People are using iPad OS features on their iPhones

[tekacs]

This is kinda wonderful to see - a peek into a world where we get to see the 'other side' of what would have been possible had Apple not locked our devices down beyond belief.

Jailbreak stores have never felt like a particularly strong illustration of what's possible due to their tiny user market - I'd love to see what developers would do if even for a period we could use these devices to anything remotely like their potential.

[frfl]

There was a comment few weeks ago - I forget the topic, maybe it was the new M-series release or something - that was talking about how freaking fast these things are. And the comment was pointing out how locked down everything is and most of that power is pretty useless - I mean sure on device "AI" and faster apps...OK I guess. I'm not the target demographic for these things anyway, so my opinions are whatever.

But really, imagine how much power these things have and if you could actually run a free (as in freedom, in the GNU sense) OS on them and really get access to all that power in a handheld device. Only if.

I have an M1, which is like N-times faster than the laptop I write this on. Yet it collects dust because I'd rather continue to use this old dinosaur laptop because that M1 macbook is a locked down, very fast, shiny Ferrari, but I just want a Honda Civic I can do whatever I want with.

[jajuuka]

I imagine we might seen some of these features in a iPhone foldable since it will have the space to take advantage of these features.

[throw0101c]

I wish the iPad went back to being more iOS-like: something like multiple Safari windows, each with their own collection of tabs, is something I wish I could disable (both for myself, and for some of the seniors I'm tech support for).

I have iDevices because I want simplicity and single-task-ness; I have Macs for multi-tasking.

If Apple needs to satisfy both single- and multi-tasking iDevices users, there should be some kind of mode toggle.

[runjake]

You can disable or not use these features.

Like gyomu said below, iPadOS Windows Apps is optional and opt-in. The default is full screen:

https://support.apple.com/guide/ipad/work-with-multiple-wind...

Select "Full Screen Apps".

And you do not have to use Tab Groups.

iPad User Guide link: https://support.apple.com/guide/ipad/organize-your-tabs-with...

Unsarcastically speaking, I've been using these OSes for 2 decades plus but I still read through each OS's respective User Guides and still learn a ton every release.

iPad User Guide: https://support.apple.com/guide/ipad/welcome/ipados

iPhone User Guide: https://support.apple.com/guide/iphone/welcome/ios

Mac User Guide: https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/welcome/mac

[gyomu]

Turn off windowed apps on your iPad

https://support.apple.com/en-us/123635

[mark_l_watson]

Isn’t your mode toggle just turning StageManager in or off?

[LeoPanthera]

I have an 11" iPad and the screen still feels too small to use windowed apps. It gets very cramped very quickly.

I can't imagine trying to do that on an iPhone. Surely it's useless.

What this does do is reveal the fiction that "iPadOS" and "iOS" are separate. Clearly not.

[rock_artist]

It might not be super practical on the device display. But with external display and keyboard/mouse this becomes much more usable.

[Someone]

> What this does do is reveal the fiction that "iPadOS" and "iOS" are separate. Clearly not.

Technically, I don’t think anybody ever claimed they were 100% distinct. Apple, for instance, says (https://developer.apple.com/ipados/get-started/): “Powered by the iOS SDK, your iPadOS apps”, and they’ve touted the ability to build apps that ru on both iPhone and iPad.

marketing-wise, they clearly are separate, in the same sense as https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car_platform: “A car platform is a shared set of common design, engineering, and production efforts, as well as major components, over a number of outwardly distinct models and even types of cars, often from different, but somewhat related, marques.”

The only difference is that here, Apple apparently ships all or major parts of the special parts for the iPad on iOS, too. Maybe they also do that vice versa? Can you enable the calculator app on iPad with this method?

[Razengan]

> I can't imagine trying to do that on an iPhone. Surely it's useless.

When there's a will you'll be glad there's a way.

People used to make do with "tiny" screens throughout the 1980s and 1990s: Bigger displays sure but smaller resolutions Han the iPhone. Doom came out in 320x200 ffs

When traveling I've had to do all sorts of tricks to use various services while away from home. Like my bank app which set an OTP to email or SMS, but if you swiped out of the app to go check the message, it would generate a new OTP when you switched back to the bank app. So I had to check my mail/messages on the minuscule Apple Watch screen. And that was the only time I ever used email on the Watch but I was infinitely glad that it had that option.

[tombert]

I did an awful lot with my GPD Win 2, which was running vanilla desktop Ubuntu. The tiny display did require a bit of getting used to, but it was a lot of fun to have a tiny little thing that could fit in my pocket that I could write code while on the train.

Screen isn't much bigger than an iPhone Pro Max, if at all, but I was able to adapt to the desktop GUIs without much trouble.

[asdff]

I used to use the old old form factor iphones with a jailbroken tweak that would split the screen. It was surprisingly useful even just having those maybe two inches a piece. I could type while referencing something else.

[rado]

Yes, on 13" it's just about right

[Gigachad]

Linked site is unusable. Screen is completely covered in ads.

[schappim]

It was completely unusable on an iOS device with slightly increased text size.

[bdcravens]

If your browser supports reader mode, it becomes tolerable.

[nottorp]

Sad but unrelated:

There seems to be something wrong with the Cloudflare server that's supposed to serve me (Bucharest, they say).

I was trying to take a break and read something on HN. Clicked on 4 sort of interesting headlines, 3 got me the Cloudflare error (including this one) and one sort of loaded some navigation bar without CSS and content.

Cloudflare offers a great service... until it breaks half the internet.

[htk]

I'm on the same boat. Several links on HN are not opening.

[Ezhik]

Can this be used to enable multiple display support on iPhones/non-pro iPads? Would be pretty damn cool if so.

[Ezhik]

Update - YES. Misaka26, enabling Stage Manager through it enables external display support on my non-pro iPad.

[brookst]

I think the hardware is t there in A-series chips. But not positive.

[rcarmo]

This would be a great thing to use with an external display when traveling, but of course it will never happen.

[trvz]

You can already use an iPhone a desktop computer, just not well: keyboards work fine, with AssistiveTouch you can get a pointer for your mouse, and by connecting iPhone to an external display it mirrors its display. Sadly, that includes the orientation and resolution.

I've been hoping Apple will get eventually around to work this out, and the article shows it'd be easier than anticipated. I think it'll happen eventually.

As for travelling specifically, it'd be easier to bring a MacBook than to bring a mouse and keyboard and portable display. The display could be replaced by a TV in your acommodation, but it's rare to be able to use that ergonomically.

It'd be instead quite interesting in general for people who already only use little more than the browser.

[AbuAssar]

So iOS and iPadOS are the same thing…

[jeroenhd]

Wasn't that always obvious? Surely nobody actually believed Apple built an entirely separate OS for their slightly-larger iPods?

[hollow-moe]

There's no way they would blatantly lie to the EU to avoid having the ipad marked as gatekeeper by adding it to the numbers of the iphone

[bossyTeacher]

Apple will probably say that it locked down the features because they could brick the phones

[carstenhag]

On Android you can use split screen apps. Either some apps are broken (including some I was part of writing...) or it's really annoying to put in text when both apps are open. It's really just useless almost alway

[isoprophlex]

They locked it down because this way, it offers a superior experience to their revenue streams

[bradgessler]

I want macOS on my iPad Pro so I can plug my Moonlander keyboard into it and have a “laptop” that doesn’t destroy my wrists.

[eddieroger]

You can have that today. If you get a USB-C breakout for the dock, it'll treat the Moonlander, or any keyboard, like a normal keyboard. You can not destroy your wrists right now, as I sometimes choose to do.

[NaOH]

Actual title: How to Enable iPad Features like MultiTasking & Stage Manager on iPhone via MobileGestalt

[ChrisMarshallNY]

This is not exactly something that any old schlub will be doing.

I don’t find many of these features useful on my iPad (to be fair, my Mini is my daily iPad), let alone, my iPhone. I can’t see myself doing all that work, for features I don’t want to use.

[sroussey]

The Medusa stuff is new and yeah, it’s in iOS as it’s the basis for the foldable.

[ichicoro]

Got a link with more info about the Medusa stuff? The OP is down currently...

[singularity2001]

I wish there was a way to get rid of this new features on the iPad. Getting a split screen now feels incredibly clumsy compared to before

[asadm]

Looking at the video, I can see why this was locked down. I wouldn't hand my mother that kind of complex UI.

[crooked-v]

What's really missing here is the mode where you plug the iPhone into a monitor, connect keyboard and mouse, and suddenly it's a functional desktop-lite in the same way that a basic iPad now is.

[amomchilov]

Are you suggesting that the test for whether they should “allow” a feature is whether your mom can figure it out?

Why?