This resonates a lot, especially the “death by a thousand papercuts” feeling.
None of these are deal-breakers alone, but together they make iPadOS feel hostile to repetitive, text-heavy, or workflow-driven tasks. The image URL point is a perfect example — something trivial on desktop becomes a ritual on iPad.
The WebP handing is particularly telling. On macOS it’s invisible friction; on iOS it’s a multi-step ceremony that feels like the system actively resists you. “There’s an app for that” isn’t really an answer when the OS already knows what the file is.
Safari losing long text areas is another one that quietly kills trust. Once you’ve lost a few drafts, you start working around the device instead of with it — Notes buffers, manual copy cycles, etc. That’s usually the moment a device stops being a primary machine.
Curious: do you feel this is something Apple could realistically fix with iPadOS changes, or is it more fundamental to iOS’s design assumptions?
This exactly. I bought an iPad in 2020, thinking it would be a second laptop to port around while my primary laptop stayed at home. Turns out that while the iPad can in theory do everything my laptop does, in practice certain tasks can be cumbersome. Now I just divide tasks between different devices and accept that certain things (like any image manipulation or editing) can only be done on my laptop or desktop. Then there’s the tasks that the iPad does perfectly fine (like writing) but the thin keyboard hurts my fingers if I’m at it for more than 30 minutes or so; I need a regular springy keyboard for a proper writing session. Apparently I type hard.
In all, I thought the iPad would be like a slightly smaller laptop, but instead it’s just an oversized phone.
They could have made little things LIKE A DAMN FILE SYSTEM and all the items above symmetrical with MacOS ages ago. It had to be choice. Cannibalizing low end macbook sales? Who knows?
Really, it's not just tiktok viewers who use these.
How long did a file system take? Was Apple so certain of buying Dropbox that this was left undone?
But the point you make is a lock. These were (IMO) easy to implement long ago, easier than a lot of things we never asked for and never use.
And the only tone control I've ever seen is the equalizer hidden in Apple Music (nee iTunes) Why not a system control? How damn hard is that, given that the code is already written? I get equalizer boxes at the thrift store. Now, REALLY?
I personally feel that a great deal of value in life is creating things, rather than just consuming. So, you can say to me "Well, not everyone is talented in this area or that" and I say: "Who knows what they are capable of doing if they don't have the instruments or tools available? Or if things are so dumbed-down as to make a moat? Hypercard was genius, but without it, people had to cross that programming moat to use programming languages.
And kids? They love to create, or used to, until fed nothing but computer junk food. Even the dumbest Linux distro has plenty of learning tools (besides GCompris). All other concerns aside, the tools were free, and it was/is a sign of respect for the users to include them.
Assuming your users are dumb-asses is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Bicycles for the mind became DIY Formula 1 cars for the mind, and on the low end, we don't even have to think any more. Someone took the web design book "Don't make me think" and made it a way of life.
Secret AI man.
You're a man who leads a life of brain rot.
Everyone you meet is now a chatbot.
With every word you type, you get 10 megs of hype.
You will never have a thought, just borrow.
Secret AI man. Secret AI man.
They've given you a chatbot and taken 'way your soul. (CC, please steal)
"But lo! men have become the tools of their tools." Thoreau
I built my own S-100 computers when there were none. My point isn't that everyone needs to do that, but was excited to "do something" as in "Computer Lib; Dream Machines" I wanted to solve interesting, even bespoke problems and had to build stuff to do it (outside the IBM machine room). And at the time, one could "consume" content on radio and TV, the point being that you could get good stuff as well as junk, and I watched concerts, Bernstein lectures, and outrageously creative stuff like Ernie Kovacs and Twilight Zone. "Content" was always there, but the creative tools weren't --- until they were.
Assuming your users are dumb-asses is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
None of these are deal-breakers alone, but together they make iPadOS feel hostile to repetitive, text-heavy, or workflow-driven tasks. The image URL point is a perfect example — something trivial on desktop becomes a ritual on iPad. The WebP handing is particularly telling. On macOS it’s invisible friction; on iOS it’s a multi-step ceremony that feels like the system actively resists you. “There’s an app for that” isn’t really an answer when the OS already knows what the file is.
Safari losing long text areas is another one that quietly kills trust. Once you’ve lost a few drafts, you start working around the device instead of with it — Notes buffers, manual copy cycles, etc. That’s usually the moment a device stops being a primary machine.
Curious: do you feel this is something Apple could realistically fix with iPadOS changes, or is it more fundamental to iOS’s design assumptions?