Monthly Archives: May 2018

Apple News, Google News, RSS

I’ve used RSS since the early days. I forget the exact year but I think I started using around 2002 which was also around the time that I started blogging. Been awhile. Anyway, I’ve had an RSS reader on every computer I’ve owned for at least the previous 15 years. On iPad (and previously on my Mac) that’s mostly been Reeder. I’ve tried several others but Reeder remains my favorite.

But I’m also open to trying new things. When Apple introduced Apple News I tried it. Not the best experience but I kept at it. It was no replacement for Reeder and RSS but I used it as a supplement. No doubt, it’s gotten better and I’ve used it more and more but RSS still remains the foundation for all my internet reading. With the release of Google News I thought I’d try it though I’m not big on using Google. I have gmail which is now relegated to my junk account and iCloud is my primary, preferred account. Google is not my default or usual search engine. My plan with Google News is just to use it to compare to Apple News and after a few days use I can confirm I’ll be sticking to Apple News. Google News is okay but it’s not great.

What I like about it is the quickness with which content reflects my likes or dislike. I can tap the widget at the bottom right of any story summary on the main page and give it a thumbs up or down. If I thumbs down it it goes away instantly. Of course this is long term training and I’ve only used it a few days so can’t comment on that. But I like that it goes away. Compare this to Apple News. This weekend, like everyone else, I was inundated with royal wedding news. Not the least bit interested. On Google News I could thumbs down it and it was gone. With Apple News I could dislike it but it remained in place. Even worse, after disliking 40+ such royal wedding stories they continued to reappear with my little dislike icon highlighted. So, not only do they not go away but they remain over the course of a couple days. Ugh. That’s a terrible user experience.

I also noticed Google News is heavily weighted towards entertainment news which isn’t something I’m interested in. I’d rather see a an emphasis given to science. By default the headlines section offered almost no science. Will see if it can be trained though I don’t plan on keeping it around. I’m just curious. My assumption is that because I don’t use Google for search the app doesn’t know what I like. I’ve followed a few topics and will see how that affects what’s presented to me.

Another contrast worth noting is visual design. In the first section, “For You” I prefer Apple News to Google News. Of course it’s been around and has had some time to evolve and change so it seems more refined. Google News has a nice, simple design but the main feed is so bare as to seem unfinished. Apple has achieved a balance of well presented information that is well organized without being too cluttered.

A downside to Apple News is refresh time. When I load Google News it is fairly quick to refresh. Apple News seems to take quite a bit longer. I’m in a rural area on satellite internet. I often run out of data half way through a month which drops me down to about 2 Mbps for normal usage. That’s not too bad but I really notice it with Apple News. I’ve also noticed with Apple News a repeat of stories days old. Why show me a story that was in my feed 2 or 3 or 4 days ago?

Overall, the feel that I get with Apple News is that it is generic. I can customize in that I can choose topics and sources but the For You section really feels like it has no intelligent foundation. As mentioned above, the stories I’ve disliked continue to show up. Stories similar to stories I’ve disliked continue to show up. The Spotlight section often seems useless as it presents topics I’m not interested in. If Apple is going to emphasize Apple News and if it has human curators, might not the Spotlight section present more intelligently? For those that like sports, they get more sports in Spotlight. For those that prefer science, more science. I rarely use it now because every time I look it’s presenting me with stories I’m not the least bit interested in. In short Apple News doesn’t really know my interests even though I’ve spent time liking/disliking stories, topics and channels.

Search is much better on Google News as one might expect. It’s at the top of the screen of every section of the app and it works great to present recent news on the various searches I’ve tried. For example, a search for Gaia Telescope presents a series of recent stories from diverse sources. It’s excellent. The same search in Apple News? Nothing. Literally, nothing. I realize Google has the upper hand here given the nature of it’s business but if Apple News is going to be useful it must be better and getting me useful search results.

Lastly, sharing. Again, Google News is better. If I choose to share a story I simply get a proper web link to the original story on the original site. If I try to share from Apple News I get an Apple News link. When I’ve shared from there in the past non-Apple users get errors. So, I have to take the extra step of first sharing the article to Safari then sharing from Safari. That’s lame.

When I started this post my feeling was that Apple News is my preferred app. I want it to be my preferred app. I’m all in on Apple in part because I appreciate the focus on privacy. I want Apple’s machine learning to improve for the whole Apple platform. As I’ve written the post I keep asking myself why not use Google News? In almost every way aside from visual design it is better. If I use Google then I just have the feeling that not only am I leaking my data to Google but I am not informing Apple. I want Apple to know more about what I need and want when I use my iPhone and iPad. But after years of using Apple News I don’t get the sense that it knows my interests any better. It presents me with the same generic content everyone else gets and it’s search results are so weak as to be useless.

For now I’ll continue to test Google News along side of Apple News. A few days ago I would not have considered switching but I’m at least open to that idea now.

iPad Journal: Pages Update

It’s been awhile since I’ve written about using Pages. Last time I wrote this:

Pages is no substitute for something like Adobe’s InDesign but it works very well for brochures, small newsletters, posters and more. At the moment one of the features I miss most is the lack of linked text boxes which are often necessary for larger documents such as newsletters and annual reports. There are other limitations such as no text on path and no stroke for text, features I sometimes need for event posters and flyers. On the Mac version of Pages a pen tool is available but it is, sadly, missing on the iPad. The iPad does offer a line tool but it only allows for one curve. It would be great to see the pen tool added to the iPad.

It’s been just over a year since I wrote that and Pages has seen a few updates. Most importantly, for the work I do, Apple added back the ability to have linked text boxes. For anyone that does multi-page layout, linked text boxes is a very important feature and it has allowed me to return to larger, more complex projects such as newsletters and annual reports. With the previous version of Pages on iPad these kinds of projects were sometimes possible but also more difficult. This is the feature that allows me to leave Adobe InDesign unopened for longer periods of time. I still need it but not as often. If a client specifies that they would like InDesign used or if a print job requires it then I’ll use it. Otherwise I use Pages on the iPad.

As before, the Mac version still holds onto a few features not yet brought over to the iPad but in the past year there are fewer of them. If I had to single out one missing feature that is most likely to require me to go back to the Mac to make changes it would be the inability to specify exact line height. Why this is still missing I do not know. I can change it using the -/+ widget but that is limited to Apple defined increments: .5, .75, 1… Sometimes a line height of 1 is too much but .75 is too little. I might need .9 or 1.1.

On the plus side, Apple finally added the ability to edit paragraph styles on the iPad. This one was another significant omission from the previous version and often forced me to open documents on the Mac. Additionally, Apple has added the option to display two pages side by side which is a great benefit for quickly scanning through multi-page documents. Lastly, the ability to create a master page. I’ve got a starting template that I use for newsletters and annual reports which has border guides built in. Very handy given that Pages does not have a way of showing such things.

What I have not yet had occasion to use more than a bit of playing is the ability to draw using the Pencil. This is a feature introduced with the Apple education event in March 2018. I’ve played with it a bit and can see how it might be useful but as of now have not used it for any client projects. I look forward to the kind of project that will let me have a go with it.