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Comment by afandian | Hacker News Reader

This is what the Macbook touchbar is for (with, granted, no tactility). And, to put it mildly, it divides opinion. I really miss my muscle memory for media keys on my mac.

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I hate the touchbar. I am a professional programmer and need all the keys I can get. The touchbar removed a number of keys that I used with Emacs, and in return I get little tiny picture that I have to look at before using. Right now the Touch Bar is mostly showing the three words that my Mac thinks I might be typing next based on the prefix that I've already typed. Really? Does it think that after typing D followed by o as I start this sentence that I want to look at the touchbar to see it's guesses and then press 'Does' to save typing the e key followed by the s key. Its a totally stupid feature on a keyboard for people that know how to type.

i wonder if it has more utility if the suggestions were restricted to words longer than, say, 6 letters, where spelling confusion might slow down typing enough to make the tradeoff?

If the touchbar had the same haptic feedback the trackpad has, it'd be awesome.

When people are told the trackpad doesn't move when it's pressed - that it isn't "clicking" in the sense you are not pressing a switch - the first reaction is incredulity.

The Macbook touchbar is a good concept. The implementation is terrible

You should keep the tactile feedback, and the default keys, only enhance on that.

The problem of the touchbar is that it has no tactile feeling and literally no allowance for muscle memory. It lets you see what mode your in, but it also requires that you look at it.

Well, exactly—this is what Apple was going for with the touchbar, except that Apple neglected to complete the circle. Apple expected users to give up tactility in exchange for contextual information; in reality, most laptop users were unhappy with the trade.

This keyboard does both.

Having a 15" and a 16" (work and personal), I can tell you it's night and day on the 16" with a physical esc key and good keyboard. I haven't once wanted to hurl the 16" into the sea :)

I have always wished Apple would have simply replaced the top row of keys with addressable and configurable LCD or eInk keycaps. Maybe even combine the rightmost 3-4 keys into a smaller slideable touchbar.

With the 2019 refresh I thought they might do that as a compromise.

We could have all had whatever keys we want. Revolutionary. Instead, nope.

I think people on HN miss the "divides opinion" bit.

I love the touchbar. I love that well-written apps put shortcuts straight in the touchbar so I don't have to discover what function key does what.

I wouldn't give it up at all.

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