eXtensions - Friday 27 December 2024
By Graham K. Rogers
As well as concerns about the beta AI writing tools, I look at minor changes made to Photos and Mail. It is the micro-details that make an application and tinkering with displays while ignoring missing features won't always cut it. With the new Proxima chip in development, several commentators (and me) want Apple to produce a replacement for the much-missed Airport WiFi router.
A happy new year to all. Despite the current world situation (conflicts, climate, et al) we all need to hope for a better future and extend compassion to those less fortunate. Apple stock price approached $4 trillion this week so in the new year we can expect that many of the chickens in the Wall Street barrel will be trying to drag Apple down. Look out for some negative reporting and pronouncements of doom.
I had a message from a reader who had just accessed AI on the iPhone after the recent update, but who was a little wary of the tools after my comments last time. Well, good . . . sort of. The current state of Apple Intelligence is beta - unfinished - being improved (hopefully), and Apple is using input from users as part of its road to improvement. I think that all AI is beta anyway and in the process of constant improvement: that is why developers train their AI engines on documents (or images) they steal from the web mainly. Some of the more reputable (like Apple) do license the input they use. Apple also has thousands of its own papers that it does not need to license.
My correspondent was less willing to engage with the AI features, but I feel that, although my experiences have not been perfect, I am looking at the AI tools in a somewhat skewed way. I am concerned with the ethics of academic output and worry that some students and/or academics will not check. That was why I included the anecdote about my nephew who, as my sister relates, uses AI for lists and other business-linked purposes, but checks before the information is sent to customers.
I also mentioned that the proofreading tool appeared to have improved from my first look when iOS 18.1 came out. With iOS 18.2 the results appeared much better. That is as it should be as the Apple team use input from users to improve the tools.
I made comments too on the rewrite tools, which I have steered clear of since my first look when a paper I had edited was rewritten using the formal style and in my opinion made some unacceptable changes to words, for no other reason than they could be changed: reducing the readability of the paper with a word salad of multi-syllabic words. I am staying away from Compose for now.
There are other ways that AI is used on my devices that I am not entirely happy about. The Repair tool in Photos on the Mac was fairly good, but before iOS 18.1 there was nothing like this available on iPad or iPhone versions. An unacceptable omission. I had to use 3rd party applications for something that should have been available to users years ago. I am not over happy about ClearUp. When activated (that takes a second or two) some areas of an image, particularly people, may be highlighted in white. This makes it easy - too easy - to remove a figure or object from a photograph. It is the little bits of dust I am after and just touching with the pencil on the iPad does nothing: the tip has to be moved to include a little of the area outside the blemish.
In the main, the result is quite acceptable, although sometimes, as with all such tools, there may be some bleed into a nearby object. It is best to try again, preferably with the tool radius reduced. In most cases I find that the Repair tool that is available in Photomator is better; easier to apply and with good results. As Apple now owns this, maybe we can look forward to this being incorporated into Photos.
The Library view of mini-thumbnails has been improved. I had found that when the display was zoomed in for a larger thumbnail view, the next time it was accessed, it had reverted to the mini size. It was frustrating doing this each time. Now, however, once I had adjusted the size, it remained at the new size for a few hours, extending into the next day (more testing to be done here). Andrew O'Hara (AppleInsider) has some thoughts on the recent updates to Photos on the iPhone. He is generally on the right track, although I disagree with his comment, "While the app was loved by many, it hadn't changed in a while. . . ." I have always detested the interface, even with the late addition of Straighten, Perspective and Keystone and their tiny sliders (Photomator does this much better).
The iPad uses the same interface so Photos is even less suitable for the device; and neither match Photos on the Mac which, with its limited set of tools, is still better than the interface on the handheld devices.
With the Nikon DSLR cameras, one of the settings is for copyright. I always set this up when I buy a new camera, although sometimes forget to update the metadata setting when the year changes. Despite the sometimes-professional use of the iPhone and the way Apple pushes its capabilities (for example in competitions), there is no way to add copyright information to the limited metadata the user can access.
In those applications that can display this, the metadata runs to several pages; and with the Finder on a Mac it is possible to search for specific attributes (such as if the flash was used or not). Copyright? No. Nor is it possible to add this to the mini-metadata sheet that is shown in Photos (Mac, iPad or iPhone). Aperture had this, of course; while some apps can also be used to add such information; but instead of messing about with displays and album organization, there are other missing features which would be useful.
The update to Mail on the iPhone was not generally well-received. Even though I have turned off the 4 mailboxes on the iPhone it is clearly not behaving as I want although (as with many updates) I am beginning to deal with what Apple giveth. My correspondent (above) also queried the choice of icons for some mail senders. I has to admit I just did not know why these choices were made, or by whom. Despite turning off the separate mail boxes, the email counter on the iPhone reported 8 unread messages, although there were more. The counter on the iPad was reporting 29. To the rescue comes Ryan Christoffel (9to5Mac) with a good overview of the updates to Mail that (almost in passing) mentioned the badge count could be changed to reflect reality, but did not explain how.
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I went looking. This was not in the app, where the mail-sorting can be turned on or off; not in the Apps list of Settings; but I finally found it in Notifications. I had to go down 2 panels to reset this from Primary to All Unread Messages. That should have been much easier. Once again, Apple has made arbitrary changes to apps on the iPhone (and only with Mail on the iPhone) that interrupt the way the application is used. Mail could work in 3 different ways on the Mac, iPad and iPhone. The Apple knows best approach is wearing a bit thin as this and other approaches often ignore the user.
An example of this apparent disregard for the user is the excellent WiFi router that Apple made for several years: Airport. Note here that I am extremely biased and still use mine, although I did try a Netgear wifi 6 router with less than satisfactory results. I went back to the Airport after a couple of weeks and am still running with that. Following a report from Mark Gurman regarding the modem chips Apple is working on, sources have looked at the potential for a new Airport router. Joe Rossignol (MacRumors) suggested that any hopes users might have had for this are unlikely to be satisfied.
That is no reason not to keep pressuring Apple. Charles Martin (AppleInsider) also picks up on this, noting that "fans have called for the company to revive the product, celebrated for its ease of setup and management." Martin suggests that with the way the Proxima chip could be incorporated into Apple products, this in itself could create a home network. Of course the disadvantage for me is that it might take a couple of years to arrive in some markets: Home Pod only went on sale here officially in the last year or so.
Also cheering this possibility, Dennis Sellers (AppleWorld Today) thinks that Apple should definitely revisit plans to revive Airport. Count me in too. I also remembered that Jason Snell wrote something similar earlier in the year, long before details of the Proxima ship were known, so this is not some recent fad. Closing down the development and manufacture of the Airport was a mistake. It was not well-received at the time. Airport was so easy to set up when using Apple devices (and the Airport apps). It is about time Apple rectified this.
When I was almost at the end of One Hundred Years of Solitude on Netflix, they threw me a curveball with another Spanish language series, La Palma. This is a volcanic island and there have been tremors in the past, but the premise is of the big one about to come, with the threat of an eruption of the Cumbre Vieja volcano and half the island about to slip into the North Atlantic. There is a clear tsunami threat, this week being the 20th anniversary of the tsunami here and other parts of SE and South Asia. There is also a personal link in the series as 2 characters are a graduate student and her still-affected brother from Norway who were in Thailand in 2004 and lost their parents. Remembrance events are taking place this week for that tragic event.
The central characters are from Norway, with much dialogue also being in Spanish (both helped along by clear subtitles), plus some English when different nationalities communicate. No planes can leave because of ash, and one that is unable to abort takeoff crashes adding another plot ripple. There were mixed reviews on Hot Tomatoes, but the threat and the buildup, with other tensions thrown in kept me watching this mini-series. How one family can be so contrary and lucky at the same time, ignoring much advice and surviving when others are less lucky, does stretch things a bit: good in parts.
I also managed to watch the Netflix movie, Carry-On, which was a bit long-winded and drawn out, although the action was exciting enough, despite a few plot-stretches. On AppleTV I also downloaded the movie, Mona Lisa Smile which was enjoyable enough, although someone had it in for Wellesley College and upper class snobbishness of the 1950s when a woman was expected to be married and tethered to the kitchen sink. The advertising shots included with the film made it clear how far we have come. I also finally watched Fly me to the Moon, based in part on the conspiracy tale that the first moon landing was a hoax filmed in a TV studio. I stayed up all night to watch that on my 19th birthday and was in awe when the Eagle landed and the first shots when the camera was turned round to show the Lunar Excursion Module (LEM). A message on the Watch this morning tells me that the next episode of Silo has arrived.
Graham K. Rogers teaches at the Faculty of Engineering, Mahidol University in Thailand. He wrote in the Bangkok Post, Database supplement on IT subjects. For the last seven years of Database he wrote a column on Apple and Macs. After 3 years writing a column in the Life supplement, he is now no longer associated with the Bangkok Post. He can be followed on X (@extensions_th). The RSS feed for the articles is http://www.extensions.in.th/ext_link.xml - copy and paste into your feed reader.
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