512 Pixels

Welp, it is real. These images are straight out of System/​Library/​PrivateFrameworks/​PassKitUI.framework/​Versions/​A/​Resources on my Mac running 10.12.1:

There’s a lot to parse here. Clearly, the rumors of a Magic Toolbar are all correct, as well the inclusion of Touch ID to the right of the Toolbar. It looks like this version of Touch ID lacks the stainless steel ring found on iOS devices.¹

(I just hope third-party developers can access it like they do on the iPhone and iPad.)

There’s some conjecture that this is running on top of the S1 — or something related to it. That makes a ton of sense to me.

Would be pretty fascinating if the Magic Bar ran on a variant of the S1 chip and had “extensions” like WatchKit…on macOS? https://t.co/SHSvujOtJm

— Federico Viticci (@viticci) October 25, 2016

Beyond TouchID, these images seem to match what we’ve been expecting out of the Magic Toolbar. The Fn keys are gone, and it looks like the system can show related content on the screen. That first image shows a Cancel button, the Apple Pay logo and directions on where to touch to pay, complete with a janky-ass red arrow.

There’s also no hardware Escape key. Even the Chromebook keyboard — WHICH REPLACES THE CAPS LOCK KEY WITH A SEARCH BUTTON — ships with an Escape key.

Jeff Geerling points out that 10.12.1 has added the ability to re-map the Escape key. Or maybe this will be a thing.

There are some other interesting things going on here. The speaker grills look like what’s on the MacBook, but running down the sides of the keyboard. The current 13-inch MacBook Pro has solid aluminum on this surface.

The hinge looks like a cousin of what is on the 12-inch MacBook with Retina display, as do the keycaps. I’m hoping the key travel is equal to that of the Smart Keyboard, but I’m suddenly afraid it’s going to match that of the MacBook.

All in all, it’s hard to believe that these images shipped in Sierra, and they certainly take the edge off of Thursday’s event. As these images shipped in 10.12.1, which came out yesterday, I’d be willing to bet these machines will be shipping very shortly after the event.

At least we have something exciting to discuss right before what may be a lack-luster quarterly results call in an hour or so.

The original iPod’s tech specs don’t look impressive today, but the thing really was like magic when it debuted 15 years ago.

The iPod turns 15 years old today. I thought it would be fun to revisit early coverage of the music player to see how people responded to it at the time.

The Brown Fury at Slashdot:

No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame.

Jonathan Seff at Macworld didn’t seem to think the Nomad comparison was a big deal, and praised the speed FireWire 400 brought to transfers:

The iPod has a smaller hard drive than the 20GB, USB-based Nomad Jukebox, but its FireWire interface makes the USB connections on other MP3 players seem slower than molasses. It takes hours to transfer 5GB of music files to a music player that connects via USB; the iPod can transfer that amount in as little as 12 minutes.

Walt Mossberg was impressed and compared the iPod to other MP3 players of the day:

Portable digital music players are frustrating gadgets. These hand-held devices, which play songs in the MP3 format, seem like a great idea, but they are hobbled by major drawbacks.

Some can hold only a scant 10-20 songs on little memory cards too expensive to buy in quantity. Others include built-in hard disks that can hold hundreds or thousands of songs, but are large and bulky with lousy battery life.

For the past 10 days or so, however, I’ve been testing a terrific digital music player that solves all of these problems. It has massive storage capacity, is small and light enough to slip into a pocket and can be run nonstop for an impressive amount of time. Its controls are simple and clear, and it downloads music from a computer at blazing speeds.

It’s no surprise that this new music player, called the iPod, comes from a company with a long history of great engineering and user-oriented design: Apple Computer. This is Apple’s first noncomputer product in years, and it’s a design home run. The iPod is simply the best digital music player I’ve seen. It costs $399, and will be available Nov. 10.

David Pogue wanted Apple to push harder:

Apple clearly believes that the iPod’s advances in size, speed, function and elegance are worth the $150 price premium, but not everyone feels that way. In an informal poll at the Macworld.com Web site, 40 percent of Mac fans indicated that they would not be buying an iPod, and every single one cited the price.

It should also be noted, however, that the remaining 60 percent had either already ordered iPods or were virtually drooling onto their keyboards. They are among the first to succumb to the lure of the most beautiful and cleverly engineered MP3 player ever. But if Apple ever lowers the iPod’s price and develops Windows software for it, watch out: the invasion of the iPod people will surely begin in earnest.

Apple would end up doing both, but that’s a story for a different time.

Margaret Kane wondered if the $399 price tag was too high:

It’s an important product for Apple. For starters, the iPod is the company’s first foray into the consumer electronics market and marks an effort to use Mac-powered devices to drive sales for its product line. The move comes with a question mark, however: Has Apple created another iMac-like hit or a well-designed but too expensive flop like its Cube?

Eliot Van Buskirk didn’t seem to share that concern, and wrote an amazingly forward-thinking review:

I know that Mac-only compatibility is just one of the things that people will complain about in reference to this device. But the naysayers have it wrong, and I’ll tell you why: The iPod is revolutionary in a number of ways, and its descendants will replace the PC.

(I’m typing this on my iPad.)

Not everyone could see this future. Rodney O. Lain didn’t:

I don’t want Apple to relegate itself to an also-ran. Apple is shaping up, with the iPod, to be the Sony of the computer industry. This bodes well for those interested in more “pedestrian” devices like MP3 players. But there are those of us who would like an Apple solution for tasks like portable computing, easy networking (when is AirPort gonna move past 11 Mbps?), and power computing. This is the end towards which the company is money will be made.

Fifteen years ago today, Steve Jobs announced the original iPod.

His pitch was simple: 1,000 songs in your pocket.

The iPod was designed to easily sync all of your digital music. You could take it with you, wherever you went.

In a world where portable music meant often carring a battery-powered CD player and a huge wallet of discs, this was a revolution.

The original model used a 5 GB spinning hard drive, which allowed granted the music player both portability and density. Most people didn’t have 5 GB of digital music in 2001. FireWire 400 meant data transfers were nice and speedy, and its 10 hours of battery life was good enough to not worry about recharging in the middle of the day.

In a way, though, the specs didn’t matter. The iPod was small, easy to use and offered a great user experience. I recently spent some time with mine, and it’s shocking how much Apple got right with its first try.

Today, the iPod seems old-fashioned. Our smartphones have access to the all of the world’s media with just a few taps in apps like Apple Music, Spotify or YouTube. In 2001, that seemed like science fiction.

The iPod, however, was cool.

NASA’s spacecraft that is currently circling Jupiter has had a rough couple of weeks.

On October 14, it was announced that the engine burn that was to insert Juno into close orbit around the gas giant would be postponed:

Mission managers for NASA’s Juno mission to Jupiter have decided to postpone the upcoming burn of its main rocket motor originally scheduled for Oct. 19. This burn, called the period reduction maneuver (PRM), was to reduce Juno’s orbital period around Jupiter from 53.4 to 14 days. The decision was made in order to further study the performance of a set of valves that are part of the spacecraft’s fuel pressurization system. The period reduction maneuver was the final scheduled burn of Juno’s main engine.

Juno was still scheduled to pass Jupiter even without this burn, but then the spacecraft encountered more issues:

NASA’s Juno spacecraft entered safe mode Tuesday, Oct. 18 at about 10:47 p.m. PDT (Oct. 19 at 1:47 a.m. EDT). Early indications are a software performance monitor induced a reboot of the spacecraft’s onboard computer. The spacecraft acted as expected during the transition into safe mode, restarted successfully and is healthy. High-rate data has been restored, and the spacecraft is conducting flight software diagnostics. All instruments are off, and the planned science data collection for today’s close flyby of Jupiter (perijove 2), did not occur.

NASA has until early December to get the engine valve issue straightened out, or it will be another 53 days before the burn can be attempted again. I wouldn’t want to have be feeling the stress the Juno team must have right now, and I hope they get things worked out. It’s a cool mission to a planet we don’t know all that much about.

Sure seems likes the name.

Apple today announced an event that will take place on October 27. Here’s what the invite looks like:

Wait, damn it. That’s not right. Hang on.

Here we go:

Crap. This is confusing. Let me see what Jason posted.

There we go:

I guess we’re getting Macs. I highly doubt that new MacBook Pros will have the same historical impact as the Macintosh and iMac, but it’s fun that Apple revisited the tagline.

Eva Dou, at The Wall Street Journal, describing Apple’s plans to possible replace the plastic keycaps on its keyboard with ones that include e-ink displays:

The new keyboards will be a standard feature on MacBook laptops, and will be able to display any alphabet, along with an unlimited number of special commands and emojis, people familiar with the plans said.

Apple is aiming for a 2018 launch, these people said.

I’m actually more enthusiastic about this than I am the rumored maybe-never-announced MacBook Pro, assuming this keyboard would still have physical keys. In my mind, this MacBook would have a keyboard like it does today, just with a bunch of little e-ink displays in the keyboard, like shown in this MacRumors article.

It’s not hard to imagine the possibilities this could be bring. While many international keyboards use different physical layouts, this sort of system could allow users to type with their own language’s letters on the keys.¹ Imagine that in a classroom.

Additionally, this could push the flexibility expected in the next MacBook Pro’s OLED Touchbar even further. Keyboards like this one that use custom keycaps to show shortcuts for professional apps could theoretically be done in software.

Count me as intrigued.

From this handy FAQ:

Learn more about the Apple Thunderbolt to Gigabit Ethernet Adapter and the Apple Thunderbolt to Firewire Adapter.

There are a bunch of Mac notebook rumors flying around today, so I thought it’d be fun looking at them individually.

RIP, 11-inch MacBook Air

TIL the 11-inch Air is still around.

I’m joking. Mostly. I know it has some big fans, but this machine feels redundant in a world where the 13-inch Air is just $100 more and the MacBook is just as portable:

11-inch Air:$899 13-inch Air: $999 12-inch MacBook: $1,299

If the 11-inch Air goes away, I wonder what will happen to that $899 price point. I can see Apple abandoning it.

13-inch Air to be updated

The new Air is to come with USB-C and Thunderbolt 3 support. Coupled with the processors Apple uses in the Air, this machine would continue to be more powerful and flexible than the 12-inch MacBook.

I think that makes a lot of sense. I think the MacBook is still a little too much in the future for most users. The Air is almost as light and thin, but a lot more useful for some users.

Ports? Where we’re going, we don’t need ports.

It sure seems like the OLED Touchbar is a lock for these new MacBook Pros, as is the inclusion of USB-C/Thunderbolt 3.

There’s part of that MacRumors report that still hurts, though:

Previous rumors and part leaks have suggested the upcoming MacBook Pro will include four USB-C ports, doing away with an SD card slot, an HDMI port, USB-A ports, and a MagSafe connection.

I understand why the MacBook has a single USB-C port. I can even see the Air moving to all USB-C/Thunderbolt ports. On the MacBook Pro, it seems like a bridge too far.

Apple has often included I/O in the MacBook Pro (and even PowerBook) not found on other machines. MacBooks had mini-DVI ports, while pre-unibody MacBook Pros got full-sized DVI connections. The MacBook Pro is the only Apple portable to ship with HDMI. The Pro and the 13-inch Air sport very helpful SD card slots while the 11-inch Air doesn’t.

I/O is important to professionals. Pros often have a lot of things plugged in, from hard drives to SD cards to external displays. I’m not in love with the idea of using adaptors for almost everything I need to plug in to a notebook.

(Of course, I own Thunderbolt adaptors to access Ethernet, FireWire 800, DVI and VGA. It can be annoying, but adapting to USB just makes my head hurt.)

Having 4 USB-C/Thunderbolt ports may make for a nice, neat MacBook Pro, but it’s a machine that may prove more difficult to use in the short term. One day we’ll be in a USB-C world, but we aren’t today. The industry of boutique MacBook dongles show it. Going all in with a new MacBook Pro will make the future show up faster, but I’d argue that in a professional machine, leaving some “legacy” I/O for those who need it is the right call.

That said, I think we’re headed into a future with far fewer ports on our MacBook Pros. We’ll get used to it, and one day laugh and laugh at how we used to use things like HDMI and SD card readers on our notebooks.

Sigh.

This week, Myke goes to the Apple Store, the group reads Pixel reviews and Federico brings back Weekly Picks.

My thanks to our sponsors:

• TextExpander, from Smile: Communicate smarter with TextExpander.
• The Nuisance Committee

Joe Caiati, writing for The Sweet Setup:

A markup app can be used in many different ways, like showing design changes, pointing out something funny to your friends, or using it as an educational tool.1

With Apple integrating markup even further within its mobile operating system, it’s clear that this is an essential tool to have available. We’ve tested a folder full of options and it became clear that Annotable is the best markup app for iOS.

This has become a must-have app for me.