spitfire

Recently, i was looking for some kind of iPad stylus with 2 requirements in mind:

• less expensive than the insane €150 price tag of the official Pencil 2, and hopefully even the €90 or whatever the USB-C Pencil costs
• can be actually turned off and won't just die if i keep it detached from the iPad for a prolonged period of time

and so, i ended up buying the very oddly named and advertised (more on that later) Hama Scribble Stylus - which turns out to be a pretty good Pencil alternative.

ever since i got an ipad (the small one), it constantly blows my mind that iOS lets you edit PDFs. and i don't just mean the usual freehand scribble, but actually editing a PDF:

• splitting and merging
• extracting any number of pages to a separate PDF
• inserting new pages anywhere in an existing document
• converting anything else to PDF without having to go through some virtual printer bullshit

(and obviously there's also the typical stuff like form/text insertion, rotating pages, and OCR which is actually a systemwide feature but also worth mentioning)

like this is the kind of thing people usually give exorbitant amounts of money to Adobe for. in iOS it doesn't even get its own app - it's all just context menu options within Files.

how the hell is this not like, the #1 feature mentioned in all the painfully corporate ads?
and why, oh why is literally everyone else letting Adobe rule the """PDF market"""?

i left a 1-star review for the discord app after the latest UI update and it got removed.
don't wanna start any conspiracy theories, but i certainly did not write anything that would violate the "guidelines", and it looks like some of the other negative reviews i've seen literally yesterday are now gone as well...

so @clip’s recent post got me in a little monologue about firmware restoration on apple devices.

for ipods/ipads/iphones: either pray for itunes, or have a mac around that supports your device’s latest iOS version. in case that doesn’t fix your issue - to the genius bar you go. or a local certifier reseller.

for macs or displays: have a second mac around to restore. not everybody has 2 premium-class computers, you know. or go to the local genius bar.

for apple watches: GOOD L_CK (YO_’RE F_CKED). straight to the genius bar. because apple watches have this tiny little diagnostic port under the bottom strap.

so i’ve just decided to check it and… it’s not on my S7? there is a new little hole at the top band slot, but it’s for air pressure leveling and sensors. so how do they restore these now?

that led me to this article by The Verge, and the last fucking part. the last fucking part.

Of course, Apple still needs a way to do diagnostics on the Apple Watch, and appears to be replacing the mysterious port with an even more mysterious 60.5GHz wireless module that pairs with a magnetic dock capable of local data transfer for internal use.

AND I’VE POSTED RECENTLY ABOUT HOW APPLE INTRODUCED THIS HIGH-SPEED WIRELESS CHIP BUT DIDN’T EXPLAIN IT. so they are using some wireless solution now for diagnostics, so it’s not even a physical port now, but an over-the-air firmware fix.

i think apple’s firmware teams need to get an award for “innovating internal solutions” and a kick out of the office right after that. what the fuck.

which checks its physical rotation during the boot sequence.

to enter DFU mode, you plug the USB in and flip it upside down.

yep.