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Comment by nrclark | Hacker News Reader

My work gave me one of the 2016 15" MBPs as my main computer, and the keyboard is horrible.

My V key double-presses about half the time, and the rest of the keys are really hard to press down all the way. Some of the keys make a weird metal rattle when I press them.

Typing on that wretched keyboard for more than an hour or so literally bruises my fingers.

Since I do most of my day-to-day work at a dock with an external keyboard, I'm debating whether it's bad enough that I need to fight with IT and be the one special snowflake with a PC instead. But it's bad enough that I'm seriously considering it.

The more I write about this keyboard, the angrier I get. >:(

And also seriously, fuck the touchbar. Who the hell decided that programmers don't need a functional ESC key or permanent function keys? And who the hell decided that I should have to fumble around and mash my already-bruised finger against a tiny glass icon to change my volume level? Just so Skype can show buttons that mimic the buttons already on the screen?

The user experience of the touchbar is objectively worse and adds no value. Most apps don't even use it, and the ones that do don't use it for anything interesting. And before long I'm sure it'll be playing advertisements at me.

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My biggest beaf with the TouchBar: volume takes two clicks! Instead of an up down and mute button, I get mute and volume which then opens a slider to the left of the click. So instead of just clicking once to lower volume I have to click, move my finger and slide. It would be so easy to allow custom button to add back on (and maybe there is that I haven't been able to find?)

I also accidentally 'touch my pinky finger when typing my password (numbers) and it registers as touch even though I'm not applying downward force. In Chrome thank god I could remove the refresh button, would accidentally refresh login pages all the time.

You can just put your finger on the slider key and slide. No need for tap, let go, slide. It's pretty natural.

A twist on the old if-a-tree-falls-in-the-forest riddle: If a hidden gesture exists but nobody knows it, does it really exist?

You know now.

How is it a hidden gesture? It's literally shown in every marketing video and advertisement since demo day.

And yet somehow you still have someone (who I assume is a poweruser) who doesn't know about its existence.

But to answer your question: It's hidden because it doesn't have a graphic representation on the device itself. Nothing on the volume button indicates that it's somehow a hidden slider.

its as hidden as control-alt-delete.

>>It's literally shown in every marketing video and advertisement since demo day.

The whole point of a good UI is you shouldn't be reading a manual and watching videos to do X, Y and Z.

Apple used to be a pioneer at things like this.

Sad things have come down to this.

A couple things: you don’t have to click volume and then move to the slider, you can just touch the volume button and begin sliding immediately and it will adjust relative to how you slide. Also, if you go into System Preferences—>Keyboard, you can customize the keys, including adding a dedicated mute button.

When users have to fiddle with settings to do the things they could do before without fiddling, what have you achieved? Apple used to be the UX good guys, now they are the devil in disguise.

You don’t have to fiddle. Just click the default visble one and drag

>>Apple used to be the UX good guys

Apple had one person who was good at UX. And that guy is dead for years now. His product pipeline can't be milked further to make more money.

From here onwards its just your usual managers running the show.

Don Norman may be over 80, but not dead I think ;)

Maybe I'm missing it or my os is not up to date? These are the settings I get, I only see mute and single volume button: https://imgur.com/a/CIgz3

Nevermind comment below showed where to find it, you have to change Touch Bar shows to expanded - which having had this computer for like a year I never found. I'm probably not the most advanced, especially compared to HN users who live in vim like many people here, but still I make a living on my computer and use it 12+ hours a day - feels kind of silly that I'm just now figuring that out (thanks to someone explaining it).

> you don’t have to click volume and then move to the slider, you can just touch the volume button and begin sliding immediately

Woooow, this is a revelation. Thank you!

You can add "Volume Up" and "Volume Down" keys, along with other useful functions, in the initial touchbar view by going to the settings.

I've been wanting to do this for ages, but I can only find the volume slider! Could you tell me how to put Volume Up and Down buttons on there please?

It's hidden weirdly.... go to "Keyboard" prefs pane and "Keyboard" tab (initial one shown when you bring it up.

At "Touch Bar shows".... change that from "App Controls with Control Strip" to "Expanded Control Strip". Then you will see the individual buttons. You can then further "Customize Control Strip..." and you will now see more buttons. But you will also loose "App Control".

Of course, why can't those specific buttons be a customization option there with "App Control with Control Strip" forcing you to choose between volume up/down and "App Control"? Because Apple.

Savior! Thanks. I feel really dumb for not knowing about this, but my ego is going to blame Apple. Just in general feels rushed all over for many many things - this is (was) just my personal biggest gripe!

> But you will also loose "App Control".

For fuck's sake... Thanks for the "upgrade", Apple.

I was having the rogue pinky issue as well. I disabled the app awareness of the touchbar and then added flex space to that area where my pinky would hit. It works great but now the touch bar is useless (which is fine by me).

>Instead of an up down and mute button, I get mute and volume which then opens a slider to the left of the click. So instead of just clicking once to lower volume I have to click, move my finger and slide.

Hah, You couldn't make this stuff up... GUIs were borne out of a hatred of highly context based keyboard behaviour (VI, Xerox Parc), now Apple go full circle and revert to context hell by combining a keyboard with a touchscreen GUI. Goodbye Apple, it was nice knowing you.

Read the other comments here and try it out for yourself. The single volume button is a slider itself. You don't have to touch twice.

This same UI is found on other touch screens including my Honda's dashboard.

aaaaaandd as usual the inevitable fan boy down votes ensue.

It's really just an accident of history, not intentional on Apple's part, that Macs became popular with developers. In an alternate universe Jobs isn't kicked out of Apple, doesn't develop NeXT based on Unix, and Apple continues merrily snubbing developers and not accidentally attracting them the way they did. In this alternate universe I believe more energy and funding would have been directed at Linux and it would be a stronger desktop platform.

Agreed.

What do you think is the best Linux desktop distro these days?

For hardware it seems like the higher-end Dells are the winners. I have a co-worker with one (runs Windows) and the hardware is excellent. He has some issues with the TPM and firmware but it seems like stuff that would not be a big problem in Linux.

For me the most interesting distros are vanilla binary rolling-release ones, which ship all stuff from upstream unchanged. I love Arch, but Slackware and a few others are interesting too.

These make it easy to set up a simple system with few moving parts, which is fast and doesn't break. I just a tiling window manager (xmonad), a terminal (urxvt), a browser (firefox with vimperator) and emacs.

And Nix-style ones, NixOS and GuixSD, are the future. Declarative system configuration and package definitions. Non-destructive changes.

In terms of laptops, I'm really fond of Xiaomi Air 12 M3. Fanless, really good quality, cheap and all stock Intel components. So it just works.

I have Arch with Gnome on the 4K HP Spectre x360 13 inch, and everything basically just works. Even mixed-DPI with a standard HD monitor.

I got a cheezy second hand Lenovo Y40 from Craigslist for about $200 and put Debian on it. Not even close to top of the line but it works great for my development needs.

> Who the hell decided that programmers don't need a functional ESC key or permanent function keys?

a) I'm a developer, I do not use traditional function keys and would much rather have media keys, etc.

b) This laptop is not just for programmers. It is designed for many people, many of whom could benefit significantly (applications in video/music editing look very useful).

> a) I'm a developer, I do not use traditional function keys and would much rather have media keys, etc.

Function keys also served as media keys.

True, but the touchbar is much better at that specific role. It also opens up different forms of interaction for other applications.

The terminal, for instance, has an instant man page key. This is kind of cool. A tiling window manager could have window management special keys. I have a very nice keyboard on my desk at home with, a glorious Unicomp PC122 with 24 function keys. I love it, but I need to confess I never used that many function keys. Ever.

> The terminal, for instance, has an instant man page key.

So, F1 on Windows basically?

It seems to me that a lot of advantages mentioned by folks on the touchbar are born of Apple’s refusal to actually use the Fn keys as shortcut keys, unlike on Windows.

Not quite, because F1 meaning help is entirely a convention. Much like :q! is quit or C-x C-f is open file and Meta is the alt/option key.

That's one of the reasons I use the F-keys on the PC122 so little - it's hard to remember what I made them do.

The touchbar is worse imo. The problem is the lack of tactile feedback, plus unwanted "keypresses" when your fingers wander over it.

If they would have just placed the touchbar above the old row of ESC and Function keys, it could have been good. Now it is just shit.

It's a mystery to me why they didn't do this, at least on the 15" Macbook. Instead they made the already-plenty-big-enough touchpad even larger. A secondary screen / input control above the full keyboard would be awesome. It'd be a great way to get notifications (tests passed, build finished, sports scores, whatever...) or have ad-hoc controls.

RE: Lack of haptic feedback - There's an app for that - https://www.haptictouchbar.com/ It's not great (that the feedback is in the touchpad and not the touchbar is disconcerting), but it's better than no feedback.

By default, even! There's a config option now, but it used to be that you needed KeyRemap4Macbook to change that.

> Who the hell decided that programmers don't need a functional ESC key or permanent function keys?

I'm still amazed that there are programmers that complain about this. As a programmer, I've avoided ESC and the function keys for years before the touchbar came out.

Apple has even had a built-in option in Mac OS to remap ESC to Caps Lock, for quite a while now. And considering how conservative Apple is when it comes to adding options, I think that says that I'm not alone.

The ESC/function key row is not suitable for ergonomic typing. It's simply to far away from home row. If that area is suitable for anything at all, it's for rare context-sensitive operations, so I think Apples idea was absolutely rational. Wether it's worth the cost is different discussion (for me, probably not).

The culture around keyboards is super weird if you ask me. You have whole subcultures around a near irrelevant thing like key-travel and mechanical switches (though I must admit there is a visceral satisfaction to clicking a really clicky keyswitch), yet people still stick to qwerty and typewriter-based physical layout. ErgoDox seems to be growing in popularity, so it might be changing.

Debugging? Xcode defaults to F6/F7/F8 for step over/in/out. Many IDEs do something similar.

The alternative is to map some key combination, but it's much easier to be able to hit one key instead of Ctrl-something.

>I'm still amazed that there are programmers that complain about this.

You shouldn't be. Not sure about Mac. But all the big IDEs - MS Visual Studio, all the JetBrains products, Eclipse, Netbeans, etc use function keys in their default key bindings.

True, functionkey row is not suitable for ergonomic typing, BUT it is not used for ergonomic typing. It's used for... well special functions!

I think that’s actually the key difference here - OS X apps very rarely make use of the function keys, instead preferring Cmd-letter combos (which to my mind possibly make a bit more sense as you can remember e.g. R means Refresh). That means that doing away with the function keys is probably a much smaller deal for Mac users than Windows users, as on the Mac they were pretty much just used as media keys anyway.

Key travel and key response is far more than a near irrelevant thing for folks with RSI. Some people can literally cure RSI with the right keyboard that encourages the right typing habits.

Maybe it is a small enough percentage of the population that it doesn't matter, but this is hacker news and we care a about a lot of strange and esoteric things here that only a small percentage of the population care about anyway. If Dell can make a 15" laptop with a full number pad Apple can find a way to have a less shitty keyboard with an escape key and maybe don't force the touch bar on everyone. It doesn't have to be a popular consumer option. You can hide it in an esoteric out of the way place for us esoteric out of the way users, but... it is ridiculous to ignore the hard core tech fan base and keyboard issues.

yes I agree. I don't know how hardware teams with such a stellar track record as Apple have can make such awful decisions. The first time I used the new keyboard I thought that it was broken in some way (how is a shorter key travel a better thing?), and the touch bar is just stupid. I've seen people use them and the awkward way they have to stop what they're looking doing, orient themselves with the silly little screen and press a button is just beyond stupid.

I'll go out of my way to buy an old mac before I spend money on these stupid new machines.

The answer is simple. They no longer had someone that would tell them "No, redo it."

It's also why we have a notch on the iPhone X.

The notch is extremely ugly and unApple. Its seriously messed up.

When Steve Jobs passed on, I read a blog post by someone saying (in response to a bad, pretentious ad from Apple targeting Samsung, the one which had a condescending tone belitttling Samsung users rather than showing what the iPhone has) that it would take years before Apple screwed up its product line, but only about a year or so until they screw their advertising. I guess they have started messing their product line.

Literally every mouse Apple ever did since....1998? was not something I'd ever use. Didn't like the external keyboards the gave me either but they were less awful. If there's any aspect ever that still having Steve Jobs around would not help in it's the input devices. Though the touch pads on laptops are still the best in their class.

I love the short throw keys. Obviously everyone has their own personal preferences. I feel like my fingers are dancing across the new keyboard. Initially I disliked the size of the keys, but now when I go back to an older keyboard I realize I even prefer those. (Edit: I still dislike the arrow keys, those suck).

Apple’s big problem is that they cater to everyone with a single offering. And since the keyboards are cut into the metal casing of the laptop, it would probably be expensive to offer an option here (though they probably should). So they make a decision, piss off some, make others happy. This is where PCs have an advantage, as you have more choice.

Expensive, for a company with a ridiculous cash stockpile. I think many users would trade a touchbar in for a better keyboard and a slightly heavier laptop (acknowledging you won't be able to get a laptop as thin with a different type of key). This is a really important issue for a pretty significant chunk of their core tech audience. If Dell can manage the complexity of their product line and all the options they have, then Apple can budge a little on the mono-design of their laptop product lines. I get it on phones and they already proliferated their phone options too much IMO, but laptops, especially since you can put that out of the way as a custom order on the web site for people that really care, just seems like an obvious thing. That or figure out how to make everyone happy.

> Who the hell decided that programmers don't need a functional ESC key or permanent function keys?

Steve Jobs.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/jurvetson/841771

The original Macintosh didn't have them either, or Control.

I have a 2017 MBP 15 with touch bar and love it. Granted it's newer, so I haven't had any key problems yet, but the keyboard is one of my favorite of all time. (I normally use a CODE keyboard with clear switches at work.) I also really like the touch bar. I've spent some time using BetterTouchTool to customize it, and it has definitely been helpful. The escape key is always there and you don't have to specifically hit it, as the space to the left of the key also functions as escape. For other function keys, they show up when you press the Fn key, which is how I had my old MBP setup anyway. You can also set it so that they always show up instead of the "normal" touch bar functionality.

Not saying you're wrong, just giving my feedback. I'm definitely not a fanboy by any means. I used a mint linux setup for the last year before switching back to mac, and wouldn't touch an iPhone with a 10ft pole. :)

I think cursor is the worst. why not cut off shift and do up and down proper keys.

The up/down keys are the only issue I have with the new keyboard. I routinely manage to hit it wrong and the cursor doesn’t move. The rest of it I actually like, including the touchbar.

Cursor keys were quite a switch from the trusty old MBA. The layout is a bit different (left/right are full size keys instead of half height) and the keys are so flush with the enclosure that it was just much harder to find them "blind".

Though, having had the MBP now for nearly a year, it's not an issue anymore.

About half the macs at work have been upgraded to touchbar models.

Mine hasn’t, but I’ve noticed the touchbar screen freaks out when lots of crap scrolls by in terminal. I’d be tempted to electric tape over mine if I had one. Instead, the common case for coworkers is to keep the old one for WFH, dock the new one at desks, and cope with terrible keyboards during meetings.

We have an open floor plan, so that would break my “hide in a random room to concentrate on stuff” workflow.

I’ve seen die-hard laptop screen users take 17” macs to coffee shops, and lay an external keyboards on top of the now irreparable built-in one.

Maybe that’s the right way forward for people that still want keyboards.

After owning one since January, I really don't notice the touchbar. However, I spend most of my time docked with an external keyboard - I've used a Das Keyboard (blues at work, browns at home) and the new Magic Keyboard with 10-key (which has same mechanism as laptop but a little more key travel IMO)

> Who the hell decided that programmers don't need a functional ESC key or permanent function keys?

I find functional keys nice, but not necessary. I also just remapped ESC to capslock since I never use capslock anyway.

I have capslock as control. My work computer has the ESC key, but it's out of reach. My ipad keyboard has no escape, so I've been training myself to use ctrl-[. Works ok, I don't really notice the difference anymore.

My years on a Sun keyboard spoiled me, so I remap backquote to escape (much more easily reachable than now-standard Escape location). Also Capslock to control and swap backspace and backslash. Everything I use more frequently is closer in. :)

They definitely should have offered the touch bar as an option, so people who wanted it could have it and the rest could have normal function keys!

What you are describing is a broken or dirty keyboard. First of all, the new MBP requires compressed air for cleaning under the keys. If that doesn't work, they will repair it under warranty.

if a keyboard requires compressed air cleaning to function, that sounds like a design defect to me.

I've used PC keyboards for ~25 years now and I've never had one that would break if not treated ...

I have seen absolutely filthy "old" MBP keyboards that worked just fine. It's a laptop, I should be able to use it without having to treat it like a delicate snowflake. Whatever happened to building quality hardware?

We voted with our money that we didn't give a damn about quality hardware or software.

Ehhh, we voted with our money that we trusted Apple. Their hardware design has been quality until the new keyboard.

This ignores whether you want more ports or faster processors, of course.

IMHO the hardware has been shit since the AMD disaster.

When people are taking your latest model into your store to figure out wtf is going wrong with it, in much greater numbers than the previous model, you've created a broken design.

About the ESC key - if you're using vim you should be remapping it to caps lock. If you rather not remap, you can always just hit ctrl [ (and this works out of the box).

I've been doing this for so long its natural to me even on a keyboard with an actual escape key.

I’m a heavy VIM user and I’ve never once had a problem hitting the ESC key on the touchbar. Yes, it doesn’t have same tactile feel, but it’s an ESC key and is a known distance and angle away, so I’m fine.

If you're talking about escaping a non-normal mode, control+c should always work just fine.

I completely identify with your anger

There is a functional Escape key. It's right there in the top left corner. I use it hundreds of times a day. It's definitely not as nice as a dedicated key but you get used to it.

And if you want permanent function keys then just go to the Keyboard control panel and enable it.

stop making excuses for Apple's dumb decisions. With physical buttons I can find a key by feel just by running my fingers across the top row. Good luck accurately hitting any button on that stupid little touch screen.

The touch bar finally forced me to remap Caps Lock to Escape. It's much easier to hit on my computer (just don't ask me to use yours).

Personally I map caps to control because it makes all my text navigation easier (ctrl + a, ctrl + e, ctrl + shift + enter, etc).

Plus side: less RSI-feelings in my left wrist. Down side: muscle memory makes you look incompetent on other machines.

The Escape key is always in the same position (top left).

I always hit it with 100% accuracy just like I did on my previous MacBook.

And I am not making excuses for Apple. I think they should've made Escape key in particular a physical key.

No right now in the top left corner of my touchbar is an (X) key, the esc key is to the right of it.

My understanding is that even though by default there is some (inexplicable) space left of the escape key on the touchbar, that space still functions as the escape key.

In my case I actually had a completely separate, non-esc button to the left of esc. Screenshot: https://i.imgur.com/InvBvqa.png

I'm not sure exactly when it happens, but I think it happens when you have some background context open on the touchbar (like some app's music controls). The X dismisses the bar you have open and then you get esc back. Often there's no esc at all and just the X.

That sounds terrible. Dismiss the window before you can escape??

Or, you know, use the keyboard layout that everyone has become accustomed to, instead of coming up with a special-snowflake input device that is a gimmick.

These new Macbooks are the Wii U's of laptops.

> stop making excuses for Apple's dumb decisions.

This breaks the HN guidelines by being uncivil as well as uncharitable in the sense requested here: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize."

Your comment would be fine without that first bit. Would you mind reading https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and following the guidelines when commenting here?

still it adds that small something to the comment. we humans adapt to things, we try to make excuses for our (and our friend's) errors. we try to come up with solutions.

that unpolite remark underlines the issue pretty well: one one side there is a solution, on the other side there is a poor implemented idea

Sure, but the unpoliteness was gratuitous and damages the container. You can drive to an interesting place without scratching the car.

This is subjective; I don't agree, I need tactile feedback so the ESC key is no more. Like many others, I have disabled the magic bar as much as I could because it occasionally got triggered if I just glanced a finger off of it accidentally.

As an emacs user, I do the following on this box:

[CAPSLOCK] -> CTRL [LEFT CTRL] -> ESC (just like an old HP 9000 workstation keyboard lol)

The above works for me.

While the keyboard is bad on this $4000 laptop; I do love the performance, battery life, and the screen. I would never buy another one though. I suspect I will be on my 2nd key replacement any day now.

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