I know a guy who thinks it's great that, when a process pegs his phone's CPU, he can drop into a root shell and kill -9 it from top.
I think it's great that in five years of iPhone ownership that's not a problem I've ever had, or even had to think about. And the only Apple service I use is the app store.
Horses for courses. If you want total control and software freedom, you won't prefer an iPhone. If you want the closest available approximation to appliance-level reliability, you won't prefer anything else.
The other issue for me actually is that while I might like to drop into a shell sometimes I don't really feel Android phones offer me much in that regard either.
Android is far for a standard Linux/UNIX system. And it's hard to build one on top of Android because of their use of BIONIC rather than glibc.
So, I feel that Android has taken Linux and crippled it to suit their ends. To me jailbroken iPhones felt much more like standard UNIX phones than Android phones.
My ideal phone doesn't exist. But he iPhone is still the nearest match right now.
I use macOS every day, and I love it. And it is me who owns the hardware, and who is root on the device (I can't say I own the software). If I want to kill a process on macOS, I am free to do this. I don't have this freedom on iOS. On my Android phone I have the freedom to root the device (which is sort of supported by Fairphone), and if ever the OS isn't supported anymore I can just run CM or LineageOS or stock Android on it myself. You don't have that liberty on iOS devices. Jailbreaking on iOS isn't very feasible because you end up having to run code to exploit iOS. Which means your phone has a known vulnerability which you want to get fixed. But you can't without the source.
Right. But, to my earlier point, you never really need to, either, because the OS does a good enough job of managing resources that such intervention is not required. I'm sure there exist corner cases, but having never hit one in half a decade of extensive use, I am prepared to argue they are vanishingly rare.
That's the tradeoff: a lower granularity of control over the system, in exchange for a system well enough designed that such granularity is not required for stable and performant operation. There's an argument to be made that the tradeoff shouldn't exist, but that's theoretical unless Craig Federighi is actually on the panel. Here in the world of things that are, it's worth keeping in mind that the compromise is exactly that: yes, we give something up, but we get something in exchange for it, too.
> Right. But, to my earlier point, you never really need to, either, because the OS does a good enough job of managing resources that such intervention is not required.
What do you mean? I'm not aware of any SSH which fulfils my needs on iOS. Or Android for that matter. On Jolla (and MeeGo/Maemo) you had a CLI at your command. The conundrum is you don't know what you're missing unless you had it before to begin with. Case in point: there's an entire generation of children raising up with touchscreens. That exposure has a price.
What do you consider the best browser on macOS? I don't consider Safari the best one. YMMV. At least you and I got the freedom to run another browser on macOS (those versions of Firefox and Chrome on iOS are not the real deal). I got the freedom to run Tmux, Vim. I got the freedom to compile my own version of OpenSSH which includes a patch for additional functionality. I get to decide which browser extensions I get to run (without having to rely on Apple to decide which extensions are allowed for Safari). I get to configure ssh and sshd. I'd like to take the risk myself of taking it for granted when/if it breaks.
I am actually OK with all of this as long as I don't have to rely overly on my phone. However, smartphones have become so important now, and I end up having and needing a MBP to make up for it. There's going to be a time where the computers (smartphones, tablets, etc) running iOS are so powerful that you can easily run a lot more on them. And, with that progress, they become less of an embedded device and therefore the freedom to decide what you run is increased.
Finally, there's Apple who decides who's in and who's out. Americans are totally cool with violence of all sorts and kinds, but as soon as the first thing a baby sucks on is shown its suddenly drama. I find that bollocks, and I don't want to be scrutinised to such a culture deciding on what I am and am not allowed to run on my device. The device I (not an American) worked hard for to afford, the device I bought, and the device I own (not rent). No, Google isn't perfect either; Google earns money via advertising, Google just blocked an anti adware extension in Chrome called Ad Nauseam, and they also don't allow certain software in GCM.
I'm talking about having to sysadmin one's phone. You seem to be roving all over the map, from cultural standards of sex vs. violence to an advertising provider's choices in walled garden curation. I'm confused.
You say crippled, one might say made it useful for the cause. One huge feature of Android was and is the application packaging, which is a PITA on desktop Linux to this date.
> I think it's great that in five years of iPhone ownership that's not a problem I've ever had
I wonder what it is that your acquaintance and I do differently than you? I've been an iPhone user for a bit less than two years, and I am frustrated with it almost every day. Of course, the same was true of my HTC and Samsung Android phones previously, and even to some degree of the Nokia N900 (still the best phone I ever had).
It is not a common occurrence, but every now and then I do have some issue where my iPhone freezes and I have to reboot it to get it to come back. More commonly, miscellaneous things go wrong, like text in some areas becoming invisible, or opening an application showing me a blank screen for twenty seconds before the application either comes up or silently quits for no apparent reason. Most frustratingly, the sequence of touches I need to go through to do something requires me to react to each individual screen that results, rather than being something that I can do all at once, or even just being fast enough that I'm not paused, waiting, while some application screen takes its time loading.
If the delays were consistent, I wouldn't be very upset about it, because I would expect a certain time in between each action. If the phone could keep up the UI interactions, then that would be even better.
And typing lag... don't get me started. :(
I feel like expectations for hardware that is unrelated to the function of my phone has gone way, way up (thinness, smooth edges, tiny bezels) and the attention to the actual functioning of the phone in a consistent and timely manner is now much worse than it used to be, all around.
Well, I'm running 9.3.5 on an SE, so there's that.
In general I tend to agree with those who argue that Apple's peaked and is going downhill, and I accordingly expect that, whatever the new bells and whistles, iOS 10 will work less well for things I actually do every day (like typing!) than iOS 9 does, which in turn has been a regression from iOS 8. The hardware's not improving, either, and I don't think Apple has correctly understood occurrences like the difference between expected and actual demand for the SE versus the 7 and 7+.
But, as best I can judge from the experience of Android-owning acquaintances and colleagues, for all iOS' and the iPhone's flaws, it's still by far the most solidly reliable smartphone platform on the market, and that's what counts the most for me. Others who feel differently will make different choices, and that's fine. I don't see why people seem to want to make such a big fight about it.
>Standing up for your right to lock-in your data with a single vendor?
Apple didn't lock me in, I gladly locked myself in, because Apple's ecosystem is cohesive in a way that nobody else even comes close to.
I love being able to make and receive calls and texts from my MacBook, I love having my documents in the cloud waiting for me wherever I am, I love being able to start browsing a site on my laptop and transfer it seamlessly to my phone on my way out the door, I love being able to take photos while I'm out and have them sitting on my PC before I even get home, and most of all I love that all of these things just happen without me even having to think about it.
There are a million different options for me, I could very easily switch to Android and use a dozen different services like Dropbox and Flickr and whatever the messaging app du jour is on Android these days to achieve the same results, but why on earth would I want to?
Google docs, drive and photos do those things and way better than apple imo. If the cohesiveness of the ecosystem is your most important measure, google is second to none.
Great, so that's one small part of the ecosystem covered, how about handoff between apps on my phone and apps on my laptop? How about a unified messaging system that lets me send SMS messages and make phone calls from my laptop?
Google is fine if all you need is the sliver Google offers, and if you're okay with Google doing their level best to violate your privacy, but there's so much more to Apple's ecosystem that nobody has replicated right now.
Sending SMS from the laptop can be nice for the same reasons I sometimes use the web versions of WhatsApp, Messenger and Telegram (days of long conversations), but making calls... Do they hand over to the phone if you want to walk to another room without bringing the laptop with you? I start only business calls on my laptop with Skype or Hangout, because I know I'll be at the keyboard working while speaking. Calls with friends, those start on the phone almost always.
App integration between phone and laptop looks nice but in fact for most people all it matters is email and files, mostly pictures and musing. Those are covered by Google and possibly by Dropbox, plus some streaming service.
Anyway, yes, even a slight edge over the competitors is better than no edge.
Yes... FaceTime handles both audio and video calls so that you can unlock your phone and the call transfers to the handset. It's really, really convenient. Throw in an iPad and the Handoff/Coherence features are really, really awesome.
I don't really feel my data is locked in to any great degree.
I don't use iCloud for backup. I use my own mail provider. What lock-in are you referring to? I think it would be pretty painless for me to move to Android if I wanted.
I agree the AppStore is more limiting than some alternatives, but overall I think Apple have more interest in user rights than Google.
Android development is not paid for through licensing fees (to any great degree) it's paid for by advertising via Google being the default service/search provider on the platform. This puts you in the position of the advertiser being the customer and the phone user being more like the product.
I personally prefer the Apple model where the phone user is the customer. However I do realize it's not entirely ideal. It just feels like the best option currently available to me.
> Standing up for your right to not use your device as you please?
What right? Most people (but not enough) have some sense that privacy is an actual right. The number of people who think that it's a right that every device you own with an MCU or CPU should be a completely open general programming platform is a fraction of a percent.
> Standing up for your right to lock-in your data with a single vendor?
What lock-in? You can have all your iPhone data (contacts, notes, etc.) on Gmail if you want, you can have all your photos synchronized to Dropbox. Which data are you referring to?
I have to be honest and say that this comment comes off as a knee-jerk reaction. I mean, you probably have some valid criticism in there if you worded it better. It would definitely be much better for us geeks if iPhone was more open. But a right? Get real.
> What right? Most people (but not enough) have some sense that privacy is an actual right. The number of people who think that it's a right that every device you own with an MCU or CPU should be a completely open general programming platform is a fraction of a percent.
Ultimately, those are the same thing. There is no privacy if you can't inspect it and verify that it's upholding its promises.
> What lock-in? You can have all your iPhone data (contacts, notes, etc.) on Gmail if you want, you can have all your photos synchronized to Dropbox. Which data are you referring to?
If you've used one word processor, how do you open them in another without using any external service?
> Ultimately, those are the same thing. There is no privacy if you can't inspect it and verify that it's upholding its promises.
If you want to go down that road the software you need to inspect includes all the software with access to your data.
In android's case this includes all sorts of proprietary code running in google's infrastructure that you'll never see. If you enable all the features of a modern android phone the amount of data google tracks about you is staggering. All that data is available to any government that asks for it directly from google. Google is actively incentivised to data mine, use and sell my data. I don't think they sell it - but thats the direction the incentive arrows point.
If you want to roll your own, or use one of the non-google android forks then I respect that decision from a privacy standpoint. (Although my security engineer voice is much more nervous.) But stock android is a privacy disaster (at least if you worry about google / the US govt). The ability to root your device is nice, but in google's ecosystem the computers that really matter are the servers.
> Funny that, does Apple allow push notifications without telling APNS about the notification message yet?
Yes, of course they do. That's what remote-notification UIBackgroundMode is for. How did you think encrypted messaging apps like WhatsApp and Signal showed message previews?
> There is no privacy if you can't inspect it and verify that it's upholding its promises.
But unless you're a top-end OS developer AND a top-end embedded systems designer at the same time, how are you going to analyse something as complex as the iPhone and verify that?
Sure, you can see the code / source / raw binary. But actually analysing and verifying every part for security or privacy concerns - bearing in mind you have to consider all the possible interactions this code can generate - and that's before you even get to the hardware interactions - is still beyond 99% of developers, never mind normal people.
I was speaking to "There is no privacy if you can't inspect it and verify that it's upholding its promises" actually, and I probably agree with you, as your point applies just as much to open source.
Do you live in the Rainforest without internet access ? I mean.. even the simple action of switching on the light of your living room , triggers data that later on will be sold and use by third party companies... please.
I think it's great that in five years of iPhone ownership that's not a problem I've ever had, or even had to think about. And the only Apple service I use is the app store.
Horses for courses. If you want total control and software freedom, you won't prefer an iPhone. If you want the closest available approximation to appliance-level reliability, you won't prefer anything else.