An iPad Pickle
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Hello and welcome back to another episode of App Stories. I'm John Voorhees and I've got Federico Vittici with me. Hey Federico. Hello John, how are you? Good, good. It's been a big week over at Mac Stories. We've had a lot of popular stories this week, including the most popular of all, which is your interview with Craig Federighi, which was really, as I think you guys mentioned on Connected, was really a

Two stories in one, because it was really a story about your thoughts on iPadOS 26 and the journey of the iPad. And weaved into there was the interview with Craig Federighi that you did at WWDC. Yeah, that was sort of the idea for that story. I figured, well, obviously, this is not a first impressions story, right? Because that will come with the public beta in July of the new operating systems.

But I also could share some thoughts. And I did have the beta on my iPad Pro. So I figured, what's a good way to frame this in a way that it's not just, I couldn't do an interview transcript. That was not the format for the story. And I figured, well, you know, there's a type of conversation that I want to have with Craig Federighi

I've only had limited time with iPadOS 26. I am going to save my first impressions for July and a proper review for September. What can I talk about and really go in depth? And I figured, well, I've been covering this thing for really the majority of my career. And I figured maybe the historical aspect of it is a good angle. And it seems like people appreciate it. I don't know if you notice, but like,

And this is something that I do all the time that I've been doing since high school. I really like to have my narrative arcs in my stories. And so many, this is like just my style, I guess. I really like to always start a story with an idea and circle back to that idea in the end. This is something that I picked up, I think, from the ancient Rome, from the Latin classics.

like Cicero, like Seneca, like that sort of stuff. Like you do have a narrative arc. You start with one idea, you end with the same idea, but you also, you got to leave something impactful for the end because that's what people are going to remember at the end. And so I figured I'm going to have this separate arcs in the story and those sort of

topics will be combined with quotes from Craig Federighi. That was also how I structured my interview questions for Federighi. So that was sort of the idea. And, you know, it was fun to go back to really old Mac Stories articles, dig up what Split View used to look like in iOS 9. At first, I did not remember that Split View didn't used to be drag and drop only. There used to be a split

special app picker on the right side. And then when I saw the screenshots, this is one of the benefits of Mac Stories, I guess. It's a treasure trove of old screenshots at this point. And when I saw the screenshots, it all came back to me. I was like, oh yeah, that app picker that was sort of showing you recent apps, but not the same recent apps

as the main app switcher. - Yeah, it was so weird, wasn't it? And I saw that screenshot. - That was, and now, you know, Mike mentioned that to me and then it all came rushing back. It was recent apps, but recent apps in split view.

So it was, yeah. And it was weird because nobody, nobody really understood how it worked at the time. And so you really had two app switchers, the main one, you know, the, the grid when you swipe up or at the time when you used to double click the home button that used to be a thing. And that was one set of recent apps. And then there was the second set of recent apps, which was the app picker in split view. Also,

SlideOver used to be just one app at a time. They did multiple apps in SlideOver with iPadOS 13. And of course, before that, it was iOS 11 with the drag and drop activation gesture for SplitView that caused a lot of concern because there was like parents and grandparents accidentally getting into multitasking. Yeah.

And so I figured, you know, this is what I've been doing for all these years. I might as well just talk about this stuff with a man who's been in charge of shipping these things. And so that was fun. I love seeing the apps that were in your switcher too. You know, like terminology was in there. It was a very old icon for terminology. I just, I don't know. I love seeing those old screenshots and there is a treasure trove of those on Mac stories. Federico, I want to embarrass you a little bit.

bit because I want to tell you that this is one of the very best stories you've written ever, really. I mean, I enjoyed it so much. I was sitting at the airport in San Francisco and I saw a very rough draft very early and

And it just kind of gave me chills because I know your story so well compared to most people, I suppose, that it just had a real big impact on me. And I do think if you're somebody who wants to write about technology or whatever it is, there's a way to do it clinically, but there's also a way to do it that actually tells a story that

captures people's imaginations and emotions and things. And I think you did a fantastic job at that. I mean, I think that that's what really sets your writing apart from other people. I mean, I've learned an awful lot from you myself, and I always appreciate writing those stories. Thank you. I appreciate that. I am slightly embarrassed by that because I...

I don't really love compliments. I personally, I am partial to two stories that I've done over the years. One is just the emotional connection that I have with my first iPad Pro review. Just the whole story of going to London, meeting Mike and Gray for the first time, coming back with the iPad Pro in secret for like a week. That was a whole thing. And for me, it was my first big break, really. And the other story that I did a few years ago.

And I'm just, it's a personal story. It's about music. It's called I Made You a Mixtape. One of my favorites too. Thank you. I'm always going to be partial to that story because it means a lot to me. But yeah, this was another of those. It's just, you know, last week I'll remember forever, you know, just being with you, rehearsing with you before, preparing for the interview, talking to people. It was good. It was good. Yeah, it was really good.

But, you know, now enough about that. Enough about that. Enough about Federico Vittici. Let's talk about the iPad. Yeah. So, all right. So I am in a bit of a pickle, so to speak. Yes, you are. After having completely torn down and rebuilt your system for probably, what, the 1,000th time in the last five years? Oh, God. Okay. Where are you right now with this stuff? So...

Obviously, I'm going to go back to the iPad. Sure. Here's what I'm thinking. I will, for the foreseeable future, I will be split between the iPad and the Mac Studio. I think the computer that gets the short end of the stick here is going to be the MacBook Pro. Because I have a laptop again. That's my iPad Pro. Yeah.

But for like really advanced AI stuff or like really powerful Mac stuff, I have my Mac studio on loan from Apple for a few months. I still need to produce more content. I want to produce. It's not like I need, not because Apple is telling me because I want to. I need to try a lot of things, especially with local AI, local models, that sort of stuff. So...

And obviously, like my desk right here is not going away. This microphone is not going away. That audio interface is not going away. This monitor right here is not going away. So here's what I'm thinking. I want to be able to get to a place where these accessories, microphone, audio interface, monitor, and CalDigit TS4 dock,

can be used independently with either my iPad Pro or the Mac Studio. Right. But my problem is

is that I do not want to unplug the Thunderbolt cable from the Mac Studio every time I want to use the iPad Pro instead. Yeah. And so you know what this means. I totally get that. I'm the same way. I wanted to connect to Mac. Also because like, yeah. It's just hard. I got to sort of like crouch under the desk and reach behind the Mac Studio. I don't want to do that.

And I have been forbidden from placing the mic studio on my desk from my lovely girlfriend, Sylvia. Rightfully so, because it's a bit of a sight. Now, you know what this means? It means it's KVM time, baby. Finally. Once again. Okay, so my plan, my working theory, which by the time this episode is out...

I will either have a solution and I'm going to be happy or I'm going to be very sad. Right now, it's like Schrodinger's Thunderbolt at the moment in the sense that the plan should be

There is, to the best of our knowledge, one, or maybe two, but I think one, really, officially certified Thunderbolt 4, not 5, but Thunderbolt 4 KVM switch. Now, a KVM switch is literally a switch with a button that allows you to switch the same Thunderbolt setup between two computers. Now, my two computers are going to be the Mac Studio and the iPad Pro.

My working theory is that I will have the iPad Pro and the Mac Studio. One Thunderbolt cable going into each. So one cable into the iPad Pro, one cable into the Mac Studio. Now both cables...

Obviously, two cables cannot go into the CalDigit dog. So the two cables instead will go into this. What's it called? The Sabrent Thunderbolt 4 KVM switch. Yes. A switch that I've looked at before myself many months ago and talked to you about. Yes. Supposedly, it is the only one like proper Thunderbolt 4 KVM switch. It's a little different.

rectangular... It looks like a hub, basically. It does. It's pretty expensive, too, if I remember right. It's 340 euros. Which is a lot for something that's essentially just switching between two sets of inputs, but...

But I mean, compared to a KVM, that's like a regular USB-C KVM, which is probably like $50 or something. Yeah. Because in theory, again, in theory, it should have a Thunderbolt 4 controller inside. Right. Now, both cables from the two computers will go into the KVM switch. Out of the KVM switch will go one cable that goes into the CalDigit dock.

And of course, downstream into the CalDigit dock, I have my monitor, I have my camera, I have my audio interface, and I have Ethernet. So in theory, I should be able to press one button, that is the KVM button, and switch between the iPad Pro or the Mac Studio, and along with that, move my monitor signal, my Ethernet connection, my audio interface, and my camera.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the big question is whether that handshake works. Once you hit that button, do those signals properly travel from one computer to the other one? Do they? Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, they should. That's the idea. When it comes, and I think if this works, that'll be, of course, a nice update to the Mac Stories setups page, which needs a bit of an update now with iOS 26 and everything. Now, in terms of actual input, I have been using for a while this much better and not really expensive ergonomic mouse. It's called, let me show you, it's a vertical ergonomic mouse. So this is called, on video, I'm showing this off on the video version of App Stories. This is called the

proto arc eml ergonomic mouse okay and i have been using as we've established the nufi air 75 keyboard oh how do you like it i haven't asked you about this i i've been looking i had my eyes on those how quiet i like it you like it well well the microphone will not pick it up no it's not as loud as other mechanical keyboards it's not a magic keyboard it's not quiet like i mean i don't know can you hear this

Probably not. Well, okay. So that's a good sign because it's not dramatically loud.

But it's still a mechanical keyboard. Still, it's right at that threshold of like, I can live with this. And this keyboard can pair between multiple inputs and same as the mouse. You can just switch between multiple inputs. So in theory, I should be able, if the KVM switch works, I should be able to have this keyboard and mouse and everything else. And I have my gaming PC, my Nintendo Switch, my iPad Pro and the Mac Studio, everything at my desk.

Will it work? I guess, I don't know, stay tuned. You know, I think the little backstory is in order here, Federico, because I did research this switch a lot, maybe six to nine months ago. And I took a pass because I wasn't convinced that it would work.

And for $350, I decided to take a pass at it. So I'm very eager to see how it works for you because you are now my guinea pig because I could not find anybody who had actually used it before. And as a result, I just kind of let it go.

And decided on a different setup. But I would like a very easy and quick way to switch between my MacBook Pro and my Mac Studio. Because right now I have to do what you said. Which is unplug the Thunderbolt cable from the back of my Mac Studio to plug it into the MacBook Pro. And it's a problem because I have it under a little shelf.

that I use as a display stand and it's just not easy to get back there and unplug it and then replug it and all that stuff. So I would like to have a switch myself. It's bad for your knees when you need to crowd. I don't know about that. It's a hassle. I might unplug something else, bump something else. If

If all of this works, obviously I'm going to have a lot of questions like, can I actually do my podcasts on an iPad Pro? How will the local capture work with Zoom and video and audio? Will it work with my audio interface without having to switch the

Very confusing settings of my audio interface. I heard that Jason Snell mentioned like, oh, it only works with mono input or something like that. And then it sort of like passes that as a stereo signal. I don't know, some weird stuff like that happening. Right.

I think what he said is that it's passing stereo signals into a mono file. Right, right. The other way around. Okay. Yeah. And separating each track into the way wave files can have. Well, that's not a wave file. It's flack, but basically different tracks on different parts of the same single audio file, which.

- And there's no gain control on iPadOS 26, but my audio interface has like hardware gain control. So in theory, that should not be a problem. Then I guess big picture, I think I'm gonna have more questions about like, okay, this is all good and nice. Proper windowing, stage manager that actually works. I don't have limits, background tasks, local capture.

But will it still change the equation in terms of... Like, you got better windowing, but it's still no macOS. Like, I still don't have a terminal. I still don't have Xcode. I still don't have desktop apps. So...

I think I'll probably settle, like I mentioned, on a hybrid approach. Like for some heavy-duty stuff, I'm going to have the Mac Studio. When this Mac Studio loan is up, we'll see what happens. I guess I can just put my MacBook Pro in clamshell mode under my desk or something. Yeah, something like that. We'll see. But I do think that I...

I know because I'm doing it now, I will be using the iPad Pro more because it's got a better way to multitask and it's got that flexibility that I didn't have with Stage Manager for the past two years, really. Three years almost. And so it's not good to be in a situation where everything sort of hinges on a KVM switch. But we'll see. I've done...

I've done stranger things for sure. Yeah. Yeah. No, I hear you. And you know, I've been doing some playing around with iPad OS 26 also probably more so than just about any other of the OSs yet. And taking my iPad pro down to a coffee shop a couple of times this week. And, and,

the new windowing really does make a difference. I think it, you know, I was doing things like working in obsidian in my email at the same time, or I, and then I would have like messages behind it. Cause I was getting messages from people and it's just, it's just an easier way to work. Um, I do think that for you, a hybrid approach is going to make sense, especially since you've been working with a lot of, um,

AI apps. There's so many things that are web-based now that are just, I think, more powerful on the Mac that you're going to find that having the outlet of a Mac with the terminal, Xcode, various web apps, all that stuff will probably be to your advantage to have it available and not just go all or nothing. I mean, I've always been a proponent of kind of a hybrid approach anyway, even though I am more Mac-focused than you are. I mean, I've always had the iPad as part of what I do. It's just not...

been the center of everything I do. So yeah, I think that that's a good idea. I mean, for me, it's like the thing that's exciting is that, especially with the audio recording, it means I can go away for the weekend, I think. And if I had to do a recording while I was away, I can do it. And I happen to have a USB-C microphone that has gain control right built into the microphone. And

that's you know for me is that the one you sent me it is the one i sent you and i i understand why you don't want to use that because you've got a very good one i've been thinking about it you know as like it because it does allow for a really portable setup that is why i did it because it's it's still i mean that one there are other ones you can consider and i think even by that company i think it was a sure mic that i sent you i forget but in any event

What's nice about it is that it does make for a more portable on-the-go setup. And so what I've liked to do, and I did this not this year, but the year before at WWDC when we weren't,

In the podcast studio the entire time, I brought that microphone because I could use it without bringing an audio interface and connect it directly into my Mac laptop. And now with the iPad having the recording capability, I think I'll get a lot more use out of that particular microphone because it's just, it's not as good as my one at home, but it's good enough for most things, especially once you clean up the audio and post-production.

I'll think about it. So this is the Shure MV7, right? Yeah, and they may have updated it since the one I bought. I just sent you a link to the one that I bought, so I would look and see if they updated it since then. There may be a slightly better version that came out, but...

I bought it about a year ago and I haven't used it a ton, but I bought a little case for it. You can find some of those hard, you know, hard cases online so that when I pack things up, it's like the little lunchbox size package that fits into a backpack, which is pretty good, you know?

I want to leave you, before we move on to the post-show, where I want to talk about Apple Intelligence. And these topics are slightly related, but I want to bring this idea to the show that's been sort of running in my brain. My brain is already sort of like thinking about September and sort of like the angle for my iOS and iPadOS 26 review. So here's the thought that I had.

I did not begin 2025 thinking that by mid-year, I would feel attracted to go all in on the Apple ecosystem as much as I am right now. How so, though? How so? Because I thought that my workflow...

would be better served by a combination of platforms, web services, and different AI providers. And that is still true to a large extent. But I feel like with this WWDC, the combination of a redesign, an iPadOS 26, and the Apple intelligence integration in shortcuts,

I have a feeling that is sort of the perfect storm for somebody like me, who maybe over the past couple of years had gotten a little bored by the Apple ecosystem. I feel like it's the perfect combination of things to draw me and someone like me back in. I had this thought. So it all started with one specific regret that I had while coming to California. And that was...

I am so bummed that I didn't bring my AirPods Max. Now you may think, what's this about? Now, I brought my Sony XM6, which I purchased just out of curiosity. And I was on the plane and I was switching between my MacBook, my phone, my iPad, my Nintendo Switch. But mostly I didn't really play a lot on Nintendo Switch. I mostly just wore it.

I realized, oh man, like pairing this Bluetooth thing sucks. And especially because like you got to enter, like the Sony headphones can only remember two devices at once with multi-point. But then if you want to add in a third one, you got to do the manual pairing and then you got to manually connect to it. Whereas,

I was looking around the plane, I was looking at all these people with AirPods Max, and I thought, you know, if only I had brought my AirPods Max, that wouldn't be a problem. And that is obviously an example of the ecosystem advantage.

But then WWDC, all the announcements, and I'm looking at the redesign. I'm looking at the integration between obviously the iPhone and the Apple Watch. And I'm looking at the consistency between platforms. And I'm looking at like all the things that you can now do in shortcuts with native apps that have shortcuts actions and Apple intelligence inside shortcuts. And I'm thinking, wow.

All these things coming together are calling to me again in a way that six months ago, I didn't think would be possible in June. Yeah. Are they going to be cutting edge enough though? Because I know from your experiments already, you think that Apple is using like an older model of chat GPT. They are using an older model of chat GPT. They're using GPT for turbo. But I'm wondering like,

Will we see more models in shortcuts by the end of the summer? Or...

can I use the Apple intelligence models for tasks that don't really require reasoning or are not really that complex? And I can still fall back on third-party APIs for things like cloud or touch GPT reasoning, that sort of stuff. Yeah, so what you're not saying is you're going to abandon your subscription to cloud or Gemini. No, no, no, no, no, I'm not going to do that. But what I'm saying is that

And I think other people are in my shoes right now. Like, I'm in the same situation where, like, I mean, let's face it. For the past couple of years, being all in on the Apple ecosystem was kind of, you know, hey. No, yeah, I hear you. You know, it was kind of boring. It was beyond, you know, some customization, right?

Nothing was really going on, but especially if you're the type of person who's really into automation, who's into combining actions and shortcuts, who appreciates good design and great performance. These are the sort of things that... And this is like, I think this is a theme that we've seen from some commentators after WWDC. This was the kind of WWDC that Apple is great at. Design, new features, and new apps. And...

You know, it's, it's interesting, too, though, because some of the reactions I've seen from a more general tech presses, oh, this was a boring WWDC, they're still behind on AI. And it's like, yeah, it's kind of both. I mean, yes, they're still Siri, smart Siri hasn't shipped. And there's more that Apple could be doing with artificial intelligence. At the same time, though, I think you're absolutely right. I think this was like a meat and potatoes kind of

kind of WWDC where there are a lot of really interesting new APIs for developers to use. There's a lot of interesting new features for users to try out. And I think it's going to be, it's not just the fresh coat of paint that it's been made out to be by some people with the liquid glass. I think there's a lot more depth there than meets the eye. I think

Two, one of the things that's interesting to me, having kind of stepped back and tried to figure out where the AI stuff comes in with all the announcements, you know, despite all the talk

in the Google trial that Gemini is on the cusp of coming to Apple platforms. It's not in Xcode. I think you can hack your way into getting it to work with Xcode, but it's not easy. So there's that, which I found interesting. I also find interesting that Xcode is the first place where Apple has created chatbot. People talk about how Apple doesn't have a chatbot. They absolutely do in Xcode. And I think it's the kind of chatbot

That could work in other apps as well. Having like a sidebar type of thing that is a supplement to creative work. Whether it's like a sidebar in pages to help you with spelling and grammar checking or supplemental research. Or maybe in numbers to help you create formulas the way that Google's doing it with Sheets now on the web. All that kind of stuff. I think that that's kind of like the next step.

frontier we're going to see from Apple is maybe a little more integration with some of the first party apps. Yeah. Yeah. So that was a thought. I don't know. I'm feeling excited about what Apple is doing again.

And I think it's obviously a combination of things. And I want to talk about Apple intelligence and shortcuts some more in the post show, which, John, what is the post show? Where can people get the post show? Well, the post show is a very, very special part of App Stories called App Stories Plus. And you can get it a couple of different ways. You can either just subscribe to App Stories Plus by itself by going to

appstories.plus, or you can become a Club Mac Stories Premier member, which not only gets you the bonus show in App Stories and ad-free, of course, and early, you also get all the stuff we do for the club, which is newsletters, both weekly and monthly, as well as our Discord and a bunch of other goodies. So you can go to plus.club to learn more about the club. That is kind of your all-access pass, Club Premier. It's everything we do with the club, plus App Stories Plus.

So that's where they go, Federico.

Awesome. All right. Well, I think that that's a good place to stop. Tichi, you can find the two of us over at MacStories.net. We have a lot of podcasts at Mac Stories, and I think it's time we start shouting these out a little bit more, Federico, because I did hear from a couple of people at WWDC who were surprised to hear that we have a whole family of podcasts. It's not just App Stories. It's not just Mac Stories Online that you and I do together, but there's also Comfort Zone.

with Chris Lawley, Matt Berschuller, and Neil Ayan. There's also...

All the other ones that we do too, you know, we've got all kinds of things going on over there. We've got Magic Rays of Light. So there's a lot of stuff going on and it's all throughout the week. So check it out sometime. In the meantime, you can find us on social media. Federico is at Vitici. That's V-I-T-I-C-I. And I'm at John Voorhees. J-O-H-N-V-O-O-R-H-W-S. Talk to you next week, Federico. Ciao, John.