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Comment by tjohns | Hacker News Reader

I know it's trendy to hate on the touchbar... but for what it's worth, I personally find it more useful than the old function keys.

Most mac apps don't use function keys as shortcuts, so the old keyboard ended up being used for media keys (volume, brightness, play/pause, etc.).

The touch bar gives me a better version of that (I actually get a volume slider), plus more apps actually make use of that space to provide useful shortcuts now. And the scrub bar for media playback is really great when you have audio playing in the background.

Yes, you lose tactile feedback. But battery life doesn't seem to be a big problem. At least for me, it's been net positive.

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> I know it's trendy to hate on the touchbar

The touchbar hate is not trendy. It's based in specific complaints.

If, on the balance of how you evaluate the problems and benefits of the touchbar, it's useful for you, great. That doesn't mean the primary reason people express a distaste for the touchbar is essentially a social fashion.

I didn't mean to imply that the concerns were unfounded. I know there are real, legitimate complaints with the touchbar.

At the same time, I just wanted to point out that there are at least some developers who do prefer it, and that the dislike isn't universal.

So maybe a nice compromise would be having both... having a touchbar that can be customized in addition to a standard set of function keys.

Or one model with and one model without. I don't like the touchbar (keys move around and change size depending on context, escape can be triggered by touching areas outside of the escape key, touch bar locks up / crashes) but I'm largely indifferent to it. My primary complaint is the awful butterfly keyboard itself. There's too little travel, the keyboard itself is far too delicate (only took a few weeks for the spacebar to start crapping out on my 2016), and the layout is subpar.

My mid-2012 MPB is in need of a replacement, but the butterfly keyboard is a dealbreaker. I'm not thrilled with the touch bar, generally supportive of USB-C (although I miss magsafe), will tolerate the glossy screen and oversized trackpad, and don't give two hoots about the fingerprint reader. If Apple could see fit to provide a current gen MBP with a proper keyboard I'd buy one in a heartbeat. As it is, when my MBP dies for good I'm almost certainly moving to a Linux laptop.

That's what I don't understand- there is plenty of room for both, especially on the 15". Just add the Touch Bar strip above the function keys and call it a day...

In my experience, most of the people (not all, but most) who complain about the TouchBar haven't actually even used one for any significant period of time.

It's definitely trendy.

There's quite a bit of selection bias because people who don't want a touchbar generally have a strong enough opinion on it that they aren't buying computers with touchbars.

I don't need to use one to know that I already resent the one backlit screen. I don't need or want another.

More flexible is great, sliding for volume is great, I have no conceptual problems with the touchbar except that I don't want another screen.

It's a mostly-black screen with fairly low brightness. I'm not in the habit of sitting in a pitch-black room on my laptop, so I can't tell you how it looks there, but in my everyday use it hasn't been even the remotest problem.

I can’t say I have ever noticed the light from the Touch Bar at night, and I’ve had this laptop since they first came out. It’s so much dimmer than the screen it’s a complete non-issue.

I am convinced that the only people complaining about this have either never used this laptop or have such sensitive eyes that daytime light would render them permanently blind. And I say this as someone who was excited by the possibilities of the Touch Bar but have so far been underwhelmed and wants to go back to the physical keys.

Not once in this conversation have I insulted you or anyone else. Not once in this conversation have I dismissed your needs and wants. I acknowledge that there are benefits to it that for some outweigh the loss of tactile feedback or addition of a second screen.

Does it really help the conversation to say things like this?

> I am convinced that the only people complaining about this have either never used this laptop or have such sensitive eyes that daytime light would render them permanently blind

You've expressed a concern about having a second screen, but the concern seems to be unfounded. The parent is dismissing you because it appears that you're manufacturing a reason to hate on the touchbar and have already stated that you believe you don't even need to try it out to determine whether your concern is valid.

If you're not willing to consider that your concern is unfounded, then you shouldn't be offended when other people dismiss your concern.

I tape over the LED power indicator on my monitor, I have the screen disabled when not in use on my microwave oven, I disable the charging light on android devices, and I even cover the indicator on my refrigerator that tells you whether it's going to dispense ice or water.

Trust me, for me, it's not an unfounded concern.

Everything you’ve described are lights that can shine in the dark. But that’s not what the TouchBar is. The TouchBar can only be seen when the laptop screen can be seen, and is really dim (certainly dimmer than the laptop screen). The TouchBar can’t ever be a light shining in the darkness because it would always be drowned out by the laptop screen.

The LED power indicator on my monitor is absolutely equivalent. When the monitor is off it doesn't produce light because I press the button. It only shines when the monitor is on, and I still find the need to cover it.

I bet it's pretty bright though. LEDs like that usually are.

I thought the tone of the second part of my comment was very obviously tongue-in-cheek, simply serving to underscore how dim the Touch Bar actually is. The main point still remains: I have yet to find a person who's complained about the Touch Bar brightness who's actually owned one of these devices.

It's really not bright. I'd guess it's probably less bright than the keyboard backlight, which also isn't bright (but is at least dimmable). It's so not bright that I've literally never noticed the thing at night in well over a year of regular use. Whatever number of lumens it outputs is so far below the brightness of the main display that it's all but unnoticeable in use.

I'm not willing to spend the money to own one, specifically because of the touchbar brightness.

I cover my monitor's power LED as well as the status screen on the receiver for my wireless headset. I run F.lux on the reddest settings when I'm within 1-2 hours of bedtime. (and after that I don't run any screens)

I have no issues with daylight brightness, but must carefully control lighting at night due to a broken circadian rhythm. Trust me, I don't need to own it to know that it's too bright. Especially if F.lux is not supported, which it is not last time I checked.

>I'm not in the habit of sitting in a pitch-black room on my laptop, so I can't tell you how it looks there...

The one situation I can imagine the Touchbar brightness concerning me is when I'm on a plane. They always turn the cabin lights out, and I'm aware that I need to turn the brightness right down on my laptop when I'm in economy class, so I don't bother those around me. A quiet keyboard is also important on a plane.

I've not used newer Macs except in the store, so I don't know if the touchbar brightness is actually an issue or not. I definitely like my physical volume buttons for making sure my laptop is muted while flying though.

I'm at the 6 month mark on a 2017 15in and I still dislike it. It's not that its terrible...it's just worse than the function / media keys. Its a step backwards. Perhaps if the touchbar was in addition to the old function row I wouldnt mind it as much.

in system settings under keyboard you can set it to only show the function keys and act only as a row of keys (similar to how it runs while bootcamped into windows)

That's how I've set mine up, but even that mode is significantly worse than having physical keys, due to the lack of tactile feedback. I still accidentally touch the software keys without intending to several times per day, and I can't press them without looking at them to confirm that I'm touching the correct one.

Same. My typing precision has gone down due to a lack of tactile feedback with button shapes and what not.

You can set that up only per application, and you can't do anything fast like dragging all your apps into the window. You have to click the + button once for every app on your machine and manually select it from an Open dialog. And the dialog doesn't remember the last directory used. It's utterly hostile.

I was given an MBP with a touchbar when I contracted with Comcast for 10 months. Hated it.

My personal laptop is MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Mid 2014).

I will NEVER EVER pay with my own money for a touchbar mac book.

My number one rule when getting a laptop is a good keyboard. Period.

Plus the USB-C drivers for external displays in the new mac books is complete trash. Misaligned windows, constantly forgetting window positions, occasionally completely not working.

The MBP line of computers keeps on getting worse and worse.

I’ve got an issue with the Touch Bar that, as far as I can tell, only I am experiencing:

Take your MacBook Pro, put it in a room indoors, and flick the lights on and off in that room several times a second. You’ll notice high CPU usage on a process called “TouchBarServer”, as it tries to adjust itself to the changing light levels so it can display its screen. For some reason, as it does this, it lags the entire rest of the computer: scrolling will freeze every couple of seconds, clicks won’t register, the mouse will lag, and keystrokes will just be ignored.

Why would you do this, you might ask? I work on trains a lot, and I get this same flicker effect as the trees by the tracks go past. As they pass the windows of the train, it’s like a bright light source is being rapidly turned on and off.

I don’t ever use the Touch Bar — nor did I want one — but merely having one renders my laptop unusably slow for two hours every day. I hate this computer.

That sounds both very frustrating, and quite bizarre. I can't imagine why ambient light sensing would need to peg the CPU ever.

If you haven't done so already, I strongly encourage you to file a bug report with Apple at https://bugreport.apple.com

I have filed a bug report. But yeah, it’s crazy that one part of the machine makes all the rest of it slow down! There was a time before I figured out it was the Touch Bar when I thought it was _moving fast_ that was making it lag (because it didn’t happen when the train stopped at stations). I was paranoid that it was trying to keep tabs on my location... so it could be worse, I guess.

This is fascinating, but wouldn't this be the case on older MBPs since they have ambient light sensors?

I’m not sure, but for what it’s worth, I’ve got “Automatically adjust brightness” unchecked in System Preferences. So either it’s just ignoring that option, or it’s using some secondary light sensor.

That's my main issue with the touchbar as well, not this specific light issue, but the fact that it drags the rest of the computer down with it.

I would have preferred buttons, but I'm pretty adaptable and can deal with the touchbar if I have too. But what really gets me is that mine frequently crashes and when it crashes it's impossible to control system volume. And since trying to mute or lower the volume is one of the specific situations that causes it to crash, it results in one of the worst user experiences you could have.

God, I hate the touchbar. I constantly brush it, which is particularly frustrating when I'm typing something in Chrome and it accidentally focuses the address bar or creates a new tab. Drives me up a wall! The lack of real function keys is another huge annoyance. Also had a couple keys on the keyboard get stuck. I've had it for a year now and I'd throw it out the window in a second if I thought there was a decent shot I could get a 2015 replacement.

I've got a 2015 for personal use and a 2016 for work and I can honestly say that at the end of the day I'm thrilled to work on a machine that doesn't get in my way. They had it so right and really, really dropped the ball for me.

I'd absolutely buy a new $3000 MBP if it was the new specs inside the 2015 body. As-is, I think my next machine will be Windows.

Is six months long enough for my hate to be valid? I actually had my place of employment take it back and started working out of my retina MBP again. I'm considering buying a Windows laptop for the first time.

IMHO the touchbar requires more effort and distraction to control the brightness and volume. What previously was one key-press to dim/brighten or mute/volume - all without me having to take my focus from the screen now requires a multi-stages process with no tactile feedback.

No thanks. Plus the keyboard will likely have the same issues my 2016 version has. I’ve had keys replaced 4 times already.

Also the loss of global prev/pause/next keys was a regression that ensured I ordered the non-touchbar version.

Muting is still one key press.

I especially like the way the toucher handles dual screen brightness, 1 press and it brings up a brightness control for each screen.

Just to note because it is non-obvious and not documented - both volume and brightness buttons are one touch. You can just tap and drag up/down to immediately adjust, and you don't have to tap, move over to the slider, tap again, then drag.

Your tip only works for _decreasing_ the volume. If it’s turned all the way down, and you want to turn it up, you can’t tap-and-drag it because the fingerprint sensor gets in the way.

You’re right. It’s just two quick drags to maximize the volume. Or one drag to get about 80% there, which covers most situations. The slider stays open when you lift your finger.

Try moving your finger left, then right, without letting go (video: https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmVacED7iVnDn7JiHuUT7buAL96iSTzqHB7NTZR...).

Oh hey, neat.

It's not documented but you can:

1. You can swipe in each direction to quickly adjust 2. You can tap and drag to finely adjust

The touchbar was what I thought was most idiotic before I got my macbook with it, and is the least idiotic thing after I've had my macbook. It is ok, sometimes kinda nice. If they put a physical Esc key on the far left, and a physical Mute key on the far right, and stuck the touchbar between the two, it would be actually very nice, because I agree the function keys are useless on a mac. But the touchbar utility doesn't make up for not having a physical Escape key.

>Yes, you lose tactile feedback

That's the only part I really can't lose.

I like the volume slider fwiw but the regular ones worked fine too.. it is a small bonus with a massive drawback .. of course I don't like it.

Not to mention that I don't ever look at my keyboard when typing, so touchbar is just a annoying glow at the periphery of my vision.

There is an app called HapticKey that triggers vibration when you touch tb.

My pie-in-the-sky idealized computer experience is a color e-ink display with a decent framerate.

Replacing tactile buttons with a second blinding photon emitter is not progress as far as I'm concerned.

I understand all the benefits you quote, and I'm not just complaining because it's "trendy". If it was eink, I wouldn't care at all. But it's another backlit screen shining in my face. No thanks.

Were you hoping for pixel qi to make it to market with their tech? I was. I so wanted a machine with that screen so I could work outdoors

Marry me

As a heavy IntelliJ user - I use the function keys all the time. Some examples: F1: show file in project view, F2/Shift F2: next/previous error, Ctrl+F2: stop process, F3/Shift F3: find next/previous, F6: move/rename, different F7 variations: find usages, F9/F10: run/debug options, also F8-F10 - step over/into/out/continue, F12 - toggle maximize editor, etc.

I don't understand what I'm supposed to do with a touchbar, or how to otherwise remap all of these shortcuts... Sticking to my 2015 MBP for now, but I really hope Apple get their act together and release a developer-friendly model (because otherwise I'm a huge fan).

Intellij could support the touchbar - I was going to say it's a great way to do debugging until I found that using arrow keys + modifier is a fantastic way to control the debugger. (up=continue, left=step out, right=step in, down=step)

Why have I never heard of this arrow key method of debugging? That would be much more natural than the typical "fn+shift+F8 is step" stuff

I use Control+S,Z,X,C for debugging, mapping Caps Lock to Control. (S=continue, Z=Step Over, X=Step In, C=Step Out). It keeps my right hand free for mousing around, drinking coffee, etc.

What modifier are you using for the arrow keys? Aren't they all taken already?

They already do, in the 2018.2 EAP there is support for touchbar. Since it's already in RC state I think the stable version will be out in a couple of weeks.

Nobody needs to re-map anything, if IntelliJ would just support the touch bar, then they could keep the same shortcuts and rename the keys from "F8" to "Step Over"

I'm not looking at the keyboard when hitting those keys (I've been using this exact keymap for over 8 years), touchbar support isn't helping, I need tactile keys.

Well, now it’s IntelliJ’s responsibility to add TouchBar support or remap those keys.

Nonetheless you can just turn the F keys back on.

FWIW they're adding support: https://twitter.com/bulenkov/status/984476361699069952 - it was supposed to be in 2018.2 but I haven't checked whether it made it or not.

I agree though, IntelliJ is my biggest worry when it comes to the Touch Bar.

I am using it right now. It works very well, also context aware so that it shows different stuff depending on what you are doing like in the debugger you will continue, next etc.

I use it, it made it, but I'd still prefer the old function keys back

Adding media keys did not require the loss of Function keys (“fn” toggle) so low use in apps was not a reason to remove keys entirely.

How is a touch volume slider better? Using modifier keys you can achieve any level of precision from keyboard volume keys, without looking down to find and watch what you tap. There are also slider controls already, using the mouse (both in the menu bar and System Preferences).

I noticed a big regression in battery life (25-35%) between my 2013 and 2017 MacBook Pro. I don't know how much the Touch Bar had to do with it, but the 2017 was definitely worse.

From 2015 to 2016 models the battery capacity dropped from 74 watt hours to 49 watt hours in the new 13" design. The gap was made up for by efficiency gains of the CPU and possibly the display. But the display can also be cranked way brighter now, running it at the full 500 nits will hurt your battery performance for sure. Also if you are running demanding loads it will be worse off as well.

The Touch Bar likely sips power, but the real issue with it is the lost battery capacity beneath it (The non-touchbar models have larger batteries at 54 watt hours)

Maybe I'm a backwards person but I barely use escape at all. I do however use the function keys, all day, every day. I have them mapped to various apps for screengrabbing, batch copy and paste of files, rename etc. Apps like keymaestro let me add extra functionality to these "spare" keys and I don't want then replaced by any damn touchbar

In my experience, adding those functions to the Touch Bar via Better Touch Tool was just as easy as making f-key bindings, plus I get easy and visibly-distinguishable per-app bindings.

The Touch Bar is great, Apple just isn't going far enough.

visibly distinguishable is great but IMO tactilely distinguishable is more important

The majority of my use of my MBPr is in clamshell mode, with a large external monitor, and a mechanical keyboard. Even for people who use theirs open, beside a large monitor, it's usually on a stand. So a Touch Bar is either pointless, or so unwieldy as to be useless, in these situations, respectively.

Imagine not being able to mute your sound in public because your finger doesn't have enough capacitance for some reason.

The sound can also be muted by clicking the sound icon in the menu bar. There is a volume slider there.

Trackpads are capacitive, and that’s much too slow anyway. Often your menu will be hidden, or inaccessible until all of your processes have resumed

True. I can’t think of many situations where a laptop can be used, but capacitive touch cant, and the laptop can’t be switched off or the lid closed, and the noise will would cause a problem. I guess I thought that would happen, I’d keep a headphone jack handy as a silencer. I don’t think the utility in an unlikely situation outweighs the balance of use.

closing the lid doesn't mute the sound as a hardware switch. Lots of sounds will continue to play through the closing of the lid, including sounds for video.

For an example of when capacitive touch wonts work but the laptop would, simply get your finger a little bit wet.

The scenario I'm imagining is opening your computer only to discover that had closed it in the middle of a youtube video or something the night before, and it just continues playing where it left off. A crime of the highest order in OS design, to be sure, but hardly a rare occurrence.

Cmd+Q would be my first action in that situation (which I’ve been in!) But I agree not everyone knows that.

I was imagining someone wearing a glove, but you are right that a certain amount of water will start causing issues. I think it would be difficult to pool enough water on both the touch bar and the trackpad outside of a catastrophe.

I can’t get sound to continue emitting after closing the lid. I’m sure an app can be developed to make that happen, but it wouldn’t be something commonly used. The most likely candidate seems to me to be something like audio performance software, but a person in that situation wouldn’t be using the speakers as an out and would be used to quickly dealing with software/hardware quirks.

Researching this conversation has been fun. :)

Question for someone who has a touchbar: is it possible to add app shortcuts to it (like an extension of the dock)? And what about a dedicated escape button?

I use F12 throughout the day to open iTerm and Cmd+F2 to open Spotlight, and the escape key is obviously generally useful. Losing equivalent dedicated buttons/shortcuts would be a dealbreaker, but otherwise I could take or leave the function keys.

Edit: If yes to the above, are there any situations in which my configured dedicated buttons might conditionally disappear?

The escape button shows up in practically all apps, and extends beyond the area indicated by the OLED screen to the edge of the glass. Basically, the entire left 1" of the touchbar is a large dedicated escape key.

System Preferences allows you to do some limited customization of what buttons show up, including adding a dedicated Spotlight button. (I replaced the Siri button with that on mine.) See: https://www.howtogeek.com/303733/how-to-add-or-remove-icons-...

Beyond that, BetterTouchTool allows more advanced customization of the touchbar. I've never used it, but it's worth a look. See: https://www.howtogeek.com/307468/how-to-add-custom-buttons-t... and https://folivora.ai/

Interesting, thanks! Sad that it requires third-party software to add the iTerm shortcut (which was my biggest concern since I use it so often), but sounds like the touchbar will probably be a net positive, or at least not a dealbreaker when I do eventually upgrade.

I'm a developer and BetterTouchTool is great. I have terminal shortcuts and others bound to touch bar buttons. BTT even lets you run bash scripts from the touch bar.

So... does either one let you have a dedicated escape key?

My gripe with it is that it's not sufficiently customizable. If it were heavily customizable it could be pretty useful.

I wonder why they don't just through haptics into the touchbar to diminish the tactile complaint? My Galaxy S9 has touch haptics that feel rather nice.

Smartphones have less mass to move. The touchpad is haptic but the Taptic chip is fairly large and the whole pad is kind of suspended so that you can feel the vibrations. I bet they will do this but it might be tricky since it has a display in it.

I use HapticKey, which makes the Touch Bar slightly less awful by clicking the trackpad when you touch it: https://github.com/niw/HapticKey

> Most mac apps don't use function keys as shortcuts

Many buy MBPs for the perceived quality of hardware, and install Windows or Linux as their primary OS.

in bootcamp the touchbar continues to function independently and acts like the function row of keys

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