Anyone else think Apple might release a hybrid in the near future?
What do you mean by hybrid?
What, like a Prius?
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Hybrid Mac/iPad or Hybrid Car? I hope for neither, unless they have a clever way to transition between MacOS and iOS.
Mac/iPad
I think Tim Cook has ruled it out, but you never know.
Unless they have some sort of clever way to make Mac Apps touch compatible and iOS apps mouse/keyboard compatible without ruining iOS apps on iOS devices and Mac apps on macOS devices, I don’t see the point.
They also ruled out the larger iPhone and a stylus.
Personally I’d be happy with a MacBook pro with a removable screen that goes into IOS mode with the standard IOS apps
Jobs ruled it out larger screens the market shifted. He never ruled a stylus out as such, he said (more of less) that if you needed a stylus to use the interface, then its a failure, he wasn’t talking about using Styluses for creative purposes.
Microsoft failed to make a great workable with Windows 8 and the surface hasn’t really taken off as they haven’t got it right. Windows 8 ended up with desktop apps being clunky and massive a they were designed for tablet use and tablet apps that were not optimal for touch screens.
If you’ve ever tried to use a desktop/laptop with a touchscreen, unless it’s directly in your lap or at an angle and distance an iPad would be, it strains your arms and feels awkward.
Touching a screen that far from your body and at head-height is really not natural 
the iPad/iPhone form factor invites touch because there’s physically nothing between your hand and the screen. You’re holding the screen in your palm.
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In the recent pow-wow where a bunch of Apple execs got together with selected journalists to talk about the Mac Pro, amongst other things, they talked about this again. The unequivocal word from Schiller et al, is they’ve tried it and they just don’t think it’s a goer. They claim to (still) be firmly behind the dual OS strategy.
And, whilst I do find myself poking the 'puter screen a bit after I’ve been using the iPad, I can see where they’re coming from. It’s very much as Lawrence describes - awkward and weirder in practice than one might think.
As one example, how on earth could you use a touch screen 30" iMac? It would be ridiculous. Laptops are a bit different, but some of us still like big arse screens. It’s not like they would make touchable MacBooks but traditional desktops.
So I’m going for highly unlikely in the foreseeable future.
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Touch screens have been discussed a little on the last couple of ATP episodes and it’s been interesting.
Yes, Windows sort of sucks as a touch screen as @lawrence has said, unless it’s built for it (AKA iPad apps) it’s pretty ordinary for full time use… but then I have a Surface Pro 3 and while I use a mouse most of the time (or the trackpad) being able to reach out and touch the screen is very convenient and somewhat second nature these days thanks to smartphones and tablets. Even if it’s only for limited tasks.
My (Windows) desktop screen at home is also a 27" touch screen purchased mostly for the hard glass front panel since the kids managed to break the last one. While it’s rarely used as a touch screen it’s very nice to be able to point, touch, click and scroll with your finger when you’re showing someone something…
… how many time have you pointed at a screen and said “click here”…
So is this one of those things, given it’s pretty affordable these days should Apple simply build a touch screen into Macs and let people use them in a “build it and they will come” sort of approach?? It doesn’t have to be a primary input method but it’s definitely one that more and more people simply expect to be there. If I was buying a Windows laptop and a choice of touch screen or not I would be buying the one with a touch screen even few a few extra bucks.
As for hybrid, I’d love to see a MS Surface style iPad/MacBook hybrid giving you the best of both worlds. I don’t really need an iPad… or can justify the cost, but then if I got one with my laptop it could be nice.
All of that said I don’t think they will do it as it would build too much of a power gap between “normal” iPads and this hybrid and that’s before you deal with different architecture issues. If ever, the iPad Pro was the place to do that and they chose not to.
I petty much only use the touchscreen on my HP laptop for scrolling. Absolutely nothing else.
All that needs to happen is that an ipad version of IOS is given the flexibility of a desktop IOS. A real finder would go a long way to achieving that.
I also think the way forward is for iOS to mature. Apple has been pretty lazy with iOS for iPads.
I think that concept is great!
The way it will happen is with processes being handed off to ARM processors as they are now to run the touch pad on the MacBooks. ARM processors are not nearly fast enough. Apple knows this. But they are useful for what they can do for co-processing in the same sense as other devices such as vdeo cards now use ARM processors for co-processing.
I’m hoping for the opposite. The primary CPU being ARM with offload to an Intel coprocessor. The Intel platform is carrying a little too much baggage around with it these days (mainly AMT).