bad Apple

My one-emoji review of Apple Books

Ah, Apple Books. I remember when the iPad debuted in 2010 and along with it iBooks, because back then Apple named everything iSomething. Because there were no deals with Canadian publishers in place, the iBooks store in Canada was a virtual empty shelf. This is part of why I ended up buying most of my ebooks from Kobo, something I continue to do today.

But I wanted to give Apple a chance, so once actual books became available, I found one I wanted that was on sale (bonus) and purchased it: Redshirts, by John Scalzi. Now, part of the reason I bought Redshirts is because the publisher specifically sells it without DRM, meaning I could sideload it onto my Kobo ereader and not be stuck reading it only on my phone or iPad. But ho ho, it turns out Apple’s own DRM was still applied, thwarting my efforts and souring me on the experience. I did ultimately get a DRM-free version and read the book on a Kobo device. But it was the last ebook I purchased on Apple Books.

Until today.

BookBub noted that 3,000 Writing & Plot Prompts A-C was on sale for $0.99 from the usual places: Amazon, Kobo and Apple. At that price, it’s an easy impulse purchase because I love lists and some prompts might, er, prompt some writing.

But because it’s only $0.99 (not exactly a huge investment), I thought I’d be wacky and get it on Apple Books. I load up the Apple Books app on my Mac, go to the book’s store page, click the $0.99 button, enter my Apple ID credentials, watch the little spinny circle as the purchase is made, then…nothing. It actually navigates away from the page to a different part of the bookstore. I make my way back to the page with the book of prompts, and it is again showing the $0.99 button. I check my library in Apple Books. The book is not there.

Now, I think I saw something briefly flash on screen after the purchase began, but it disappeared in a blink and never came back. Dare I try the purchase again? Since I had money in my Apple Wallet anyway, I figured what the heck and clicked the $0.99 button again. It spun. I got prompted for my Apple ID credentials. I entered them. I then got another pop-up asking me if I was totally absolutely sure I wanted to buy this book and clicked affirmative. The $0.99 button then changed to a handy READ button because the purchase was now complete.

I don’t know why the second confirmation to buy comes up to begin with, or why it failed to stay up the first time I tried buying (I wasn’t leaning on the mouse or anything), all I know is that when I buy books from Kobo it just works every single time. My experience with Apple on buying books and something not going awry is now 0/2.

Here is my one-emoji review of Apple Books circa 2022:

Apple: Mucking up your music since 2001

Oh, Apple. How do you manage to take something that works and break it in such wonderful ways?

The other day I went for a run and decided to listen to the Jon and Vangelis album The Friends of Mr. Cairo. I had previously downloaded it from Apple Music onto my iPhone (the downloaded part is important–this saves me bandwidth because I don’t need to stream the music over cell while I’m out running). I had listened to the album on runs before, and had no issues.

This time I noticed something different.

The previous night, I had added two other Jon and Vangelis albums on my Mac–added, but not downloaded. These were faithfully reproduced (but not downloaded–as expected) on my iPhone’s Music app. All good so far.

Except the first song, “I’ll Find My Way Home” was no longer part of The Friends of Mr. Cairo. It was now part of another album, but only listed by itself. The two albums are:

  • The Friends of Mr. Cairo (Remastered) — the one that previously had all the songs from the album, but was now missing “I’ll Find My Way Home”
  • The Friends of Mr. Cairo (2016 Remaster) — which only has “I’ll Find My Way Home” and nothing else

Yes, by adding these other albums, the Apple Music app apparently tried to fix something that was not broken and now has split the single album across two separate albums, apparently pulling from two different versions or just two of the same but with slightly different names. For my run, I had to create a playlist just to play the actual album in order. I guess that helped warm up my fingers. I named the playlist in a crude, but I think fair, manner:

To fix this I had to delete both copies from my iPhone, then download the 2016 remaster, except the first time it only grabbed one song (this isn’t even the downloaded part, just getting the actual list of songs), the second time it grabbed two and the third time, by some miracle, it grabbed all seven tracks and downloaded them without setting my phone on fire.

Now to see if this actually stays in place or if Apple’s secret and evil gnome magic will start splitting it up into multiple albums again.

I could have been eating a cookie instead of doing all this. A yummy cookie.

Bad Apple.

On the Apple Studio Diplay’s webcam

Jason Snell (emphasis mine):

And yes, there’s hardware beyond the display itself. Most notably, Apple has placed the widescreen 12-megapixel camera that has spread across the entire iPad line in the top bezel of this display and enabled Center Stage. This is the first time that Macs have been able to take advantage of the automatic pan-and-zoom technology—and a desktop monitor is a perfect place for it, since so many of us sit at our desks doing video calls these days.

John Gruber:

I don’t really understand why Apple chose to support Center Stage with the Studio Display, and thus use this ultra-wide angle camera, in the first place. Center Stage feels clever and useful on iPads, which are often handheld and often positioned in all sorts of different angles and dynamic positions. But how is that [Center Stage] a good choice for the camera on a big desktop display that isn’t intended to move around, and which you tend to sit in front of in a fixed position?

Unsurprisingly, the Apple tech crowd have soft-pedaled their criticisms of the monitor, which is in the end an overpriced run-of-the-mill IPS monitor with some nice but strictly speaking unnecessary features (speakers, webcam, microphones) and ludicrously doesn’t include an adjustable stand. Gruber’s indirect reference to this is embarrassing cover for Apple (emphasis mine):

My review unit is the $1600 base model with the standard glossy finish and tilt-only base. On my desk, it’s the perfect height; if I had the model with the adjustable-height base, I’d probably set it at this exact height anyway.

Because everyone in the world is the exact same height as John Gruber, so obviously an adjustable stand is no issue being a $400 extra, amirite? Why include it when the monitor is already THE PERFECT HEIGHT. (Yes, I know Gruber isn’t literally saying this, it’s still stupid.)

Also, the power cord is permanently attached to the back of the monitor. What the actual heck, Apple? Did their design team journey back to the 1980s for reference? Just appalling, lazy, consumer-hostile choices all over the place on this.

UPDATE, March 21, 2022: It turns out you can remove the power cable on the display, if you have a special tool from Apple made just for the task. I think what we are seeing here really is Apple stepping back into the 1980s and the days when nearly everything they made was locked down and/or proprietary.

I kind of hate Apple now, even as they have finally started to turn around Tim Cook’s disastrous stewardship of the Mac.

DisplayLink dilemma done and dealt with

Well, mostly.

I decided to take another run at getting both monitors working with the DisplayLink USB adapter on my MacBook Air (previous attempts here) because I am a silly person.

I started by downloading the latest DisplayLink drivers and…that was the solution, actually. With the new drivers in place, both monitors began working. Hooray!

But…when I put the MacBook Air into clamshell mode, the “main” monitor suddenly stops displaying. It might be a refresh rate issue, but it could also be one of a million billion other things, and it’s working well enough now that I’m considering this issue sufficiently resolved.

Now that I have dual monitors working on the Mac, I can better evaluate using the configuration and I can’t help but feel that macOS still trails behind Windows in terms of things like multiple monitor support, as well as window and file management. A lot of the systems feel like they were designed 20-30 years ago and haven’t really changed much since then. Sure, even in Windows 11 you can still find legacy bits dating back 20 years or more, too, but it’s usually just some semi-obscure outdated icons, or an old-style dialog box. The actual systems in place are modern.

On the Mac, you have weird decisions like making the dock only appear on one screen in extended mode and having to click near the bottom of the active screen to move it over.

But man, the fonts render so nicely!

(I’ll have my comprehensive Mac vs. PC post up soon. It’ll be like living through the 90s again!)

The battle for multiple displays on an M1 MacBook Air, Chapter 1

Right now, I am caught between two worlds. Specifically, Mars and Jupiter. I’m stuck in the asteroid belt, send help!

Just kidding.

I use both a Windows 11 PC and an M1 MacBook Air. Both are very nice machines and perform well. I think Windows 11 has caught up in many ways to macOS in terms of appearance and UI, and even surpasses it in some ways (window management remains much better, as I’ve noted before).

I would be Windows-only save for one thing: my fiction writing is done in Ulysses, which is a Mac-only app. Now, it’s true that my fiction writing has been moribund (very, very moribund) for the last year or so and if I had no intent on changing this, I could just put aside the MacBook Air for the fabled time when I’d actually need to go back out into the world with a laptop again.

But I am intent on actually trying to revive my fiction writing and I’m too lazy to look for or switch to another writing app, so I’m keeping my Mac–for now, at least.

My previous setup was a single 27″ monitor and it worked well for both PC and Mac. Switching between the two was not instant, but it was pretty easy and only took a second or two. I added a second monitor, which has been glorious for my Windows 11 setup. However, for ?reasons? Apple deigned to make its initial Apple silicon offering, the System on Chip (Soc) known as the M1, only work with a single external display.

This means I can only use one of my two 27″ monitors with my MacBook Air and I am sad.

But wait!

You can use a DisplayLink adapter or dock to sneakily connect more displays via USB. It’s confirmed to work with all M1 Macs (it’s not needed for the newer M1 Pro and M! Max SoCs, since they support multiple external displays). I procured one of these devices, specifically a StarTech USB-A to HDMI DisplayLink adapter. I downloaded the latest DisplayLink drivers (also required), connected the adapter to a free USB-A port on my CalDigit 3 dock and…it didn’t work.

With both monitors connected, only one or the other would work, neither would work at the same time (the “permanent” monitor is working via USB-C to HDMI).

Thus I began troubleshooting.

It’s worth mentioning here that the reason I went with a DisplayLink adapter as a solution is because it would be the cheapest way to get a multi-monitor Mac setup going (about $100). The next cheapest option would be to trade-in or sell my Air and get an M1 Mac mini, which supports two external monitors because it really only supports the same number as the Air, but since it doesn’t come with a display, it can actually display to two external monitors. This option, no matter how I might finagle it, other than winning the lottery, would cost more than $100.

Troubleshooting involved a lot of the usual stuff. I won’t go into details. It was bad enough that I suffered through it. No one else should suffer through it by proxy.

In the end it’s still not working. I have one thing left to try–switch the “permanent” connection from HDMI to DisplayPort, but this would upset my PC configuration, which is working just dandy, so I am loathe to do it. I might, if I manage to reach the right balance of bored and desperate.

For now, my Mac work continues to be single monitor, with the second display dimly showing my forlorn reflection and nothing else.

I have considered getting one of those new MacBook Pros by selling my Air and using other monies I have from previous trade-ins, but there’s no getting around it costing a lot more than $100, and it would be serious overkill for writing. I rationalize it by saying I’m getting into game development now and video editing and it would be useful for those things. But my PC already works well for those. But it is now and shiny and solves a problem, and so I ponder, occasionally glancing up to that forlorn figure looking back at me.

tl;dr: DisplayLink is definitely a hack when it comes to M1 Macs. This isn’t the technology’s fault, really, it’s Apple’s strange and arbitrary regression on monitor support for their first batch of Apple SoCs. Still, it’s important to remember what you may be getting into before making the leap, as I did.

Also note: All PCs happily support multiple displays without any trickery!

I end with a repeat of this:

Bad design: Cryptic firmware updates

Yes, Apple again. Apple makes this too easy.

This MacRumors story outlines a firmware update for AirPods today. Here’s the relevant quote:

Apple does not offer information on what’s included in refreshed firmware updates for the AirPods, so we don’t know what improvements or bug fixes the new firmware brings.

Why would any company push out updates to a product and not tell the customer what the updates contain? I cannot think of any reason for this that is not consumer-hostile, and the Apple executives who have signed off on this policy are wrong-headed and dumb.

And on top of being needlessly secretive, Apple has pushed out firmware updates that have actually degraded the user experience, but with no way to opt out of the updates and no way to see what has changed, the user is effectively held hostage to the hope that Apple won’t screw up.

It’s just such a bad way to treat customers. It really baffles me. If anything ultimately brings down Apple, it will be the hubris behind its “we know best” policies and actions.

Ghost in the machine: Apple edition

Tonight, the Apple TV turned itself on (technically it woke up, as it doesn’t have an actual on/off switch) and started silently streaming music from my music library (the receiver that powers the speakers was off at the time–it does have an on/off switch).

The last time I streamed music on the Apple TV was…I don’t remember when, actually. More than six months ago, I’d guess. Maybe longer. And I’ve done it maybe twice or three times in total.

But there was the Apple TV, doing its thing, unbidden and unwanted.

This happened a few days ago, too, but in that case it didn’t actually play music or do anything else, it just sat there until the screensavers kicked in.

A quick search suggested that having Background App Refresh set to ON might be responsible in it waking on its own. That doesn’t explain why it also started running some random app, though.

I updated the software, set Background App Refresh to OFF, then took the most important step:

I unplugged the power cord on the damn thing.

With all the streaming apps on the Xbox One (including Apple TV+, the confusingly named streaming service Apple offers), the Apple TV hardware is redundant. With it also acting squirrelly, it’s now actively annoying.

Having compared the streaming experience between the two platforms, I prefer the Xbox One, anyway. Maybe I’ll use the Apple TV as a very expensive paperweight–it’s actually about the right size and heft for that job.

Bad design: Most music apps

But the one I’m going to highlight here is, of course, Apple’s. Apple makes itself such a juicy target because the company’s leadership extols its superior design aesthetic while charging a premium price for the experience.

Specifically, I want to highlight one thing about the interface of the iOS music app, which is pre-installed on every iPhone. You can see it in this screenshot:

First, let me acknowledge the prehistoric nature of the songs highlighted (the newest is from 1992). I am old as dirt, and so is the music I like. Plus, I was sampling some music Apple has highlighted that supports the Dolby Atmos spatial sound standard (more on spatial music in another post) and I didn’t recognize the majority of suggested tracks (again, due to being an out of touch dinosaur).

(Also, the fact that the time was 4:20 p.m. when I grabbed the shot is not some sly signalling that I love the mary-ju-wanna, it’s just a coincidence. Sorry, my BC buds!)

You can see the currently playing song at the top of the screen. It’s Blondie’s well-known classic, “Hanging on the Telep.” It’s “Telephone,” of course, but because the song title is too “long” (four entire words) for the UI, it gets truncated. Apple’s solution (as with nearly all music players) is to slowly scroll the title from beginning to end, allowing the music lover to eventually piece together the entire title of the track they are listening to.

Look at the rest of the music app and ask yourself, “Is there enough room here to fit the entire four word title of a song so it doesn’t have to scroll?” and you may find the answer is, in fact, yes.

And yet this is almost never done. The UI of the music app isn’t actively bad or anything (Apple has much worse stuff tucked away in other areas of iOS), but this tiny space for song titles has always baffled me, because when you’re listening to music this is always going to be the active part of the interface. It just grates on me, especially since there is enough room to easily manage any title of reasonable length. I mean, okay, I don’t expect a music app to properly display Pink Floyd’s “Several Species of Small Furry Animals Gathered Together in a Cave and Grooving with a Pict”, but still.

Why are wireless mice so bad on the Mac?

Seriously, this should be a solved problem, but the only way to get consistent performance on a mouse when I’m using any Mac (I have owned three in the past four years) is to use one that plugs in using old-fashioned cables.

Tonight I have been using my MacBook Air with the Logitech Marathon mouse and it started out fine, but over time the mouse cursor starts to become slow and then erratic, glitching across the screen. It improves for a bit, then starts glitching again. If I dig out one of my old wired mice it works just fine, so it seems like there’s something up with both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity on Macs.

This never happens in Windows. In fact, I can take this exact same mouse and use it in Windows right now and it will operate perfectly fine. My regular Windows mouse is a Logitech G703 wireless gaming mouse. It works perfectly when untethered.

I just don’t get it. It’s like Apple optimizes the OS to only work with their mice and nothing else. It’s incredibly annoying and reminds me why I never manage to make it long whenever I try using the Mac. For an OS that gets lauded for its stability and design, it has some pretty deep flaws.

At least the keyboard works properly. Oh wait, it’s plugged in. Bleah.

EDIT: Here, have an amusing (?) semi-related gif: