I think it's more about justifying the case. I feel like Apple "pros" or bloggers really spend a lot of words justifying how each new accessory or device fits their use case instead of just saying "It looks cool, but it's not for me". For me, I'm okay with my current keyboard folio case - I can just pair a bluetooth mouse for the few times I need to work with a mouse, which is not that often right now because there's no native code editor on iPadOS yet.

I also think it looks cool, and I can image how I could use it. But I think of many situations where I’d prefer to use it over my MacBook. My 13” MBP is already very portable. I’ve never struggled to work in a cafe or on a plane with it, and it’s not too heavy to worry about lugging around.

The reason for this: the hardware is many years ahead of the software.

The potential of the physical device is far ahead of its software capabilities, but you can't install your own OS or run your own applications.

I feel like that’s the case every time I load task manager or the equivalent and see cpu usage almost pegged at 0% most of the time. Or just use a text editor or excel sheet for much of what I do.

The iPad is great in its own right (what "functional setbacks"?), and if it's also possible to get a laptop-like experience from it, it's even better.

I know I'm not the target user for the product but not being able to write code on it is a pretty significant functional setback.

I can write code with it, and execute on it in some cases. For example, I find myself using Swift Playground to quickly test out some code I’m tinkering with and run it on device. Or Pythonista/the other interpreters on the App Store. Or I use Blink to SSH into a VM where I can write code to run on Linux etc. I use it quite often.

I don't think this qualifies. You have to use bespoke tools end environments to be able to code in a very limited fashion.

I think a lot of people can get by just fine with SSH/mosh, vim, tmux... I did this for a bit but actually run vs code-server a lot too.

That setup requires you to always have internet. It also requires you to have a remote PC somewhere where you develop. The Ipad is little more then a screen in that case. In contrast I use a Surface Pro and I don't even have a desktop PC.

That's the difference between these devices. One is a fully fledged computer where you can do whatever you want on it. The other is a glorified teletype terminal. It's fine that the iPad Pro isn't a fully functional computing device but the thing that is wrong is Apply positioning it as such.

The bigger issue isn’t writing code (that’s feasible, as is using git), it’s building code. You need a server to load it to or a build pipeline setup for the repository.

Xcode is rumored to arrive on iPad this year.

As much as I want this rumor to be true, the leaker that “leaked” this has a terrible track record. Furthermore, what he “leaked” is something already in iOS 13 thats meant to be a companion app to Xcode for some debugging stuff.

Sir you’ve given me a reason to live.

My frustration is that a lot of features that are built-in on macOS sometimes require extra apps to use.

Want to resize an image (not crop)? There's an app for that, but it's hard to justify paying $9.99 for a photo editor app when macOS Preview supports resizing built-in.

I do find I can focus on specific work a lot better on an iPad. It's so much nicer to use in an intangible way that makes me more productive doing specific tasks on iPad.

And in recent days, it has been a great videoconferencing machine (except the positioning of the camera is weird - it should be on the long edge). Why is the camera on the 'side'?

Sorry, can you explain the resizing limitation a little more? I do agree it’s worth owning Pixelmator or Affinity.

I also would like a second front camera that’s center top when in keyboard mode. It’s on the “side” because that’s top in portrait mode and Apple considers that the default orientation of the iPad.

It's not worth paying $9.99 to simply resize a 4000x4000 image to a 500x500 (for example). That is basic functionality that should be built-in and not need some third-party app.

It's a weird design choice to consider portrait the default, because all first-party accessories (the triangle cover thing, the keyboard cases and folios, and now the magic keyboard) are about using iPad in landscape. When using any of those accessories, the camera on the side is just weird.

Ah, I wonder if you just haven’t seen the resize tool in Preview? I thought you were trying to do something more complex. Here’s a support document with instructions: https://support.apple.com/guide/preview/resize-rotate-or-fli...

That's on macOS, but we're talking about iPadOS here.

Ah, there’s the misunderstanding. :) Use the Image Size app on iOS; it’s free.

You’re probably not going to see a native resize tool on iOS because Apple doesn’t want users thinking about pixels or file sizes, just saving everything and converting down only when needed (Mail’s small/medium/large sending, etc.)

You're probably not the target market.

For people for whom this fills an important use-case (there are a few really really killer ones, ask your designer friends), there's literally nothing else like it.

If you're happy with your laptop and mostly just browse the internet or consume media then you're probably just fine with the regular non-Pro iPad and it probably just acts a supplement rather than a critical device.

I believe Jason Snell is a happy iMac Pro user.

IMO the iMac Pro exists because they got caught with their pants down on not having a Mac Pro ready to go in time.

That was the consensus of the same Apple reviewers at the time, too. It is apparently still a capable machine (I’ve never used one.)