Ruby 1.9.2 Released - <AUTHOR> http://blade.nagaokaut.ac.jp/cgi-bin/scat.rb/ruby/ruby-talk/367983

<comment><USER2> With 1.9.2 coming out, and Rails 3 too, the last pieces are in place for the Ruby community to move to Ruby1.9 for good.

The last year we had a lot of "choice" due to the transitional period we were in. Hopefully by the end of the year that will be history.

Hurray! :)

<comment><USER3> I finally made the leap and installed RVM and 1.9.1/1.9.2. It is done.

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> This seems... erm... stupid:

> == FAQ :The standard library is installed in /usr/local/lib/ruby/1.9.1 This > version number is "library compatibility version". Ruby 1.9.2 is mostly > compatible with the 1.9.2, so its library is installed in the directory.

<comment><USER5> This is insane. I have just had to explain 3 people on #ruby-lang why my error log has 1.9.1 in it if I am running purely 1.9.2.

This tangentially breaks the principle of least surprise. I can't see any good reason for doing this. This will result in unnecessary head aches during debugging for months to come.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> It's surprising (though not unwelcome) to see that the only distro at the highest level of support ('Supported') is Debian 5.0 (i.e. Lenny). Some irony here: Lenny currently has Ruby 1.8.7 and 1.9.0 (as a distinct package - 1.8.7 is the default Ruby); Squeeze (Debian 6.0) has 1.8.7-p299 as a Ruby default and 1.9.1 for the 1.9 branch. Since Squeeze just froze, it is unlikely to release with 1.9.2 - though they may make an exception. Point being: the only distro that enjoys the fullest level of support has no stable version with 1.9.2.

OSX, Windows, FreeBSD, Solaris and Symbian make the next level ('Best Effort'), and all other Linux distros only come in at the third level ('Perhaps').

I respect the developers' frankness, and it's not something I have to worry much about, but the names of the support levels don't scream "use me on a multi-billion dollar project" for corporate folks.

<comment><USER7> We use Debian for the CI machine. CI failures are taken quite seriously, and we have a person maintaining this CI box. I believe that is why Debian is considered highest.

The next level of OS support are core developers that use that OS for work / home, but we don't have CI machines.

I think if we had more CI boxes, then more platforms could join the "highest level" support. I know there was a conversation on the Japanese dev list about this, and I can try to dig it up if people are interested.

<comment><USER4> When you say "we," I presume you mean ruby-core?

<comment><USER7> I am on ruby-core. :-)

<comment><USER4> That's what I thought :-)

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> This is the first version where conformance to RubySpec was made a high priority. It now passes over 99% of the spec. This is great news for the community because it makes it much easier for alternative ruby implementations to remain compatible.

</comment><comment><USER9> It's already on rvm, <http://rvm.beginrescueend.com>

<comment><USER6> You may need to do this:

      rvm update --head && rvm reload && rvm install 1.9.2

<comment><USER10> Question: I just installed using:

rvm install 1.9.2-head

and it used: <http://svn.ruby-lang.org/repos/ruby/branches/ruby_1_9_2>

And:

$ ruby -v ruby 1.9.2p0 (2010-08-18 revision 29034) [x86_64-darwin10.4.0]

So I am good to go, right?

<comment><USER6> I get this from `ruby -v` (having installed 1.9.2):

        ruby 1.9.2p0 (2010-08-18 revision 29036) [x86_64-darwin10.4.0]

So, the revision number is very slightly different. Hard to say in this case whether that is worth uninstalling the one and installing the other. Probably not, but hard to say exactly.

<comment><USER10> Thanks, I am going to re-install.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER11> With 1.9.2, the I18n internationalization module does not update available locales after loading more languages in the backend module. In my app we do this as a plug-in and since it can be done in run-time there may need to be some extra steps taken. I doubt this matters for 99% of the people here but just thought I'd give you a heads up if any of you move to 1.9.2 and use I18n dynamically.

</comment><comment><USER12> ..waits patiently for Heroku to support it ;)

</comment><comment><USER13> An eagerly anticipated release. I'm really looking forward to utilizing the fibers associated with native kernel threads.

</comment><comment><USER14> is it just coincidence that this release was on whyday? <http://whyday.org/>

</comment><comment><USER15> Now everyone can actually move to Ruby 1.9!

This is really exciting.

<comment><USER16> Not until distros start shipping it. I don't know about Ubuntu because I don't really use it, but Fedora's still shipping with 1.8 and Fedora 14 will only be released in November.

<comment><USER17> At this point as a Rubyist the only thing you really need is rubygems (of any version) on your computer. gem install rvm and then rvm install RUBY_VERSION.

<comment><USER18> What's the best way to get rubygems with no other ruby packages on my system? Package manager, or dl and compile it?

My package manager wants to install ruby, irb, and a couple other 1.9.1 packages with it that I'm not sure I'll want after using rvm to install the 1.9.2 versions.

<comment><USER19> Go with whatever your distro provides as a default. RVM completely segregates your RVM Rubies from your system Ruby, so you're far better off with a "common" system Ruby install than you are trying to hack together a stripped down Ruby install. The package maintainers already know the platform specific idiosyncrasies you'll need to work around, so might as well leverage that. You may also encounter other software that expects a certain system Ruby environment on your system, so there's that too.

<comment><USER18> Thanks! Will use both the distro default and RVM.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER20> JIT for some sweet Rails 3 love!

<comment><USER21> LOL, at first I thought you meant there was a new JIT compiler with 1.9.2 -- but you're right, this is good timing for those of us excited about Rails 3.

</comment></comment><comment><USER22> rvm update --head && rvm reload && rvm install 1.9.2 && rvm 1.9.2 --default

(sorry for the duplicate)

</comment><comment><USER23> encodings, dl, sockets and time improvements - too good to be true! ^_^

</comment><comment><USER23> cannot build working binary with clang sigsegv in ./miniruby on linux/x86_64 =(

<comment><USER24> I didnt have any luck compiling ruby trunk this morning with clang on Snow Leopard.

<comment><USER25> This may help: [http://joneslee85.wordpress.com/2010/04/23/howto-compile- rub...](http://joneslee85.wordpress.com/2010/04/23/howto-compile- ruby-1-9-2-head-with-clang-svn-head-on-mac-os-x-10-6-3/)</comment></comment></comment>


An Introduction to Speech Recognition Using WFSTs - <AUTHOR> https://medium.com/explorations-in-language-and-learning/an-introduction-to-speech-recognition-using-wfsts-288b6aeecebe <comment><AUTHOR> I was looking into FSTs in the context of Lucene and Search Indexes when I discovered that they are used in speech recognition.

It's still a little beyond me how they're connected.</comment>


Introducing Tokkr - <AUTHOR> http://www.daniellemorrill.com/2013/04/introducing-tokkr/

<comment><USER2> Good effort on the mocks, all for just an April fools' day :)

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, that's a screenshot of Pinterest when you search marijuana and Love with Weed is a real site (and really are Referly's customer too!)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> I normally hate April Fool's Day, but this was well done.

</comment><comment><USER4> Danielle, you've figured it our. Sounds like the right way to go.

</comment><comment><USER5> You had me at "bespoke"</comment>


HexFiend - A fast and clever open source hex editor for Mac OS X - <AUTHOR> http://ridiculousfish.com/hexfiend/

<comment><USER2> Hi, I'm the author. Thanks for all the kind words!

I'm very actively developing Hex Fiend, which is nearing a new release. Some major new features are bookmarks, support for text encodings (including multibyte, though sadly not variable width), support for opening files only readable by root, including device files (after authentication, naturally), and a visual binary diff (a true LCS diff). There's many other miscellaneous improvements and bug fixes, including the longstanding request of preserving the Undo stack after Save, when doing so would not require too much memory.

For those unfamiliar with Hex Fiend, the features that set it apart from other hex editors are:

\- Very deep support for large files. Many other hex editors have some support for large files, but it's easy to get into a situation where they consume all your memory, or do some O(n) blocking operation that hangs the UI. Hex Fiend never does either.

\- Natural Mac-like editing, including insertion and deletion, smooth scrolling, multiple discontiguous selection, anchored selection, coalesced undo, key bindings, lots more.

\- It's provided as a framework which is easy to embed in other apps.

\- It's open source with a permissive BSD style license.

Some have asked how Hex Fiend compares to 0xED. Not to pick on anyone, but I'll give some examples that illustrate Hex Fiend's strengths relative to 0xED (and most other hex editors):

1\. Open a large file (say 5 GB), overwrite some bytes in the middle, add some bytes to the end, then hit Save. Hex Fiend will appear to save instantly because it makes the changes in-place, while 0xED will require time proportional to the file size as it writes the entire file to disk.

2\. Search for some text. 0xED will block the UI until the text is found or the file is exhausted, while Hex Fiend performs the search in the background, including a progress indicator and cancel button.

3\. Select everything in the file and choose Edit->Copy. Hex Fiend will do this instantly, while 0xED will require time and space proportional to the file size, as it attempts to read the entire file into memory. Now select all and hit the delete key. Hex Fiend again does this instantly, while 0xED will again try to read the file into memory (to service its Undo stack).

Let me know if you have any questions and I'll be happy to answer them in this thread!

<comment><USER3> First of all, I love your app. It has been _invaluable_ to me in my work.

I do however, have a few UI niggles you might be interested in hearing. When I jump to an offset, I have the hardest time spotting the cursor. There's that nice brief yellow line flash so I can see what line the cursor is on, which is already a lifesaver, but I just can't spot the little blinking line, the grey on white just doesn't stand out enough I guess. I have to click on the line and basically binary search down to the right offset. Some sort of call out for the quad of bytes containing the cursor as well as the line would be _awesome_.

Also, since I'm mostly looking at scientific data I'm trying to parse, it is _awesome_ to hear that you've added signed floats and integers.

Let me just reiterate, thanks for this app.

(Also, apologies if I'm referring to an old version - I don't know offhand which one I have)

<comment><USER2> That's a good suggestion. Please feel free to add any requested features or bugs you find to the wiki page at <http://ridiculousfish.com/hexfiend/docs/wiki/Bugs/Bugs> . Thanks!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> Sort of old news, I guess, but worth saying: this is one of the 3 most-used tools at Matasano. It's a really excellent piece of code.

<comment><USER5> did you guys ever modify it?

<comment><USER4> We've done all sorts of strange things to it over the years; 'yan is planning on embedding it wholesale into one of our projects, so that may be the direction we're going with it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I prefer 0xED.app:

<http://www.suavetech.com/0xed/0xed.html>

<comment><USER4> It isn't open source, is it?

<comment><USER7> No, just free of charge.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER8> I hit "Post to Delicious" on this and noticed I'd already done so on March 28, 2006. The Internet is now officially too big by my reckoning :-)

</comment><comment><USER9> Incidentally, the author was also the one who wrote this delightful piece: [http://ridiculousfish.com/blog/archives/2006/05/30/old- age-a...](http://ridiculousfish.com/blog/archives/2006/05/30/old-age-and- treachery/)

</comment><comment><USER10> Ye olde friend, ridiculousfish.com:

[http://www.google.com/search?q=site:news.ycombinator.com+rid...](http://www.google.com/search?q=site:news.ycombinator.com+ridiculousfish.com)

:-)

And couldn't help but notice in the results:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=734727>

</comment><comment><USER11> If you, like me, wonder about the Windows alternatives; Hexplorer ( <http://artemis.wszib.edu.pl/~mdudek/> ) is a very nice and capable hex editor for Windows. The only downside is that it chokes on rather big files. Then again, I don't use it daily for my work, so I might be missing some big pros or cons.

</comment><comment><USER12> I'm not sure if Okteta is available for Mac as well, but it's a beautiful hex editor I use when on linux. WinHex is great on windows. I'll take a look if this might a good choice to use on my mac.

<comment><USER13> Okteta's beautiful from a user interface perspective, but like most hex editors it fails when trying to deal with large files. There are very few hex editors around that will open files that are larger than the amount of RAM that you have.</comment></comment>


I interviewed 35 founders for my book, "Startups Open Sourced". Ask me anything. - <AUTHOR> http://anyasq.com/69-i-wrote-an-amazon-best-selling-book

<comment><AUTHOR> Startups interviewed: AirBnb, AppSumo, Blippy, Bump, Cloudkick, Crowdbooster, DailyBooth, Divvyshot, Djangy, foursquare, GitHub, Gobble, Greplin, Grooveshark, Hipmunk, Husky Starcraft, Indinero, Justin.TV, KISSmetrics, LikeALittle, Listia, Little App Factory, Mixpanel, Noteleaf, Octopart, Omnisio, One, One Llama, OrangeQC, reddit, Weebly, WePay, Wufoo

<comment><USER2> Well, I an considering wanting to showcase Startups from my website. How did you get time with them to interview?

<comment><USER3> If you have to ask you aren't cut out to make that type of website. I've found most CEOs to be pretty accessible.

<comment><USER4> Hey suking,

What's your email? Would like to talk to you about something, regarding one of our comments.

Ping me: shahedkhan30 [at] gmail [dot] com

<comment><USER3> Feel free to ask it here.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> Anyone have any details on this AnyAsq.com site? How long has it been around? How's it doing traffic-wise?

<comment><AUTHOR> We're YC S11. AnyAsq is our weekend side-project that was accidentally launched a week ago when Harj (without knowing that AnyAsq was by a YC company) started "I'm a partner at Y Combinator. Ask me anything", and someone posted it to HN. We've had several other interesting people start AMAs as well, and we're excited about the response so far. We've had 25,000 visitors.

<comment><USER5> Sweet. Hustle it up.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> Hm -- can't seem to post to anayasq in either Safari 5 or Firefox 5. So thought I'd post one here:

I love and appreciate how transparent you've been about your recipe and process for the book. That's super cool and it's totally inspired a few ideas of my own. You shared some revenue figures after the first week, but would you be willing to update on revenue to date since then?

<comment><USER6> Turns out there was an undisclosed character limit on questions, and posting such fails silently.

Otherwise, the question (and answer!) are posted there now. Thanks, Jared!</comment></comment>


Think outside Photoshop - new image editing concept - <AUTHOR> http://www.vladstudio.com/post/?think-outside-photoshop-new-image-editing-concept

<comment><USER2> Immediately reminds me of GEGL[1], the new library underneath the GIMP[2].

[1] <http://www.gegl.org/>

[2] <http://www.gimp.org/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Thanks, other people noticed it's also much like "nodes" in video editors.

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> We call it non-destructive editing in the audio world. I believe Aviary attempted what you're suggesting with Peacock, now Nodewerk [1].

[1] <http://nodewerk.com/>

<comment><AUTHOR> Never heard about it, thanks!

</comment></comment><comment><AUTHOR> Honestly, it's a pity to see my idea sink deeper and deeper into HN news black hole. I really hoped to discuss it. Not the first time though :-)

</comment><comment><AUTHOR> Also, Russian translation and discussion - <http://habrahabr.ru/post/172403/></comment>


Meta: Paginated Comments - <AUTHOR>

I've just noticed that comments are now paginated. In some cases like "Lighten Up" (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3736037) only the first comment and its children is displayed.
I noticed this because I'm working on an extension that does various things on news.ycombinator.com and one thing is determining new posts on comments. It's now not practical to find the last comment id on a page so that's broken. I'm very hesitant to implement pagination because I really don't want and it's a bad solution.
Besides the problems for certain extensions, top comments are now even more privileged than before. The incentive for piggybacking the top comment is greatly increased because otherwise you'll be on the next page of comments.
edit: Not to mention the unreliability of 'More' (/x?) links to still exist when you get round to following them. <comment><USER2> You can use a convoluted bit of javascript to determine if there is a more link in the comments page. Then if you detect a more link, use ajax and get that page and append to the current page. Rerun your javascript to determine if the newly appended page has a more link in it. Repeat till you find a page that does not have a more link in it. This is what I did for my HN ipad app.

Also, comments pages have been paginated for quite some time now. I believe it started around 9 months to a year back.

<comment><AUTHOR> It seems like threads only become paginated when they become closed for comments. I think this makes sense in some ways. I noticed it because I way testing, went to sleep, woke up and refreshed the thread I was testing with and everything broke.

Your approach is what I was thinking of doing. It's good to hear that it's working for you. Do you perform any queueing or waiting? I was worried that the reportedly aggressive rate limiter might block someone who opened a few large threads at once.

<comment><USER2> I'm not really using it to scrape the comments threads in bulk, I'm just using it on an individual thread at a time. So I haven't had any problems with rate limiting.

Also, unless you are hitting hundreds of threads at the same time, I don't really think you will be caught by the rate limiter. Not sure about this though, but it's something that has been discussed before on HN. Try searching for something like 'HN crawl rate', and you will get more info.</comment></comment></comment>


Show HN: WebTorrent CDN with graceful degradation - <AUTHOR> https://github.com/andreapaiola/P2P-CDN <comment><AUTHOR> Author here, example live here :)

[https://andreapaiola.name/P2P-CDN/examples/](https://andreapaiola.name/P2P-CDN/examples/)

</comment><comment><USER2> Hmm. Doesn't seem to work on iOS.

<comment><AUTHOR> Yeah I have to investigate... Maybe because ES6... you can transpire with Babel in case..

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> Really cool.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thx <3</comment></comment>


Show HN: Passphrase generator - <AUTHOR> http://stray.io/tools/passphrase-generator.aspx

<comment><USER2> >5000 most common words

>secure

Well that's quite a contradiction.

Is it really that difficult for an English speaker to think of 4 independent, unrelated words that are at least 6 letters long each? It seems like that'd be much easier, faster, simpler, and more secure than any website like this.

Not to mention that choosing a password a website has given you over plaintext (no HTTPS) is a terrible idea for a wide variety of other reasons...

I don't mind websites like these as experiments, but there is no warning or indication on the page to not actually use the passphrases generated as real passwords. Someone may actually use one of these passwords for real.

</comment><comment><USER3> Looks to be down to me.</comment>


An Amazonian's Response to "Inside Amazon" - <AUTHOR> https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/amazonians-response-inside-amazon-wrestling-big-ideas-nick-ciubotariu?trk=hp-feed-article-title-like&redirectFromSplash=true

<comment><AUTHOR> Not written by me, but I thought it would provide an additional viewpoint about Amazon in light of the NYT's article.

Full disclosure: I work at Amazon in a non-tech role.

</comment><comment><USER2> duplicate of [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10067505](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10067505) with 50 comments

<comment><AUTHOR> Didn't see that; thanks!</comment></comment>


Robotic Nation - <AUTHOR> http://marshallbrain.com/robotic-nation.htm

<comment><USER2> I've often wondered when we were going to see automated kisoks for ordering food. Apparently, very soon.

Now if only we could improve these a bit. For example, give everyone a RFID "membership card". When you approach the machine, it greets you and displays your favorite foods at that place, or configures the kisok to how you like it.

It seems like if I scan my membership card at one of the current automated checkouts, it should recognize the fact that I've shut the voice prompts off every time, and do it automatically.

</comment><comment><USER3> The short of it: in a fully automated society, it is simply infeasible to have 100% (or even 50%, with most jobs moving into the service sector) employment.

Thus he proposes a $25,000/yr/person stipend funded from a combination of sources, including high marginal rates on new tax brackets for multi-million- dollar corporate salaries, various sales taxes, and the full reallocation of social spending in almost all other areas.

The result would be a complete elimination of poverty, the stigma of welfare, wage slavery, and the social security solvency problem, leading to a "supercharging" of capitalism via massive increases in consumption and ultimately "true economic freedom".

I find this proposal very appealing, yet lacking in other core respects; e.g., those countries and entities with the greatest access to natural resources will continue to be the root sources of growth, and as money is simply a tool for distributing wealth, it inevitably adapts to reflect the availability of wealth. Maybe he's also assuming energy from pervasive nuclear fusion?

I was waiting for him to mention gift economies, but he seems to love the profit system too much to accept its fundamental infeasibility in the long term.

<comment><USER4> _I was waiting for him to mention gift economies_

Isn't Brain's "Australia" basically a gift economy? <http://www.marshallbrain.com/manna6.htm>

_In Australia, these people could completely fulfill themselves, and humanity would be much better off because of their contributions. Creative people want to -- need to -- create. That is their passion. Instead of millions of talented people working in jobs that had nothing to do with their dreams, simply to make ends meet, in Australia they could follow their dreams.

The goal in Australia is to encourage and nurture creativity and innovation. [...] It meant an amazing level of creativity and innovation in every product category -- food, housing, architecture, vacation resorts, restaurants, furniture. Whether it was basic research or final consumer products, innovation was everywhere. The innovators had the ability to take their research/inventions/ideas as far as they could._</comment></comment>


Programming in BASIC on the TRS-80 - <AUTHOR> http://baugues.com/trs-80/ <comment><USER2> Ahhh, a most timely article, from my perspective. I've recently being writing a computer game for my first computer, which was a contemporary of the trash-80 ([http://www.compucolor.org/emu/ccemu.html](http://www.compucolor.org/emu/ccemu.html)). The guy that made the emulator was working for NVIDIA last time I talked to him, and he thoughtfully provided most of the programming manuals for Compucolor II on the site.

Why? Well I was mostly expired from a story in "Surely You're Joking, Mr Feynman" where he talks about being bored with physics, and he gets back into it by playing around with toy problems that he had to work out from first principles (the way that the wobble in a spinning plate precesses around the axis). So I've started programming in an emulator of this old 1980s computer. It seems to be working for me too - I'm finding myself to be much more engaged in my day job since I've started.

<comment><USER3> Same here, that growing feeling that we have lost something during the 90's when home-computers were replaced by 'business PCs' drove me to write an emulator to preserve some of the magic in the past few months: [http://floooh.github.io/virtualkc/](http://floooh.github.io/virtualkc/), here's how to write a 'Hello World!' program on it in BASIC, FORTH, machine code and assembler: [http://floooh.github.io/virtualkc/p035_helloworld.html](http://floooh.github.io/virtualkc/p035_helloworld.html)

In my opinion, the RaspberryPi is the closest thing to a home-computer we have today, it encourages to learn, experiment and create things, it would be nice if it had a simpler, more home-computer-like standard operating system though. Linux (or any other current desktop or mobile OS) is simply too complex and scary. In contrast to that, smartphones and tablets are closed ecosystems optimized for consumption. I don't see how these closed-off platforms encourage kids to explore and learn to create something on their own.

<comment><USER4> The RISC OS people have produced a custom ROM that runs only BBC Basic at boot: [https://www.riscosopen.org/content/sales/risc-os- pico](https://www.riscosopen.org/content/sales/risc-os-pico)

There's also some stuff here on the RPi site on other BASIC options: [https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/celebrating-50-years-of- bas...](https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/celebrating-50-years-of-basic/)

I would actually love to re-case an RPi in it's own retro keyboard unit and turn it into a proper TV-computer of old. Alas I don't really have anything in the way of that kind of solder/hardware skills.

EDIT: Actually, following some of my own links, it looks like someone's beat me to it: [http://www.fuze.co.uk/](http://www.fuze.co.uk/)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER4> The REPL still lives! You need Racket. There's a lot of great programs now using Racket/WeScheme in education for younger kids.

Another project though I think really seems to be gunning for that old-school feel with some modern conveniences is PICO-8, which is a retro Lua VM meant mainly for designing games, complete with REPL, built in editors, and even PEEK and POKE. :D

To be honest though, I also kinda wonder how well you'd do just plunking a kid down in front of one of those older machines. Especially the Tandy ones. The Color Computer came with an amazing manual, that's pretty much what got me into programming all on my own as a kid.

As a fun side note, here's a Lisp in 1.5 pages of Tandy Color Basic: [https://twitter.com/J_Arcane/status/668545293164683264](https://twitter.com/J_Arcane/status/668545293164683264)

<comment><USER5> Pretty sure that is Randy Beer's model 1 and model 3 lisp from 80 micro, part of a multi article series beginning March of '83, see page 176 or so of:

[https://archive.org/details/80-microcomputing- magazine-1983-...](https://archive.org/details/80-microcomputing- magazine-1983-03)

It may very well run on a coco unchanged (they were very close) or someone modified it to work on a coco without changing the version remarks. I'm not motivated enough to do a biological meat powered DIFF between the tweet and the magazine.

I tried typing it in (in probably summer of 83), LOL thats not happening without typos, ended up convincing my Dad to get the load-80 for that month (essentially load 80 was a cassette tape delivered monthly with the code from the magazine so you don't have to type stuff in). Later Load-80 was a floppy disk. The future being very unevenly distributed it was at least half a decade before IBM PC clone users finally had "big blue disk" (which I enjoyed monthly)

It was my first experience with a LISP. I would advise that LISP and magazine series were very interesting but highly non-optimal way to introduce a roughly ten year old kid to LISP.

From memory by the third month or so of the series he had a crude database set up and implemented MATCH. Performance was slow, the REPL took maybe a minute to think about complicated things.

Its fun to page thru the ads. Dynamic ram had dropped below a buck per kilobyte. 80 micro was going thru a computer science phase, interesting to read the APL article a few pages later.

Edited to add, this is Randy Beer's home page today:

[http://mypage.iu.edu/~rdbeer/](http://mypage.iu.edu/~rdbeer/)

<comment><USER4> To give proper credit, that's actually a port of the Model I/III Lisp to the CoCo, as printed in Hot Coco magazine.

I'm still idle in a few bits of the CoCo scene and someone dug it up a while back so I snapped the code just because I was impressed that 1) it was pulled off in BASIC, and 2) in so little space.

Probably indeed not the best introduction to Lisp. I do wish I had had _some_ intro to Lisp, or perhaps more ideally Scheme, back when I was that young though. I honestly believe I'd've stuck with programming if I'd discovered Lisp & FP when I was just starting to look beyond BASIC/QBasic. Instead all I saw was everyone telling me I should learn Assembly or C if I wanted to be a "real programmer", while Python and JavaScript were sneered at as mere "scripting languages," save for those like Perl that were intelligible only to other Perl hackers.

Once Java came along and I took two glances at that, I just gave up on programming for another decade, resigned to the idea that coding for a living was nothing more than a life of tedium and irritation.

I'm still not always sure I was wrong.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I've had surprising luck with doing simple Logo with my daughter (4-1/2). Actually I feel a bit guilty as she'd like to do more. So far we're just doing drawing (no loops or anything), but with all the tedium of finding the keys and getting the commands just right. I helped her make one routine that randomly changes the color, which she likes. (She named the routine after herself – kids don't need to stress over proper naming ;)

But I really wish there was material to get her started. I haven't found any introductory Logo books – finding an old book and updating it to a new dialect would be fine, but I'd appreciate some structure and thoughtfulness about the order of introduction. I probably should print out some primers too, so I don't have to remind her of RT and LT and FD every time.

I've been using this Logo interpreter: [http://www.calormen.com/jslogo/](http://www.calormen.com/jslogo/) – it does all the traditional stuff pretty well, but it could also use this same sense of structure and content. A kid should be able to sit down and think: here's a thing I could try to do. And here's all the tools I need to do it. Really that's just content.

On the fancy side Hopscotch has been really impressive (significantly better than Scratch), but being iPad-only has been a problem. That said, my daughter still appreciates Logo even compared to something fancy.

(One important thing about my daughter's interest: I talk to her in detail about what I do. The importance of this occurred to me during a parent education event I was at, where they noted: when you ask your kid how their day was and they disappointingly say "fine", have you been telling them how your day was? Parents need to demonstrate that kind of storytelling and engagement, and in my experience kids suck it up more than you'd expect, even stories about seemingly boring work stuff.)

</comment><comment><USER7> I, too, wrote my first programs on a trash-80, sitting in the store and saving the things to a high-performance cassette drive ;)

But I no longer think that's the thing...the point back then was, to me at least, "here is something big that no one else I know is doing but its so obviously very cool, empowering, and in a way, _secret_ ".

Nowadays, with so many devices intruding on every aspect of our lives, there is just very little of that _secret_ anymore, and while of course its hard for me to know how modern tech is affecting kids nowadays, I just cannot imagine they can feel the same way as I did, sitting alone in a Radio Shack in 1978, writing BASIC programs in wonderment.

</comment><comment><USER8> I have just started teaching my daughter to program. I would certainly agree that starting off is not nearly as easy as it used to be.

Kids love interactive and graphical environments and trying to do this in any mainstream language quickly becomes non trivial.

I chose Python and pygame but it gets confusing for the child to see things like:

       from pygame.locals import *

and

       for event in pygame.event.get():
         if event.type == QUIT:
            pygame.quit()

and

       size = (120, 640)
       screen = pygame.display.set_mode(size)

One can tell her to ignore these and just accept they are necessary but it does cause issues and looks very intimidating to a beginner.

<comment><USER9> processing may be a nice alternative. very small boilerplate to have a graphical/interactive program running, and a cute ide to keep your sketches. [https://processing.org/](https://processing.org/)

<comment><AUTHOR> Love your username.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Scratch is the only thing I've gotten my kids interested in: [https://scratch.mit.edu/](https://scratch.mit.edu/)

Unfortunately, it didn't last long.

</comment><comment><USER11> Very happy memories. I spent so much time in Radio Shack when I was a teenager that it started to feel like home. Friend of mine wrote the first machine- language program I ever saw, "Mountain Mission". You basically controlled the elevation of a cannon and it shot at things on a mountain. Radio Shack put it in their software catalog. I think he made several hundred bucks.

I feel sorry for folks learning to code today. I was thinking about creating a course to teach folks to program, and it occurred to me that a more useful course might be along the lines of "How to set up and run 'hello world' in various configurations" You could have a section on each O/S, and then exercises would cover the top 5 or 6 languages.

</comment><comment><USER12> Microcomputer BASIC is what inspired Glass Table for Gambit Scheme: [https://github.com/bitwize/glasstable](https://github.com/bitwize/glasstable)

It's basically a development environment you operate from the REPL. Every time you define something, GT memorizes your definition; you can then save this "workspace" of definitions to a program file or load prior work into the workspace.

It's a shame that there are almost no programming environments that work the way BASIC did, where the command language for the development toolset is the same as the programming language itself.

<comment><USER4> Strictly speaking, most Common Lisps can do this too out of the box. It's how "compiling" even works under most CL implementations.

</comment></comment><comment><USER13> Neat article, I miss the simplicity of the old machines as well.

I teach a weekend programming class for middle schoolers and the setup is a real pain. There's just too much stuff that gets in the way of learning to code. Our setup is Python 3 with Pycharm EDU2 installed on each child's laptop. for some lessons we have a Raspberry Pi (gopigo and minecraft) that the kids can control remotely using Python.

We tried using Idle but it crashes too much and is a bit of a pain to navigate with the multi-window display. Pycharm EDU is pretty good, but I haven't had much luck using it with lessons. The lessons take a lot of time to setup and sometimes just crash Pycharm or become unusable, holding up class. So we use Pycharm EDU just as an IDE.

I thought of using something remote like Koding or codio (I really like these options), but we have some lessons that require us to be local so we can reach out to our bot and rpi. A more lightweight IDE would be nice, something with nice debug capability like Pycharm EDU. These kids are sporting some really old laptops, hammy downs from older siblings mostly. Ideas welcome.

</comment><comment><USER14> >> I can't help but feel a little sad at how much harder it is to learn to program today.

>> Back then, with a few lines of code I could write a program that ran on practically any home computer.

Pop open Chrome and you can write almost the same program from that magazine in Javascript. You'll have to figure out how to do the input, though.

Magazines like Linux Format even have multi-page coding tutorials for different languages all the time.

[http://www.linuxformat.com/archives&listpdfs=1](http://www.linuxformat.com/archives&listpdfs=1)

>> There's so many more steps to reach "Hello World" in any of today's major languages

>> There's also so much more distraction. With no Internet, no video games

There were TONS of games for the TRS-80. I used to sit in Radio Shack as a kid playing them all day long. You didn't have the Internet back then but you could dial into BBS's. That was a real time-waster.

</comment><comment><USER15> Basic is still alive and well, providing a simple programming environment for beginners.

It has returned to being a hobbyist scene, just like in the 80s. Basic compilers are written by hobbyists for hobbyists.

For native applications my favourite is PureBasic: [http://www.purebasic.com/](http://www.purebasic.com/)

It's a nice variant that compiles to a tiny, dependency free executables for Windows, Linux and OSX.

It also provides a nice gateway to the underlying assembler. [http://www.purebasic.com/documentation/reference/inlinedasm....](http://www.purebasic.com/documentation/reference/inlinedasm.html)

It also has an online version called Spider Basic that compiles to JavaScript: [http://www.spiderbasic.com/](http://www.spiderbasic.com/)

<comment><USER16> Monkey X is by far the best BASIC compiler available to date. Purebasic is still good for GUI stuff, but it's not OOP like Monkey X. And Monkey X can support native GUIs if a library or wrapper were created (and may already exist).

<comment><USER4> Hmm. Maybe I should take another look at Purebasic then. "Not OOP" is a selling point for me, and rare as hen's teeth where GUI software is concerned.

<comment><USER17> > rare as hen's teeth where GUI software is concerned.

You can still write native Win32 and Xlib apps in C not to mention all of the languages where OOP is an optional bolt-on.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> I remember typing in games on the TI-99/4A without understanding how to edit a program in TI Basic. If I mistyped I couldn't go back and edit the line so was screwed. With some guidance back in the day I would have had a lot more fun.

</comment><comment><USER19> I remember as a teenager in the mid 2000s my sweet old grandmother gave me this book she found lying around because she didn't understand it but she knows I'm into "those computer things". It was the manual that came with the TRS 80 explaining how to use BASIC. It came with some example programs. It was an amusing glimpse into a bygone era but ultimately I declared the book to be hopelessly outdated trash. I kind of wish I had kept it.

<comment><USER20> Was it this one?

[https://archive.org/details/Getting_Started_with_TRS-80_Basi...](https://archive.org/details/Getting_Started_with_TRS-80_Basic_1981_Tandy)

My introduction to programming was this via this book in the back of my sixth grade math class in 1982. Been hooked ever since.

<comment><USER19> That looks right.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Somewhere around 1991 or so we got a 386SX with DOS and Q-BASIC. Here I was stuck with all these Apple II and Commodore books from the library, most of the games wouldn't work because the peeks and pokes and functions that weren't available.

I later found some GW-BASIC books which helped a little bit, but I wish the library had some newer stuff. C compilers were $500 back then so BASIC was all I had.

</comment><comment><USER21> Wow nostalgia taking me back to learning level 1 basic on a TRS-80 Model I at the Radio Shack store.

But the ease of learning BASIC is alive and well today, you can write a PHP program with as much ease (then you can learn to write better code later but the point is the barrier to entry is very very low).

You can even run PHP as an interpreter in a DOS-like command window in Windows, very easy.

</comment><comment><USER22>
      POKE 16407, 43

This wrote a value into an absolute memory address. 16407 was one of the registers of the video controller. Poking various values into it would cause various funky things to happen on screen. 43 was one of the best values to put in there, but others were interesting too.

Sometimes you had to reboot the machine to recover, though...

</comment><comment><USER23> My second computer (after the Timex Sinclair 1000) was a TRS-80 MC-10. I liked that it had the same BASIC commands mapped to keys like the TS/1000 and so it was a great upgrade into a computer that had colour and sound... and since I was 6 the small keyboard was okay =)

</comment><comment><USER16> The first computer I had access to and learned to program on :)

</comment><comment><USER24> Oh, this is fun. Nice piece.

Time to turn my Apple 2e on and play for a while.</comment>


About choosing the right programming language for a software startup...  - <AUTHOR> http://vettyofficer.blogspot.com/2010/10/which-is-right-programming-language-for.html

<comment><USER2> OP -- you sound like an MBA : bland and completely devoid of any semblance of originality.

I think hackers should be opinionated ( right or worong doesn't matter) and have something original to say.

So let me answer the question for you.

Drum roll ....

The right programming language for a start up is Scala.

Programmers who have taught themselves Scala , with being virtually very little job requirements for Scala , have self selected themselves into an elite category.

It is statically typed.

It runs on JVM that you can instrument and monitor.

Java ecosystem is vast.

See .. having an opinion isn't that hard.

<comment><USER3> The OP, to their credit, did manage to avoid igniting a language war. Now you're standing in the town square with a sandwich board strapped to yourself and shaking a noisy bell while crowing about Java.

Scala, awesome or not, is a pretty crazy thing to advocate. People complain constantly about the lack of developer support for something as common-place as Ruby and instead want to go with PHP or C# simply because they can't throw a rock without hitting one of those developers.

The best language for a project is the one that fits the requirements and can be supported. That short-lists things a bit.

<comment><USER4> Ah, but you don't need to hire 10,000 mediocre programmers; you just need 5 good ones.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER5> _Google is doing this, Facebook is doing this and so even your startup can do this_

Whilst using more than one language may be acceptable, this is a very bad justification for it.

<comment><USER6> I think this all comes down to using the right tool for the right job. I've worked in polyglot environments where the decision to use multiple languages and platforms was a complete disaster. There's just no need to use two tools, which perform the same tasks at the same speed, for one job. It makes hiring a nightmare, and means the team may become conversant in 10 languages, but never master any of them.

That said, sometimes (and I do mean sometimes), there is a justification and reason for this sort of thing. Facebook chat was written in Erlang for speed and scalability purposes. That makes sense. The application needed more than the standard platform (PHP) could handle.

</comment></comment><comment><USER7> Maaaan.

This says absolutely nothing, except for the ever-present "just start-up, it doesn't matter." It doesn't matter only if you're a Blub programmer (see <http://www.paulgraham.com/avg.html> though I imagine most people have already seen it), or if you're a non-technical manager needing to convince himself that it doesn't matter.

So here is some real advice: if you are doing a typical "mostly-web-but-a-lot- of-little-elses" choose Python. Python has good frameworks like Django (that will bring up you to speed clearly for a CRUD-based web site) and Twisted (for the small "everything elses"). If you find performance bottlenecks, well, the C-API is not a "pleasure" to work with, but it's reasonable at least. It is easy to learn, so the whole "find an engineer familiar with it" is a bit of a red herring.

Sure, this advice will not fit all start-ups, but if you think it doesn't apply to yours, you better have fairly solid arguments.

(Some arguments that I think are solid: "We already know Ruby well, and the difference is small enough that this tips the scales", "we need to write in Davlik for Android". "But I know C++" isn't, for example.)

</comment><comment><USER8> Sorry to say, but this is 370 words that say nothing.

 _choose a programming language that best suits and can easily accomplish your product's requirements_

Such as? I would love to hear OP's thoughts about the relationship between product requirements and language choice. Unfortunately, he doesn't offer any.

 _Frameworks are very important for startups to keep up their pace._

Why? I don't mean to be snarky, but I really want to understand what makes frameworks so important, especially if we've already selected the best language for the product. An explanation is better than a declaration.

 _Give more preference to the programming language which the team members are familiar with_

What happens when this choice is the exact opposite of the best language for the product requirements? I imagine this happens quite often. Then what do you do?

 _Have an eye on the availability and cost of hiring a programmer in the language you choose._

Again, conflicting advice. What do you do when this is totally different from what the team members already know?

 _Do not blindly follow the trend_

 _A startup is not about the language, it's all about the people._

 _don't worry too much, just startup!!!_

These last 3 items sound more like fortune cookie content than blog advice.

It's hard to argue with much here because there isn't much here. If I turned this report into any competent manager or professor, it would probably come back with one word on it, "Obvious"

OP, please put some meat on these bones. You sound like you have something important to add. So add it.

</comment><comment><USER9> Well, if you are doing anything related to the web... chances are that you cannot escape JavaScript

This reduces the question to: JavaScript or CoffeeScript? Problem solved.

OTOH, who enjoy living in a prison?</comment>


Can Intellectual Ventures invent its way to redemption? - <AUTHOR> http://www.seattlepi.com/local/science/article/Can-Bellevue-s-Intellectual-Ventures-invent-its-7465031.php#item-38490 <comment><USER2> Nathan Myhrvold, who is otherwise off-the-charts brilliant, and who has access to resources the likes of which most of us could only dream about, will forever be remembered for accomplishing the dubious goal of becoming the world's most famous patent troll.

What a waste.

</comment><comment><USER3> Well, I doubt it, but maybe if they get enough puff pieces like this one, they can start to feel a bit better about themselves.

Also, no: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headli...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Betteridge%27s_law_of_headlines)</comment>


Apple Finally Updates MacBook Air with Retina Display, Touch ID - <AUTHOR> https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/10/apple-finally-updates-macbook-air-with-retina-display/ <comment><USER2> Love the device but I can't get over how expensive it has gotten. A 20% price bump...

Sure, there's still the old Macbook Air around, but it wasn't updated and is based on a decade old model with a CPU/GPU that's a 3 years old (5th gen i5 from 2015), and a 128 PPI screen, that's a bit ridiculous.

If you want a modern machine you're looking at $1200 for the cheapest model.

That isn't even too bad but when you go abroad, all bets are off. I still don't get this.

USD/EUR rate has been as high as 1.4 and as low as 1.05 in the past 5 years, averaging about 1.2 USD/EUR. So a $1200 Macbook Air should be €1000, typically. It's not. Instead it's more, €1350.

Or in dollar terms, that's about $1620 at the 5y average exchange rates.

That's what EU students have to pay for a modern but entry-level Macbook in the new Air. The regular Macbook or Macbook Pro are of course even more expensive.

Okay so part of this is silly exchange rates and pricing, some of it related to high EU VAT by the way, not just Apple's pricing. But part of it is also a pretty damn expensive lineup, with this new Macbook Air coming in at 20% higher prices than the previous model.

Yes prices tend to move up, inflation is a thing... but technology is supposed to be the exception, where you can get better specs after a few years without moving the price point. They just bumped it up 20%, that's pretty ridiculous.

<comment><USER3> > Love the device but I can't get over how expensive it has gotten. A 20% > price bump...

I got downvoted for posting this as a top-level comment, but it's insane to me how Apple's hardware specs have stagnated while maintaining the same price.

In 2014 I bought an entry-level Macbook Pro with retina display, 2.6 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 128 GB SSD for $1300.

In 2018 I can buy the entry-level Macbook Pro with retina display, 2.3 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 128 GB SSD, still for $1300.

In 2018 I can also now buy an entry-level Macbook Air with retina display, 1.6 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 128 GB SSD for $1200.

I'm in the market for a new laptop and I'm seriously considering making the jump to Linux rather than paying the same price for the same specs that were available 4.5 years ago.

<comment><USER4> I'm sympathetic to the complaint about price, but if your contention is that the devices are basically unchanged, then why buy a 2018 model? Why not buy a 2014 model?

And if you don't want to make that sacrifice, then there's probably _something_ different about the device that Apple is assuming is worth ponying up for the upgrade for you.

(For starters, despite the similar clock speed and processor names, the processors are not the same speed.)

<comment><USER5> > (For starters, despite the similar clock speed and processor names, the > processors are not the same speed.)

of course not, it's at least 4 years older.

I mean that would not be fair to compare them. I have a Late 2013 Mbp 15" it was priced at ~2.200€ it was the "entry" model of the mbp 15" however if you look now the price is going to the roof. 2.799,00 € is the new price, of course the processor is now faster, there are 4 years in between (well clock speed is lower, but more cores). What else has changed? Of couse It lost it's sd slot, and also lost 256gb of ssd storage (if you want the same storage than the 2013 model you need to pay an increase of 240 €!) what did also change? the graphics card, it now is a radeon (and of course more clock speed, it's 4 years older.

So how did the price changed:

* Late 2013 15" MBP: ~2.200,00 € (cheapest)

* Curr 2018 15" MBP: 2.799,00 € (cheapest)

* 2018 15" MBP: 3.039,00 € (same storage space)

that is totally unreasonable. The processor does not cost 600 € more (btw the i7-4850HQ costed roughly ~400€ hard to say since prices of that processor aren't well known, however the current mbp uses the i7-8750H which is actually priced officaly at 400 $, so should be less euro, but keep it 1:1 it would mean no increase) of course memory prices gone through the roof, but since that's the cheapest component that would justify a maximum of 100 €.

SO tl;dr

Late 2013 to Current with newer hardware for the same price means a increase of 839 € or 599 € (you can even remove 100€ and it wouldn't be ok) if you can take the storage hit. and all you get is a touchbar, which you probably might need or not.

<comment><USER4> Exactly! This is why I'm quite sympathetic. I just think it needs to be laid out like this to make it an effective point.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I wonder if a lot of people are leaving the Mac ecosystem.

Apple has been selling roughly ~19M Mac per year since 2012, and its new user to Mac has also been steady at ~50%. Apple has had 60M Mac user in 2012 announced in WWDC, and they has been nearing 100M since early 2017. I assume that actual number is larger than 90M at the time, so after nearly 20 Months, ~20M New Mac Users on board, it manage to add a total ~10M Active Install Base.

That is surprising for me, as I was expecting ~110M+ Mac User already, others analysts like Benedict Evans and Asymco put those number past ~120M. So for every 2 new Mac Users, there is one leaving.

I hardly call that good news by Apple Standard. And this high churn rate happens after early 2017. From 2012 to 2016-17, there is 4 / 5 New users for every 1 leaving the Mac Ecosystem.

The timing actually align with their sudden Interviews with Apple journalist on Mac, Mac Pro, and the release of iMac Pro.

And judging from these numbers, I would bet the release of MacBook Pro, iMac Pro and MacBook didn't restore the faith of its Mac users. Apple didn't care about its Mac lineup, this new MacBook Air as well as Mac mini were likely reaction to this churn, much like the iMac Pro.

Or may be, the timing has something to do with their New Keyboard Design, which they introduce to MacBook in 2015 and Pro in 2016, and they managed to fit that in this New MacBook Air.

<comment><USER7> Apple executives are probably telling themselves these people are just trading in their old laptops for iPads hence why they have been doubling down on iOS for the last 5 years. Milking the entire ecosystem for 30% compared to 0% on a laptop sure hasn't hurt, either.

<comment><USER8> Based on business results the Apple execs are right. To detriment of the relatively small number of professional users like software devs or photographers.

<comment><USER9> One can only hope that those software devs who create applications for both ecosystems don't leave for greener pastures, taking their software with them...

<comment><USER8> It will be interesting. I always thought that one success factor of iOS was that during that time Macbooks were incredibly popular among devs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Am I the only one, who is excited and considering buying this thing? I'm still on 2012 Air. It's good device, but showing it's age (slow CPU and only 4GB of Ram, the screen resolution is joke). But new Air seems very compelling to me. I'll miss the magsafe though.

Also I would like to know if the SSD can be upgraded later (unofficially of course). 2012 Air SSD can be replaced, using cheap reduction (from proprietary apple to standard M2). Not sure about the newer models.

<comment><USER11> Out of curiosity, what is the appeal of the new MacBook Air over a regular MacBook? Is it the 13" screen vs. the 12"?

I'd just assumed that when Apple introduced that crazy-thin 12" MacBook a couple years ago, it was meant to replace _both_ product lines. I don't understand why it's necessary to maintain a third discrete product line. Why not add a 13" variant to the standard MacBook line with i5 and i7 processor choices? That would be similar to what they do with the MacBook Pro line.

Is there some other difference that I'm overlooking?

<comment><USER12> The Macbook Air also has a fan. The base Macbook does not. The base Macbook therefor hits its thermal ceiling pretty much immediately and is suboptimal in hot environments. My girlfriend's overheats all the time.

Frankly, I think the three product lines should be shaped like this:

\- Macbook: For price sensitive people. $800-900 to enter the Apple ecosystem.

\- Macbook Air: Basically the current MBP with its fixation on power capped by form-factor. (Note: The new Air is _heavier_ than the MBP!)

\- Macbook Pro: A portable workstation that doesn't sacrifice everything for form factor. Apple doesn't have one of these right now. For example, prioritizes thermals so that it can sustain max performance instead of the bursty performance of the current MBPs.

<comment><USER13> The Macbook has a 4.5W chip and the Macbook Air has a 7W chip now. So you get 2 extra Watts TDP and an extra port. The Air is actually $100 cheaper and 1 inch larger screen effectively obsoleting the Macbook. The Macbook has always been a weird place, it should really be the budget budget mac, but has always been a lot more than the Air.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER14> Given that 15 minutes later, in the iPad part of the event, they claimed the new iPad is faster than 92% of all notebooks sold in the last year, the writing is on the wall. For me, the next Macbook to be excited about, would be one with an ARM processor.

Still, really disappointing that for the new Air they do not allow you to go to 1TB SSD, but they won't allow you upgrade from a dual-core i5. Feels like a political decision more than a technical one.

<comment><USER15> >Given that 15 minutes later, in the iPad part of the event, they claimed the new iPad is faster than 92% of all notebooks sold in the last year, the writing is on the wall. For me, the next Macbook to be excited about, would be one with an ARM processor.

hey not a huge technocrat when it comes to pc parts, but could u explain that part to me?

what is the writing on the wall?

what is arm exactly?

and what makes u think its better than whats being offered currently and that it will be in a macbook soon?

<comment><USER16> ARM based processors which are used in most mobile devices and use a different instruction set, as opposed to x86 based processors, such as those available from Intel and AMD. Apple licensed the ARM technology and builds their own chips using it, and really good chips at that. So good, that some people are now calling for Apple to release an ARM based laptop (which has been done by others, but not to much popularity).

There would be advantages (power savings) and disadvantages (most existing MacOS software wouldn't work until recompiled at a minimum)

<comment><USER17> Odds are they already have ARM-based Macs in house, with all the cross- compilation stuff worked out. The reason they haven't made the switch yet isn't because of work they haven't done.

Back when they switched from the PowerPC chips to x86, it was revealed that they had been building experimental x86 Macs in-house for years. That's just good planning.

<comment><USER16> Oh, I'm fairly sure they've tested all their MacOS core software that comes with the OS (and the OS), but all the third party stuff and things in the MacOS app store likely need a lot more time. (at least for those that weren't already shipping iPhone/iPad versions).

<comment><USER18> My expectation is that any ARM laptop/desktop made by Apple would include some form of x86 emulation, just like they used during their PPC-x86 and 68k-PPC transitions.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER19> Summarizing a bit:

* Starting price of $1,199

* 13" display with trimmed bezels

* 2.75 lbs

* Higher resolution screen ("Over 4M pixels")

* HD front facing camera

* No Touch Bar (Yay!)

* No USB ports (Boo!)

Assuming it doesn't have any odd dust or logic board issues cropping up in the next couple months, I can see myself getting one of these.

<comment><USER20> And a Dual Core CPU for $1200, app compatibility aside the CPU in the new MBA might be arguably slower than the A12 bionic.

It's literally going to be the same CPU as in the current 12" Macbooks with a slightly relaxed power envelope which now begs the question why is the Macbook Air even a separate product? at this point it brings nothing to the table other than being slightly larger and slightly cheaper version of the Macbook.

<comment><USER21> > It's literally going to be the same CPU as in the current 12" Macbooks with > a slightly relaxed power envelope

Is it? I was under the impression that these were different chips.

<comment><USER22> They are different chips in the sense of being different generations. It's interesting that the Air is a "Y" part which is the same low-power/lower performance family as the Macbook. No updates for the Macbook yet otherwise they probably would be the same.

Macbook 12" 2017 = i7-7Y75 (top spec, cheaper ones are lower clocked i3/i5 Y)

Macbook Air 2018 = i7-8510Y (617 graphics supposedly faster)

<comment><USER23> I'm not sure it's an i7-8510Y - note that the MacBook Air specs [1] say it's an i5 chip. (And you can't upgrade it to an i7 either.) I'm not sure we know what chip it actually is yet.

[1] [https://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook- air/silver-1.6...](https://www.apple.com/au/shop/buy-mac/macbook- air/silver-1.6ghz-dual%E2%80%91core-processor-with-turbo-boost-up- to-3.6ghz-256gb)

<comment><USER22> The i7-8510Y is the only one with the specified 617 graphics, but thanks for pointing out that difference. Maybe they have a slightly lower-spec custom i5 SKU from Intel? I'd be surprised though if it wasn't a Y-device nevertheless.

<comment><USER23> Looks like it's landed in Intel ARK now - i5-8210Y:

[https://ark.intel.com/products/189912/Intel- Core-i5-8210Y-Pr...](https://ark.intel.com/products/189912/Intel- Core-i5-8210Y-Processor-4M-Cache-up- to-3-60-GHz-?q=Intel%c2%ae%20UHD%20Graphics%20617)

<comment><USER22> Thanks for posting - that's a pretty big yawn part. The Haswell in my current old Macbook Pro (a wonderful laptop) beats that easily enough.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER24> So they finally removed the last computer with mag safe and a good keyboard from their lineup. I am not at all happy about that. All this computer needed was a new cpu, memory and a type-c port.

<comment><USER25> Magsafe is done. The writing was on the wall when the rMBP switched to USBC. If you want a magnetic breakaway USBC cable, just buy one.

<comment><USER26> Are there any breakaway USB-C's that work with 45-65W? Serious question.

<comment><USER27> There are, but they aren't good. This [1] still seems to be the best offering by the most established brand. The reason people want Apple to make them isn't because they aren't available. It is because a version made by Apple would be expected to be far superior to anything else on the market. I assume Apple knows this and is not yet able to deliver on that quality so they simply aren't offering it.

[1] - [https://www.amazon.com/Griffin-BreakSafe-Magnetic- Breakaway-...](https://www.amazon.com/Griffin-BreakSafe-Magnetic-Breakaway- Chromebook/dp/B01CQTK6GU)

<comment><USER25> That does not square with my recollections of managing a fleet of Macbooks with Magsafe adapters.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> Never mind all that; it has an Escape key! (When they dropped it on the latest MacBook Pro, I feared that this portended its general demise on the whole laptop line...)

<comment><USER29> on their website / in their video, it has an escape key or am i mistaken? [https://www.apple.com/macbook-air/](https://www.apple.com/macbook-air/)

<comment><USER28> All recent 15 inch and higher-end 13 inch MacBook Pro models come with a "Touch Bar" where the Escape and Function key row ought to go. Sometimes a soft button will appear near the left edge of the Touch Bar that says "Escape", but there's no physical feedback when you touch it, and it doesn't protrude from the surface of the keyboard housing, nor have any key travel like the physical keys do, so all-in-all it's funky to touch-type. Not a happy thing for vim and emacs users, as well as for the korn shell, where it invokes command completion (as on the Tenex / Tops20 shell, for that matter).

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> I'm a bit confused as to where the base model MacBook Pro without the TouchBar fits into the lineup now.

It was always pretty clear to me that the 12 inch MacBook replaced the 11 inch air, and the 13 inch MacBook Pro without TouchBar replaced the 13 inch air.

There's barely any difference between the Pro without TouchBar and the new Air. The extra hundred dollars for the Pro gets you a slightly older but faster process at the expense of an additional quarter pound of weight.

<comment><USER31> They didn't update it with the 2018 Macbook Pro refresh, presumably because this new Air was coming. I'd expect it to quietly disappear.

<comment><USER30> That makes sense, although it's a little unfortunate. I would have preferred they update the Pro instead of releasing the new Air with a weaker processor and graphics.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> There's also, finally, a new Mac Mini!

"The most specced-out Mac mini can feature 64 GB RAM, 4.6GHz 6-core Core i7 CPUs, a 2 TB SDD and 10 Gigabit ethernet."

<comment><USER33> Whoa, the internals aren't just a MacBook Air now?

<comment><USER34> The price has skyrocketed though, entry model is $800 (used to be $500), the top end with all options is $4200.

<comment><USER35> It would be interesting to compare that to an equivalent Intel NUC, my guess is you are paying a lot for the ability to run macOS.

<comment><USER36> There aren't NUCs that compare. You can't buy a NUC with an i7 6 core, one with 64GB of memory, or one with 10GBit.

<comment><USER37> There aren't NUCs that compare _for all variants_.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER38> The current line is a bit weird. MacBook 12" vs MacBook Air 13" vs MacBook Pro 13" without Touch Bar.

I just wish they release a 14" MacBook. That would have made more sense.

<comment><USER39> Exactly. The Macbook feels out of place now. It has one less USB-C port, less battery power, and is $100 more expensive with lesser specs.

And it has a different name. Before this new Air came out, I figured they were just going to kill the Air line and release a 13" Macbook at a cheaper price. (Which is essentially what this is)

<comment><USER40> _The Macbook feels out of place now_

Think of it as an entry-level, but fully capable Mac. For people who use their phone almost exclusively, but need a computer once or twice a month for work.

That's exactly how my wife uses hers.

<comment><USER41> But now the entry level Macbook Air is better than the Macbook in every way except the base storage level.

<comment><USER42> The 12" MacBook is still better in terms of portability.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> I just got a surface book 2 after having trouble adjusting to the touch bar mbp. It is not perfect in any way but everything I care about (thermals, battery, performance, keyboard) got so much better. WSL is a good enough shell replacement and windows as a whole feels more productive. The touch and tablet mode is surprisingly handy. It is weird but after 10 years die-hard mac user I don't feel it no more. No matter how hard I try, iOS keeps being a toy (media consumption/browsing) and mac has the wrong priorities. Maybe that changes with next years Pro lineup. Right now I am a refugee in the Microsoft ecosystem. And I like it.

<comment><USER44> Funny, I just got a 2017 Macbook Air because Windows 10 was annoying me with news-in-my-start-menu and a change in how start-button-search worked from all the previous Windows OSes.

WSL got me used to using bash in my daily work flow, but having a Darwin system with unix in its bones is heaven to me.

Funny how tastes can change :)

</comment></comment><comment><USER45> > 1.6GHz dual-core Intel Core i5, Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz, with 4MB L3 > cache... Intel UHD Graphics 617

[https://twitter.com/tum_apisak/status/1034639298174148608](https://twitter.com/tum_apisak/status/1034639298174148608) it's a custom chip made for Apple. Look at the other Amber Lake Y chips: [https://ark.intel.com/products/codename/186968/Amber- Lake-Y](https://ark.intel.com/products/codename/186968/Amber-Lake-Y) they have lower base but higher Turbo and UHD 615 not UHD 617.

<comment><USER46> Any idea how these compare to the 2.9Ghz dual core i7 in the 2015 MacBook Pro 13"?

I'm expecting these to be slower, but have no concept of what an apples to apples comparison looks like there since clock speed can be so misleading between generations. Ditto the UHD 617 vs. Iris 6100, for that matter.

<comment><USER45> > since clock speed can be so misleading between generations

I am sorry but no. They haven't been misleading for a long, long time. IPC grew from Sandy Bridge to Kaby Lake only by 20% [https://www.hardocp.com/article/2017/01/13/kaby_lake_7700k_v...](https://www.hardocp.com/article/2017/01/13/kaby_lake_7700k_vs_sandy_bridge_2600k_ipc_review/4) and since then nothing because Intel is barely doing more than tweaking the Turbo profiles because 10nm is not happening. All these years the progress was more in power consumption than anything else. Note how ThinkPads (and the world) moved from 35W dual core to 15W dual core chips. So if you compare them clock to clock you won't be far. But you don't know what clock of the chip actually will be because the problem with Y CPUs the problem always was: how good is the cooling, how long are they are able to maintain their top Turbo before throttling. Noone can say as there are no Amber Lake laptops yet and much less an Apple. What we can say with surety is even if it has exceptional great cooling it can only keep up with the 5557U in single core, in multi core performance it'll be half at best.

The UHD 617 is not officially launched but [https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-HD-615-Mobile- Ka...](https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-HD-615-Mobile-Kaby-Lake-vs- Intel-Iris-Pro-HD-6100-Mobile/m193629vsm25925) the Iris Pro is a different class to the HD 615. I do not expect anything groundbreaking between the HD 615 and the 617. Check the difference between 610 and 615: [https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-- HD-610-Desktop-...](https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-- HD-610-Desktop-Kaby-Lake-vs-Intel-HD-615-Mobile-Kaby-Lake/m225196vsm193629)

<comment><USER46> Awesome, thanks for this and the context around clock speed not being quite as misleading anymore modulo thermal throttling.

My takeaway here is that my 2015 MBP13 will still blow away a new MBA then, so no reason to upgrade.

Edit: the GPU comparison may be off, though. MBP13 used an Iris 6100, not an Iris Pro. Problem is I can't find official reference anywhere to an Iris Pro 6100, so have no idea what's reporting for this benchmark. What I do know is the Iris 6100 benched worse than the Iris Pro 5200, whereas this IP6100 in the link benches better.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER47> We're inching ever so gradually toward idlewords's 2016 piece "Benjamin Button Reviews The New MacBook Pro".[1]

[1] [https://blog.pinboard.in/2016/10/benjamin_button_reviews_the...](https://blog.pinboard.in/2016/10/benjamin_button_reviews_the_new_macbook_pro/)

<comment><USER48> Reminds me of the "Upgrade to Windows 7" article that was doing the rounds when Windows 8 was big.

<comment><USER49> I feel that both were appropriate. I think that Windows 7 was in many ways, better than Windows 8; the MacBook Pros before the 2016 redesign were in many ways, better than the ones after that.

I'm sure there will be a design that will be better than the 2015 model (Which I recently bought, second hand, after using the 2016 one for a bit over a year.) But we haven't seen it yet. Similarily, I'd rather use the modern Windows 10 rather than Windows 7. But Windows 8 or Windows 10 at its inception? Heck no.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER50> Pros: Thinner, lighter, better display, thunderbolt, 8th-generation chip, headphone jack(!)

Cons: Still dual core, no USB-A, no magsafe.

Would buy, and I'm a Lenovo fanboy. I just love the Airs.

Does anyone know if you can install Linux onto the newer Macs with the T2 chip? Or is it locked to osX^H^H^HmacOS?

<comment><USER51> _Cons: Still dual core, no USB-A, no magsafe._

And still the butterfly mechanism. And apparently, specks of dust also affect the latest iteration:

[https://theoutline.com/post/6409/the-new-and-improved- macboo...](https://theoutline.com/post/6409/the-new-and-improved-macbook- keyboards-have-the-same-old-problems?zd=1&zi=uxnezkmg)

I have been waiting for a good replacement for my MacBook Pro 2016. But this is not it. Still too few ports, still the risk of sticky keys. And given that the base model with 128GB is $1199, after the upgrade to 256GB and adding the Europe tax, it's not going to be that much more affordable than the MacBook Pro (assuming that they update the MBP Escape as well).

It's great that they have finally updated the Mac Mini though! The pricing is a bit steeper than previous models, but they stuck with the nice old unassuming design, no wild experiments. Just the same old box with updated innards. Well done.

<comment><USER52> Everything is OK except keyboard...

<comment><USER53> The Carbon X1 6G is 120 grams lighter and has much more ports. Gonna leave Apple for good. The MacBook Air was an amazing machine for the past 8 years, but Apple lost its way. Too many cargo cults (slimness, few ports, radical changes, secretiveness, to name a few) and too little closeness to their customers (poor repairability, high prices, unwanted features).

<comment><USER54> I just priced out the Carbon X1 with similar CPU/RAM/SSD and it costs $1331 (vs $1399) -- plus the Lenovo has a slightly larger screen with lower weight and normal USB ports. I don't think it moves the needle for Mac fans, but it definitely moves the needle for people who are ambivalent between the two.

<comment><USER3> Not sure the specs you're looking at, but Costco had a deal on the X1 with 16 GB RAM + 512 GB SSD for $1399 earlier in the month, and I think it's $1499 now

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER55> > the new model comes with the latest-generation edition of Apple's > "butterfly" keyboard

Maybe it was naive of me but I had high hopes Apple would use the Air refresh as an upgrade path for those of us who have decided they need a keyboard with more travel and reliability beyond a few months.

(I use a 2017 butterfly keyboard today, never again)

<comment><USER56> Any info on whether the 2018 keyboard update fares much better [1]? I'm seriously considering buying this MBA, but I'm happy with the travel and durability on my 2011 MBA keyboard and primarily spooked by the butterfly keyboard complaints.

[1] [https://www.macrumors.com/roundup/macbook- pro/#keyboard](https://www.macrumors.com/roundup/macbook-pro/#keyboard)

<comment><USER57> I had a lot of problems with my 2016 keyboard (repaired four times and getting ready for a fifth when it took an unplanned drink of water).

I now have a 2018 MBP and the keyboard is really reliable and actually pretty great.

<comment><USER58> I recently got a 2018 for work and I'm enjoying the keyboard. I like clicky keyboards with low travel, I think it makes touch typing easier and I have to move my fingers up and down less. After going back to my 2015, the keys on the older one feel mushy and not as clicky, and I tend to drag my fingertips across the tops of the keys because they have more travel.

I never used a 2016/2017 keyboard though so I can only compare 2018 to 2015, and I like the 2018.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER59> | It will start at $1,199, which is a slight jump from the $999 starting price of the older MacBook Air.

apparently, a 20% increase is a 'slight jump'

<comment><USER60> I'm so bummed out by this. Rumours had me hyped for a cheaper package, but seeing as it's 1599 USD in my country, I will not be looking into buying one now.

</comment></comment><comment><USER61> If only Apple could make their Pro line without Touch Bar but with Pro specs, that'd be nice

<comment><USER62> I was kinda disappointed they didn't touch the MBP lineup this time around but hey we might get something come WWDC.

<comment><USER63> It did get updated not 3 months ago.

<comment><USER51> Except for the MacBook Pro Escape, which didn't get a refresh, nor the butterfly mechanism update.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER64> Been a long time since I bought a new computer. How should I think about / compare the processor options of the new MBA[1] and the non-touchbar MBP[2]? I've seen the passmark results, but have no idea how to interpret.

[1]: 8th Gen 1.6-GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 [2]: 7th Gen 2.3GHz dual-core Intel Core i5

<comment><USER65> I've been scratching my head on that point too. Apple's spec page list the MBA processor to have "4MB L3 cache", while the MBP non-touch bar processor is listed as having "64MB of eDRAM".

I mean, 64 sounds better than 4, but are these things even comparable? is eDram something you have next to L3 cache or instead?

<comment><USER42> The eDRAM is mainly for the integrated GPU and an addition to the L3 cache. It's also only available for a few selected Intel CPUs, which usually have higher graphics performance. As Wikipedia puts it [1]:

> The 128 MB of eDRAM in the Iris Pro GT3e is on the same package as the CPU, > but in a separate die manufactured in a different process. Intel refers to > this as a Level 4 cache, available to both CPU and GPU, naming it > Crystalwell.

[1]: [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#IRIS...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Graphics_Technology#IRIS- PRO)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER66> Why is the 12 inch MacBook still in the line-up? The only benefit is that it offers an i7 processor at the top-end - beyond that, I can't see any benefit. Why not just unify the two lines?

<comment><USER34> > The only benefit is that it offers an i7 processor at the top-end

That's not _really_ a benefit since it uses a 5W i7 (formerly m7) versus — I assume — a 15W i5 on the Air, it's just Intel's shitty branding confusion.

The 12" is quite a bit lighter (2.03 lbs to 2.75), is fanless, and has a smaller footprint (width of 11.04" to 11.97" and depth of 7.74" to 8.36").

That's pretty much it.

The Air has touchid, likely better performances, seemingly a better display, higher storage options, more ports, _better_ ports (12" only has USB-C, MBA has TB3), more battery life.

</comment></comment><comment><USER67> Aside from losing magsafe this is my perfect Mac.

<comment><USER68> The other day two MBPs were running out of battery during a meeting. We plugged one into the room charger and plugged the second one out of another USB-C port on the first one.

I miss MagSafe, but USB-C is seriously cool.

<comment><USER69> Wait... you can charge a MBP with another MBP?

<comment><USER70> Absolutely. I still lament the retirement of magsafe, but USB-C is a considerably better standard than USB-A.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER71> Sure, but it has the horrible butterfly keyboard--with those crammed up arrows I hate so much--and all ports are gone.

Also, how do we kniw they'll stay without releasing another one for another 5 years?

As a MacBook Air user for years, I'm glad I jumped ship a year ago.

<comment><USER72> What did you replace it with?

Would love to upgrade with something as reliable as this 2013 Air I've been abusing everyday for years.

I'd give anything for a windows laptop with the trackpad and reliable sleep/hibernate you get from osx/apple laptops.

<comment><USER73> Not the person you replied to, but look at a Dell XPS 13 or a Lenovo X1 Carbon. I have been recommending the XPS 13 to our customers and they love it.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER74> Genuine question:

Why would someone choose the new MacBook Air over the 12" Macbook? I have the 12" (it's my everyday computer and I love it, not looking to switch) but wondering why choose one over the other, size of screen? Thanks.

<comment><USER75> A second port and it should be noticeably faster.

<comment><USER76> one usb-c port on the smaller macbook was of course just a silly stupid idea. But I think 2 is less good than 3 or 4. I'd rather have multiple. next apple needs to convert the phone to use usb-c so we can all move over to one port type.

<comment><USER77> With the iPad Pro now using USB-C, I think it's a given that the next iPhone will do the same. If only my next Kindle would do the same.

<comment><USER78> another possibility is that it will not have any ports at all. BT, WiFI and Qi for wireless charging.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER79> Nice option for people who love the form factor, if somewhat expensive. I was surprised that it weighs about 3/4 of a pound more than a MacBook, but then it is a 13" screen rather than a 12" screen.

I have had computers since before I bought an early Apple II (I had a single board Intersil PDP-8 emulator board) and I must say that my MacBook is my favorite computer ever. I am not sure why someone would buy the new MacBook Air over a MacBook.

</comment><comment><USER80> I'm a little upset we are now without a $1000 ($999) introductory-level Apple notebook.

Even though it was gloriously underpowered, it still presented an entry-level device for students and those generally with less cash.

The extra $200 also makes the differential between the 'Air' and the standard 'MacBook'...well, um...can anyone specifically tell me the differences, even?

<comment><USER2> I mean, it's still for sale, the original Macbook Air, it's just a horribly outdated machine now. It's got a 5th generation (2015) CPU, 128 PPI (what), and bezels as thick as your thumb.

It's still a great little thing, the battery life is just great for ordinary casual use. It's thin... but I feel it belongs in 2013, was still nice for a few years after, but approaching 2019 this thing should have gotten a real replacement.

And replacing it with something $200 more expensive (that itself is quite similar to the 12 inch Macbook anyway, which caters to a higher-end casual- user segment), when the air is supposed to be a cheap entry-level product for the lower-end casual-user segment like students... Can't say I like it.

It feels we didn't get a replacement for relatively cheap entry level Macbook Air, but rather got a new expensive alternative to the expensive Macbook.

If they dropped the original Air and dropped this price down to $1100 next year, I think that'd be okay. But really I was hoping for another $1000 Air. And I don't see it happening. $1200 will be the new normal for a modern entry level Apple machine.

</comment></comment><comment><USER81> > Apple says the new Air takes up 17-percent less volume than the past model.

Do anyone really care at this point ? I'd rather have those 17% filled with batteries or storage.

Do people really choose a laptop based on its dimensions ? (I don't mean the transportable laptop vs ultrabook).

> Apple says the display now has a 2560×1600 resolution and 48-percent more > color than the prior model.

Just goes to show how terrible the previous screen was I suppose. /s

> It will start at $1,199, which is a jump from the $999 starting price of the > older MacBook Air.

So, no more $1000 usable laptop in the apple ecosystem ? That kinda sucks. I though the brand was declining and that would open up Apple to lower its prices.

If technology is going forward then why does it get more expensive ?

</comment><comment><USER82> Looks like the same shitty keyboard as the MacBook Pro. At least there's an escape key...

</comment><comment><USER83> Too late.

I was an Apple user for years but I recently purchased an AMD Ryzen based development box which I am extremely happy with.

My iPhone SE will be my last iPhone as well - I won't purchase an expensive mobile 'phone that lacks something as basic as a headphone jack.

<comment> ratfaced-guy Nobody cares about headphone jacks.

<comment><USER84> I do.

<comment><USER85> I recently bought wireless headphones. I have a small collection is wired headphones.

Given that Apple, Google and reportedly Samsung have done away with it, and everyone still buys their phones, you have to ask yourself, how long will you hold out?

<comment><USER84> Forever. I prefer lossless music.

Not that I won't buy an iPhone without one, as long as there's lightning-to- jack, but I do find its removal misguided.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER86> Nice... but still the same dual core? Shame!

<comment><USER33> They're constrained by TDP. The MacBook Air draws too little power (thus having good battery life!) for a quad-core CPU to make sense.

<comment><USER87> They also probably dont want to cannibalize the MBP which is like the same computer but quad core

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER88> It's pretty much the 2017 nTB MBP in a slightly changed chassis with touchID and 8th generation chips added. Now we know why they didn't refresh the nTB this year. Eventually, the price is the same.

</comment><comment><USER89> "Finally"? I don't think anyone is clamoring for the touch bar. The TouchID is fairly useful, but the only time I ever use the Touchbar is accidental.

<comment><USER90> It doesn't come with the Touch Bar, just Touch ID as an independent key

<comment><USER89> OH, nice! I guess I didn't pay good enough attention to the pics! This is actually pretty close to what I want!

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER91> The difference to the entry level MacBook Pro seems very minimal. The form factor is pretty much 100% identical - the Pro even is listed to be thinner overall on the tech specs (0.59" vs 0.61), even though the Air is slightly thinner at the front. So it seems like the difference is 100$ price, 100g weight, and a slightly slower CPU.

</comment><comment><USER92> I don't love it, but between this and the mac mini update, I think Apple is back on a more reasonable path.

The overall laptop lineup makes actual sense now if you pretend that the macbook and macbook pro without touchbar models don't exist. And I suspect that they won't exist much longer.

The only thing you get for an extra hundred dollars for the macbook Pro escape is a higher base speed processor with the same turbo boost on an older generation chip and Iris Graphics vs UHD. Worse battery life. Heavier. No touchID. Same thunderbolt 3 ports.

The macbook is even more of an anemic joke now. I guess if you really have to have the thinnest and lightest mac laptop possible, this one's for you.

But pretend for a moment that those confusing models aren't in the lineup, and the whole thing starts to make sense after they get EOL'd. The new MBA handles the low end competently. There's some gray area when you upgrade it to 16GB rams and 512GB SSD. That's the same price as the entry level 13" macbook pro with touchbar. But now you get real differentiation between the Air and Pro line. 4 thunderbolt 3 ports, 2 core vs 4 core. Higher base and boost clock speed; same generation chip. True-tone display. Option to upgrade the processor.

What sticks out to me the most here is how completely hamstrung Apple is by Intel right now. There should be a 32gig RAM option for the 13". But it's a different architecture than what they have on the 15" models that do support it, and they couldn't cram into the 13" form factor.

It's not ideal. USB-C is still a shitshow, and I wish you could opt for at least one step up in processor. But it's actually better than I expected. They also didn't completely ruin the mac mini. They gave us pretty much what we wanted out of that. So overall, I'm pretty pleased with the direction. I just can't decide if I should wait another couple years to see more of that direction until the macbook pros get a redesign with these ideas or if I can live with this MBA as an upgrade from my older stuff for now.

My biggest concern was that every new design and product matrix since the trashcan mac pro has been a massive, "WTF are you thinking, Apple?" This makes me feel like they've figured some things out about what people want out of their Macs. Or made the leadership decision to listen to what they already knew people wanted. The next gen pro should be very exciting.

</comment><comment><USER93> I think the entry level macbook pro is better buy than this. For $100, the CPU is much better, and very likely the build quality too. And everything else including weight, keyboard, ports, battery life etc. mostly the same.

<comment><USER94> The Air has the 8th generation i5 which seems to be a solid upgrade in benchmarks [https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-i5-8250U-vs- Intel...](https://www.cpubenchmark.net/compare/Intel-i5-8250U-vs- Intel-i5-7200U/3042vs2865)

</comment></comment><comment><USER3> In 2014 I bought a Macbook Pro with retina display, 2.6 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 128 GB SSD for $1300.

In 2018 I can buy a Macbook Pro with retina display, 2.3 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 128 GB SSD for $1300 (and now you have to buy dongles).

In 2018 I can also now buy a Macbook Air with retina display, 1.6 GHz i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM, and 128 GB SSD for $1200.

I don't really understand what market this Air is hoping to target. The Macbook Pros are already winning the ultraportable category, and the Air doesn't offer any significant price differentiation.

I thought in 2014-2015 the "Apple premium" wasn't actually too bad for the specs compared to equivalent laptops from the competition. Unfortunately their hardware offerings have stagnated over the past four years and they are again overpriced for what you're buying.

<comment><USER95> >I don't really understand what market this Air is hoping to target.

i'm assuming it's meant to target the people buying the $1300 macbook pro, so they can get rid of that model and ratchet up the prices of the pro models while still having a 13" laptop that works for most poeple.

</comment></comment><comment><USER96> Do people actually like the butterfly keys on the keyboard? They may have fixed the issues, but it still feels like crap every time I try it.

</comment><comment><USER97> How does the CPU compare to the 7gen i5 of the 2017 non-TB MBP?

Otherwise they have basically the same specs - with the MBP being a bit more expensive.

</comment><comment><USER98> So is the Macbook 12 dead now?

<comment><USER21> No, it's still sold.

<comment><USER98> Dead as in, has no future.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER99> A lot of people seem to forget that Apple is a luxury brand. Their tech is not going to be the latest. Does Louis Vuitton care about the latest fabric ? No, cuz you're gonna pay a lot for it anyways!

</comment><comment><USER100> Does anyone know if this will support egpu?

<comment> rsln-s It does

</comment></comment><comment><USER101> So TouchID is good enough for laptop but they "just can't" make a phone with it anymore huh? Rabble.

<comment><USER102> I never really understood fingerprint scanners on phones. Is it really more useful to you than e.g. a headphone jack?

<comment><USER103> I mean, I have a 6s which has a headphone jack and a fingerprint scanner. Happy as a clam. I have "wake on lift" on and I grab it by the bottom quadrant and touch id works 90% of the time.

I really want the better camera of the newest iphone, but I am weary of face ID and I really don't want bluetooth headphones. I already lose headphones a ton as it is.

<comment><USER104> FaceID is rock solid...Both it and TouchID have there ups and downs but FaceID has been great since day 1 with the X.

100% agree with the bluetooth headphones. I have lost multiple pairs. AirPods are now something I have to track in my day to day carry... Phone / keys / wallet / AirPods... which is a little annoying.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER105> The Air of my wife was the worst computer we've owned, yellow display with dark areas, Wifi basically doesn't work anywhere and trackpad broken in a short amount of time.

<comment><USER106> Do you and your wife live underground, in an active coal mine? If not you must admit that your experience is atypical for that computer.

<comment><USER105> I've owned several dozen Apple products, iPods, iPhones, iPads, from XSans/XServers, Cubes, Minis, maxed out Macbook Pros and a dozen iMacs, and no the experience is not atypical for Apple. Many people I know have problems with bad iPhone and MacBookPro Wifi reception. This development iMac Pro I'm writing this on feels slow, often has a beach ball and crashes randomly. The 27 iMac before this had fan problems from the start.

Also see [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUaJ8pDlxi8&t=526s](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUaJ8pDlxi8&t=526s)

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER107> The old 13 Inch Macbook Air had a resolution of 1440 x 900.

The new Macbook Air has a resolution of 2560 x 1600, but at 200% dpi scaling, so the usable resolution is only 1280 x 800. It'll be prettier for sure, but you're getting less screen real-estate than on the old models!

You can adjust the dpi scaling, but then the scaling won't be even and everything will look a bit blurry. I honestly would have much preferred a straight 1080p screen.

<comment><USER108> With the Display Menu app you choose from lots of resolutions. They are not blurry whatsoever. I use 4096x2304 on 27" retina imac, 2880x1800 on 15" retina mbp, and 2304x1440 on 12" retina mb. Plenty of real estate.

<comment><USER107> It's a subtle difference that not everyone will notice, but the icons will not be quite as sharp at these alternate resolutions due to uneven pixel scaling. The icons were drawn for a specific resolution, not the in between ones. This is also why System Preferences marks one resolution as best for the display.

I can absolutely see the difference on the iMac I use at work, unfortunately.</comment></comment></comment>