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Connected

244: This is Not Propaganda

 

00:00:00   (upbeat music)

00:00:02   - Hello and welcome to Connected, episode 244.

00:00:12   It's made possible this week by our sponsors,

00:00:15   Backblaze, FreshBooks, and TextExpander.

00:00:18   I'm your host, Steven Hackett,

00:00:20   and I am joined by Mr. Federico Vittucci.

00:00:23   - Hello, Steven Hackett, how are you?

00:00:25   - I'm doing well, how are you on this fine Wednesday?

00:00:28   I am doing better than in the previous weeks.

00:00:31   I'm doing very, very well.

00:00:32   Thank you.

00:00:33   Yes, we're going to talk about that.

00:00:34   There's a lot to cover this week.

00:00:37   And of course, we are joined by everyone's favorite bearded

00:00:41   British man, Myke Hurley.

00:00:43   You put a lot of qualifiers in that one.

00:00:45   I mean, I couldn't say favorite man.

00:00:47   Can't I just be everybody's favorite?

00:00:48   Why can't I just be everybody's favorite?

00:00:50   Because it's Federico's Week.

00:00:52   I'll be everyone's favorite next week.

00:00:54   Next week?

00:00:54   OK, great.

00:00:56   Let's just dive right in.

00:00:57   have a lot of follow up. And we're going to start with hashtag beat Buffett, we're talking

00:01:03   about Warren Buffett's weird iPhone game that's now just in the US and how we felt like the

00:01:10   the high score was probably hard coded. This campaign was a failure. It was we have a tweet

00:01:17   that the highest we've seen was what 12,700 and Warren's I'm looking at the screenshot

00:01:23   Warren Buffett's high score, 15,350.

00:01:26   Yeah.

00:01:27   I do wonder if maybe you put in Warren Buffett as your username, maybe it tricks the game

00:01:33   into giving you a higher score.

00:01:35   I'm surprised that nobody else has tried that before.

00:01:37   Oh, that's interesting.

00:01:39   Maybe you get access to some kind of special mode.

00:01:42   The Warren mode.

00:01:43   The Warren mode.

00:01:44   The Buffett mode.

00:01:45   Can you change your name?

00:01:46   It is clearly very impossible to take that score.

00:01:51   I'll delete the app.

00:01:52   Oh no. I was done. I was done with it. I mean, how many more times am I gonna play it?

00:01:57   I boosted it off into the moon. It's gone. I threw it out of the window like one of these newspapers.

00:02:02   Like you threw out your phone.

00:02:05   I keep dropping my phone all the time. Really?

00:02:08   Yeah, I've got so many. It's covered in scratches now, the screen. I don't know what's wrong with me.

00:02:12   But you have a case, right? You have a case. Yeah, yeah. If I didn't have a case, this thing would have been obliterated before now.

00:02:17   It's taken some real bad like I dropped it a couple of days ago and it hit a shelf

00:02:22   And like yeah on the way down and just like

00:02:26   Catapulted its way across the room. So I'm pleased I have a case

00:02:30   I would have 100% blown through my two Apple Care repairs at this point

00:02:34   Are you sure using the silicon iPhone case like the Apple case? Yeah. Yeah

00:02:38   Do you feel like it's let not grippy enough or you're just suddenly clumsy or like I just I keep dropping it

00:02:44   I don't know what it is. It's not like it's slipping. I just keep dropping it.

00:02:49   It's almost as if the phone is too big and the Max was a mistake.

00:02:53   It's almost as if my hands aren't big enough.

00:02:55   Oh, that's the problem.

00:02:57   That's the real problem.

00:02:59   You should find techniques to grow your hands bigger.

00:03:02   I'm going to look into that. Maybe I should get cases for my hands.

00:03:05   Like a hand extender medication. Something like that must exist. You know, like a pill

00:03:11   that you take and it grows your hand, you know? Or maybe some exercise to extend the

00:03:17   length of your fingers. Is there such an exercise that can do that?

00:03:21   I have no idea. Well, when I was younger, I think my mom convinced me, I don't know

00:03:27   if this is true or not, that there were exercises that you could do to sort of force yourself

00:03:33   to grow taller, like if you remain suspended, like hanging on with your arms, like a bar

00:03:42   or something, you force yourself to grow taller.

00:03:45   This is like some torture rack type stuff.

00:03:47   Yes, it sounds like a torture rack.

00:03:49   It's medieval.

00:03:50   I think it's a medieval technique.

00:03:52   I'm pretty sure that it's not true.

00:03:54   I'm not sure it's a good idea.

00:03:56   But I had a whole problem growing up, because until I was like 14 or 15 I was very short,

00:04:02   I was very short and then in the span of the summer, like two months, I grew by like 12

00:04:08   centimeters and that made me feel a lot better.

00:04:12   It was super awkward when I went back to school in September and I was like a different person.

00:04:16   But yeah, anyway, sorry.

00:04:20   Yes.

00:04:21   Okay, I hope that's enough of that.

00:04:27   Yes.

00:04:28   Sorry.

00:04:29   we have some news from CNET that it seems that they may have fixed the Galaxy Fold.

00:04:37   Samsung may have done it.

00:04:38   Let me talk about the Galaxy Fold. Let me talk about it.

00:04:41   Oh my god. Still.

00:04:43   CNET are reporting on some other reports from some other websites that I've not yet seen.

00:04:48   Wait, this is not even their own report? The reporting from...

00:04:52   Yeah.

00:04:53   Reporting on other... Okay.

00:04:54   Yeah, they, CNET are reporting based on reports from Yonhap News.

00:05:01   I don't really know what that is, but I'm going on whatever I got.

00:05:07   So apparently Samsung are going to be tucking the protective layer, the kind of screen protector,

00:05:12   under the bezel now so it doesn't come off and people won't want to pick it up.

00:05:15   I don't know how this was ever a thing in the first place.

00:05:19   And they've also reduced the size of some of the hinge parts apparently, so it will

00:05:22   covered by a protective frame better. We'll see. Samsung definitely haven't said this,

00:05:29   but someone is. So, keeping that dream alive, boys.

00:05:33   Yeah, I sure hope that Yonhap News is correct. Nobody hopes it more than me and Samsung's

00:05:40   CEO. And the folks at Yonhap also.

00:05:43   No, they're fine. Yonhap got what they need, right? Like, they've got what they need. It

00:05:47   looks like a Korean website.

00:05:49   Okay. Alright. Well, I'm happy that you're holding on to this glimmer of hope that is the

00:05:59   Galaxy Fold mic. I want this to be true for you, mostly, at this point.

00:06:04   Speaking of things that folded too soon, let's talk about works with Nest.

00:06:09   Oh, that was a transition.

00:06:10   Oh my god. This was the partnership of Nest and some other devices that let them interact,

00:06:17   including the Amazon Echo voice assistant. It worked through this program and some other things.

00:06:23   Google has now extended that through August 31st. They're using the time to work with partners to

00:06:29   make a more permanent solution available, almost as if it's what they should have done in the first

00:06:34   place. What a concept. It's kind of funny, really. You work with these large companies,

00:06:39   and yet you decide just not to bother mentioning to them.

00:06:41   If they had announced this in the first place, saying, "Hey, you have until the end of August,

00:06:47   and then we're gonna move over.

00:06:49   I don't think people would have been upset,

00:06:50   but you pull the rug out from under everybody,

00:06:53   then you have to go back.

00:06:54   They really did it poorly.

00:06:56   - But yet some stuff's never,

00:06:57   like IFTTT is not mentioned, right?

00:07:00   That's probably gone forever.

00:07:02   They called out Amazon as like Google,

00:07:05   in Google's blog posts,

00:07:06   they specifically called out Amazon, right?

00:07:08   That they're gonna work with them.

00:07:09   And they also said that they're gonna work with partners

00:07:12   and they're gonna add assistant features

00:07:15   that will help replace the stuff that's going to be lost.

00:07:17   And they also spoke about, which I do appreciate,

00:07:19   they're like, you know, when we're working with people and adding these things in,

00:07:23   we're actually going to do periodic security reviews of them.

00:07:25   That's going to be part of it.

00:07:27   Good.

00:07:27   But like, see, this is what I mean.

00:07:28   Stuff like that, you're like, yeah, Google, that's a really good point.

00:07:31   Like you should be doing periodic security reviews of the companies

00:07:35   that you allow your products into, right?

00:07:36   Probably nobody else is doing stuff like that, right?

00:07:39   Like you get the certification and then it's all job done.

00:07:43   But that's the type of stuff people want to hear.

00:07:45   They don't want to hear like, oh, all the stuff that you currently are bought into.

00:07:49   We just decided to kill it.

00:07:50   So please buy our products instead.

00:07:53   Up next, I want to talk a little bit about our Macs that has come up on Twitter

00:07:58   in the last week after Myke's promise to buy me an armac if they come out.

00:08:02   Yeah, including if the Mac Pro is an armac, the highest spec.

00:08:06   So just reminding people of that.

00:08:09   That's the one I wish I wouldn't have said the laptop.

00:08:12   Oh, now you wish you wouldn't have said that. That was so obvious.

00:08:15   The laptop, like I could maybe get away with a bit, but like the highest end, the Mac Pro,

00:08:21   I'm still feeling confident about it, maybe. You should feel confident about it.

00:08:25   About the Mac Pro specifically, but like I'm still just a little,

00:08:28   I remain, that's the part that I'm most concerned about.

00:08:31   That's understandable, because it could be very expensive.

00:08:34   So it came up on Twitter, what defines an ARM Mac, because Touch Bar Macs started with the T1 chip,

00:08:42   and now they have the T2 chip and... Can I stop you here for a second? I am unhappy with our

00:08:47   listeners who are trying to like find loopholes. Huh? Right? To be like "Oh, well the T2 chip's an

00:08:55   ARM chip!" No! Shut up is what I say to you, right? You know what I'm saying. Don't try and find

00:09:00   loopholes. This is literally the reason this isn't follow-up, so... No, no, I appreciate you putting

00:09:05   it in here, but I have nothing but disdain for people that made these claims to you, Stephen.

00:09:10   disdain for all of them. I feel there's a, the phenomenon here is that people find it

00:09:16   entertaining when you're forced to spend money. Yeah, yeah, it's why all those YouTube videos

00:09:22   are so popular, right? Like, I'm giving $50,000 to someone for sitting in a car for six hours,

00:09:29   like it's just like a thing. So I think we need to define this a little bit. So yes,

00:09:35   Macs have ARM chips in them now, but they're secondary doing security things in the Touch

00:09:39   or whatever, I think the definition,

00:09:42   I think this is a pretty clear definition,

00:09:44   is that an ARM Mac means the OS or its apps

00:09:48   are running on an ARM processor, right?

00:09:50   It seems like a very simple definition to me

00:09:54   that if the OS or the apps run on something

00:09:57   other than an Intel chip, then it's an ARM Mac.

00:09:59   Like it's not, it's clear.

00:10:02   So then the question came up,

00:10:03   I'm just reiterating what happened on Twitter,

00:10:06   what happens if it's a dual CPU system?

00:10:08   So what if, just hypothetically, I don't necessarily

00:10:11   think this is the case for a lot of-- because it's

00:10:12   super weird and probably expensive.

00:10:14   But let's take the new Mac Pro.

00:10:17   Let's say that it comes with an Intel Xeon in it,

00:10:19   but it also comes with the Apple ARM Mac CPU in it.

00:10:24   And you can run--

00:10:25   it has both.

00:10:27   Again, I think the answer is, does the OS or its apps,

00:10:31   can they run on the ARM processor directly?

00:10:34   And if so, I would say that that is an ARM Mac.

00:10:37   I feel like in good faith I could not argue that point away.

00:10:40   Yeah, I feel like we're all on the same page.

00:10:42   I just wanted to clarify that,

00:10:43   because people are trying to find loopholes,

00:10:45   so I think that's our definition.

00:10:46   'Cause then I could get you a Mac that does both, right?

00:10:49   Lastly, in follow-up, Myke, this is just for me and you,

00:10:53   we have a co-host on this show who really likes awards.

00:10:57   I feel like he's very--

00:10:58   It's not that I like them, I deserve them.

00:11:00   Yeah, okay, okay.

00:11:01   I feel like he's overcoming some trauma in his past

00:11:05   where he was passed over.

00:11:06   What is possible?

00:11:07   You know, and this has spilled out into the Relay FM newsletter.

00:11:14   There's a new show called Adapt.

00:11:15   We talked about it last week where Federico and Ryan are challenging each other to do

00:11:20   things on the iPad.

00:11:21   It's a great show.

00:11:23   And I interviewed the two of them in the Relay FM membership newsletter.

00:11:28   And there's just a link in the show notes about one of Federico's answers.

00:11:33   Myke, do you want to tell us what this other person wrote?

00:11:36   So the question was, will there be prizes?

00:11:38   I know Federico's really into trophies.

00:11:40   And Federico says, "I like trophies because I deserve them.

00:11:44   As other shows on Relay have proven time and time again,

00:11:46   I hope that ADAPT will allow me to win more trophies in Connected,

00:11:50   whose co-hosts have established an alliance against me

00:11:53   to prevent me from winning additional trophies."

00:11:55   - Now, - Yes.

00:11:57   I feel like we are entering into a very deep and complicated lore here

00:12:00   that I can't comprehend anymore as to how this has occurred.

00:12:05   Well, I believe there is an alliance or a conspiracy against me.

00:12:09   We all have an equal amount of trophies.

00:12:12   We all have one each.

00:12:14   Only one was shaped like a toilet though.

00:12:17   Yeah, and I have that one.

00:12:18   Over time, points were stolen from me over time.

00:12:23   When? Come on!

00:12:25   When? When were they?

00:12:26   In previous predictions and in previous contests that we did, points were not assigned to me.

00:12:34   And you know why the points weren't assigned to you, right? Because you got the answer

00:12:38   wrong. Because you didn't deserve them.

00:12:39   Well that's debatable and you two have teamed up.

00:12:43   Two sides to every story. You two have teamed up and have colluded with

00:12:47   Jason Snell. No collusion.

00:12:49   Yes, there has been.

00:12:52   Easy, easy, easy.

00:12:57   I feel like we would need a report to assess the situation here.

00:13:01   Oh my God.

00:13:04   Well, um.

00:13:06   Are you going to be the person to assign the independent report coordinator?

00:13:11   I would like to have going into WWDC a special investigator looking into the practices that

00:13:19   assigned the points and grade the predictions. Okay. To assure that there will be no collusion.

00:13:27   Sure. Okay. What can we call it? The Gruber Report? Something like that?

00:13:37   We have some big news, gentlemen. Big news. This is actually pretty huge news. Big news. So,

00:13:45   This fall, Relay FM will turn five years old,

00:13:49   which is just, as a side note,

00:13:51   completely mind-blowing to me.

00:13:53   - Yeah.

00:13:54   - And we are marking the occasion

00:13:56   with a special live show in San Francisco.

00:13:59   There is a ticket link in the show notes.

00:14:02   This will be on Thursday, August 22nd in San Francisco.

00:14:06   It is going to be a podcasting extravaganza,

00:14:09   so we're going to have a bunch of Relay hosts there

00:14:12   doing some fun stuff.

00:14:14   It's not just like a regular connected or a regular upgrade.

00:14:16   This is gonna be just a full blowout of relay

00:14:20   good fun times.

00:14:23   - Yeah, we're trying to get as many hosts

00:14:24   as soon as we possibly can.

00:14:25   We're trying to get as many people involved

00:14:28   in the episode as possible.

00:14:30   It's gonna be the most ambitious crossover event in history.

00:14:34   Tickets are on sale.

00:14:36   Obviously space is limited because it's a venue

00:14:38   in San Francisco.

00:14:39   I'm very, very, very excited about this.

00:14:43   We obviously have one big live show still to come before this one, but I am very excited

00:14:49   about our fifth anniversary live show.

00:14:52   So we're going to be doing a bunch of stuff throughout the rest of this year, I think,

00:14:58   to try and celebrate our fifth anniversary because it's a pretty big deal for us.

00:15:03   We hope that you'll join us in San Francisco on August 22nd.

00:15:07   I think this will be one that you wouldn't want to miss.

00:15:11   So we're working on some stuff.

00:15:13   We're gonna shoot Myke Hurley out of a cannon. It's gonna be great. I'm like

00:15:17   Actually, you know what? I don't want I will be the one with a surprise at this show

00:15:21   Maybe I'm working on something. I'll let you know later on if it actually pans out

00:15:27   Lastly sort of in this like follow-up topic zero big news section of the show today

00:15:33   Apple sent out invites to the WWDC keynote to everyone's surprise. No one surprise

00:15:39   it is Monday June 3rd in San Jose in the conference center there they're probably

00:15:47   gonna announce some software maybe some hardware we'll see maybe maybe a service

00:15:51   or two you think they could be a service maybe? Maybe the ARM Mac Pro the mic will need to buy

00:15:55   yeah possible maybe the ARM Mac Pro would be possible so the only person

00:16:01   happy about that product if everybody that wants one I actually I would be

00:16:05   happy about that actually. No, but like if everyone that wants to own one, like Steven

00:16:09   will be the only person. Because it's gonna be free. It's true. I can't believe you said

00:16:15   that. I can't believe you made this promise in public. Sometimes I get excited. Well,

00:16:20   a little too much maybe. So here's the question, had you been editing that episode, would you

00:16:25   have edited that promise out? No, I would have stayed in. I'm a man of my word. Good.

00:16:29   Good. Now I know you are, I just wanted that on the record. Much to my detriment. Just

00:16:34   case. So yeah, so WWC is, will be there, all three of us will be of course at WWC all week,

00:16:40   we have our live show that Wednesday night, and Federico and I will be at the keynote,

00:16:45   which is very exciting.

00:16:47   I'm very pleased for you both.

00:16:49   Thank you.

00:16:50   Thank you.

00:16:51   Stephen will get, oh Stephen you don't drink coffee do you? I don't.

00:16:54   I wanted you to experience the terrible WWC coffee with me.

00:16:59   I'll be holding down the fort, being the only one of us bothering to take any notes

00:17:05   from a hotel room somewhere in San Jose.

00:17:07   But I'm very, very happy for my co-hosts that they're going to be going.

00:17:11   Especially Steven, because it's going to be his first Apple event.

00:17:14   So no, that's very exciting, because he deserves it.

00:17:16   I'm super pumped.

00:17:17   So we'll see you in San Jose, if you're in San Jose.

00:17:21   If you're not there, we won't see you.

00:17:22   If you're not there, what's wrong with you?

00:17:24   Really, that's the point.

00:17:26   So, cool.

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00:17:57   laptop and my iPad, but I realized that there's something I need to work on in the evening

00:18:01   and I realized it was in the downloads folder on my iMac at home.

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00:19:23   We've got a couple of new apps we wanna talk about.

00:19:25   Myke, I know you are a big time tracker.

00:19:28   You've been doing a lot longer than I have.

00:19:30   So could you tell us about Timery?

00:19:32   - Yeah, I can.

00:19:33   I love this application.

00:19:36   I'm very happy that it's out now,

00:19:37   so people will stop asking me when it's gonna come out.

00:19:40   This Timery is a third-party time tracking app

00:19:47   which uses the service Toggle,

00:19:50   which is a time tracking application that I use

00:19:52   and I'm a fan of, but the Toggle app

00:19:54   always left a lot to be desired. That's generous, they're not very good. I'm really trying to be kind,

00:20:00   I'm trying my best to be kind. I am a big fan of this application because it does everything that

00:20:09   I want. It looks great, it's very simple, it's very fast to start timers. One of the things I

00:20:14   like about this app, when you go in to start a timer, the first thing you do is start the timer

00:20:19   running before you enter any of the information in, which just feels like the right way around

00:20:24   to do things to me. It's made by a developer whose name is Joseph Hribar, who's a super nice guy too.

00:20:30   I've been on this beta for quite a few months and he's been very accommodating of little features

00:20:39   that I think would be good for the application. But as somebody who really believes in and quite

00:20:44   heavily time tracks, I have a lot of thoughts about these types of things. But the application

00:20:50   is very nice. I like that all of the entries are categorized really well and I can kind of at

00:20:54   a glance get an idea of how much time I'm tracking. I use the widget that it has, the notification

00:21:00   center widget constantly for a couple of things. One, it shows your current timer and you can stop

00:21:05   it from there. It's like a super quick way for me to stop the timer. But you can also have listed

00:21:10   there and in other views of the application saved timers. So if you have specific timers with like

00:21:16   projects and tags that are very frequent for you. You can set them up so you can quite quickly,

00:21:21   like when you first open the application, just fire them off because they're all kind of like

00:21:25   templates that you can hit or they live in the widget. And it also has extensive series

00:21:29   shortcut support where you can basically create whatever timer you want and it can be fired off

00:21:36   with shortcuts. And there's a couple of other shortcuts in there too, to like check the current

00:21:39   entry, stop the current entry, that kind of stuff. I haven't used the shortcuts too much because,

00:21:45   to be honest, like, I...

00:21:49   Well, the reason is,

00:21:53   when I'm doing the work, I'm usually at a device,

00:21:56   and so I just set it up on the device.

00:21:59   Yeah, this is my problem with this, or not my problem,

00:22:02   but I haven't used them either because if I'm doing work,

00:22:04   I'm either at my Mac and I have toggle running,

00:22:07   or I'm on my iPad or my phone with time-re.

00:22:10   So I don't, I just open the app and do it.

00:22:12   Maybe that's just, you know, months of muscle memory and I'll like move to using Siri at some point,

00:22:18   but it hasn't made a big impact on me yet. I mean, but this is like maybe a part of a

00:22:23   larger conversation for the fact that I actually do not ever trigger shortcuts by voice. Ever.

00:22:28   Interesting. We can, we should probably talk about this at another time, but like I, I,

00:22:34   I continue to find the experience to be less than reliable. Like I, I need what I feel like

00:22:42   would be constant reliability from that feature.

00:22:44   And I feel like I can't get it because Siri too frequently is trying to jump in.

00:22:49   Like, for example, this app's name is Timery, right?

00:22:52   Or and I think of my toggle timers as timers.

00:22:57   Siri does not like me to use the word timer.

00:23:00   Siri gets very upset if I use the word timer.

00:23:03   And then it's like, how far do I really want to go

00:23:07   to change my own mental model for what I'm calling things?

00:23:10   And to be honest, it's not far enough, right?

00:23:13   Like, I don't want to start thinking about my time tracking and my time tracking

00:23:17   timers as like different words, because if I say like what, like if I say like, I set

00:23:23   up a specific phrase and I ask Siri for it and then the HomePod just tells me I don't

00:23:28   have any timers running.

00:23:29   But what it's doing is looking for food or cook like the timers that I set for the

00:23:33   clock app. You know what I mean?

00:23:35   Like stuff like that is just too frustrating for me, which is probably why I haven't got

00:23:39   that far with shortcuts because a lot of the applications and things that I want to do

00:23:43   are things that the HomePod can do natively or Siri can do natively, right? So it's like calendar

00:23:48   stuff and email stuff or whatever. And then the nomenclature is too close to what Siri thinks

00:23:55   is native stuff. Right? Federico, do you find that? I mean, I'm sure that you probably have

00:24:01   like a whole set of words that you use instead, but is what I'm saying... I do have the word

00:24:07   Timer in them. Yeah, you see sometimes it works for me and sometimes it doesn't. It's the second

00:24:12   it's the second word like for example I have I have article timer and that starts the mac stories

00:24:19   posts timer that I have or I have like um I guess it depends I have a mix of them but I know that

00:24:27   at least five or six of them have the word timer in it and um it's just I was listening to you both

00:24:34   and I'm the complete opposite.

00:24:36   So I work on the iPad and I have

00:24:38   Timery there.

00:24:39   And in fact, most of the time it's

00:24:41   in SlideOver.

00:24:42   But I think it's just easier for me

00:24:43   to to just shout

00:24:45   at the HomePod and

00:24:47   start a timer.

00:24:48   And it's relatively fast.

00:24:50   It takes a couple of seconds.

00:24:51   I just...

00:24:52   I mean, maybe maybe I should look

00:24:53   at it again. I mean, honestly, it

00:24:55   was kind of just like I was I was

00:24:57   frustrated with it for a while, like

00:24:59   it wasn't giving me exactly what I

00:25:00   wanted and then I just stopped using

00:25:01   it.

00:25:02   I mean, I use shortcuts all the

00:25:04   the time, but I manually activate them, right?

00:25:07   And so plus, I think what it is as well, a lot of the shortcuts that I want to run,

00:25:12   we're really kind of pushing into our last topic today already.

00:25:16   A lot of the shortcuts that I want to run, they require action from me.

00:25:21   So I feel like I can't get into a groove of always wanting

00:25:26   to activate my shortcuts by voice because I can't activate them all by voice.

00:25:32   If I was to think that, oh, shortcuts can always be Siri because I can,

00:25:36   Siri can ask me a question and I can give an answer, I think I'll be more inclined to do it,

00:25:40   you know? But the fact that like some you can and some you can't, some are like,

00:25:45   oh, go check it on your phone. It's like, well, I should have just done this in the first place

00:25:48   then, shouldn't I? So like, I think that that kind of disconnect is one of the things that's

00:25:51   kept me away from using Siri for shortcuts, because it's not a consistent experience as

00:25:57   to what I can actually achieve. And I think that's one of the things that's kind of like

00:26:00   kept me away from it. But Timery is really good. Genuinely, if you are interested in time tracking,

00:26:11   you should try it anyway and you should sign up for toggle. This only works with toggle,

00:26:14   this application. It's like a third party app for this service. But if you are a toggle user,

00:26:19   no question you should be using this app. It is so much better than the toggle app. The one thing

00:26:25   it doesn't have is reports, but how often are you checking those? And when you need them, just go to

00:26:30   to the website anyway because they suck in the iPhone app as it is so like that

00:26:34   I think that this application is fantastic and I really really urge

00:26:39   people to try it out it's free to download free to try and it has a

00:26:44   subscription which enables a bunch more features I really really really love

00:26:49   this application it's lived on my home screen since like the day I got the first

00:26:54   beta and it has really made like a significant difference in how I've been

00:26:59   tracking my time. Like I use this way more than I,

00:27:03   but I don't use my shortcuts workflows, any shortcuts workflows,

00:27:07   my shortcuts shortcuts for this stuff anymore.

00:27:09   Like the stuff that Federico built and I've started to replace,

00:27:13   like I have some more complicated ones that like set timers and open

00:27:16   applications or whatever.

00:27:18   And I'm slowly starting to like and have been for a while going through and

00:27:21   replacing all of those with, uh,

00:27:23   with time-ery actions instead because I just prefer the way that the app works.

00:27:28   and I think that it is really well made and it's very well focused and I'm a big fan.

00:27:32   Yeah, I absolutely love Timery.

00:27:36   It has replaced all of my workflows and now shortcuts.

00:27:40   As I mentioned, I activate the shortcuts via voice all the time,

00:27:45   either on my phone or the watch or one of the many home pods that I have.

00:27:50   I also do only have one home pod as well.

00:27:53   Maybe that's like well, one home.

00:27:55   I only have home pods in one room.

00:27:57   Like I don't have them in my office, but I could always just ask because then because that's the other thing.

00:28:01   I'm sorry, I'm going I'm going back to this again.

00:28:03   The home pods are in the other room.

00:28:06   And then if I say the the high telephone phrase,

00:28:09   even though I then can't hear what it's saying to me properly,

00:28:13   but it can hear me and then my phone won't do it anyway.

00:28:16   Man, I'm on one today. I'm sorry.

00:28:20   But I also in addition to the to to the voice shortcuts,

00:28:24   I also use the Siri shortcuts for Timery as actions,

00:28:29   as little action steps, part of my longer custom shortcuts

00:28:33   in the shortcuts app.

00:28:35   So for example, I have a shortcut that I run

00:28:38   before I sit down to record a podcast,

00:28:41   and this shortcut looks into my calendar,

00:28:44   and depending on the event name,

00:28:47   which would be connected or app stories or adapt,

00:28:50   it starts a different

00:28:52   timer shortcut, depending

00:28:55   on the podcast that I'm about to

00:28:57   record.

00:28:57   I need to do this one.

00:28:58   I need to do that. You told me about

00:29:00   this before. And I feel like I have

00:29:01   an idea of how you would build it,

00:29:03   right? Like just hearing you say

00:29:04   that. And I really need to look into

00:29:06   that.

00:29:06   Yeah.

00:29:07   So I also want to call out

00:29:10   the integration with tagging

00:29:12   and tasks.

00:29:13   These are two separate toggle

00:29:15   features. So tags

00:29:18   allow you to just

00:29:20   tag your timers and later you can use these tags as filters

00:29:24   or just as a better organization

00:29:26   if you wanna use the reports in the web app.

00:29:29   And unfortunately reports and stats

00:29:31   are not available yet in Timery.

00:29:33   But there's an API for those,

00:29:36   so hopefully the developer will implement reports

00:29:38   and stats in the future.

00:29:40   Tasks are something that not a lot of people know about

00:29:44   because it requires a premium toggle account.

00:29:47   If you just use toggle for free,

00:29:51   the task feature will be completely hidden

00:29:53   from time area as well.

00:29:55   But if you're a premium toggle user,

00:29:57   you will be able to organize your projects

00:30:00   with tasks which are effectively like sub projects.

00:30:05   So for example, I have max stories

00:30:07   and using the toggle task functionality,

00:30:10   I can have max stories articles or max stories admin.

00:30:14   You know, it's a way to break down a project

00:30:15   into multiple areas.

00:30:17   And with Timery, you can completely manage those tasks,

00:30:21   and you can create saved timers for a specific project

00:30:25   and a specific sub-task.

00:30:26   It's really well done.

00:30:27   And yeah, I guess there's one feature

00:30:32   that John called out in our review on Mac stories,

00:30:37   which is something that the Toggle Web App

00:30:39   for desktop computers does very well,

00:30:42   is the ability to group related timers.

00:30:46   So for example, if during the day you've been working on and off on different projects,

00:30:51   the toggle web app aggregates all the timers belonging to the same project into one condensed view,

00:30:59   and there's a button on the right that you can press to expand all of those timers.

00:31:04   And it's just a way to condense all of the related timers into a more compact list.

00:31:10   And I would like to see a similar grouping in Timery as well,

00:31:13   because right now Timery only lists your timers in reverse chronological order,

00:31:19   so from the latest to the oldest.

00:31:22   But I would like to see the grouping like the Toggle web app for desktop,

00:31:26   because for some reason the Toggle mobile app also does not do grouping.

00:31:32   Because the Toggle mobile app basically does nothing.

00:31:35   And what it does, it just continues to do it in varying ways of bad.

00:31:40   I've never known an application like this.

00:31:41   Give them some credit. They launched the iPad version a mere two weeks ago.

00:31:46   They did. I mean, at least it honestly, at least it finally exists, but don't need it because

00:31:51   Timery is universal.

00:31:53   Yes, of course. And it's very good.

00:31:55   And it's one of the, I'm going to call it, it's going to be for sure one of the best app

00:32:01   launches of the year in 2019.

00:32:03   Damn!

00:32:04   I mean, it's super awesome.

00:32:05   And we all use it at Mac stories.

00:32:07   It's really good.

00:32:09   Yeah, so...

00:32:11   Hopefully now Myke...

00:32:13   Just want a Mac version.

00:32:15   Mac version, Mac version, Mac version.

00:32:17   Just wait till the end of the year, no problem.

00:32:19   This is perfect for Marzipan.

00:32:21   It'll run really well on my ARM Mac Pro in December.

00:32:23   It will, it will run natively on your ARM Mac Pro.

00:32:26   Hopefully Myke now in the Cortex subreddit people will stop asking

00:32:30   "When's the time tracking app that Myke and Gray keep mentioning?"

00:32:33   I'm not kidding, I'm not kidding, it's switched over now.

00:32:36   now now people are asking me for Android replace like oh no replacements it's

00:32:40   like I can't help you you know I can't help you like you know if you listen you

00:32:43   know I can't help you I have nothing for you super glad it's here but it's not

00:32:49   the only new app we want to talk about this week our friend and sometimes enemy

00:32:53   Casey lists frenemy has frenemy frenemy of the show it's not he's not he's not

00:32:59   my enemy is Casey's a lovely man he smells like cantaloupe when you're up

00:33:05   close to it's very strange it's kind of comforting what is cantaloupe like a

00:33:08   melon it's like a orange melon I thought was like an animal like an antelope

00:33:13   anyway Casey yes well okay see so he's been talking about this on ATP and

00:33:20   analog for a while now and it's finally here it's called vignette and it is it's

00:33:25   like the perfect iOS app that takes a very narrow set of problems and just

00:33:31   executes very well on top of them.

00:33:34   So the issue is we all probably in our contacts

00:33:37   have people that we text with all the time

00:33:39   or talk to all the time,

00:33:41   and they don't have a photo in our contacts.

00:33:42   It's just a gray circle with their initials over it.

00:33:45   And look, I don't wanna live like that.

00:33:47   I wanna live looking at people's faces.

00:33:49   And in the past, before this app,

00:33:51   that meant you have to go around to Twitter

00:33:53   and find people's pictures.

00:33:54   Maybe you took a picture of them at a wedding

00:33:56   and you drop it into contacts on the Mac,

00:33:58   but then it beach balls and crashes

00:33:59   'cause it's contacts on the Mac.

00:34:01   and it was very difficult to keep your contact database photos updated.

00:34:05   Casey's app is designed to solve that.

00:34:07   So it's an iPhone app.

00:34:09   It skims your local contacts database.

00:34:11   It does not upload them anywhere.

00:34:13   It does not log into any of your accounts.

00:34:16   It's all local on the device, which I love.

00:34:18   So there are other services like this, like on the web.

00:34:21   It's like you got to do some things your contacts you don't want to do.

00:34:24   This app's all local and it searches for the people in your database.

00:34:28   So it looks at Gravatar,

00:34:31   which is where the bulk of mine came from.

00:34:33   Someone's email address is in a contact record.

00:34:35   They use that email address on Gravatar.

00:34:37   It pulls their photo in.

00:34:39   But it can also look at their Twitter profile,

00:34:41   Instagram or Facebook, if you have their links

00:34:45   to their social media accounts in your records

00:34:48   of your contacts.

00:34:48   And I don't have any of those.

00:34:50   Most people probably don't.

00:34:51   So Gravatar was the big fallback for me.

00:34:53   But it goes out and fetches those images

00:34:55   and then gives you a list saying,

00:34:57   I found 32 people with updated images and it lets you select.

00:35:01   I want to override all of them.

00:35:03   I just want to override a select few.

00:35:05   For instance, I have some people in my contacts that I very carefully chose the photo that

00:35:11   I have for them in my contacts list.

00:35:13   It's not necessarily the one they use on Twitter or elsewhere.

00:35:17   So I could just skip over those people and use the photo that I already had.

00:35:22   You hit apply and it applies to them and they sync everywhere and it's awesome.

00:35:26   This is like the perfect example of you have an idea which is a thing that people actually

00:35:32   want to fix and then you make an app that perfectly fixes it.

00:35:36   It's just like, I think Casey did a really great job and like obviously he's a very close

00:35:40   friend but I'm actually really proud of him because I think he's done a very very good

00:35:44   job with this application and I think that it is worth people's time.

00:35:49   Especially because you can download the app for free and do the scan of your contacts

00:35:54   and you only pay when you apply the features.

00:35:59   You pay and then you can apply the updates

00:36:02   and then you can then do it for as many times as you want from that point.

00:36:05   But you can actually see it's like a try before you buy.

00:36:08   You can actually see if it's going to be of a benefit to you,

00:36:10   because if you have a lot of friends who don't have any like a gravatar

00:36:15   and you haven't put that information into the contact database

00:36:18   like their Twitter account or their Facebook account or whatever,

00:36:20   it's not going to find anything.

00:36:23   So I think he did a really good job with the way in which he has done things,

00:36:27   because you can work out if his app's going to be of any use to you before you buy it.

00:36:31   I think he's done a genuine, I'm very proud of him.

00:36:34   I think he's done a great job.

00:36:36   We recorded an episode of Analog yesterday,

00:36:38   which was fun because I always like talking to people just before

00:36:43   something happens because you can kind of get those raw feelings.

00:36:46   So if you're interested in what kind of like what it was like for him to make the app

00:36:51   and then what it felt for him the day before he released it.

00:36:53   You can go listen to episode 157 of analog.

00:36:56   But this app is definitely worth your time as well,

00:36:58   because it has actually genuinely solved the thing that I wanted solved.

00:37:05   So it's great.

00:37:06   Yeah, it's a very good app.

00:37:08   And I'm like, I was surprised

00:37:12   to how many of my contacts were without profile pictures.

00:37:16   And it's just it's such a simple idea and it's been realized so well.

00:37:21   and even the thought of adding a custom field for Instagram to the contact card, that was genius.

00:37:28   So I should also point out that I'm only friends with folks who make great apps. So, you know,

00:37:37   the disclaimer of saying "Walkaes is a friend" of course he's a friend because he makes great apps.

00:37:41   I cannot be friends with developers who make terrible apps. It's like, for example,

00:37:49   Like, all of my friends are handsome and beautiful.

00:37:52   Like, I cannot be friends with ugly people.

00:37:54   Yes.

00:37:55   So, I have very high standards for my friends,

00:37:58   and my friends make great stuff.

00:38:00   So, I have, you know, I have filters for my personal life,

00:38:06   and this is one of them.

00:38:08   So, it's only natural that this is a great app,

00:38:10   because it's my friend.

00:38:11   So, if it sucked, I would have told Casey,

00:38:13   "This app sucks, and you're no longer my friend."

00:38:15   Yeah, if one of your friends makes a bad app.

00:38:18   "Oh, I get upset. I get upset. I get real upset." Like, what have you done?

00:38:21   You have to break up with them. You ruined everything.

00:38:24   I was working on a project a while back with another person, and he came up to me with

00:38:29   something that was ugly and terrible. Like, I basically told him, "Why would you bring this

00:38:37   to my attention? Like, this is a waste of time. Do you know me at all?" And eventually we figured it

00:38:43   out. You know, I have very high standards for everything. So, yep, I'm sorry. This is

00:38:49   just who I am. Oh, okay. Wasn't expecting that look into your psyche, but here we are.

00:38:54   Hey, look, you should as long as you know yourself, you know, all right, we have some

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00:40:57   MacBook Pros!

00:40:58   We're gonna chant, you ready?

00:41:00   MacBook Pros!

00:41:01   You gonna chant?

00:41:02   Come on.

00:41:03   Do we have to talk about this?

00:41:05   Yes.

00:41:06   Is it important?

00:41:07   Yeah.

00:41:08   I have to talk about it.

00:41:09   I mean, if you want to get a coffee or something.

00:41:10   Apple released a revision to their laptop plan yesterday.

00:41:14   So just to confirm, this is important?

00:41:16   Yes.

00:41:17   Okay.

00:41:18   Cool, cool.

00:41:19   No, no, just cool.

00:41:20   It is.

00:41:21   Alright.

00:41:22   You can take a break, because you've got to talk a lot next.

00:41:25   Yeah, go get a coffee.

00:41:27   Take a walk.

00:41:28   I don't need...

00:41:29   Yeah, okay.

00:41:30   I was just double checking.

00:41:31   No, it's fine.

00:41:32   We can just call you back.

00:41:33   Yes, okay.

00:41:34   So Apple...

00:41:35   For the last several years now, Apple has sort of cleared the decks before WWDC with

00:41:39   announcements that aren't going to be in the keynote.

00:41:41   I think sometimes they use these to signal expectations.

00:41:45   Whatever the case is this year, there are some new MacBook Pros.

00:41:49   So very quickly, the 13 inch width touch bar got a spec bump to faster CPUs in the base

00:41:55   model and faster turbo speeds.

00:41:57   So same machine, same 16 gig RAM limit, but faster Intel CPUs.

00:42:04   Still the same generation, the eighth generation, but the 15 inch is really where most of the

00:42:09   attention was placed with new six core and for the first time, eight core ninth generation

00:42:17   Intel CPUs.

00:42:18   So the 2399 model is six core i7,

00:42:22   2800 bucks will get you an eight core i9,

00:42:28   and you can configure an eight core i9

00:42:30   with up to five gigahertz turbo boost.

00:42:32   Apple says this is the fastest MacBook Pro

00:42:35   they've ever shipped.

00:42:36   It includes, of course, options for the Vega graphics

00:42:39   that they added towards the end of the year last year.

00:42:42   So in July, they had a big update to the MacBook Pro,

00:42:44   that's where mine came from.

00:42:45   They had a release in the fall with new GPUs,

00:42:47   they have these. I totally love that Apple is spec bumping this computer as

00:42:53   they can. You know, there was for such a long time there, it felt like their eye was

00:42:57   off the ball with these sorts of updates. This is, Federico, to your point, this is not

00:43:01   that necessarily that exciting of a MacBook Pro update unless you just

00:43:04   really wanted eight cores. I mean, if you're really pushing a MacBook Pro, this is good

00:43:08   news. But for most people, including myself, this isn't going to make me go

00:43:11   out and radically change my setup, but it's a signal that Apple is

00:43:16   willing to update these machines as it can, you know, every 10 months, 12 months somewhere

00:43:21   in there.

00:43:22   So I think that's awesome.

00:43:24   But I do think it raises some questions.

00:43:27   And I've got a handful of them.

00:43:29   One, will we ever see a 15 inch without a dedicated GPU again, so in the 2015 generation,

00:43:35   and before the baseline 15 inch you could get with just the Intel integrated graphics.

00:43:40   And as Marco talked about, sort of in that time, and as I agreed with, that was kind

00:43:45   the machine to get if you wanted a bigger screen but you valued battery life and heat because the

00:43:51   dedicated GPU runs a little hotter obviously has an impact on battery life. If you didn't need the GPU

00:43:57   but you just wanted the screen size that was a really good option and that has gone away with

00:44:02   with the Thunderbolt 3 machines and who knows if we'll ever see it again but it's kind of just a

00:44:09   an asterisk on anytime they update these. But what's more interesting is what is going on with

00:44:14   with the 12 inch MacBook and the non-Touch Bar MacBook Pro,

00:44:18   which Federico Lovingly calls the MacBook Escape.

00:44:21   - No, I do not.

00:44:21   I came back from my walk to say that I do not.

00:44:24   - I ran.

00:44:25   - The Verge called it the MacBook Escape in their article.

00:44:29   - What, The Verge is wrong?

00:44:30   The Verge is not God.

00:44:31   - I'm just saying, like, I mean,

00:44:33   that was Marco's nickname, so that's pretty awesome.

00:44:35   It's made it into, like, mainstream.

00:44:37   - Well, we're gonna have to revise this friend's situation

00:44:40   with Marco then, if he insists on using nicknames.

00:44:42   - Wait a second.

00:44:44   - Does that override, he makes a good app,

00:44:46   does that override his app?

00:44:47   - See, that's the problem, he makes a great app,

00:44:50   but he uses nicknames, so they sort of cancel out.

00:44:53   - Interesting.

00:44:54   - I guess we'll have to establish--

00:44:55   - So he's on a level playing field.

00:44:57   - Yeah, well--

00:44:57   - So now I guess it's all about how attractive you find him.

00:45:00   - Well, I guess we'll have to wait and see,

00:45:02   I know he's been working out, he's been working out.

00:45:04   (laughing)

00:45:06   We'll check it out with him.

00:45:07   - The beard looks good.

00:45:08   (laughing)

00:45:09   - Okay.

00:45:10   (laughing)

00:45:12   (laughing)

00:45:14   He's a dog person, he's a dog person.

00:45:16   So by default he wins.

00:45:18   So if you're a dog person,

00:45:20   that defeats all the other factors.

00:45:23   So being--

00:45:24   - So you can be not good looking,

00:45:27   make a bad app and use nicknames,

00:45:29   but if you have a dog, you're all good.

00:45:31   - We can have some kind of acquaintance, yes.

00:45:34   Yeah, yeah, yeah, that'd be fine.

00:45:37   But if you're not good looking,

00:45:39   make a bad app and use nicknames

00:45:42   and also are a cat person, just don't even like,

00:45:46   don't even walk near me, yeah.

00:45:49   - What is your email address?

00:45:51   - It's on my website.

00:45:53   - Okay, great, cool, cool, cool.

00:45:54   - So if you, please send me feedback.

00:45:56   I really want to hear what you think about my weird

00:46:00   and twisted psyche. - Grading system

00:46:01   for human people. - Yes, mm-hmm.

00:46:03   You were talking about this very important computer, yes.

00:46:07   - Something. - GPUs.

00:46:08   - Yes, so this is now the second release.

00:46:11   This is now the second release where these two machines

00:46:15   have not gotten an update.

00:46:16   They are the same as they were in 2017,

00:46:19   which means the old keyboard, old CPUs.

00:46:21   My thought is that the non-Touch Bar machine

00:46:26   is only there for a price point.

00:46:28   The Touch Bar 13-inch is pretty expensive.

00:46:30   It also feels sort of irrelevant

00:46:32   in the era of the new MacBook Air.

00:46:35   The Air kind of fills that price point.

00:46:37   So do you need a MacBook Pro there?

00:46:38   Is it just legacy?

00:46:39   What's the deal?

00:46:40   I still think, as I predicted, I think,

00:46:42   or it was a non-graded pick,

00:46:44   at some point I said in our predictions

00:46:45   that I think this machine will go away.

00:46:47   I still think that case is even stronger

00:46:50   after this lack of updating.

00:46:51   - It makes sense too that like,

00:46:53   if that 16 inch rumored amazing MacBook Pro

00:46:57   was probably never gonna replace either of these,

00:47:00   like it would go in at the top end

00:47:02   like the Retina MacBook Pro did, right?

00:47:04   - Oh, of course.

00:47:06   - So then the 13 with touch bar

00:47:09   becomes just the entry MacBook Pro.

00:47:13   - The base, sure.

00:47:14   And yes, it's like whatever it is, $1499 or $1599.

00:47:17   Yeah, so the rumor of this high-end,

00:47:22   like 16-inch MacBook Pro with a new design,

00:47:25   I think you've really hit the nail on the head

00:47:27   of if and when that thing comes to pass,

00:47:30   if it's at WWDC or if it's later,

00:47:33   I think it will be exactly how they introduced

00:47:35   the Retina MacBook Pro in 2012.

00:47:37   They had the same MacBook Pros that they had.

00:47:40   In fact, they revved them, I think, in that same day.

00:47:42   And they said, hey, and now we have a new model

00:47:44   at the top of the line.

00:47:46   This is like the fancy one.

00:47:47   All computers will be like this,

00:47:48   but for now it's only the special one.

00:47:50   And then over time it trickled down

00:47:52   and now they all have run-in displays and look like that.

00:47:55   So I think they will follow that pattern again this time.

00:47:59   The 12-inch MacBook, I think,

00:48:01   is the more interesting question here.

00:48:03   Like, say the non-touch bar just goes away, whatever.

00:48:06   It failed, the MacBook Air is here,

00:48:08   the MacBook Air is awesome, you should get that instead.

00:48:12   The 12 inch I think still does have a place.

00:48:14   Now I still think it's probably too expensive,

00:48:16   but I do think that there are people who value

00:48:20   the thinness, and lightness, and portability above all else.

00:48:23   And I really have come to understand this better

00:48:26   in the last couple of weeks.

00:48:28   I needed a second, normally in the summer

00:48:31   I install the macOS beta on my MacBook Pro,

00:48:35   and I leave my iMac alone because it's my production machine.

00:48:39   But I have a lot of travel this summer.

00:48:42   I've got several personal trips, I have WWDC,

00:48:46   and of course now we can talk about it,

00:48:48   I have this trip to San Francisco in August

00:48:50   for our live show.

00:48:51   I'm unwilling to run a Mac OS beta on a machine

00:48:55   that I need for those sorts of trips.

00:48:57   'Cause I gotta record shows live on stage,

00:48:59   I gotta stream audio, and that's not the best thing

00:49:02   to do on a Mac OS beta.

00:49:03   And so I was thinking like, well, how am I going to run the Mac OS beta?

00:49:07   Do I do an external drive?

00:49:08   And then I remembered I have a 2015, the original one port MacBook.

00:49:12   It was my wife's machine for a long time.

00:49:14   She has a new air.

00:49:14   And so I got up off the shelf and put Mojave on it.

00:49:18   And I don't want to use that machine.

00:49:20   It's slow and the keyboard is bad and one port is dumb, but the size is sort of intoxicating.

00:49:26   I can see why people really like the thinness and lightness.

00:49:28   So I've kind of come around on this machine existing because it's, it's so portable.

00:49:32   I mean, it's like nothing else in the Mac line, even the MacBook Air that she has now

00:49:38   feels way bigger and heavier than this thing.

00:49:40   So I think there's still room for it to exist.

00:49:43   Maybe they're holding off because it's going to be the first ARM Mac, as a lot of people

00:49:46   have predicted.

00:49:48   Maybe it's that they just haven't put the new Intel CPU in it.

00:49:51   I do believe there are core end processors they could use, but they haven't gotten around

00:49:55   to it for whatever reason.

00:49:56   So that's kind of the shifting ground of the MacBook Pro is still like a problem.

00:50:03   Like it's still unclear where these machines, how they fit together.

00:50:06   But if you want a 15 inch, now seems like a good time to buy it.

00:50:09   We do talk about the keyboards though.

00:50:10   So the 2019 machines have a keyboard and Apple says that they have changed the material in

00:50:19   the butterfly mechanism in a way that should substantially reduce issues that some users

00:50:24   have seen with key sticking and debris and we all know that story. I guess we'll see if it works.

00:50:29   This is now like the fourth iteration of this keyboard, depending on how you count them.

00:50:32   Apple's still calling it the third generation keyboard because it has the membranes.

00:50:36   So like, whatever, you can also count it as the fifth generation keyboard if you really

00:50:39   like count very specifically. So whatever they keep the number doesn't matter. They keep re

00:50:46   working this keyboard. And we'll see if it if it happens to fix it or if it doesn't. But what's

00:50:53   What's really interesting is the keyboard repair program has been expanded to now cover

00:50:59   all butterfly keyboards.

00:51:00   So they lumped in the 2018 MacBook Pro and the 2018 MacBook Air, like we have in my household,

00:51:06   and the brand new 2019 model.

00:51:08   So if you buy a new $3,000 15-inch MacBook Pro tomorrow at the Apple Store with an 8-core

00:51:14   CPU in it, it is covered under the keyboard repair program.

00:51:18   And they also made a lot of statements to some outlets that they are doing a lot to

00:51:24   -- I find this so funny, really -- to reduce the wait times and stuff like that, how long

00:51:29   it takes to get things fixed if you do have a problem.

00:51:33   It's kind of funny, right?

00:51:34   Like Apple say -- and there's a great quote from Jason Snell's article where he's like,

00:51:38   "While Apple is quick to say that the vast majority of the MacBook Pro customers haven't

00:51:42   experienced any keyboard issues, the company still keeps tweaking this design."

00:51:47   And it's like, if, if, cause Apple seem to like really want to talk about the fact that

00:51:51   they don't get that many people with these problems, but yet at the same time they're

00:51:54   extending the whole, like keep like the replacement program to everyone.

00:51:59   They're making great strides at trying to like fix it.

00:52:01   If you go in with a third generation keyboard, they will upgrade it to this new material

00:52:08   model, right?

00:52:09   Like it's like, yeah, I mean you, you say what you're saying and what you're doing,

00:52:15   They don't really match.

00:52:17   And it's like, okay, it's still maybe a small amount of people, but it's clearly more than

00:52:22   before.

00:52:23   Right?

00:52:24   Because you're having to go to all this trouble.

00:52:25   Right.

00:52:26   I want to be clear because we glossed over it.

00:52:27   It seems like the 2018 models will get the new 2019 keyboards.

00:52:31   If you have an older one, you're not going to get this keyboard.

00:52:33   So it's very limited in the changeover.

00:52:36   My feeling is that it may make it better, but I think more important to Apple at this

00:52:41   point is like the damage control angle.

00:52:44   And look, when I bought my 2018, I got AppleCare on it because I get AppleCare on my computers.

00:52:50   But I've heard from a lot of people and seen a lot of tweets and emails of people like,

00:52:53   "I feel like I bought AppleCare just because of the keyboard."

00:52:57   And now I guess it's sort of a sign of Apple saying, "We're going to take care of you no

00:53:02   matter what with this keyboard issue."

00:53:05   And I think that's good.

00:53:06   I still don't know if it's fixed or if people should trust it.

00:53:10   I will say that my 2018 has been mostly okay.

00:53:13   the spacebar has gotten sticky twice,

00:53:14   but compressed air has cleaned it out.

00:53:16   No keys have broken off like on my 2016.

00:53:19   Time will tell.

00:53:19   And until then, Apple seems willing to do what it can

00:53:23   to help the customers with this machine.

00:53:25   Now, the thing they could do to help them the most

00:53:27   is to have a new keyboard,

00:53:28   but clearly that's not the time for that yet.

00:53:31   So here we are, new MacBook Pros,

00:53:34   slightly new keyboard, extended keyboard repair program.

00:53:38   It's interesting they're doing it now.

00:53:41   I guess they're kind of saying that, hey, if they had done this at WWDC, a bigger story

00:53:49   during the conference would be the keyboards, and now this has its own new cycle and it

00:53:53   will be gone by the time that the keynote comes around.

00:53:57   So I see why they did it now, but it's a little bit of a bummer that it's not completely solved.

00:54:03   What do you think about the rumor of the new MacBook Pro?

00:54:07   Do you think this makes it more likely, less likely, or no different?

00:54:09   I don't think it makes it any different.

00:54:11   I still think they could do that in two weeks in San Jose and say, Hey, look,

00:54:15   there's this new high end MacBook pro it's all fancy and new.

00:54:18   It's obviously more expensive, more powerful, whatever new design.

00:54:22   I think that's still totally on the table for WBC.

00:54:25   I don't think this makes it less likely. So we'll see.

00:54:29   I don't know how likely it is.

00:54:31   I don't feel like say that I was 30% sure that it was coming.

00:54:34   I don't think that number's changed for me because of this, but, uh, they can,

00:54:39   If they do that, that path that we talked about a second ago about, this is a new

00:54:43   machine, like the retina macro pro was, and eventually it stuff will trickle down.

00:54:48   They could really do that at any point, I think, and be okay.

00:54:50   Keyboards and laptops.

00:54:54   I'd love to talk about this again, but we're not there yet.

00:54:59   We're not there yet.

00:55:00   All right.

00:55:03   Uh, I'm going to tell us, tell everybody about Texas spender.

00:55:06   Myke, do you want to call Federico and get him back?

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00:57:28   So Federico, you published the article that you've been talking about for the last couple

00:57:31   of weeks, and I think probably in essence the best way to describe it, the magnum opus

00:57:37   to working on the iPad right now, right, like this is everything.

00:57:41   This is what, if you want to work on the iPad right now, this is the situation that we are

00:57:46   in in the middle of 2019.

00:57:49   So I kind of wanted to talk to you a little bit, well we all want to talk to you a little

00:57:53   bit about the article and kind of where it came from and then I have some

00:57:57   comments on the content itself. Okay. It was kind of funny because how many

00:58:02   words? This is a big one it's like 50,000 words or something? This is 48,000 49

00:58:07   almost a thousand words it's bigger than my iOS 12 review. Whoa! Wow! Wow really?

00:58:15   Wow it was really funny because you sent this to us like a few days ago so we

00:58:18   could read it beforehand.

00:58:21   And it took me quite a while.

00:58:24   But it was kind of funny.

00:58:25   Like, Stephen was just like, oh, great.

00:58:26   And then he popped in later on.

00:58:27   And he was like, oh, that was really good.

00:58:29   I read it.

00:58:29   And it was like 90 minutes later.

00:58:31   And I'd gotten through like a quarter

00:58:34   in the same amount of time.

00:58:36   It was just so heartbreaking.

00:58:37   I'm a very fast reader.

00:58:39   It disappoints my wife as well.

00:58:41   Sometimes we're reading something together.

00:58:43   I'm like, turn the page, turn the page.

00:58:45   That's the worst.

00:58:46   those people that like I hear my voice in my head when I read which you right

00:58:50   which you obviously don't because you would not be able to do with it actually

00:58:54   I hear your voice in my head yes it takes me takes me quite a while but I

00:59:00   read through it oh it was really good but I kind of a feeling that I got

00:59:05   though while reading the article was I I could just assume that when you set out

00:59:10   to start this project, it probably wasn't the scope that it ended up being.

00:59:16   Very good assumption, yeah. I don't know why exactly I feel that, but

00:59:21   it just, well, maybe one like, probably not the best time of the year for you to be writing

00:59:26   such a huge article considering you've got to do it again starting in two weeks, but...

00:59:31   Okay, I get that, like, why would you want to do this now? But it is true that it started

00:59:39   as a more limited article, but the scope grew quickly. So it's not like suddenly two weeks

00:59:48   ago I realized, "Oh, I've been writing too much." So I'm going to talk about this entire

00:59:56   process in the weekly newsletter this Friday, but basically I started thinking about wanting

01:00:04   to have at least two big stories on the website before WWDC in February. And I just started

01:00:14   saving some notes, some ideas, basically having like a super simple outline. And initially

01:00:19   I wanted to do an iPad story and an Apple Watch story. And both of them, those ideas,

01:00:27   those notes that I had, they did not have the scope of, you know, this major iOS review-like

01:00:33   story. I kept those notes for like a month, so I kept thinking about those ideas, and

01:00:40   then it was in late March when I decided, realistically speaking, I'm not going to

01:00:44   be able to do two stories, and I'm going to focus on this iPad One, and I guess that

01:00:50   it should have a bigger scope than what I initially set out to do. For example, it was

01:00:57   not supposed to include accessories, it was not supposed to include the bridge keyboard

01:01:01   and working with external displays, it was not supposed to include scriptable and JavaScript automation.

01:01:09   So all those elements were supposed to be like separate posts that I wanted to have on Mac stories,

01:01:15   and realizing that I'm not going to be able to do two stories, so I just want to do one,

01:01:22   and I want to make sure that it leaves an impression.

01:01:24   That forced me, and that happened during the mind mapping process,

01:01:29   That forced me to reconsider the scope of the story and say, "Okay, maybe there's a way that I can expand

01:01:37   and still have it feel like a single cohesive story instead of a bunch of sort of disconnected posts."

01:01:47   So I spent a few days in the mind map trying to make sense of it all.

01:01:53   And there were still a few sections that got cut.

01:01:56   There was a section about the Apple Pencil, there was a section about iPad apps that have a three column layout.

01:02:04   Both of them were cut.

01:02:06   But yeah, it started as a more simpler thing.

01:02:09   Like I was just gonna talk about multitasking file management and wishes for iOS 13.

01:02:14   But then I realized, you know, I'm gonna be able to do just one story,

01:02:22   because we were also launching other projects and all of that.

01:02:25   But also, you mentioned why would you want to do this before WWDC?

01:02:29   You're gonna have to write a long article again in a few weeks. That is true, but I realized I

01:02:34   want to go to WWDC

01:02:37   with an article that maybe people can read during the trip to San Jose.

01:02:42   And I wanted to make sure that I will have something that people will keep thinking of at

01:02:49   WWDC, like have people go to San Jose with this article on their minds and

01:02:54   to sort of have one final update because I know that iOS 13 is gonna change things right for the iPad and

01:03:01   I didn't want all my experiments and all my setup changes and all my research go to waste

01:03:09   So I want to have like one final

01:03:12   update one final sort of like state of the Union type of article before

01:03:17   PwC so that people would keep thinking of that so that maybe I could

01:03:21   They could draw some comparisons between my article and what ends up being in iOS 13

01:03:26   but also I wanted to

01:03:29   This is effectively for me an investment in my sanity going forward because in my iOS 13 review

01:03:37   I will not have to waste, well not waste, but you know spend as much time

01:03:42   on offering

01:03:45   historical context for

01:03:47   or "This is how file management used to be" or "This is how multitasking used to be"

01:03:51   because I've already done the work in May and April. So that's why.

01:03:59   Does this feel like a new annual story? Or is this like you wanted to catch everybody

01:04:04   up and then there's that?

01:04:06   Yeah, not an annual thing. I've done iPad stories before, I've done one in 2014 with

01:04:17   the iPad or two and I did one in 2016 for the first year of the iPad Pro, I think.

01:04:27   I don't see myself doing an iPad state of the union like this every year.

01:04:33   Maybe every couple of years.

01:04:34   I don't know if I would do a story of this scope again.

01:04:38   There's only so much you can say about like here's why I use the iPad and I said I don't

01:04:42   want to repeat myself every couple of years.

01:04:45   I'm going to talk about this later, if you accept the fact that I like to work on the

01:04:48   iPad, well, this is it. This is why. I cannot see myself in 2021 or something, saying again,

01:04:58   "Well, it was 2012 when I was doing chemo, and that's why I started using the app." It's

01:05:02   not a story that I want to tell every couple of years.

01:05:05   I think you did it justice by using the review layout on the site, because A, there's just

01:05:11   so much here. Reading it as a flat blog post would have been difficult. But I

01:05:17   think it's nice because it's broken up that say that multitasking gets a big

01:05:22   overhaul in a couple weeks or you know shortcuts get some amazing overhaul in

01:05:28   five years. You've built it for your use case of referring to it in the

01:05:34   future that you can point people to a direct section and say this is

01:05:38   you need to go if you want the background. And I think it deserves this sort of fancy layout,

01:05:43   because it is such an incredible piece of work. The animations are amazing. You guys talked to

01:05:48   Brian who helped you with the animations on App Stories this week. People should go check that out.

01:05:52   But it feels as a reader like the big story that it is. And I like that you've sort of

01:05:59   put a flag in the ground saying this is where we are with iOS 12 up to this point.

01:06:05   Because A, clearly you believe that iOS 13 has the ability to change a bunch of this stuff,

01:06:11   and that hopefully there's a lot of these complaints and issues in here just won't be

01:06:14   a problem in two weeks. But even if they're not, it's sort of a capturing a moment in time with

01:06:23   where you are with it. And even if things don't change in two weeks, they will hopefully change

01:06:28   in the future. And I think that's kind of important when considering a platform that's

01:06:34   that's still as dynamic as iOS on the iPad.

01:06:36   - Thank you, yeah.

01:06:38   I hope that's the case.

01:06:39   I mean, even if iOS 13 ends up being a major disappointment

01:06:42   for the iPad, there's still this article,

01:06:44   it's still gonna be valid.

01:06:46   But one of the, you mentioned capturing a moment in time,

01:06:51   one of the things that is always difficult for me

01:06:55   is to strike a balance between what is personal

01:06:58   and what can be also relatable for other people.

01:07:01   like, when I'm writing a personal story like this one, it's about my usage of the iPad.

01:07:06   Am I writing it for me or am I writing it for other people? And of course, I want to

01:07:10   make sure that other people, that readers, can get something out of it. So those sections

01:07:15   that I cut, where they felt to me a little too personal, like I was writing them just

01:07:23   as a personal research exercise and not with... they were not something that I felt that readers

01:07:30   could get some value out of. And so striking this balance of, for example, the podcasting

01:07:36   setup from the Chapter 5, the external accessories, that is incredibly personal. And in the sense

01:07:45   that it's the setup that I like that works for me that I do not recommend to other people

01:07:50   because I wrote as much in the story. But it underlines a bigger point of how does the

01:07:58   iPad Pro work with external USB and audio accessories in the context of the USB-C port

01:08:06   in the 2018 iPad Pro?"

01:08:07   And the answer is, it's pretty terrible.

01:08:10   But still, it kind of works for me.

01:08:12   And so, that, despite the extremely personal nature, it felt like a good example.

01:08:17   So that really was the... when I was working on the notes and the mind map before I started

01:08:24   writing, going through all the sections and trying to apply this filter of "is this something that I

01:08:31   that I'm gonna have fun writing about?" but also "is this gonna be useful in the context of

01:08:36   does it prove a bigger point? Does it fit the underlying theme of the story?" and if it did not,

01:08:43   then it got cut. So yeah, I really like the conclusion. There was like one line that really

01:08:49   resonated with me in a way that I wasn't expecting. So you were kind of talking about the fact that

01:08:53   that when Steve Jobs introduced the iPad,

01:08:56   it was referred to as like this third device, right?

01:08:59   That like your iPhone is great for this

01:09:01   and your Mac is great for this,

01:09:03   but sometimes wouldn't it be nice

01:09:04   if each of them had a bit of each other

01:09:06   and there could be this device in the middle?

01:09:08   And it was like, oh, here's the third device.

01:09:11   So you say today the iPad Pro is my laptop,

01:09:13   the iPhone is my pocket computer,

01:09:15   and the Mac is the third device

01:09:16   that's better at specific tasks.

01:09:18   I didn't really realize that that's kind of where I am,

01:09:21   but it is where I am.

01:09:22   And it's just, it's my own personal use cases

01:09:25   for these devices that has led me to this position.

01:09:28   But it is kind of funny to see that like, you know,

01:09:31   nearly 10 years later, that the idea of the third device

01:09:34   for some people has changed and that's kind of where we are.

01:09:39   And I really, really heavily resonate with that.

01:09:42   - Yeah, I'm pleased that you liked that.

01:09:45   And it sort of, it plays into this theme,

01:09:49   this idea that there's some people out there who believe that certain design decisions

01:09:57   are sacred, they should never change, and whatever Steve Jobs decided ten years ago

01:10:02   should be forever. And you see this in UI design, you see this in hardware design, and

01:10:08   I think that's a sad outlook, that's a sad way, and really a limited way to look at not

01:10:14   not just technological progress, but life. Because time moves on and things change. And

01:10:23   the iPad maybe started as a way to read a book or read the New York Times or just chill

01:10:29   on the sofa and browse the web. But it is so obvious that over time it has become so

01:10:36   much more. And not because Myke Hurley and Federico are making this up or are sort of

01:10:43   trying to make this a trend.

01:10:44   So it's not propaganda that we're attempting to spread.

01:10:47   Apple is selling an iPad called the iPad Pro.

01:10:50   Like, I couldn't make this up if I wanted to.

01:10:52   It exists.

01:10:53   It's a thing that Apple is selling.

01:10:55   And we're just following the evolution of this product.

01:10:58   And so I was concerned about using that analogy

01:11:03   or sort of trying to flip that quote on its head

01:11:06   and say the iPad is now the notebook

01:11:09   and the Mac is the third device.

01:11:11   because I, you know, I'm going to talk about this in a bit, but I try whenever possible

01:11:18   not to make people upset. And while this may be, you know, I say a bunch of silly things

01:11:24   on this show, but I feel like listeners know that I'm kidding, I hope. Like, for example,

01:11:30   I can be friends with non-good looking people. Like, I've...

01:11:35   No, no, you, everyone, you should see what he's been texting us during the show. It's

01:11:40   horrific the things he's been saying.

01:11:42   Sure. I feel like listeners can separate, on a podcast I feel like listeners can separate

01:11:48   sort of the character that I play sometimes with the real person that's doing the podcast.

01:11:54   But when I write something that is taken, like it gets passed around and people take

01:12:01   screenshots and they quote sections on Reddit. You know how it goes. It's easier for something

01:12:08   that you write to be used against you. And so I was concerned about that quote, but the

01:12:14   more I thought about it, the better it felt and it felt true. And then when I shared it

01:12:19   with you, you told me this is true for me as well. And so that was like, well, I guess

01:12:23   I'm just going for it. So I'm glad that it worked.

01:12:27   What is the other point that you wanted to make about this stuff?

01:12:30   Yeah. Well, I guess it comes with the territory of whenever I publish these stories, there's

01:12:38   a subset of people in this community, the community of folks who read max stories and

01:12:45   maybe they're in fireball and maybe listen to a few relay shows, that they believe that

01:12:52   I and others are on some kind of payroll by Apple and that we're just spreading propaganda

01:12:59   like you said or that it's in our interest to write positive things about Apple because

01:13:06   I genuinely believe, those people believe we get paid, which is not true, obviously.

01:13:12   I get paid because I'm fortunate enough to have sponsors and subscribers.

01:13:18   But it's one thing to believe that, and it's totally fair.

01:13:23   But I was taking a look on Reddit and Twitter, and there's some comments that really make

01:13:33   you think like what is it the the image that people have of what I do and just

01:13:39   scrolling through the reddit thread I was called a snake oil seller yeah yeah

01:13:48   I'm trying to think of all the other things yeah like this idea that the iPad

01:13:55   is terrible therefore if you write about working on the iPad you are writing

01:14:00   false information because all you care about is being considered by Apple for

01:14:07   whatever reason they believe, whatever crazy theory they have. And also there's

01:14:14   the fact that every time I write about the iPad, and I make

01:14:21   sure to convey this point, I'm not trying to prove that the iPad is better than

01:14:28   the Mac for everybody, I'm trying to prove that it's better for me, and that maybe by

01:14:34   sharing my experiences, there's going to be other people who can find that useful.

01:14:41   But I never try to say "Apple should stop selling Macs", or "The Mac is done, goodbye

01:14:46   Mac class".

01:14:48   The entire point of this article is that I beli—and I literally wrote this and quoted

01:14:54   this and used pull quotes throughout the story to highlight this point is that I believe there are

01:15:00   certain ideas that Mac OS got right decades ago and that Apple should maybe take a look at those

01:15:06   ideas again and reconsider them for iOS. But there's still a few folks who tweet at me and

01:15:13   share comments on Reddit. This is ridiculous. Well, trolls can't be bothered to actually read

01:15:21   read what you write. So the type of people who are going to throw grenades on Twitter

01:15:27   aren't the type to actually take what you say seriously. They just want to troll.

01:15:34   Look I am used to this, right? I've been doing this for 10 years. All these being called

01:15:40   names, there's folks who call me pathetic or ridiculous and I wish I was kidding but

01:15:45   this is actual, these are actual words that people use for an article. First of all, I

01:15:49   I think it's said that, no, not for me, it's said for you that, you know, instead of, like,

01:15:55   you want to criticize my work, fine, but why would you need to call anybody, not just mean

01:15:59   names on the internet. It's really not classy or elegant. It's really not a, personally

01:16:05   speaking, I don't think it's a good, you know, it's a good way to live your life, to call

01:16:09   other people pathetic or ridiculous. But I think it's, what saddens me is that for some

01:16:18   people I am not able to convey the fact that I genuinely believe in what I write. And it's

01:16:26   that some people always see the conspiracy behind it. They believe that I'm doing this

01:16:37   because Apple is paying me. And I wish there was a way for me to fix those people, like

01:16:44   to say, "Why don't you believe me?" Not because I need them, but because it makes me sad that

01:16:50   they think that of me, right? It's like, I don't know, maybe I'm not able to convey my

01:16:56   feelings here, but it's just, I find it sad that this is generally what I believe in and

01:17:04   what I'm passionate about. I guess it's just impossible to please everybody, and there's

01:17:09   always going to be, especially once you put your work on the internet, there's always

01:17:14   gonna be folks, you know, from nine-year-olds to, you know, old people who've been using

01:17:20   computers for 50 years. It's always gonna be somebody that doesn't like you, for whatever

01:17:25   reason. That is fine, but it still saddens me to an extent. So, yeah, wow, that felt

01:17:31   good to say this. Yeah. Yeah. But let's not focus on that, though, right? No, no. That's

01:17:37   not what this is about. Like, you've produced something which is very interesting and I

01:17:42   I think quite important. I'm very happy with it. I'm very honestly I'm very happy with what I did.

01:17:46   Yeah good you should be I mean it's wonderful like so I just don't want you to

01:17:50   One obviously you shouldn't think of it that way, but I don't want I'll listen is the thing that that's what this is about

01:17:56   This conversation. Yeah. Yeah, totally

01:17:58   that the vast majority of people have been extremely kind and and like the response I

01:18:06   I was not expecting to have the kind of response that an iOS review would get in September

01:18:11   when there's more attention and people have been looking forward to that in May, which

01:18:16   is incredible.

01:18:17   So I'm extremely happy for the overall reception and response from readers and everybody else.

01:18:24   So it's just, you know, those people, they're still on my mind sometimes, but I'm very happy,

01:18:30   honestly.

01:18:31   Yes, I feel very good.

01:18:32   Good.

01:18:33   You should be.

01:18:34   You deserve that.

01:18:35   It's an incredible piece.

01:18:36   obviously linked in the show notes, take some time, go through it and you will enjoy it.

01:18:41   And for somebody like me, who I am primarily on the Mac, I went through it and downloaded

01:18:47   three or four apps and a bunch of shortcuts because like as you were talking about things

01:18:51   like, Oh, that'd be great if I could solve this or do it this way. And I think I think

01:18:56   the biggest example for me is the local storage deal. So in the files app, there is on my

01:19:03   iPad storage and then there's a bunch of folders for apps that populate things there.

01:19:08   But as a user I can't put things there and there's a third-party app that basically fixes

01:19:12   that.

01:19:13   It's like, "Oh, this is something I need right now and now it's on both my devices."

01:19:18   So it's not just Federico talking about Federico things.

01:19:22   There is real everyday use tips and things in here that are useful to all sorts of people.

01:19:29   So thank you for improving the stuff I'm doing on the iPad by letting me read it.

01:19:34   Anything else to talk about this?

01:19:36   You're still going to do your iOS 13 review.

01:19:39   Is there anything you're going to take from this into that review?

01:19:43   I know you mentioned that now you feel like you don't have to do as much backstory in

01:19:47   the review, but are there certain things that came up in this article that you're going

01:19:51   to make sure to touch on again in the fall?

01:19:53   Yeah, I mean all the core chapters, so file management and working with external keyboard

01:20:01   and shortcuts, all of those will be key areas of interest in the review. I guess something that I

01:20:09   took away from working on this is that maybe the review layout could use some modernization on the

01:20:17   the website we've been using this special layout for the iOS 11 review, iOS 12 review,

01:20:23   and now this story. So there's probably a few... I don't want to change it, like I don't

01:20:28   want to have an entirely new design, but I would like to do some improvements this summer,

01:20:34   if we have time. So there's a few things that I would like to improve. I'm definitely going

01:20:39   to do the 3D rendered animation again.

01:20:45   Yeah, working with Brian has been awesome.

01:20:48   And the freedom of having 3D models instead

01:20:52   of static 2D templates in Sketch or Photoshop

01:20:56   has been so much better.

01:20:57   Yes, please.

01:20:57   Every time.

01:20:58   Because we can try all sorts of crazy ideas.

01:20:59   And maybe even increasing the output of those images,

01:21:04   not just to use them for the initial page of a chapter,

01:21:08   but maybe more throughout a chapter. That would be nice. I guess the entire setup that I had for

01:21:17   writing this story, so using iA writer in combination with working copy and scriptable,

01:21:23   has been awesome. We, thanks to Brett Terpstra, he made a very custom, very extremely specific

01:21:34   template for IA Writer that allowed me to preview the story with the same special layout

01:21:41   that I would get on Mac Stories on the website.

01:21:44   I was able to preview the table of contents navigation, the chapter images, everything inside of IA Writer.

01:21:50   So that saved me so much time and just being able to manage my screenshots locally

01:21:56   with Scriptable, NIKL Drive, and IA Writer all together. It was incredible. So the entire writing setup,

01:22:04   I'm glad that it took me a couple of weeks to get it right, but that worked extremely well.

01:22:11   I was able to upload basically 150 screenshots in a couple of hours.

01:22:17   In one afternoon.

01:22:19   But then this is the other part, you now don't need to spend the first two weeks of June

01:22:24   working out what your setup's going to be for your review this year.

01:22:27   Yeah, which is also going to be super, super useful.

01:22:30   That's a big benefit because you know that it always takes me a couple of weeks to say,

01:22:34   "Hmm, what am I going to use this time for research and all of that?" So yeah, also moving

01:22:40   from Evernote to Apple Notes before working on this story also helped. I was very surprised

01:22:48   that I would...

01:22:49   Just helped my general mental state.

01:22:51   Yes. Yeah, totally, totally. But really, to give you a timeline, I basically started writing

01:22:59   on April 14, and I was done in two weeks with the writing.

01:23:06   So 50,000 words done in two weeks, and then two, three,

01:23:13   three more weeks of editing.

01:23:15   So two weeks of writing, three weeks of editing.

01:23:18   I wrote super fast, because it was so much easier

01:23:22   to write than an iOS review.

01:23:24   Because I was writing out of personal experience.

01:23:28   And if anything, you could argue that the research had been done for seven years before,

01:23:36   not in two weeks at the beginning of the beta season.

01:23:41   And it was a very different process.

01:23:44   I didn't have to keep track of beta one and beta two and beta three and all the changes

01:23:48   in all the betas.

01:23:49   It was like, this is how I use the iPad.

01:23:51   This is stuff that I already know, so I can just write.

01:23:54   I don't need to wait for developer documentation to go live.

01:23:59   I can just write what I know.

01:24:01   And it was a nice change of pace from an iOS review.

01:24:04   If you want to find links to all the stuff

01:24:06   we spoke about this week, you can head over to the website,

01:24:09   relay.fm/connected/244.

01:24:13   While you're there, you can get in touch.

01:24:15   There's an email link there in the sidebar

01:24:17   for feedback and follow-up,

01:24:18   or of course you can do that on Twitter.

01:24:21   You can find Federico there as Vitici, V-I-T-I-C-C-I,

01:24:25   and he is the editor-in-chief of maxstories.net.

01:24:28   You can find Myke online as I-M-Y-K-E,

01:24:31   and Myke is the co-host of a bunch of shows

01:24:33   here on Relay FM.

01:24:36   You can find my writing online at 512pixels.net.

01:24:40   You can find me on Twitter as ismh.

01:24:43   As a reminder, we are doing a live show

01:24:45   in August in San Francisco.

01:24:47   That link is in the show notes.

01:24:49   If you're going to be in the area, we would love to see you.

01:24:52   It's going to be a really special evening.

01:24:54   I'd like to thank our sponsors this week, Backblaze, FreshBooks, and TextExpander.

01:25:00   And until next time, gentlemen, say goodbye.

01:25:02   Adios.

01:25:03   Adios.

01:25:04   Adios.