Knew About the Dollar Signs
John:
Did you try that translucent menu bar thing, by the way, that I pasted?
John:
No, because... I guess you have to... Don't you have to, like, kill system UI server to make it take effect?
John:
Something like that.
John:
Yeah, please don't do that while podcasting.
Casey:
Over the years, I've come to the conclusion, and I think I first heard this from Dan Benjamin, and I think, for me, he was right about this, that...
Casey:
It is a happier experience for you, whoever you is, if you customize or if you insist on as few customizations to vanilla macOS or iOS as possible.
Casey:
Obviously, every one of us, myself included, has plenty of customizations that you consider critical to me on a new installation of macOS and same with iOS.
Casey:
But...
Casey:
I try to choose wisely and I try to choose things that usually just amount to installing like an app or something like that.
Casey:
And this is not, I mean, it's a default, right?
Casey:
Like I understand what it is.
Casey:
It's not hard to do.
Casey:
It's something I am perfectly capable of doing.
Casey:
But the fact that I didn't even notice that the darn menu bar was translucent until you said something means, you know what?
Casey:
It's probably just not worth it to worry about it.
Casey:
And I'm okay with that.
John:
I disagree with that philosophy.
John:
I understand it.
John:
Maybe if you're hoteling in a world where you have to use other people's generic computers all the time that you don't want to customize, but I'm in the opposite camp.
John:
I'm not going to live with some minor annoyance for years and years just because it's like, oh, if I happen to find myself a stranger's computer that's a default setup, I'll be able to do it.
John:
And if I get a new computer, I'll just be able to use that out of the box.
John:
But that's not true because migration system has been great for so many years.
John:
People always ask me, do you do a clean install or do you...
John:
upgrade install i upgrade install i've been upgrading install forever and apple's upgrading stalls have historically both on classic mac os and on os 10 and mac os or the hell it's called now have been really good about keeping all your crap and yes that's why i have like
John:
uh resource fork based preference file sitting in my library folder on my mac but it just keeps your settings like i that's why you know if i ever do set up a new mac i'm faced with like well how did i set this up because it's a setting that i changed i ran a default right command like in panther right and it's still it's still carrying over right because the plist file is there and it's just
John:
that's what i want it like it's such a you get such bang for your buck out of it uh if you just keep doing upgrade installs because it'll just carry everything over and it's perfectly fine it's not like windows you have to wipe out your whole computer don't be afraid of the upgrade install uh embrace it and there are lots of cool products out there
John:
cool to varying degrees that will that will script your like so you got a new mac this thing will apply all your settings but i i felt like all of them i've looked into a lot of them some of them are based on puppet which is a little bit scary because puppets a little bit wonky but uh google uses one based on puppet i think but there's all sorts of solutions like that even just some people have a giant like shell script that they run that does a bunch of things but you don't need any of that if you just do upgrade installs so
John:
don't be afraid to customize your computer uh it is a good idea to keep a text file around to just remind you what the customizations are which is what i did when i got my new mac at work because i wasn't upgrade installing from anything right but for your home computers you don't have that problem you can use migration assistant connected with ethernet wi-fi firewire i recommend using the fastest connection possible to bring all your crap over from your old computer to your new one
Marco:
Yeah, I kind of use both extremes.
Marco:
I hardly ever upgrade my desktop, both hardware and software-wise.
Marco:
And when I do update to the newest OS on my desktop or get a new desktop, I always do upgrade installs or migrations.
Marco:
It's fine.
Marco:
However, on my laptops, which I'm buying at increasing frequencies, I almost always do clean installs because it's like my secondary system.
Marco:
Usually, I am less careful with what I install on it, like when I installed that collection of trucks.
Marco:
I am usually more willing to experiment on it.
Marco:
So, for instance, right now, my laptop has High Sierra on it.
Marco:
My desktop does not.
Marco:
um so my laptop i'm always doing clean installs uh my laptops i guess i should say and my desktop uh i always upgrade and i've been carrying over the same installation my desktop for a long time now i think in my entire time using max since 2004 i think i've done two clean installs on my desktop or maybe one and
Marco:
it's it's a small number uh and everything else was just upgrades and and it's been totally fine uh you know like john i probably have a lot of clutter that i could get rid of but it's also just you know i have so many things set up just the way i like them and so many little details here and there and i can tell because when i go use a cleanly installed laptop that i have purchased you know for this quarter uh i can always tell like oh wow this thing doesn't work right or this is kind of not quite there oh i wish i had this thing here uh that i have my desktop set up so
Marco:
There are benefits of both, but certainly, if you're like me and you came from the Windows world, where it was basically a horrible idea to ever upgrade.
Marco:
In the Windows world, when I was in it, you should only ever have done clean installs.
Marco:
And even when you weren't changing Windows versions, you should probably do a clean install of your OS like every six months, which I did.
Marco:
Because Windows is so bad.
Marco:
At least it was.
Marco:
I don't know if Windows is any better.
Marco:
I haven't honestly been a Windows user in literally 10, 12 years now at least.
Marco:
So it might be better now.
Marco:
Although one thing Windows doesn't do very well is change.
Marco:
So we'll see.
Marco:
I'm sure we'll hear in the feedback with that.
Marco:
But yeah, so I've seen both.
Marco:
And I would say on a Mac, you don't need to do clean installs for the most part, almost any time ever.
Marco:
I only do it on my laptops more as a curiosity and cleanliness thing and experimentation.
John:
You guys should run ls-tl tilde slash library slash preferences and then look at the last line of output.
Casey:
Slow down.
John:
Just find the oldest item in your library preferences folder.
John:
I was just giving you a way to do it.
John:
2011 for me.
John:
What's your last item, Casey?
Casey:
uh today so the last item uh december 31st 1969 uh january 18 of 2016 which is when i got the computer so i did that matches my yeah that matches my recollection which is that this was a clean and what is marco what is your your your last item there what it actually is it what preference
Marco:
It's a whole bunch of lock files, P-list lock files.
John:
Ah, great.
John:
Yeah, those are great.
John:
Leftover from programs that crashed while they were in the middle of locking something and nothing ever cleaned up the lock files.
Marco:
Yeah, and it's just, you know, it's all like, you know, the com.apple and bezel services, app store, address book, you know, stuff like that.
John:
yeah so i must have done a good job cleaning out the resource-based ones although bbeta probably still has ones but i moved a lot of bbeta stuff to dropbox so it's synced between machines that's another preference hack by the way if program supported you can sim link things into your dropbox and then your preferences will be the same everywhere you install dropbox but anyway my bottom item is from 2003 adobe registration database i've also got in their folder an aladdin folder and com.ambresia sw.evnova.plist
John:
lots of good stuff there so 2003 and i i think i must have gone through and cleaned out a bunch of stuff uh before this so that's that's how at the very least that's how long i've been doing upgrade installs that have carried over to this exact computer in the early days of mac os 10 things were a little bit sketchier so i probably lost a bunch of my folders at various points 2004 2005 if i scroll up 2006 every year is represented just the preferences never preferences never go away
Casey:
So we should start with follow-up.
Casey:
And we have some follow-up with regard to the Google Pixel.
Casey:
And we had a handful of people write in various degrees of anger, mostly just emails, about how we didn't really give Google enough credit.
Casey:
And this happens every time we talk about Google.
Casey:
And I think some of it is justified, like I said.
Casey:
I mean, it's not unreasonable for someone to say, hey, you know, we don't know Google In-N-Out like we at least think we know Apple.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
But one of the things that we had said, and I think it was me especially that had said, was that I thought it was kind of bogus that my buddy at work could pre-order his, or maybe just straight up order, his Google Pixel 2 XL maybe?
Casey:
whatever it was that he ordered.
John:
Anyway, he ordered it.
Casey:
Yeah, exactly.
Casey:
Which, by the way, whatever joke you made, what was it you said?
Casey:
Pixel 210 or something like 10L?
Casey:
Yeah, that joke was much better than I gave you credit for because it flew right over my head when it happened.
Casey:
So I'd like to publicly acknowledge that I missed it on the last episode.
Casey:
But anyway, I was lamenting that it's a bummer that I have to wake up at 3 in the morning to give Apple a whole shed load of my money, which of course I don't have to do, but that's what I need to do if I want to get it in a timely fashion because I'm...
Casey:
and entitled Materialistic American.
Casey:
So Hans Hauer, I hope I pronounced that right.
Casey:
I asked for help.
Casey:
I hope I got that right.
Casey:
Wrote in to say, you know, Apple launches the iPhone 8 in more than 25 countries and will add dozens more this year.
Casey:
The old Pixel, the original Pixel, so a year ago Pixel, is still only available in six countries, which I thought was a really interesting point.
Casey:
So here it is.
Casey:
I'm beating up on Apple for not really doing the pre-order the way I wanted it at the time I wanted it.
Casey:
But, you know, this is a really good point that Apple is shipping to way more places and presumably shipping far more phones than Google is.
Casey:
And that comes with it some penalty, for lack of a better word, in that it's just harder to do.
Marco:
Yeah.
Marco:
And I mean, that also even restricts like what kind of component choices and manufacturing methods that Apple and materials that Apple can even use in the iPhone.
Marco:
Like Apple just makes so many more iPhones and
Marco:
...than pretty much anything else in the computer and electronic world that it's hard to even fathom the realities of how they need to do this and the restrictions it puts on them.
Marco:
I remember there was a brief rumor before last year's phone that they were going to make one out of ceramic.
Marco:
And a few people with knowledge of that business basically said like there isn't enough ceramic making capacity in the world to satisfy that.
Marco:
Like even if they bought like every machine that exists to do this in the world, it wouldn't be enough capacity.
Marco:
Yeah.
Marco:
And so what Apple has to do at their scale is so unlike what most companies have to worry about.
Marco:
Because not only do they have to make a lot of them, but they have to make a lot of them quickly and all over the world.
Marco:
This is not easy.
Marco:
And so it's almost impossible to compare anything else to what Apple does with the iPhone.
Marco:
But anyway...
Marco:
The feedback we got about mostly my dismissing remarks about the Google Pixel, because my position basically was like, it's interesting and every time a Google phone comes out, all the reviewers say, wow, this is really great.
Marco:
And then they just abandon it like two weeks later for the next Samsung thing.
Marco:
Or they go back to their iPhones if they were iPhone people.
Marco:
Most of the feedback we got didn't really contradict that.
Marco:
It was more like, you're wrong because I like it.
Marco:
And that's fine.
Marco:
I'm not saying that nobody likes the Pixel, but that the Google phones are not mass market devices.
Marco:
And I hope someday they will become mass market devices, because as I said last episode...
Marco:
When Apple has really good competition, Apple does better.
Marco:
And even though I don't have any interest in switching to Android, I want there to be amazing Android phones that keep pushing Apple to make the phones I use better.
Marco:
But the Google Pixel and former Nexus series, they just don't sell in enough volume to really make Apple have to worry about really anything.
Marco:
So again, I hope that changes over time, but that is still the reality.
Casey:
Yeah, I would agree with that.
Casey:
Also in the Google camp, Josh Lamkin writes, and he wrote an email describing kind of the repair process, because I think he took issue with the fact that one of the things that it might have been Marco, but one of us said it was that, hey, you know, Apple has all this retail presence and Google doesn't have that.
Casey:
And that's an advantage for Apple, which, you know, as much as we all lament the time it takes to get a genius bar appointment, I still stand by what Marco said.
Casey:
But Josh writes in and said, in summary,
Casey:
that if he needs to get a repair done on his Pixel phone, the repair is an overnighted replacement unit with a box for your existing phone, and it's all done online.
Casey:
And he said, I usually have my replacement Android device before my usual geek bar appointment would be.
Casey:
So in other words, if he has a problem, he, I guess on the phone, if possible, and if not on the web, he goes and reports an issue and ends up talking like live chatting with a
Casey:
And if they confirm that it's a legitimate problem, they will overnight him a new phone or presumably a refurbished phone.
Casey:
So it will be there the following day.
Casey:
And he takes that box, puts his existing phone in it, ships it back, and that's it.
Casey:
Job done.
Casey:
And you know what?
Casey:
That sounds pretty freaking great to me.
Casey:
It's not as quick as going into the Apple store and getting a screen replaced in the span of two hours.
Casey:
But that's pretty good for a company that has pretty much zero retail presence.
Marco:
Yeah, got to give them credit.
Marco:
That is a good setup.
Marco:
I still think Apple is way ahead of them on so many levels by having physical stores, but that is better than I expected Google's process to be because in the past, not even that distant past, dealing with them for any kind of directly purchased electronic device was a nightmare.
John:
Yeah.
John:
I just want to add that like an old man playing World of Warcraft on an iMac and a Panera Bread, I have nothing to apologize for.
John:
Oh, my word.
John:
Because I did not make unfounded, disparaging remarks about Google because I've never had a Google phone.
John:
The only thing that I would have added to that conversation about Google if I had anything to add, which I always said I didn't feel like I did, was my impression of the Nexus line, and this was echoed by a couple of people who sent feedback, was like, I don't know if Google's not trying to make a mass market phone or this is just their excuse, but it was always like,
John:
this is what you could do with our operating system if you made a cool phone.
John:
Now, everybody else who uses our operating system, go make cool phones like this.
John:
It's like the exemplar.
John:
They don't expect to sell a whole bunch of them.
John:
That's why it's only for sale in six countries.
John:
It's just kind of like showing the way to other people, kind of like reference designs from video card makers or whatever.
John:
Maybe not quite the same thing because they're not just giving that design to other people.
John:
But I don't know if that's actually true or if that's just something they say when they don't sell a lot of them.
John:
But yeah.
Casey:
indeed so i feel like i need a moment to get something off my chest and that's something that something relates to you guessed it cellular apple watch service fees oh because oh yes it does we're giving more time to this we are giving more time to this and do you know why they even charge him tax and additional fees
Casey:
Oh, yeah, I read about this.
Casey:
That is the executive summary.
Casey:
Yeah, I've heard of them, too.
Casey:
That is the executive summary.
Casey:
But I have received my first bill since I have activated my cellular Apple Watch.
Casey:
My $10 a month service, which I knew would not be $10, but I was hoping, ignorantly and naively so, I was hoping would be not too much more than $10 a month.
Casey:
Would you two, if you've not already clicked the link in the show notes, would you like to guess how much my $10 a month service is?
Marco:
Is it like $12 or $13?
Marco:
$17.
Casey:
John, did you look at the show notes?
Casey:
Because it is $17.40.
Casey:
So the monthly plan charges is $10.
Casey:
And I will put an image in the show notes for the episode.
John:
Is there a convenience fee?
John:
Like when you buy tickets online?
John:
Movie tickets online?
Casey:
The breakdown is, very quickly, $10 for the watch, administrative fee, $0.76, federal universal service charge, $2.42, regulatory cost recovery charge, $1.25, and Virginia equipment tax recoupment, $0.07.
LAUGHTER
Casey:
Delightful.
Marco:
Oh, and then not to mention the government taxes and fees.
Casey:
Well, I think that is everything.
Casey:
I think that the federal universal service charge is that, the $2.42.
Marco:
No, but what about the government taxes and fees, the $2.90 via Virginia Wireless E911 and Virginia Communications sales tax?
Casey:
Oh, I didn't scroll down.
Casey:
My mistake.
Casey:
I didn't scroll down on my own image.
Casey:
My mistake.
Casey:
Yes, you're exactly right.
Casey:
$2.90 of which 75 cents is Virginia Wireless E911 and $2.15 is Virginia Communications sales tax.
Casey:
My mistake.
John:
Yeah, so you actually are 1740s.
John:
Wow.
John:
There you go.
John:
What kind of tiny size do you have your web browser window that you had to scroll to see the bottom of this image?
John:
This is the real question.
John:
Is your web browser like a tiny slit like the window on the Challenger?
Wow.
Casey:
No, because, all right, well, now we're going to have to go down this road.
John:
A glimpse into Casey's life.
John:
All his web browser windows are one inch tall.
John:
I'm not sure you want to talk about crazy window setups, John.
John:
No, as I'm saying, minor proportion like sheets of paper because that's the same proportion for a web browser window.
Casey:
So only when I record this show, only when I record this show.
Casey:
So I have four panes on my single virtual desktop.
Casey:
So I don't really bother with my spaces as I usually do when I'm typically using the computer.
Casey:
In the upper left-hand corner, Skype.
Casey:
In the upper right-hand corner, taking up approximately a quarter of the screen, is my web browser.
Casey:
Which, by the way, is Chrome only because I use Google Docs here.
Casey:
Generally speaking, I never touch Chrome.
Casey:
The bottom right-hand corner is Visual Studio Code to work on the show notes.
Casey:
And the bottom left-hand corner is Colloquy, which is how I get on the chat room.
Casey:
So it is effectively divided into four quarters.
Casey:
And this is on my 5K iMac.
Casey:
And so this particular window was about a quarter of the screen.
Casey:
And it was just barely not enough to see that last section.
John:
This is an incredibly inefficient use of space.
John:
You're using Windows wrong.
John:
Oh, I love that call recorder jammed into the little... Yeah, that's actually kind of perfect.
Marco:
But no, this is an incredibly poor use of space.
Casey:
Like, first of all... I don't like things overlapping when I'm recording.
Casey:
Oh.
Marco:
the sidebar on the colloquy window come on yeah you don't need to be that big you don't need colloquy to be anywhere near that big skype window is as small as i can possibly make it i wish i could make it smaller but you know skype being skype it has like nope you can never make it a reasonable size this is as small as it ever gets yeah and and your your text editor window like that's a terrible aspect ratio for writing notes like i would like the the the portrait orientation sheet of paper aspect ratio is way better for text editors
John:
look at i love all the white space and his browser windows have the huge margins left and right but it cuts off on the thing anyway stop stop tiling your windows that's amazing this is only for when i record you big jerk how many how many s's do you have in your in your menu bar there i'm like all right so you got a lot of icons why are the three s's
John:
Four.
John:
Four S's.
John:
One of them is way over on the right.
John:
Wow.
Casey:
It's even worse.
Casey:
It's even worse.
John:
Those are dollar signs.
John:
Are they?
John:
I can't.
John:
I got to zoom in.
Marco:
You're really raking in the dough there in your menu bar.
Marco:
You got three dollar signs?
Marco:
Wait, does that mean your menu bar is expensive?
Marco:
Like on Yelp and stuff?
Marco:
Sort of.
John:
Oh, I see it now.
John:
100%.
John:
Oh, no, there's four.
John:
There's a fourth that's over there.
John:
Yeah, I know.
John:
They're hiding.
Marco:
Do you want to know what it is?
Marco:
What's the little pinwheel next to Dropbox?
Casey:
Hold on.
Casey:
One step at a time.
Casey:
All right.
Marco:
The S is... Why do you have Siri enabled at all, but it's all the way over there?
Casey:
For the love of God, people.
Casey:
Can you give me a chance to reply to any of this?
John:
The one car icon is just randomly placed in the middle of everything else.
Okay.
Casey:
Give me a chance.
Casey:
My menu bar is a disaster on this machine.
Casey:
I'll be the first to admit it.
Casey:
I will be the first to admit it.
Casey:
The dollar signs are because I have installed the most recent version of iStat menus, but apparently never entered my registration information.
Casey:
And so it is then said, give me money, apparently.
Marco:
So how long has that been that way?
Casey:
I don't know, for maybe a few days, maybe a week.
John:
It shows all the benefit you're getting from iStat menus.
John:
I need to keep an eye on my dollar signs.
John:
Keep his mind on his money and his money on his mind.
Casey:
Who's saying that?
Casey:
Oh, my God, who's saying that?
Casey:
I'm drawing a blank.
Casey:
Uh, Snoop Dogg, Gen and Juice?
Casey:
Is it?
Casey:
I don't recall.
Casey:
You're probably right.
Casey:
Uh, I just put my updated menu bar in the robot and I'm sorry, live listeners.
Casey:
It is, I'll be the first to tell you it is not good.
Casey:
It is not good.
Casey:
And, and it is, it is just plain not good.
Casey:
And I am embarrassed by it.
Marco:
Oh my God.
Casey:
Especially because I'm a devout as few things in the menu bars.
Casey:
I can get Siri out of the menu bar.
Casey:
I need to do that.
John:
Fuzzy clock.
John:
Come on.
Casey:
Oh, fuzzy clock.
Yeah.
Casey:
Wait, can I get Siri out of the menu bar?
Casey:
I got to do that.
John:
Yes.
John:
And do you have a translucent menu bar, too?
Casey:
No.
Casey:
Do I?
John:
I think I do.
John:
You do.
Casey:
You definitely do.
Casey:
Oh, that cannot be.
Marco:
I didn't even know that was still a feature.
Marco:
Let's play a new game.
Marco:
Like, what won't Casey notice about his computer?
John:
I have dollar signs in my translucent menu bar.
John:
Everything's fine.
John:
It's half past nine.
John:
i did know i did know about the dollar signs i is my menu bar really translucent yes the yellow background of like the leaves or whatever honestly i was going through i was going through my like file full of like uh plist hack commands for undocumented stuff like turn off window animations and i saw the one about the translucent menu bar i'm like oh i'm glad that feature isn't in mac os 10 anymore
John:
Or Mac OS, whatever it's called.
Casey:
Where do you turn this off?
John:
I want this off now.
John:
I honestly thought it wasn't there anymore, but apparently it is.
John:
And just like my P-list setting has been surviving multiple OS updates.
John:
Or maybe it's a checkbox now.
John:
Where is this?
John:
I think it's actually a GUI.
John:
I think it's in the display panel.
Casey:
We'll figure it out.
Casey:
We'll do some real-time follow-up in three hours when I finally figure out where the hell it is.
Casey:
wow that's all right so anyway so suffice it suffice it to say never ever ever talk about your setup with these two numbskulls because it's not good it's just not smart oh my word i can't find this this is driving me bananas where is it you might have to do that you might have to do the default right whatever thing so in summary i pay too much for my apple watch and it makes me sad
Marco:
Yeah, I agree.
Marco:
So I was totally railing against you that complaining about $10 a month to the degree that you complained about it was unnecessary.
Marco:
However, it was still like... I still agree that that is a little more than what it should cost.
Marco:
I just didn't think it was worth complaining as much as you did and not getting it as a result.
Marco:
However, $17 a month really, which is what this really is, that's a different story.
Marco:
That's really pushing it.
Marco:
Like,
Marco:
It is not worth that for almost anybody, which is unfortunate.
Marco:
It's basically being treated as a separate line by the cellular bills taxing and regulation system.
Marco:
And I don't know if it's possible... Because you have number sync, even though the watch does technically have its own number, it's the same way like my iPad has its own phone number assigned to it when I activated it with cellular.
Marco:
But you can't call it.
Marco:
You can't do anything with that phone number.
Marco:
It's just like an implementation detail of something having cellular service.
Marco:
But it shouldn't be treated the same way as a regular phone line is.
Marco:
And so...
Marco:
maybe the watch is being misclassified maybe it's temporary i don't know but that's messed up like to have to for a ten dollar fee to have another seven dollars in taxes and bs on top of that that's bs
Casey:
Yeah, and by the way, quick, not real-time follow-up, but quick follow-up.
Casey:
I found on my AT&T bill that there is, to your point, Marco, an actual phone number listed there.
Casey:
And it occurred to me...
Casey:
I bet I could call that number.
Casey:
And I feel like I had heard on a podcast somewhere.
Casey:
Maybe it was Mike.
Casey:
Somebody had talked about this.
Casey:
And so I turned off Bluetooth on my phone and then used my cell phone to dial my Apple Watch.
Casey:
And once it realized the phone wasn't there and it fell back onto cellular...
Casey:
Sure enough, I could dial this unique number that's unique to my Apple Watch, and it rang no problem, which is exactly what I expected, but just kind of funky.
Casey:
It makes sense.
Casey:
I'm not saying it's bad or wrong or anything, but it's kind of weird and kind of funny that it worked that way.
Marco:
No, that is bad and wrong.
Marco:
That means it's going to get robocalls.
Casey:
Oh, interesting.
Casey:
It very well may.
Casey:
Yeah, that's terrible, actually.
Casey:
But on the plus side, the only way that would happen is if it actually has the cellular radio on, which only happens when it's away from the phone, which for me only happens once or twice a day.
Marco:
You can get robocalls during the time when you really want to be focused on your exercise or whatever else, or focused on your kid in the park.
Marco:
Yeah, exactly.
Marco:
That's perfect.
Marco:
It's flawless.
Marco:
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Casey:
So hopefully cheer me up, one of you, and tell me about Sonos, which I don't care about, and Google Assistant, which I also don't care about.
John:
We missed this last week when we talked about it.
John:
Oh, Sonos integrating with Amazon and what was the deal with them doing the Alexa stuff.
John:
Sonos is apparently trying to be...
John:
the hardware platform that is host to anybody who has a software thing that you can talk to so google assistant is another software thing you can talk to and sonos is apparently integrating with them i'm not quite sure how it works you buy a sonos thing do you get to say do you want to talk to the amazon
John:
uh personal assistant voice thingy or do you want to talk to the google one or do you pick when you buy it like an old verizon iphone versus at&t iphone thing uh don't know the details but this this kind of changes well it doesn't change but like i'm trying to get some new perspective on
John:
sonos and uh and the combination of amazon and who's coming out ahead in this deal and what the strategies are um and there's two parts of this one is that the some of the people with voice assistance certainly amazon but maybe also google will see seem to be initially pursuing the strategy of we want our voice thing everywhere and
John:
is apparently available on an Anker product too, A-N-K-E-R, the people who make like the chargers and stuff.
John:
And various times Amazon has talked about spreading their voice thingy everywhere.
John:
If you have a thing with microphones that you can talk to and you want to do a business deal with them, they'll connect it up to Amazon because now you can order paper towels through your whatever because you talk to it, right?
John:
So that's one way you can go.
John:
It's kind of like the Windows Everywhere strategy of,
John:
you know we and you know just think of amazon uh for the most part with its uh where can i watch amazon video most televisions you buy will have it built in just like netflix uh most boxes you buy will have it built in except for apples because of a grudge match thing going on there um and they'll put their voice assistant on hardware products that are not made by them whether it's somnos or anchor or probably anybody else who will do whatever deal um
John:
I think their ideal future is wherever you are in the entire world, you can just yell at the name of that voice assistant that I'm trying to avoid saying and order paper towels.
John:
And it'll, you know, figure out who you are and send them to, you know, easy ways to send Amazon your money.
John:
It's great, right?
John:
And Google Assistant, being on Sonos, I don't know if Google is spreading its assistant far and wide.
John:
But being on Sonos as well, it's like, okay, well, we're not going to say if you want to talk to the Google Assistant, you have to buy an Android phone or a Google Home.
John:
You can talk to the Google Assistant through your Sonos speaker at the very least and possibly other places as well.
John:
And on the other side of that, if you're Sonos...
John:
Their strategy seems to be like we make great hardware and we have, you know, the wireless communication stuff and an iOS app or whatever to do multi-room audio and all the stuff that we do.
John:
We don't do an assistant, but we're not going to tell you which assistant you have to use.
John:
We're not going to say we believe the one and only true assistant is the Amazon one.
John:
And that's it.
John:
That's like if you have an assistant that you want to talk to through our speaker, let's do a deal.
John:
And I guess they'll let the customers decide.
John:
If the Amazon strategy is Alexa everywhere, when I think of the Sonos strategy, I feel like, are you trying to be the hardware makers in the PC age where Windows is everywhere and then Microsoft doesn't really care who is licensing Windows for their hardware?
John:
Just let the hardware people fight it out and then you'll just be marginalized and be fighting over razors and margins against everyone else who makes a speaker that has Amazon or Google Assistant integrated.
John:
Yeah.
John:
um the difference here of course is that no voice assistant is as dominant as windows was if that changes then yeah the hardware people are in a bad position because i feel like most of the value is in the thing that you talk to especially if the thing that you talk to buys you things from like the store that one of the people runs um and then way off to the side lest anyone forget is apple and
John:
who doesn't really have an amazon video tv app still right we're still waiting for that i keep yep i don't really check right so amazon is kind of being mean to them about that because they're everywhere else they have a speaker thingy but it hasn't even shipped yet when it does ship you can be sure that it will not support google assistant or amazon's you know voice stuff right and
John:
And so far, it doesn't seem like Apple is all about putting Siri everywhere.
John:
Will my next television have Siri built in?
John:
Can I buy an anchor puck for $35 that has Siri built in?
John:
I'm thinking no.
John:
So some very different strategies in the early age of cylinders that you talk to.
John:
And to wrap all this up, our friend Stephen Hackett had a nice post about his smart speaker conundrum.
John:
And I think it is similar to a lot of tech nerdy people who may have gone in too deep with too much different stuff.
John:
Like, well, my light bulbs speak this.
John:
But I like Apple stuff.
John:
But I subscribe to Google Play Music.
John:
But I have... It gets very confusing very fast.
John:
It's a short blog post.
John:
You should read it.
John:
But just to get an idea of the choices that you have to make about...
John:
what sort of internet of things hardware products you buy what software services you pay for and can they all talk to each other and work together and how you figure out how to make your next purchase do i continue to go down the road that i was going down before with a bunch of amazon things do i ditch everything and go to an all apple world but what about the sonos uh even marco who's mostly dedicated the amazon thing is kind of in that situation because you were saying
John:
you know do i have to buy a sonos thing or maybe if the sonos will just my existing uh echo products will talk to my existing sonos what do i do or do i switch over to be completely sonos and get rid of the echoes because why do i need them if the sonos all have smarter things in them but can the sonos thing talk to my light bulbs i don't know i'm kind of glad i'm out of this market for the most part other than having a cylinder that i can talk to but uh it doesn't things don't look smooth over there that's all i can say
Marco:
Yeah, and first of all, some quick follow-up.
Marco:
Well, some half follow-up.
Marco:
Last episode, I had questioned whether it was possible to just set up your Amazon Echo devices to talk to existing Sonos devices without having the new Sonos One.
Marco:
The answer is yes, that I set it up tonight.
Marco:
However, I didn't actually test it out because I was too busy playing Stardew Valley all night.
Marco:
But I will add to this discussion that...
Marco:
For just general buying advice or guiding people for what to do while all this stuff is getting all crazy like this, as much as possible, get things that speak multiple languages, basically.
Marco:
If Sonos ends up...
Marco:
really pulling this off in a big way.
Marco:
If they really do have AirPlay 2 support, which is not having Siri built in, but having AirPlay 2 will allow it even better integration with the Apple ecosystem.
Marco:
So if they pull off AirPlay 2, which they promise for next year, if they pull off the Google Assistant, which they also promise, I believe, for next year, or is that immediate?
Marco:
Do you remember?
Marco:
Anyway, they're adding a Google system sometime soon.
Marco:
And right now, there are a few weird little asterisks about voice control.
Marco:
So basically, with Sonos, you can't access Spotify through voice control, even though the Echo products can.
Marco:
And you can't access Apple Music through voice control, even though the Sonos products can.
Marco:
So there's all these little weird exceptions to, like, well, it can do mostly everything, except it can't do this little exception.
Marco:
It can't do this little exception.
Marco:
It's kind of like USB-C.
Marco:
But anyway, so there's all these little exceptions.
Marco:
So it's hard to say for sure, like, you know, this device or this device can do everything.
Marco:
But...
Marco:
It sure does look like Google is never going to integrate anything.
Marco:
Google's never going to have Siri or AirPlay 2 from Apple.
Marco:
They're never going to have probably the Amazon Assistant or the kind of integrations Amazon has.
Marco:
Amazon's also never going to have the stuff from Apple, but will also never do the Google Assistant.
Marco:
Sonos is...
Marco:
probably set up so far with the things we know to have the most support from the most places which is why it's interesting even though it has those weird little exceptions to things um and when you're buying products like smart home stuff these days it's not that hard to find stuff that supports both home kit and the uh the amazon devices so you might as well do that when you can but all this stuff is so so early that
Marco:
it's still advisable to just wait on almost all this stuff, even though it's fun.
Marco:
If you are averse to having to replace some of the gear you buy now in a year or two when standards change or when you want to change ecosystems or when some ecosystem cuts off some other ecosystem that used to be integrated, if you're averse to that, just don't buy anything yet.
Marco:
If you do jump in now, be prepared for that possibility.
John:
In some respects, they're saying like Apple is just off there in the corner, like with its proprietary stuff that it's never going to mix with anybody else and that it hasn't even shipped its very first cylinder.
John:
And who knows how good it will even be.
John:
And meanwhile, everyone else on their second or third iteration and has this big ecosystem and lots of users and stuff.
John:
But on the other hand, the advantage that Apple still has, because there is still no dominant, real, really dominant player in this market on the hardware or software side at this point, except for, I guess, maybe Amazon.
John:
But I don't think they ever tell us what they sell, is that if you do go all Apple, you subscribe to Apple Music, you buy Apple stuff, you buy the Apple HomePod, you have, you know, AirPlay support and all your thingies, you have Apple TVs everywhere.
John:
at least you can be sure all that stuff works together whereas i mean i guess google if you have an android phone and a home thing you're kind of in the same situation uh but amazon doesn't have you know a desktop laptop operating system they have a tablet os but i don't know if you're really going to buy that tablet they don't have a phone anymore right they don't sell the fire phone like
John:
that no one has as complete an ecosystem as apple and so no one can offer the type of just buy everything from us and your whole life from your computer to your phone to your television to your to your weird cylinder speaker that you talk to well and subscribe to our music service we'll all work together they've got the biggest picture i suppose google does too if you count like the google uh the weird google laptops and the chromebooks and stuff as well although i tend not to count those um so
John:
if you had money to burn and you wanted to make sure you had a system that all worked together that would be one way to go assuming apple actually shipped that stuff and it was any good but i don't see how that can hold long term uh i you know the and if apple just wants the high end and if sonos isn't successful then maybe they can get that but i hope eventually standards start to emerge and coalesce and it's it becomes more clear uh
John:
what the safe approach is when you buy and have some reasonable chance that it will be useful for a long time but like marco said right now there is nothing that's the case for if you want to buy and play with it and it's cool and it's fun fine but don't buy it and then two years be all annoyed because you have to replace half of it or you know it becomes obsolete or doesn't work with your new new light bulbs or whatever
Marco:
I am also – I'm increasingly concerned about Apple's chances to really make a dent in this market because as everyone else progresses and advances so quickly, the possible advantages Apple has keep getting –
Marco:
And that on the main factors of the reasons why people buy and use these things, I am increasingly concerned about Apple's competitiveness.
Marco:
So, for instance, not only my previous concerns about things like price, connectivity, and the quality of Siri and the consistency of Siri to react quickly and correctly to as many queries as possible...
Marco:
I'm increasingly concerned that if having a large ecosystem of compatible Internet of Things things, if that's important, or if interoperability with anything else, with any of these other systems are important, or if third-party app support is important, Apple's going to really fall down hard in those areas, probably for a very long time, if not forever.
Marco:
And so I really have concerns like...
Marco:
Not that they'll sell none of these things.
Marco:
They'll sell some.
Marco:
But are we looking at the next Amazon Echo or are we looking at the next iPod Hi-Fi?
John:
The Echo took a while to get going, too.
John:
And they have loosened up the HomeKit stuff in various ways, which shows I think they know that they need to do something.
John:
But my biggest concern with Apple is everyone else is shipping and shipping again in multiple generations.
John:
Like, we'll just hoist this up from it was down in the topic section.
John:
We didn't talk last week about the Google Home Max and Mini.
John:
which is the google home mini is a tiny little puck thing kind of like the uh like the echo dot the yeah and then the max is a big you know sonos size multi-speaker thing it's got two big woofers and two big tweeters you know for better sound this is google's i think second or maybe third iteration of their their home products and they already have multiple form factors in three different sizes apple still has not shipped its one single form factor very first cylinder and
John:
They're so far behind.
John:
You can't be in this game if you haven't even shipped your thing yet.
John:
Where is the three different sizes of Apple stuff, the second or third revision of the hardware and software, and the ecosystem that's built up around it?
John:
You have to ship.
John:
You have to start.
John:
Make your first one that doesn't seem like it can do much and people aren't that interested in.
John:
Then make your second one.
John:
Then make your line of three new ones and just...
John:
they they have a lot of catching up to do if they if they want to do something here and they're just lucky essentially that no one standard or thing has really completely run away with it and again maybe maybe that's not true maybe amazon has run away with it and we just don't know because people are shy about their sales numbers but uh and and you know google's and also ran that uh very few people get but i don't know i don't know i get apple's marketing and brand recognition is something that could save it if their product is actually good but we'll see
Marco:
Do you think it's still going to ship this year?
John:
Did they say it was supposed to ship this year?
John:
I kept thinking it was going to ship next year.
Marco:
No, they said HomePod was... I believe they said either later this year or December.
Marco:
I forget which of those exactly the same.
John:
Maybe the reason I discounted it is because they said such a late ship date.
John:
It's like, well, you're not making the holidays, so who the hell cares?
John:
Just pretend it's next year.
Marco:
Yeah, it sounded kind of like they were going to pretty much miss the holidays, but maybe you can place an order on December 15th, even though you probably won't get it by the holidays.
Marco:
That's kind of what it sounded like, but like...
Marco:
They're not going to launch this thing without having another event, right?
Marco:
Because right now, we know nothing about its capabilities.
Marco:
All we know is that it sounds good.
John:
It plays music.
Marco:
But we don't know how it plays music.
Marco:
We don't know anything about Siri on it.
Marco:
We don't know anything about any other kind of smart anything about it.
Marco:
They were able to show nothing, basically.
Marco:
So...
Marco:
They probably wouldn't launch it without some kind of small event or at least private demo.
Marco:
But time is running out in the year for when they might do that.
Marco:
I would bet...
Marco:
especially because we've heard nothing about it since then i bet it i bet it misses this year i bet it's delayed which is even more concerning if it's true it'll become with an apple tv remote that you hold down the speaker button and talk into when you want it to play something you just wear it around your neck on a lanyard yeah
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Casey:
All right.
Casey:
Any other follow-up?
Casey:
Oh, yes, there is one more, which I am deeply afraid to bring up.
Casey:
Somebody has written High Sierra Update.
Casey:
Was this me?
Casey:
Did I write this?
Casey:
Maybe I wrote this.
Casey:
God, I haven't even had a drink.
John:
Yeah, seriously.
John:
I don't know what you're doing.
Casey:
Casey's fear in his FOMO.
Casey:
I don't know why I wrote this, because I wrote it days ago.
John:
You didn't write it.
John:
I wrote it.
John:
You don't even know what you wrote.
Casey:
Oh, my God.
John:
I thought you were making a joke.
John:
No, I just assumed I did.
Casey:
You don't understand what you wrote.
John:
Yeah, because you were asking before.
Casey:
You wrote FOMO in here?
Casey:
You did?
Casey:
That's a very Casey thing to say.
John:
It's not a Casey thing to say.
John:
It's just slang.
Casey:
Sure, but you're above that, I thought.
Casey:
I'm not above slang.
John:
What are you talking about?
John:
Anyway, it's a thing that you say a lot, so it's applicable to you.
John:
Anyway, this was about you asking, hey, can I update Ty Sierra?
Casey:
Well, because I have to have freaking permission.
John:
uh no you just want reassurance and anyway so i feel like it's a balancing of your fear which is like what if i updated and hoses my computer and your fomo which is like everyone else are on high sierra and they're all having fun and high sierra ended up and i'm over here and just plain old sierra it's not high at all and i don't have the cool new desktop background which is the most important feature
Casey:
No, that I don't care about.
Casey:
The most important feature is Apple Watch Unlocked for my fancy pants cellular Apple Watch.
John:
The desktop background is actually really nice, though.
John:
So last time we talked, I had some fear about it, too.
John:
I was like, I don't know if I'm going to update.
John:
And it's a little bit scary.
John:
And...
John:
you know you get the new file system and the new version of photos and i'm hearing some weird stories and so on and so forth but actually shortly after that show an opportunity presented itself to just update my wife's computer after doing umpteen backups and so i did and it was entirely uneventful other than one one thing which i mean it's kind of all tied up on the os the new version of photos which i've been playing with a lot
John:
is being a little bit cranky.
John:
I don't know if I want to blame this on the new version of Photos, because if you Google for the error I'm getting, it is a many, many years old error.
John:
Mike, it's for the entire life of the Photos application.
John:
You can go back in time and see that this is not a new phenomenon, but it's a thing where it hangs during closing library.
John:
Like, you quit, and it shows a tiny little window that says, closing the library, dot, dot, dot.
John:
and then it will just hang there forever you'll leave it overnight come back it'll still say closing the library and of course you don't want to kill it right because then you're like well it's going to corrupt its library or whatever it's like oh just hold down the option key when you launch it and you can repair your database which i did and it took a really long time to run and it repaired and then i used photos for a while and then i quit and it said closing library i just sat there for a long time so i did a bunch of samples i filed the bug they sent me back some scary instructions to enable the super duper debug mode on photos which i may do if i get desperate um
John:
but that's the only problem i've had other than that i just i just pretend like nothing ever happened i'm just like oh new desktop backgrounds for everybody and photos has a bunch of new features in it but it's still slow by the way um and so i'm fine it doesn't mean casey should update because maybe it will be disastrous for you but i did it and nothing weird happened all my time machine updates continue to run crash point continues to run no software stop working
John:
everything it just like it is one of those updates where you know it it seems like nothing actually happened which i guess means that i'm not taking advantage of whatever cool new features are in there that i'm supposed to be looking at but it's fine with me that's what i wanted i wanted it to be uneventful and so far other than photos being photos it is
Casey:
So I actually have High Sierra on both my work computer and my MacBook Adorable, and it's been just fine.
Casey:
But I've been scared slash hesitant to do it on my iMac because, God forbid, there is some sort of issue with my podcast equipment or whatever.
Casey:
I guess I could fall back to Aaron's MacBook Air and presumably pour another cup of water on it.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
So I'd rather not have a problem.
Casey:
But I basically asked in the Relay Slack, hey, have you guys upgraded?
Casey:
And Dan Morin, I think one or two other people had said, yes, I have.
Casey:
And it's been fine.
Casey:
And like I said, it's been fine in every other regard other than podcasting.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
I hadn't tried any of the podcast-related stuff yet.
Casey:
And I think the moral of the story is I'm probably going to do it after we record this show.
Casey:
Not like tonight, but sometime in the next few days.
John:
Make backups.
John:
And keep in mind that the computer that I'm recording this podcast on is still running El Capitan because it's my 2008 Mac Pro and can't run Sierra.
John:
that's fine like what i'm saying is i'm i wasn't if i was trying to do it on the computer where i recorded pockets maybe i'd be even more wary but my wife's computer i felt like you know i had her permission more or less
John:
I talked to her about it.
John:
I was trying to say, I told her it might take many, many hours because you can't say, oh, the update will take like an hour.
John:
But what if it had gone wrong?
John:
Then I have to restore from backup.
John:
That's like, look, I'm going to start this process at noon on a weekend.
John:
If I started at noon, worst case scenario, you get your computer back tomorrow midday as I just spend hours doing tremendous amounts of IO, right?
Yeah.
Casey:
All right, so let's do some Ask ATP.
Casey:
Let's see.
Casey:
We'll start with Kyle.
Casey:
Kyle writes in to say, hey, ATP, what browser do you guys use?
Casey:
I like the idea of using Safari on all my devices, but Chrome's extensions are so much better.
Casey:
I do use, and I think I got this idea from Marco, actually, I do use Chrome on occasion as like my Google Docs slash Flash quarantine.
Casey:
The Flash part isn't really a thing barely ever anymore, but from time to time, I need it for some reason or another.
Casey:
Usually restaurants.
Casey:
But I use it for Google Docs, which is why I have it open for tonight because I have our show notes in Google Docs.
Casey:
But generally speaking, 99% of my web browsing for anything personal is Safari on every platform.
Casey:
I also use Google for work-related things because our work is all in on Google Apps.
Casey:
But other than work and other than basically when I record the show, it's pretty much all Safari to me.
Casey:
I am not a heavy extensions user on either browser.
Casey:
Personally, I can't fathom using Chrome full time, especially on a laptop, but really at all, because I find it to be
Casey:
No faster than Safari, which I know everyone's going to write in and tell me how wrong I am.
Casey:
But I don't find it to be any faster than Safari.
Casey:
And it is such a battery hog that it's just – I can't do it.
Casey:
And personally, I don't know why anyone would.
Casey:
So with that in mind, Marco, what do you use?
Marco:
Pretty much the same thing I've been doing for a long time now, which is Safari for almost everything.
Marco:
And then Chrome on the desktop, as you described, for –
Marco:
Either sites I don't trust or things that require Flash or things that are generally in the Google ecosystem.
Marco:
So Google Docs, as you mentioned, it's kind of like my podcasting browser.
Marco:
I have it open now.
Marco:
So my first few tabs were all like the stuff that I needed to record podcast stuff because it started out being Google Docs and it kind of became my convention from there.
Marco:
And also, I use Facebook for a couple of groups that I have to be a part of.
Marco:
And so I don't even have the app installed on my phone or anything.
Marco:
I keep Facebook only in Chrome.
Marco:
And so that way, I'm not allowed to do it anywhere else and don't have their creepiness attracting me all over the place and etc.
Marco:
I respect why people like Chrome.
Marco:
There were times in my professional career and my home life where I have used Chrome full-time.
Marco:
I ended up switching back after a while, but Chrome is fine.
Marco:
I just really like Safari a lot better.
John:
So I run both Chrome and Safari all the time on all my computers that I use, which may sound crazy.
John:
Remember, I'd use desktops or I have a laptop of work that I pretend is a desktop.
John:
So I don't care about battery because everything's always plugged in.
Marco:
Now, is this because you're hitting some kind of limit on how many tabs and windows that one of them can have open at once?
John:
I'm not hitting a limit like that, but...
John:
Now, why do I do it this split by?
John:
I feel like there are advantages to both browsers.
John:
Safari has always been and still is my default.
John:
So if I click a link in anything, it opens in Safari.
John:
I like both browsers a lot.
John:
Chrome, I use all my Google stuff in.
John:
I use Gmail for my email and I figure like.
John:
there's a nice synergy which i'm sure that like google's properties or whatever will all work well in chrome because it's in google's interest to make sure that i'm sure they work fine in safari too but it just seems more natural for me to do all my google stuff i use google calendar google docs you know all that stuff is in chrome and safari for general web browsing
John:
I use Chrome for general browsing too because Safari still does that thing occasionally to me where it just says I'm not into loading web pages anymore.
John:
I always feel like it's telling me you have too many windows open, right?
John:
Like you've got a lot of browser windows open.
John:
I know that you typed an address to the address bar and hit return.
John:
I might just stay here as a white window for a while to punish you for having like, maybe I'm not going to load windows anymore.
John:
And furthering that fact is sometimes I'll be like, all right, what if I close one of these background windows?
John:
And it's like, oh, okay, now I can load.
John:
Like I've said this before.
John:
Like it feels like it's out of file descriptors.
John:
That's not what's happening.
John:
It doesn't say that on the console, but it's that type of feeling where it's like it has exhausted some kind of resource.
John:
Whereas Chrome, every single time I open a new window or tab and type a URL into the address bar and hit return, it loads the damn page every single time it does.
John:
And that is super important to me.
John:
and i love chrome for that and i also use chrome's dev tools and i don't love this about chrome but i use it for a node debugging too i know there are better solutions i'm just still stuck using chrome for that um so i use both uh but safari is my default but i do really love chrome and not because of all the extensions i do have extensions installed i just i just think it's a good reliable web browser
Casey:
All right.
Casey:
Sebastian writes in continuing on the John portion of the show.
Casey:
What are John's thoughts on the new accord?
Casey:
And we kind of touched on this in what will probably end up being the after show that we talked about before we started really recording.
Casey:
So you may not have heard this listeners, but there will be more accord talk at some point or another.
Casey:
But John, what are your thoughts on the new accord?
John:
I think it's uglier than my generation of Accord, which is a shame.
John:
I like the fact that you get the stick shift with the big engine.
John:
I'm not sure about anything beyond that because I haven't actually driven it myself.
John:
All I can say is that it seems like Honda is going in the right direction with his cars and it's getting good reviews, but I'm kind of glad that both I and my wife got the previous generation.
John:
The only thing I'm really jealous of in the new one is the infotainment because my infotainment is dire and this one is less dire.
Casey:
Kome writes in, for command line work, do you just use terminal, or are you partial to a third-party app?
Casey:
And so, Marco, since you were quiet before, let's start with you.
Marco:
I had forgotten that there even were third-party terminal apps.
Marco:
So wait, is this the question about third-party terminal clients, or is it about using GUIs versus terminal commands for things like MySQL and Git and stuff like that?
Casey:
Let's make it all of the above.
Casey:
So A, what shell are you on?
Casey:
B, in what app are you running that shell?
John:
Please don't confuse shell with terminal.
John:
You know it's one of my pet peeves.
John:
Why would you do that to me?
Casey:
Whatever.
Casey:
God, John.
John:
I was not aware this was one of your pet peeves, actually.
Casey:
I wasn't either.
Casey:
It must be a long list.
Casey:
Are you on Bash or something else or whatever ridiculous one that John insists on?
Casey:
Are you on the stock terminal app or something else?
Casey:
And when you're doing things like Git, do you tend to do that on the command line or elsewhere?
Casey:
So all three of those, starting with Marco.
Casey:
And I have answers as well, but I'll round us all out at the end.
Marco:
Okay.
Marco:
I use Apple's normal terminal app.
Marco:
I find it great.
Marco:
I have never sought a different one because I'm very happy with it.
Marco:
Yep, titto.
Marco:
I use Bash because, you know, probably for the same reason most people use Bash, it's already there and it's what I've always known.
Marco:
I know there are better shells out there, but it has just never been worth it for me to not only, you know, learn a new shell, but then to put it on all the different, not only Macs, but all the servers that I log into.
Marco:
I mean, I log into like 30 servers on a regular basis.
Marco:
So it's not like, yes, I can, you know, you can try to like automate stuff, but like it would just, it would be a pain for me to switch away from bash and I, and it's fine.
Marco:
I know it's not amazing, but it's fine.
Marco:
As for GUIs versus terminal commands for things that programmers deal with, so things like Git, MySQL, PHP, any kind of database source control kind of stuff,
Marco:
I use terminal commands for almost all of it, including any kind of MySQL administration, things like that.
Marco:
The only thing I really use GUIs for is I do now use them for Git.
Marco:
I use the Git Tower app for Mac.
Marco:
It is wonderful.
Marco:
And I know most of the Git commands to use it via terminal or via command line.
Marco:
But Git is terrible on the command line.
Marco:
I mean, it's hard enough to understand in a GUI, let alone in the command line.
Marco:
And so I find that while I can do these things in the command line, I usually prefer not to because not only is the GUI less error-prone and more intuitive for these kind of things, but it also provides some really nice features like...
Marco:
the way it diffs and displays commits and file diffs and per line diffs and everything, it's really nice to be able to visualize that in a really nice GUI so I can tell, like, what have I changed in this file?
Marco:
What am I actually committing here?
Marco:
And exactly what lines have changed?
Marco:
Where have they changed?
Marco:
All this stuff is possible on the command line, but it's just so much easier in the GUI.
Marco:
John?
John:
I've already forgotten what all the questions were.
John:
I'll figure it out.
John:
The terminal app, I use the default terminal one and always have.
John:
It has been very reliable to me.
John:
I think I first fell in love with it when I saw the unlimited scroll back feature.
John:
Yeah.
John:
that's that's all i want in life is unlimited scroll back use all my memory that's all you want in life yeah just unlimited scroll back because i keep my computer running for a long time and windows open for a long time although actually i'm kind of a bit of a serial command care in terminal like truncating the scroll back which i shouldn't do and i should use marks but i don't but anyway
John:
um plain old terminal i've dabbled in things like iterm and stuff but just terminal is is what i've always used and it's always been so reliable and it just does its job and all of the the basics like copying pasting text and having it you know not copy hard line breaks at the end like
John:
crappy windows terminal programs do and stuff like that just everything works fine when i and when i when i scroll my mouse wheel or you know like uh or use the the cursor in emacs and it picks it up like i don't have to set all that stuff up it's the terminal type is set correctly for all the mac os 10 things that expect it to be anyway it's fine i'm sure the other ones are better but i don't use them uh so plain old terminal uh
John:
for... What was the next one?
John:
Command line versus GUI apps for... Shell.
John:
Oh, Shell.
John:
I use TCSH because that's what was installed on the ACS system at BU when I entered college in 1993.
John:
That's it.
John:
I just have a collection of .files that I've been building up since then.
John:
I have also dabbled in other shells, but there's no way I'm going to redo all my .files and aliases.
John:
I like TCSH.
John:
And it would take me a while for any shell.
John:
I actually tried Phish as well.
John:
It would take me a while for any shell for me to...
John:
I would have to basically remap everything.
John:
I'd have to say, I need Control-R to be reverse history search interactive, and I need it to behave exactly the same way as TCSH does, because if it doesn't, my fingers won't work anymore, and I don't need to go with that.
John:
So I dread the day that I have to compile TCSH myself because Apple stopped shipping it, but so far they still do.
John:
And for programming type apps...
John:
pretty much always command line.
John:
Like I, you know, I spent many, many years using Perforce and I only use the command line.
John:
The only time I would use the GUI is... Oh, I'm so sorry.
John:
It's not that bad.
John:
The only time I use the GUI is when I need to just see like a revision graph or some other sort of GUI thing in the P4V app, but...
John:
I kind of feel like that I don't actually know the version control system if I don't know how to use the command line.
John:
And Git is the ultimate challenge to that.
John:
It's like, oh, yeah, try using this freaking command line.
John:
I hate it with a passion.
John:
It is so poorly designed.
John:
Everything about it is terrible.
John:
And I am terrible at Git because I've only been using Git like at work basically for, I don't know, like less than a year now.
John:
I never really, really learned it, even though I've read a million tutorials.
John:
And at one point I feel like I finally understand Git.
John:
But that was like years ago when it was first created.
John:
Someone wrote a really good,
John:
explanation of exactly how it works under the covers and it's like oh now i get it but you know years pass and it all leaves your head and nothing sticks in there because the command line is so unintuitive and yet i still basically force myself to use the command line i just make mistakes um and i've tried git tower and the github has has an app that's the other one there's like a third one that's popular on the mac um
Casey:
SourceTree?
John:
Yeah, that's one.
John:
And there's one that's side-by-side.
John:
Gitbox, I think?
John:
Yeah, Gitbox.
John:
Yeah, Gitbox is the other one, yeah.
John:
I have all those installed, and occasionally I dive into them, but I feel wary about doing any version control stuff.
John:
And things like MySQL and stuff like that,
John:
command line always like you know the postgres command line is great and i was spoiled by that the mysql command line isn't that bad the oracle you know sql plus is is uh is the worst command line ever created by a human being um and yet still i don't it'll make you feel better by git if you if you've never had the pleasure to use sql star plus or whatever the
John:
so bad um i but i mostly use the command line ones for those and i still have the guise installs and we'll fire fire them up occasionally like oracle has sql develop oracle sql developer or whatever but just they're not good gui apps even if they run on the mac they're usually like weird java things or they they seem weird and the native mysql and postgres clients they're nice but the best interface i've ever had to something like a database has been the postgres command line like better than any gui that i've used so that's it
Casey:
So for me, I use fish shell for reasons I don't even really know.
Casey:
I just it's color coded nicely.
Casey:
Some of the scripting I like more because I've never I was never really proficient in like bash scripting or anything else.
Casey:
So it makes logical choices in places where I would expect a logical choice, which is probably more about my own ignorance of bash than anything else.
Casey:
I do basic command line stuff for Git for basic things a lot of the time.
Casey:
I'd say I'd probably 50-50 with Git Tower and the command line.
Casey:
And certainly anytime things get really wonky, I'm looking at Git Tower because I agree with the both of you.
Casey:
And I'm sure we're going to get a bunch of feedback about it, but I agree with you guys that Git on the command line is...
Casey:
really weird and has never really clicked with me and i use terminal app so terminal app phish and get tower with get on the command line from time to time and that concludes ask atp
Marco:
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Marco:
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Marco:
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Marco:
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Marco:
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Marco:
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Marco:
There's tons of time where you can fit this into your life, whether it's on your commute every day, whether, you know, train, taking long car rides, very popular with, you know, people who are taking walks or exercising.
Marco:
Audiobooks are wonderful.
Marco:
You can see for yourself with a free 30-day trial, and your first audiobook is free.
Marco:
Go to audible.com slash ATP to see for yourself.
Marco:
I'm recently reading the book called Arbitrary Stupid Goal by Tamara Shopsen.
Marco:
of the wonderful, famous New York Shopsin family.
Marco:
It's so New York.
Marco:
I really love it.
Marco:
Culturally, just worldview, language, it's just delightful if you're really into the New York style.
Marco:
So once again, Arbitrary Stupid Goal by Tamara Shopsin.
Marco:
It's just great.
Marco:
Anyway, go to audible.com slash ATP, and you can get a free audiobook when you sign up with a 30-day free trial at audible.com slash ATP.
Marco:
Again, thank you so much to Audible for sponsoring our show.
Casey:
I have a question and I don't really expect either of you to have an answer, but at one point, and I believe this was before I had installed it on my watch, but I might have my details wrong.
Casey:
But at one point I had my watch or excuse me, I had my phone.
Casey:
I think it was like in the house upstairs far enough away that the watch couldn't see it.
Casey:
And maybe I was on a walk.
Casey:
Maybe I was in the house on the other side of the house.
Casey:
We don't have a terribly large house, but I guess we were on opposite ends of the house from each other, whatever.
Casey:
But the point is my watch was on cellular and I got a push notification from the app.
Casey:
Do D U E.
Casey:
But my watch was on cellular, and I hadn't used the app on my watch at all at that point, I don't believe.
Casey:
I don't think I had installed it on my watch.
Casey:
I might be wrong about that, so maybe I've answered my own question.
Casey:
But my question is, if the watch app wasn't installed, and I got a Do push notification...
Casey:
But all of the stuff that was in due was living only on the phone.
Casey:
I don't think I'd set up iCloud syncing or anything like that.
Casey:
How did I get that push notification?
Casey:
So in summary, is Apple proxying push notifications from the phone to the watch?
Casey:
Does that make sense?
Casey:
Because in theory, this wasn't a push notification from some server somewhere.
Casey:
Right.
Casey:
It was from the phone itself.
Casey:
So it's like the phone calling home to Apple and saying, hey, can you push this notification to the watch because I can't find it myself?
Casey:
Again, I don't know if I really expect an answer from you guys, but it seemed wonky that I was and it was good.
Casey:
It was a good thing.
Casey:
Don't get me wrong.
Casey:
But it seemed wonky that I was getting a push notification for something I didn't expect on my watch.
John:
You should have written in to ask ATP.
Casey:
Didn't I try that once and you yelled at me to put it in the show notes?
Casey:
I'm pretty sure that's what happened.
John:
Marco, I'm assuming, will have the best answer for this if any of us do.
John:
But the only thing I have to add is having just gone through the watch setup process when I was nuking my watch.
John:
re-installing watch os 3 before upgrading to 4 was i was reminded again that there's an option somewhere in the the watch app preferences that says watch mirrors notifications on phone sure sure and that that would seem like doing what you said oh it's a local notification and the watch is set to mirror any notification that happens on your phone and so it did
Casey:
Well, but I think that's more about the settings for notifications.
Casey:
So as an example, let's take Do, the app, D-U-E.
Casey:
Well, okay, if you're saying mirror what the phone settings are, that means just do what the phone is doing.
Casey:
And if that means play a sound and show it on the lock screen, then the watch will get a sound and it'll show it, you know, just like any other notification.
Casey:
If you've muted the notifications on the phone, then the watch would not receive those notifications.
Casey:
This is in contrast to going into the watch app on your phone and
Casey:
and saying, no, I don't want do on my watch, even though I do want it on my phone.
Casey:
That's a terrible choice of examples because now I'm using DUE and DO back to back.
Casey:
But hopefully you get what I'm driving at.
Casey:
So I think this is something different, which is it felt as though, and somebody in the chat is saying the same thing, it felt as though there was a push notification that was sourced from my phone,
Casey:
that wound up on my watch when my watch was on cellular and thus could not connect to the phone.
Casey:
So is that being proxied by Apple or is there some other trickery going on or am I just plain bananas?
Casey:
Marco, thoughts?
Casey:
I don't think we know.
Marco:
Yeah, I don't think we do either.
Marco:
And I appreciate that you think I would have more information on this as presumably an app developer, but I don't.
Marco:
It would be interesting to know whether the notification you receive in your watch was a local notification or a remote push notification, because you mentioned that you weren't really sure about that.
Marco:
I don't know how Do works.
Marco:
I don't use it, so I'm not sure.
Marco:
But if it was a remote push notification, that would be easier to figure out.
Marco:
The way push notifications work on the app side is whenever you say, yes, you can send this device notifications when you first install the app, the app gets a token that it can use.
Marco:
It's just like a long string that identifies that device.
Marco:
And when the app is sending notifications from the server side, it just basically sends notification service like that token and then a JSON dictionary of what the notification content should be.
Marco:
So it would be perfectly reasonable.
Marco:
I don't think the watch gets its own identifier separately, but it would be perfectly reasonable for the push notification service if it knows of a watch that is on LTE to just forward anything that goes to the phone's token also to the watch.
Marco:
If it's a local notification, it's a different story, though.
Marco:
That's a very different implementation.
Marco:
That would mean that, as you theorized, the phone would have to basically, like, realize it couldn't contact the watch, send the local notification back up to Apple for it to be sent back over to the phone, or to the watch, rather.
Marco:
And that's a little bit weird when you consider the possibility that a phone can be paired to multiple watches.
Marco:
So it's a very complicated setup.
Marco:
When you're thinking about the LTE watch, it sounds kind of like a checkbox of like, oh, this year they added LTE.
Marco:
Okay, done.
Marco:
But in practice, it was probably way more complicated than that because of things like this.
Marco:
People are going to expect it to just work.
Marco:
And Apple has to figure out how to implement whatever that means.
Marco:
And it's, you know, so it wouldn't surprise me if they actually did it.
Marco:
If they actually have some kind of crazy proxying system where they're sending local notifications from the phone back up to Apple and then back over to the watch when connected or relatively, it actually might do that.
Marco:
But I don't know.
Marco:
It certainly seems like a lot of the stuff regarding LTE on the watch is super early and possibly even a little bit unfinished.
Marco:
So it wouldn't surprise me also if this was nothing fancy going on, if it was just like the same push token being used remotely by Apple servers or...
Marco:
The other option is maybe it was local to your phone, but it actually did receive it already.
Marco:
Or it was a local notification scheduled to go at a certain time, and the watch just copied it over last time it talked to the phone.
Marco:
So it just knew, like, all right, well, over the next 24 hours or whatever, I'm going to need these notifications.
Marco:
And so here, I'll just copy them all over, and then I'll show them if the phone isn't nearby.
Marco:
So there are so many ways they could do this.
Marco:
We don't really know how they did.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
And that totally makes sense.
Casey:
And like you said, I don't think we're going to know unless a little birdie reaches out, hint, hint.
Casey:
But it just was, it was interesting to me because it felt like, and I wish I had taken better notes or had paid more attention, but this like happened in the midst of me doing something with Declan.
Casey:
And I took enough of a note to remind myself that I wanted to talk to you guys about it, but I didn't have the time to document, you know, repro steps or anything like that.
Casey:
anyways the point is it just felt like the sort of thing where maybe it was being proxied by apple and that was kind of cool i mean it was again the behavior was what i wanted it's not like the behavior was bad it was just unexpected that's all so we'll see i don't know we'll figure it out one way or the other but i think all of your less fancy but also more probable interpretations make perfect sense to me so who knows
Casey:
John, apparently everything's coming up Syracuse this week because that's a reference, by the way.
Casey:
Twitterific for Mac.
Casey:
It is back and it is out.
Casey:
So tell me about it.
John:
Yeah, that's just a quick follow-up.
John:
People asked, I think... Wait, this is a follow-up?
John:
You're in the wrong section.
John:
Well, you know what I mean.
John:
It's... Yeah.
John:
Anyway, because it was asked about in Ask ADP, hey, how you're liking the Phoenix betas, which was the name of this application when it was testing for the Kickstarter things.
John:
This is that whole Kickstarter that a lot of people funded to get them to bring back their Mac application, which they had that languish because they just weren't enough customers for it.
John:
And then the Kickstarter gave them enough money to remake the app.
John:
and so i've been using it for a long time and it's great and as i said in the last ask atp that asked about this i'm enjoying it it's exactly what i wanted now it is out for everybody to buy it is on the mac app store i think there might let me click through is there a direct download i don't even know anyway twitter.com slash mac the link will be in the show notes if you're interested in a mac twitter client and you don't like any of the mac tour clients that are out there
John:
Check this one out.
John:
It's got an adorable icon.
John:
The most important feature of this Twitter application, as far as I'm concerned, is that it has my beloved unified timeline.
John:
which gives you a list of all the tweets that are, you know, related to you, mentions, replies, direct messages, and all the tweets from the people you follow.
John:
And the RT is just one big, long chronological timeline from the past to the future.
John:
That's it.
John:
And you have the other views too.
John:
Do I want to just see my mentions, direct messages, searches, all sorts of stuff.
John:
That's all there too.
John:
But the important feature is the unified timeline.
John:
And it's just a nice Twitter client.
John:
So check it out if you're interested.
John:
yeah so it's uh on the mac apps oh and the other important feature is uh on ios twitter has always been updated on ios and it continues to be updated because it's you know more viable platform than the mac these days uh and your reading position is synced between the mac and the ios version which is super important because i read a bunch of stuff on my phone and i cut to my mac i wanted to realize what i read on my phone in my one big chronological timeline and it does
John:
and it's great and it's got laser beams if you know where to find them so check it out that's awesome all right uh john tell me about apple tv gaming this is from remember the was it september event got some stuff from the september event lurking down there for a long time and i didn't want this one to fall off the end
Casey:
do you remember they did that gaming segment in that event yeah there was that that journey or whatever it is uh knockoff or not knockoff like another what is it that game company that game company made another game or something like that i'm trying not to offend you and i think i'm failing
John:
Yeah, I never liked the name of that company.
John:
That game company is clever initially, but then it's like, oh, lowercase and Switch.
John:
Anyway, so this is Apple TV and gaming.
John:
We talked a lot about this before, about whether they should ship a controller with it and whether they should allow people to ship games that require a controller, which they flip-flopped on, and now they're saying, yes, they will.
John:
And how viable is it as a gaming platform versus things like the Switch or a real game console or PC or Mac gaming, even with Steam and everything?
Yeah.
John:
And so here Apple is again at an important keynote spending time to talk about it was the Apple TV 4K, but, you know, the gaming angle on it.
John:
And they brought out on stage, you know, a third party game developer, very well known in the industry because they are the makers of Journey, which is a game that I love and a couple other artsy farts of games they made before that.
John:
which they're also bringing to ios they brought flower to ios um which was erroneously uh identified as their first game but it was not their first game anyway uh that i mean that seems like an aside but i think it factors into what i'm going to say in a little bit about it
John:
And this is, it's not bringing out the big guns.
John:
It's not like they, you know, Nintendo was on stage.
John:
They already did that with Mario Run, I think.
John:
But it's not like, you know, Apple buys Nintendo or like, you know, Ubisoft or EA announced all their future games will be on Apple TV or like...
John:
But it is significant in that getting that game company to port their games and to make their new game, which is called Sky, on Apple's platform, that only has significance for people who follow the game industry, for people who are into games.
John:
For most people, they've never heard of that game company.
John:
They don't know what Flower is or haven't played Journey.
John:
You have to be...
John:
somewhat involved in the gaming industry to understand why it's in any way impressive that jenova chen is up on stage for them you don't have to be so much in the game industry to be impressed that miyamoto is telling you that mario is coming to ios right i think he has lots of name recognition there but that game company is more obscure and yet
John:
If you were to get someone who knew a lot about gaming to say, what's one company you can get on stage that will make people think that you're getting more serious about gaming without you having to spend billions of dollars to actually buy Nintendo or convince one of the big game makers to put all their future games on your platform or whatever?
John:
You could find a company that basically bankrupted itself producing Journey, had an exclusive contract with Sony and PlayStation, which is why Journey isn't on other platforms, and would be in the market to say, we're trying to start the company back up again.
John:
Who's got a bunch of money to dump on our heads so we'll make our next game for their platform?
John:
And I'm sure Sony approached them because they made a lot of money for Sony with Journey and Flower and Flow and
John:
you know the whole nine yards and probably microsoft approached them uh and here is the unlikely third uh suitor in apple who has a lot of money to dump on people's heads and for whatever reason maybe they dumped more money or maybe uh that game company in jenova chan were tired of dealing with sony or microsoft or you know whatever and
John:
they went with apple and so they're making sky on apple tv now if anyone who follows the game industry knows that exclusive platform exclusives are things that people love to announce but they're only really exclusive in certain more extreme cases where it's kind of a second party developer or a very tight relationship where
John:
this will never be on another platform because we've really tied up the rights but a lot of times things are exclusive to xbox exclusive to playstation for three months for six months for less time that timed exclusives they call them which is like so you mean not exclusive then right this is a multi-platform game it just goes on one platform first or it's a multi-platform game and it ships on one three days before everything else and there's special you know uh features for that one anyway
John:
I'm not clear whether it's exclusive or exclusive, but either way, they gave enough money to help the development of this game and also money to port their old games that they were able to.
John:
Like I said, I don't think they can port Journey because I think Sony's got the rights to that all wrapped up, but we'll see.
John:
Speaking of that, if Apple wants Journey, I'm sure they can give Sony a bucket full of money and they would get it.
John:
bringing all those to apple tv and it's a little bit of a head scratcher because like so you're trying to appeal to people who know what that game company is and understand what a great game journey was but those people don't take apple tv seriously as a gaming platform because nobody takes apple tv seriously as a gaming platform
John:
But that's the only announcement you're going to make.
John:
And the question I have about this announcement on Apple TV and gaming is like, what's going on, Apple?
John:
Are you serious?
John:
Or is this just like another, is this your carpool karaoke of gaming?
John:
Like you try to do, carpool karaoke is popular, right?
John:
People like that.
John:
well try that like or is this your i'm spending two billion dollars in hiring all the showrunners from you know uh fancy shows and uh that that are successful in other networks like it seems like i would say that apple still is not serious about gaming doesn't understand what it takes to be a player in the gaming industry but on the other hand wanted to have something nice to say about gaming or
John:
Or maybe they're close personal friends with Jenova Chen.
John:
I don't even know.
John:
But it's a mysterious announcement to me.
John:
I'm assuming Sky will be a timed exclusive and not only exclusive on Apple TV.
John:
Because, come on.
John:
Who's going to buy an Apple TV to play Sky?
John:
Some artsy-fartsy gaming nerds.
John:
How many copies of Sky are they going to sell?
John:
if it literally was exclusive to ios and apple tv who knows maybe they'll sell tons of them but i have to think mario run has way more name recognition than a game that no one's heard of from a game developer that's no one no one's heard of and even mario run yeah it made a lot of money but zelda made more you know selling a bunch of switches made more uh hell the nes classic and snes classic probably made more um so
John:
i don't know this like i would not have predicted this and and it's still mysterious to me and i don't know if i'm being like biased against apple thinking like oh apple never understands games like what do they have to do to prove to you understand they have to prove that they understand games they have to prove that like
John:
that they know what it takes to make things that people want to play games on.
John:
And the Apple TV is not a thing that people want to play games on.
John:
Now, I'll play Sky on my Apple TV if that's the only place I get it, but I would much rather play it on my PlayStation.
John:
I would rather play it on my Mac or Macs.
John:
You can't play games on those, right, Apple?
John:
As far as Apple's concerned, you can't.
John:
i don't know so i find that people are asking what i thought of it because i love journey so much i find it interesting but also very frustrating and i continue to give apple the frowny face when it comes to gaming on apple tv and the mac for that matter because come come on like you know valve was nice enough to make steam on the mac ship with good gpus support open gl better let us play games on the mac but anyway that that's that's all i have to say about this
John:
that's all oh that's all i tried to make it short because i have deep feelings about it but that's that's as short as i can make it oh and i wanted to hear are you two going to you're a good examples of people who don't give a damn about that game company and don't really care about journey and you know which game company didn't know yeah didn't know the the name sky until it was announced on stage despite the fact that they've spent years working on this game or i don't remember if the game the name was out but everything about the game
John:
had been discussed for a long time because in gaming circles but are you going to buy this game on your apple tv if you didn't already have apple keys would you buy one to play this game john i don't even have time to play the switch and you think i'm going to buy a game for the apple tv so you're not going to buy this even if it's like 15 bucks absolutely not you did buy journey though didn't you yeah well yes i did and i borrowed a playstation to play it but uh and i'm glad i did don't get me wrong it was a great game
Casey:
but the only way i'm going to buy and play this game is if i get browbeat into it from you which is quite possible and it's not that i doubt i'm going to do that because really do i want anyone playing games with like an apple tv remote am i going to make you buy a controller joe yeah that's never going to happen
Marco:
I guess any one of mine will probably never use them again.
Casey:
Fair enough.
Casey:
So I guess that means same story for you then?
Marco:
So when I saw Apple TV gaming Sky in the show notes document, I had forgotten what that even was.
Marco:
So impactful, that announcement.
Marco:
Yeah.
Marco:
I'm not a huge game nerd or even gamer at all.
Marco:
I am currently very much enjoying Stardew Valley, but...
Marco:
I tend to really enjoy one game a year, maybe, and then that's it.
Marco:
So I really would not still call myself a gamer.
Marco:
I'm sure it's going to be interesting to gamers.
Marco:
If you come on here and tell me you have to play this game, I'll play it.
Marco:
I'll buy it.
Marco:
I'll play it, whatever.
Marco:
But that would be the only reason I would do it.
Marco:
The Apple TV...
Marco:
As much as I wanted it to be a gaming platform when the fourth gen came out and when the App Store for it launched and everything, it just hasn't panned out.
Marco:
And Apple has done pretty much nothing to help that.
Marco:
They modified the rules so that games now can at least require a controller if it just is not going to work with the Siri remote.
Marco:
But there are so many reasons why people don't even think of the Apple TV as a gaming platform.
Marco:
And if you're going to have to go out and spend $50 on a controller to make it one, no one's going to do that.
Marco:
So the fact is, no matter how hard Apple tries to make it a gaming platform, which honestly doesn't seem like they're trying that hard, but...
Marco:
If they are trying, it's probably futile until it comes with a type of remote that can be used as a controller reasonably well in the box.
Marco:
And I don't think that's ever going to happen.
Marco:
So as long as that's still not going to be the case, like no one's going to go out there and buy an extra controller for 50 bucks just to play the very small handful of decent games that are available for the Apple TV.
John:
Apple has actually done a bunch of stuff in service of gaming, which is the mysterious thing.
John:
All the stuff they're doing with Metal and all their WDC sessions and all their toolkits for making sprite-based and 3D games, they're doing a lot of work.
John:
It's like they don't understand how games are made in the rest of the industry.
John:
Nobody is going to use all their pretty impressive proprietary frameworks and stuff to make really good-performing games online.
John:
on apple tv anyway maybe on ios they're more motivated because you can sell a lot of games if you get the right one on ios but on apple tv like the only thing they're going to do is like the best thing they've done is say okay well we made sure that unity has support for metal and all this other stuff like the various game engines and the unreal engine and all that stuff have reasonable support for the underlying frameworks but they're putting money into it and it's like
John:
is it it's hard to tell is it like oh this is mostly just for phone games because people make a lot of money on phone games and by the way it happens to also benefit apple tv because if you're trying to if you're trying to compete in the games market you have to you have to do what the other companies do who have gaming platforms you have to court talent and develop talent and get people to make games for your system and make sure that multi-platform games are available on your system unless your name's nintendo which and you have tons of first-party properties that can apparently keep your company alive forever despite
John:
not doing a good job courting third-party success because you keep making less powerful hardware but anyway you have to do you have to put in a lot of work it's kind of like what they're doing with tv you have to hire the right people and they have to go get the actors and the stories and like it is a lot of work to compete in the gaming industry you can't just say here's the hardware and we you know gave some money to jenova chen so here's one cool game and like if you build it they won't come like you have to go get them
John:
you have to do all the things that sony and microsoft do and nintendo even you know to some degree do in this market or you know if you want to be like nintendo make a bunch of amazing first party games that are just system sellers on their own and but and they don't have the back catalog for that anyway so it's frustrating to me because every time i see all the gaming sessions wwc i'm impressed by what i see but
John:
i can't map that to like apple tv gaming it's all even though they talk about it and they put a powerful gpu and and the apple tv and they say it's a platform for gaming it just it just seems like a way for you to make phone games uh which is fine that's the one area where they have a little display although even phone games use third-party engines for a lot of stuff but apple tv it just doesn't seem to be going anywhere which is
John:
It's almost like I wish they would just not keep making these sort of half-hearted efforts and instead just admit that Apple TV isn't a gaming platform.
John:
Now, all that said, before we finally leave this topic, one thing I will suggest is that Flower, which is an older game made by that game company, is actually a really good fit for iOS and for Apple TV because it's entirely motion-controlled.
John:
Or I'm assuming it is.
John:
It was in the PlayStation.
John:
So even with the Apple TV remote,
John:
you don't have to touch any buttons you just tilt the remote forward and back and i don't know i haven't actually tried it with the apple to the remote but i'm saying if anything is going to be reasonably playable with that terrible remote or just on a phone or something an entirely motion controlled game is and flower is fine it's cute it's nice game uh if you're not really into games and just want something pretty to look at and a fun activity that actually does build to something towards the end if you play through the whole game
John:
i would recommend downloading the port of flower uh it is actually a good fit for all of apple's platforms unlike so many other games that just don't work without a controller like marco said so i'll play sky and tell you how it is thanks all right thanks to our sponsors this week squarespace audible and fracture and we will see you next week
Marco:
Now the show is over They didn't even mean to begin Cause it was accidental Oh, it was accidental John didn't do any research Marco and Casey wouldn't let him Cause it was accidental Oh, it was accidental And you can find the show notes at atp.fm
Marco:
And if you're into Twitter, you can follow them at C-A-S-E-Y-L-I-S-S.
Marco:
So that's Casey Liss.
Marco:
M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M-E-N-T.
Marco:
Marco Arment.
Marco:
S-I-R-A-C-U-S-A Syracuse.
Marco:
It's accidental.
Casey:
They did it.
Casey:
You're looking at that expensive Volvo?
Casey:
I knew it was a thing, but I'd never really read that much into it.
John:
Still an SUV, so who cares?
Casey:
Sometimes, John, you want space.
It's a thing.
Marco:
If only there is a way to get space without making it really tall.
Casey:
Yeah, and how are you going to do that, Marco?
Marco:
A large sedan, a hatchback, a wagon, a crossover, a minivan.
Marco:
There's all sorts of ways to do this.
Marco:
No crossovers.
Casey:
A minivan is an acceptable answer.
Casey:
Hatchback is not.
Casey:
Crossover is not.
John:
Not enough room in a Rolls Royce.
John:
You need to make the entire vehicle 20 feet high.
John:
Yes.
John:
Ridiculous.
John:
no the problem is okay i will sure john i'll buy the three hundred thousand dollar rolls royce just to avoid the fifty thousand dollar lifted car a mercedes s-class like it's not like you need to make an suv to have room in a car yeah have you seen how much room there's in my car we don't like suvs and in case you don't like suvs either but you have one now so you feel compelled to defend the form
John:
And you shouldn't.
Casey:
There's some modicum of that that is true, without question.
Casey:
However, I really like Aaron's car a lot.
Casey:
I really honestly do.
John:
You just like nice cars, but, you know.
John:
Well, that's true.
John:
If it was a nice sedan, you would like it a lot, too.
Casey:
Yes, and I have sat in a stationary – what the hell is it called?
Casey:
An S90?
Casey:
Basically her car, but low.
Casey:
And it's eerie because it feels on the inside exactly the same until you look past the second row because obviously Aaron's car is third row.
Casey:
But anyway, in so many ways it feels the same, like the same infotainment, same cushiness, et cetera, et cetera.
Casey:
The car is like 300 feet long, but I don't know.
Casey:
It just feels wonky to me when it's that low.
Casey:
I think because I was exposed to the XC90 as a SUV.
Casey:
Although it's funny because to kind of parlay this into something, that's not the right use of the word, but whatever, to turn this into something, to pivot into something else, I am taking the BMW in in a couple of weeks for state inspection for an airbag recall, maybe, if they actually have one in stock.
Casey:
And I had to put a little coolant in the car, which in and of itself is not that remarkable, but it's the first time I've had to do it.
Casey:
So I asked them to, you know, hey, just go ahead and make sure this thing isn't about to explode, which means they're going to find a reason why it's about to explode.
Casey:
And this will be another $5,000 bill.
Casey:
Well, anyway.
Casey:
I bring all this up because a sales dude called me and said, oh, I see you're bringing your car in in a couple of weeks.
Casey:
Yes, I am.
Casey:
Is there something I could do to put you in a new BMW?
Casey:
To which I just laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed.
Casey:
So I said to him, I'll put $15,000 in this car in five years.
Casey:
There's no way I'm buying another BMW.
John:
He probably believed you as much as we do.
John:
Yeah.
Casey:
I'm not buying a BMW.
John:
We'll see.
Casey:
No, you're going to buy something faster but worse.
Casey:
Probably.
Casey:
Actually, to be honest, that is an extremely accurate assessment if I end up with a Golf R. Exactly.
Marco:
Everything that you've said that you are really wanting is faster but worse.
Marco:
Correct.
Marco:
At least that you would actually buy.
Marco:
The Quadrifuglio or whatever it was, that one might overall be better depending on the transmission severity, but you wouldn't actually buy that one.
Casey:
Correct.
John:
I still continue to read all sorts of bad stories about reliability for test fleet cars, for car magazines, and they usually get the good ones, so I would...
John:
yeah although i like marco's uh most recent mispronunciation because it contains fugly in it it's a beautiful car it's a beautiful car i will i will like you are wrong john you are wrong is your given name john or jonathan it's john isn't it and that's an ugly car sorry it seems like it seems like a great car it seems like it's unreliable and i do not like how it looks
Marco:
No, I mean, first of all, you can tell it's John instead of Jonathan because there's an H and he's Italian.
Marco:
There's probably somebody out there who spells Jonathan with the H, but I'm sure it's very, very rare.
Marco:
And second of all, there's no Italian Jonathans.
Marco:
They're all Johns.
Marco:
That's true.
Marco:
And then second of all, third of all, whatever number I'm up to now, I would say that the Quadrifoglio is probably significantly more attractive than the current generation of BMW M cars.
Casey:
Nope.
Casey:
I would say it is more attractive.
Casey:
I don't know if I would say it's considerably more attractive.
Casey:
So my product communications person from Alfa Romeo North America wrote me today.
Casey:
We all have one of those.
Casey:
God, that sounded extremely self-reported.
John:
What a title.
Marco:
My product communications from Alfa Romeo America never writes me at all.
John:
What a jerk.
John:
So they talk to you about products.
John:
It's like, I want to communicate with you.
Casey:
about products i'm a product communicator this is not where i wanted this to go and i recognize that this is exactly what i deserve i never that's that's a hell of a title it's exactly what i deserve but anyway what did i call him a product communication specialist or whatever i already forgot the email yeah i closed the email i forgot too so anyway so i've been bothering him constantly because the the people that actually have the car don't want to talk to me apparently
John:
But I can't believe they're not flying you to Europe to try the stick.
John:
And by the way, the chat runs out that you should ask them for the SUV since that's what you like is they make.
Casey:
Oh, kindly kiss the widest part of my.
John:
Well, you know, that seems to be what you're into.
John:
It might seem weird when it's when it's down so low.
John:
It might seem weird.
John:
John, I hate you so much.
Casey:
You know what?
Casey:
Well, actually, you know, it's worse.
Casey:
Did I have this conversation with you guys on the show?
Casey:
I don't think I did.
Casey:
The worst part of this is that I've decided my shortlist for my next car.
Casey:
Obviously, Golf R. There are two other options.
Casey:
I would like you to guess, either one of you, what those other two options are.
John:
Honda Accord.
Casey:
No.
Casey:
Although I will look at it.
John:
You will look at it.
Casey:
It's too slow.
Marco:
It's too slow.
Marco:
No.
Marco:
The other option is going to be that Cadillac rectangle thing.
Casey:
No.
Marco:
Good guess, but no.
Marco:
No?
Marco:
All right.
Marco:
No.
Marco:
It's automatic only.
Marco:
oh okay all right so all three of these cars all three of these cars i can get with a stick brand new all right so golf r um it's probably not the jeep grand cherokee whatever it was that you reviewed can't get that with a stick yeah right no what the hell's i don't know other stick uh not not an audi no i'm gonna say since you have suv envy and there aren't that many suvs available with the stick i'm gonna guess maybe a jeep wrangler because those i think are available with stick
Casey:
That is one of the three cars.
Casey:
Yes.
Casey:
That is the... I'm not kidding, by the way.
Casey:
I am not kidding.
Casey:
That is my... I am abandoning all pretense of luxury.
Casey:
I am abandoning all thoughts of speed and comfort and screw it.
Casey:
I'm just going to go the other direction.
John:
Why not get a golf cart?
John:
What are you doing?
Casey:
John, all kidding aside, as much as I love to beat up on you two, have you ever been, either of you, in a Jeep Wrangler that has the top offer down and does not have doors on it?
John:
Yeah, no, I understand that.
John:
That's why I said a golf cart.
John:
It's fun to ride a golf cart, too.
Casey:
Right, and does not have doors on it.
Casey:
That's the key.
Casey:
The fact that you can just take the doors right off is amazing.
John:
Yeah, it's great fun.
Marco:
You know, there has never been a time when I've been sitting in a car and thought, you know, this car needs fewer doors.
Marco:
It has never happened.
John:
I mean, it's the feeling like, you know, when I used to work at the parks department, they had a lot of vehicles that were basically this, either like old trucks or what is it, the brand Cushman or whatever, like big 4x4s that you basically sit on kind of.
John:
It's fun to do that, but that's not a car.
John:
Obviously, if you live anywhere with weather, that's a no-go.
John:
Even if you don't, you're just tempting death.
John:
Why not get a superbike?
John:
If you want to get closer to the pavement, here you go.
Casey:
Yeah, I'll just get myself a... What's the ridiculous one that they always turbocharge?
Casey:
Oh, God, I'm drawing a blank now.
Casey:
Hayabusa, there it is.
Casey:
I'll just get a Hayabusa, and I'll be fine.
Casey:
Okay, so you got one of the three.
Casey:
Well, two of the three, actually, because I gave you the Golf R.
Marco:
oh man so john what do you i mean what else is available the stick bmw 2 series it's available it's not a bmw yeah i it should be it should be the 2 series but it's not um i need i need more space audi makes a4s with sticks do they but there it is there it is because you enjoyed your your renting of the silver one
Casey:
Well, I did, although the MMI, which is their knockoff iDrive, used to be abysmally bad.
Casey:
Not as bad as the Jeep, but really bad.
Casey:
But that being said, they supposedly have a new one, and you can get the A4 with a stick, and it has all the fancy digital dash that I'm sure John hates, and it has CarPlay, and...
John:
I don't hate digital dashes.
John:
You mean the instrument cluster in front of you behind the steering wheel, right?
John:
Correct, correct.
John:
Yeah, I don't hate that.
Casey:
Well, I'm surprised.
Casey:
Well, anyway, so it has all that jazz.
Marco:
But see, I think I will still be correct that what you're waiting will be faster but worse.
Marco:
Although, actually, if you get an Audi, it might not be faster.
Casey:
It would not be faster.
Casey:
Well, probably not.
Casey:
It depends on how well I can drive my car.
Marco:
To me, my experience with Audi is looking at them and test driving them and having occasional friends that have them and stuff.
Marco:
It just seems like it's like BMW, but everything looks a little bit better and works a little bit worse.
Casey:
In my limited experience with Audi, I would agree with that wholeheartedly.
John:
The outside of them look pretty good on some of them, though.
John:
Yes.
John:
Their styling.
John:
It looks a little bit better.
Casey:
Yeah.
Casey:
Yeah, that's what Marco's saying.
Casey:
And I think that's a fair assessment.
John:
Because the Audi's interior styling, people usually like two of those that you're talking about.
Casey:
I think either way, in or out, I think they're a safer bet visually.
John:
You should try the S8.
John:
And when you're at the Honda dealership, try it.
John:
You can't get the S8, the S4.
John:
You can get the S4 with a stick, right?
Casey:
Nope, not anymore.
John:
Audi makes very few sticks.
John:
When you're at the Honda dealership, you should also test drive the Civic Type R, which I know you're not going to get because it looks like a Matchbox car, but you should just try it anyway.
Casey:
I would love to.
Casey:
Actually, everything you just said is absolutely correct.
Casey:
And I would definitely give the new Accord a shot.
Casey:
And all snark and jokes aside, as much as I love to give you a hard time about your love of Accords, I am really impressed by, just on paper, having never seen one in person, having never driven one.
Casey:
I'm really impressed by the new Accord, and I think Honda's finally making smart choices, which by that I mean choices that make Casey happy.
Casey:
They're making smart choices with the new Accord, making it available with the big motor, with the stick, et cetera, et cetera.
Casey:
The review that I shared with you, and I don't remember where it was, so I'm not going to put it in the show notes, that was not terribly— Was it Jalopnik, I think?
Casey:
It might have been.
Casey:
It was not terribly flattering, but I still stand by this is the first time I've looked at an Accord and thought, you know what?
Casey:
That's a possibility.
Casey:
And for everyone saying S3 and RS3 in the chat, those are not available with a stick in the U.S.
Casey:
unless I'm mistaken.
Casey:
And either way, I'm not really sure what I'm gaining.
Casey:
over a Golf R. I need to break myself with a Golf thing.
Marco:
A Golf R. The Audi 3 Series is really minimal gains, but lots of price increases over the high-end Golf Series.
Marco:
It's just a luxury Golf.
Marco:
That's all it is.
Marco:
I don't feel like you're getting what you're paying for necessarily with that one.
John:
Why aren't you getting a jury generation Cayman that's better than all these cars that you've just described?
Casey:
I want something that I can hypothetically put two children in and a wife.
John:
No, you don't.
John:
Well, I don't want.
John:
You have this giant school bus for the kids.
John:
Oh, you're such a jerk.
John:
You do.
John:
You have this giant vehicle that can hold like your kids and neighbor kids.
John:
For you, for your car, just get a used Cayman and it's better than all the cars you've listed.
Marco:
Yeah.
Marco:
Yeah.
Marco:
Although, talk about maintenance.
Marco:
I mean, well, there's that.
Marco:
It's not so bad.
John:
How much is a Cayman?
John:
Seriously, how much is a Cayman?
John:
Could it be worse than BMW?
John:
I mean, yeah.
John:
Before they turbocharged it, the one that Jerry got.
John:
That's the generation you want.
Casey:
I know exactly what you're thinking of.
Casey:
What year is that?
Casey:
I don't know Porsche shows well enough to know.
John:
I don't know.
John:
Just go back through Jerry's timeline and see when he started posting messages of his car.
John:
Probably, what, like three years ago or something like that?
John:
Yeah, three years ago or something before they changed the name to 718 and turbocharged.
Casey:
Okay, here you go.
Casey:
So I'm looking on AutoTrader.
Casey:
Coincidentally, just as you're saying that, model name clarification.
Casey:
How quickly can you look things up on AutoTrader?
Marco:
Fairly quickly.
Marco:
Is it like a dedicated hardware key on your keyboard that just immediately launches AutoTrader and opens it up to a search?
Marco:
I feel like if I was ever to give a serious look at a Porsche, Porsche, however it's pronounced, I apologize.
Marco:
If I were to ever give a serious look at that brand,
Marco:
It would take me like three weeks of research to just figure out what the hell I'm looking at.
Marco:
Because there are so many tiny little name variations that add or subtract 30 grand.
Marco:
Wait, what?
Marco:
What is that?
Marco:
Is it that much better?
Marco:
What does that mean?
John:
But with the Cayman of this generation, even the cheap one with the slow engine is still a great car.
John:
yeah like there's no there's nothing you know and it's just a question of how much do you want to get ripped off of the fancy schmancy one and how many thousands of dollars like and in fact it might be a mistake like oh i accidentally got the one with carbon ceramic brakes because they're kind of annoying in daily use and you're not going to be on a racetrack and that would be a bad move but you can tell because it'll be an extra 20 grand in the price