reminds me of the early Macintosh days when everything was white and black, but with a bit of color added.  Of course, flat means that graphics can be rendered more quickly than detailed, more 3D graphics can be.  Also, ending the fuzzy green card table look in Game Center or the leather-bound calendar or the notepaid with poor perforations helps to make things go more quickly.

The experience is better and will eventually be smooth once version 7.1 is out, but it looks like crap on my iPhone 4S.  It looks like the first release of software, not the seventh version.  The slide down notifications works a bit better and the slide up Control Center is somewhat convenient.  However, the grab and pull down method of getting a search window seems inconsistent.  Funny, I complained about all the blue and now, it's all the white.  It's like a device they'd designed for the movie THX-1138.

(Mac) OS X 10.8.4 seems to be much better

Call me a skeptic and call me cynical but I've been deceived so many times that Apple has fixed things that I don't believe anyone else.  It's my belief that by 10.x.4, the version of the operating system is finally stable.

Mac OS X 10.3.4 finally had a decent amount of functionality and stability that I could abandon Mac OS 9.x, for instance.  10.4.4 and 10.5.4 signalled some great stability, although 10.5.x was a step backward for PowerPC-based machines.  The speed and stability was in 10.4.10.

I pretty much considered Leopard (10.5.x) a disaster.  It improved the pathetic performance on Intel-based machines to fair, while ruining it for PowerPC-based machines.  It was about this time that Avie Tevanian left the company.  If he was frustrated with Scott Forstall, I could understand that.

Snow Leopard (10.6.x) for Intel-based machines only, was a step in the right direction, as it seemed to make one faction happy--the new (often iPhone-related ) Mac buyers, who had no legacy equipment.  I have a 2009 MacBook that works pretty well with it, especially compared to my hobbled late 2004 PowerBook on Leopard.

Blah blah blah...I'm trying to establish some background but I write too much that may not interest anyone.  Sorry!

Anyway, Apple developed Lion to be a little this, a little that and Mountain Lion to improve on it.

I'm still a little uncomfortable with Mountain Lion because as soon as I connect my trackball the interface changes and some applications have a dual mode to deal with the new scrolling and scroll bars, etc.

My number one gripe with Mountain Lion is the delay.  I've got a 2.6 GHz i7 processor with 16GB of RAM and a 480 GB SSD.  It's nearly as fast as you can go--and there have been huge delays from 10.8.0 to 10.8.3.  There have been delays starting applications and delays quitting them.  10.8.4 seems to erase the delays.  Update 2013.06.10: talking to a buddy with a MacBook Pro with nVidia 320M graphics hardware, there is no noticeable enhancement.

I'm interested to see how it handles when I have 1000 photos to transfer from a CompactFlash or SD card and then, attempt to process them.  Usually, the fans start running and the temperature rises to near 100 degrees C--too hot--unless it's iStat Menus that can't count.  That was with the cooling pad running beneath the machine.  I switched to a 3 fan cooler from Targus and it helps a bit more.

I suspect that this is next to the last update for 10.8, since WWDC is next week.  I wish they'd fix iOS 6.x because I hate seeing notifications that show up 13 hours later.  Instead, they'll foist an additional set of problems upon us, and those who can't upgrade will be lost without security updates even.  I'm not being cynical--that's just history.

Update 2013.09.03: Geez, waiting for an update to anything, despite security issues, can be hell.   It's been about three months, and I see weekly reports about 10.8.5 but nothing.  There have been a couple of security updates, but nothing much to fix bugs.  I've been finding more and more than the 2012 MacBook Pro and 10.8.4 won't work with my USB thumb drives.  There seem to be conflicts with USB drivers that weren't there before the 10.8.4 update.  As a backup, I tried the same thumb drives with 10.6.8 on the 2009 MacBook and it worked just as well as it did previously.  I just need to make the data available to multiple machines.

It shouldn't be a surprise that an operating system fix breaks as many things as it fixes.  In any case, September 10th is coming, and there is an expected announcement of the new iPhone models, but computers (other than MacBook Air, already updated) should be updated and operating systems should see updates.  There will likely be iOS 7.0, as there will be new devices, but (Mac) OS X 10.9 should be available also, and possibly 10.8.5.  I certainly need fixes.

Update 2013.11.25: Time has come and gone.  10.8.5 and 10.9 and iOS 7.0.4 are all out.  Updated devices came along and 10.9 will help immensely with battery life.  10.8.5 will help with overall stability.

I've been considering a change to 10.9.x but I want to wait until it's fairly stable, especially when doing such a large download.  I might put it on the 2009 MacBook.  It's supposed to be a bit more conservative overall, so it might work better than 10.6.8, though I have my doubts.  I'd rather test it on a not so critical machine than to upset my workflow, even though Mountain Lion could use some fixing.